Learn Hardcore Malay: Guru menulis bahawa kebolehan berfikir sendiri akan berkembang jika kita banyak membaca. - The teacher writes that the ability to think for ourselves will grow if we read a lot.

Guru menulis bahawa kebolehan berfikir sendiri akan berkembang jika kita banyak membaca.

The teacher writes that the ability to think for ourselves will grow if we read a lot.

Breakdown of Guru menulis bahawa kebolehan berfikir sendiri akan berkembang jika kita banyak membaca.

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Questions & Answers about Guru menulis bahawa kebolehan berfikir sendiri akan berkembang jika kita banyak membaca.

What does bahawa do in this sentence? Is it like English that in “wrote that …”? Can it be left out?

Yes, bahawa is a conjunction that works very much like English that when introducing a clause after verbs like say, write, think, know.

Guru menulis bahawa … = The teacher wrote that …

In many everyday contexts, bahawa can be omitted without changing the basic meaning:

Guru menulis kebolehan berfikir sendiri akan berkembang jika kita banyak membaca.
(still understandable in casual style)

However:

Keeping bahawa is more formal and clearer in writing.
In longer or more complex sentences, bahawa helps the reader see where the reported clause starts.

So you can drop bahawa in a lot of spoken or informal contexts, but in careful writing (like school essays, articles, etc.) it’s good practice to keep it.

What exactly does kebolehan mean, and how is it formed from boleh?

Boleh is a basic word meaning can / may / to be able to.
Kebolehan is a noun meaning ability, capability.

It’s formed by adding the circumfix ke- … -an to the root:

boleh (can, to be able)
ke-
- boleh
  - -an → kebolehan (ability)

This ke- … -an pattern is very productive in Malay and often turns adjectives or stative verbs into abstract nouns:

tinggi (tall, high) → ketinggian (height)
penting (important) → kepentingan (importance, interest)
sihat (healthy) → kesihatan (health)

So kebolehan berfikir sendiri literally = the ability (kebolehan) to think (berfikir) on one’s own (sendiri).

How does berfikir sendiri work? What does sendiri add here?

berfikir = to think
sendiri has a few common functions:
- by oneself / on one’s own (without help from others)
- self (reflexive, like “oneself”)
- itself / himself / herself (for emphasis)

In berfikir sendiri, sendiri means by oneself / independently. So:

berfikir = to think
berfikir sendiri = to think independently / to think for oneself

Compare:

Dia membuat kerja itu sendiri. = He/She did that work by himself/herself.
Rumah itu runtuh sendiri. = The house collapsed on its own (by itself).
Saya sendiri tidak tahu. = I myself don’t know. (emphasis on I)

Could we say kebolehan untuk berfikir sendiri instead of kebolehan berfikir sendiri? Is there any difference?

Yes, kebolehan untuk berfikir sendiri is also correct and natural.

Both are used:

kebolehan berfikir sendiri
kebolehan untuk berfikir sendiri

The difference is subtle:

Without untuk, it’s a tighter noun phrase: thinking-for-yourself ability.
With untuk, it’s closer to English structure: ability to think for yourself.

In practice:

Both are grammatically fine.
kebolehan untuk berfikir sendiri may feel slightly more explicit and is very common in formal writing.
kebolehan berfikir sendiri sounds a bit more compact and idiomatic in many contexts.

In your sentence, either version would be acceptable.

What is the function of akan in akan berkembang? Is it required to show the future?

Akan is a marker of future or expected actions/states. Roughly, it corresponds to will / shall / going to in English.

berkembang = to develop, to grow
akan berkembang = will develop / will grow

However, Malay does not require a future marker. Time is often understood from context:

Kebolehan berfikir sendiri berkembang jika kita banyak membaca.
Context can still make this mean will develop.

Using akan:

Makes the future sense explicit.
Is especially useful in writing or when you want to emphasise future development, not present or general truth.

So akan is not strictly required, but it makes the intended time clearer, which is helpful in this sentence.

What does berkembang mean exactly, and why is it berkembang instead of mengembangkan?

Both come from the root kembang (related to expand, bloom, spread).

berkembang is intransitive: to develop, to grow, to expand (by itself).
mengembangkan is transitive: to develop something, to expand something, to spread something.

In your sentence:

kebolehan berfikir sendiri is the thing that develops itself, not something that develops something else, so we use intransitive berkembang.

