Once discouraged as a sign of poor education, Singapore's creole language 'Singlish' is increasingly being embraced as a key part of the nation’s linguistic identity.

When Natasha Ann Lum was growing up, there was no place for Singlish – an English-based creole language in Singapore – at home. Her father was adamant that Lum and her brother not speak with broken grammar or use conversational markers such as “lah”, “lor” or “eh”. “He didn’t have the luxury of education and felt like he missed out on work opportunities because he didn’t speak English at a level that was required, so he wanted to make sure my brother and I would be better off,” said the software...