Singapore
Stamford Raffles founded colonial Singapore in 1819 as a trading post of the British East India Company. After the company's collapse in 1858, the islands were ceded to the British Raj as a crown colony. During the Second World War, Singapore was occupied by Japan. It gained independence from the UK in 1963 by federating with other former British territories to form Malaysia, but separated two years later over ideological differences, becoming a sovereign nation in 1965. After early years of turbulence and despite lacking natural resources and a hinterland, the nation developed rapidly as an Asian Tiger economy, based on external trade and its workforce.
Singapore English
The British established a trading post on the island of Singapore in 1819, and the population grew rapidly thereafter, attracting many immigrants from Chinese provinces and from India. The roots of Standard Singapore English derive from nearly a century and a half of British control. Its local character seems to have developed early in the English-medium schools of the 19th and early-20th centuries, where the teachers often came from India and Ceylon, as well as from various parts of Europe and from the United States of America. By 1900 Eurasians and other locals were employed as teachers. Apart from a period of Japanese occupation (1942-1945), Singapore remained a British colony until 1963, when it joined the Malaysian Federation, but this proved a short-lived alliance, largely due to ethnic rivalries. Since its expulsion from the Federation in 1965, Singapore has operated as an independent city-state. English served as the administrative language of the British colonial government, and when Singapore gained self-government in 1959 and independence in 1965, the Singaporean government decided to keep English as the main language to maximise economic prosperity. The use of English as the nation's first language serves to bridge the gap between the diverse ethnic groups in Singapore; English operates as the "lingua franca" of the nation. The use of English – as the global language for commerce, technology and science – also helped to expedite Singapore's development and integration into the global economy. Public schools use English as the main language of instruction, although students are also required to receive part of their instruction in their mother tongue; placement in such courses is based on ethnicity and not without controversy.
The standard Singaporean accent used to be officially RP. However, in recent decades, a standard Singaporean accent, quite independent of any external standard, including RP, started to emerge. A 2003 study by the National Institute of Education in Singapore suggests that a standard Singaporean pronunciation is emerging and is on the cusp of being standardised.
Singaporean accents can be said to be largely non-rhotic.