Compare:

Kebolehan berfikir sendiri akan berkembang.
The ability to think for oneself will develop (itself).
Guru mengembangkan kebolehan berfikir sendiri murid-murid.
The teacher develops the students’ ability to think for themselves.
(Now the teacher is doing the action to that ability, so mengembangkan is used.)

What is the difference between jika and kalau for “if”? Why is jika used here?

Both jika and kalau can mean if.

jika is more formal and often used in writing, official documents, and formal speech.
kalau is more informal, very common in everyday spoken Malay, and also fine in casual writing.

In your sentence:

… akan berkembang jika kita banyak membaca.
sounds more formal/standard.

You could say in conversation:

… akan berkembang kalau kita banyak membaca.

Meaning is basically the same; the main difference is formality and style.

In kita banyak membaca, why is banyak placed before membaca? Could I say membaca banyak?

In kita banyak membaca:

kita = we
banyak = a lot / much / many (here, as an adverb of quantity/frequency)
membaca = to read

So banyak membaca = to read a lot / to do a lot of reading.

Placing banyak before the verb is the normal way to express do something a lot:

banyak belajar = study a lot
banyak bekerja = work a lot
banyak berjalan = walk around a lot / travel a lot

Membaca banyak is not wrong in all contexts, but it usually means to read many (things) and must be followed by a noun:

membaca banyak buku = read many books
membaca banyak artikel = read many articles

By itself, membaca banyak sounds incomplete or odd. To say read a lot in the general sense, the natural phrase is banyak membaca.

Why is kita used here instead of kami? What’s the difference?

Malay distinguishes between two kinds of we:

kita = we / us (including the listener)
kami = we / us (excluding the listener)

In your sentence:

jika kita banyak membaca
implies if we (you, me, and people in general) read a lot.

The teacher is probably including the audience (students, readers, humanity) in that we. If the teacher were talking only about themselves and some other group and not including the listener, kami could be used.

So kita is correct and natural here because it’s a general “we all”.

Could kita be dropped in jika kita banyak membaca? Would jika banyak membaca still be correct?

Yes, in Malay, subject pronouns are often omitted when they are obvious from context.

jika kita banyak membaca = if we read a lot
jika banyak membaca = if (one / people / we) read a lot

Jika banyak membaca sounds more general and impersonal, closer to English “if one reads a lot” or “if you read a lot” (generic you). It’s grammatically fine, but:

Keeping kita makes it clear that “we (including you and me)” is meant.
Omitting it makes the statement more like a general principle about people in general.

In written educational or explanatory sentences, including kita is common for clarity and inclusiveness.

How do we know that kebolehan berfikir sendiri is the subject of akan berkembang, and not the object?

Malay sentence structure here is:

Guru (subject 1)
menulis (verb 1)
bahawa (that)
kebolehan berfikir sendiri (subject 2 of the embedded clause)
akan berkembang (verb 2)
jika kita banyak membaca (conditional clause)

Within the bahawa-clause:

kebolehan berfikir sendiri is a noun phrase (the ability to think for oneself).
akan berkembang is an intransitive verb phrase (will develop).

Intransitive verbs like berkembang do not take a direct object. So the noun before it is interpreted as the subject:

[Kebolehan berfikir sendiri] akan berkembang.
Subject → verb.

If it were transitive, like mengembangkan, then you’d expect an object after it:

Guru mengembangkan kebolehan berfikir sendiri murid-murid.
Subject (Guru) – verb (mengembangkan) – object (kebolehan …).

Because berkembang is intransitive, the phrase kebolehan berfikir sendiri must be the subject, not an object.

Does menulis here refer to past tense (“wrote”) or present tense (“writes”)? How is tense shown for menulis in Malay?

Malay verbs, including menulis (to write), do not change form for tense. Menulis itself is neutral:

Guru menulis … can mean:
- The teacher wrote … (past)
- The teacher writes … (present habitual)
- The teacher is writing … (present progressive), depending on context.

If needed, time can be clarified with time expressions or aspect markers:

Guru sedang menulis … = The teacher is writing (right now).
Guru telah menulis … / Guru sudah menulis … = The teacher has written / wrote.
Tadi guru menulis … = Just now / earlier the teacher wrote …

In your standalone sentence, a natural English translation is The teacher wrote that …, but Malay itself does not mark past vs present; we infer it from surrounding context.