Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Asian Studies Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Articles 151 - 180 of 180

Full-Text Articles in Asian Studies

Chinese New Year In West Kalimantan: Ritual Theatre And Political Circus, Margaret Chan Jan 2009

Chinese New Year In West Kalimantan: Ritual Theatre And Political Circus, Margaret Chan

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Since 2002, when Chinese New Year became a national holiday in Indonesia, spirit medium parades on the fifteen day of the New Year (called Cap Go Meh) have been growing in size in certain West Kalimantan towns, especially Singkawang. This parade in particular has become a major tourist draw-card. Referring to local history, Chinese popular religion and Hakka culture, this article applies a performance analysis methodology to dissect this contemporary phenomenon from religious, historical and inter-ethnic perspectives. It shows how the parades have become enmeshed in current inter-ethnic politics in West Kalimantan, as well as revealing the way that adaptations …


Prison’S Spoilt Identities: Racially Structured Realities Within And Beyond, Nafis Hanif Nov 2008

Prison’S Spoilt Identities: Racially Structured Realities Within And Beyond, Nafis Hanif

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This article begins by seeking an explanation for the solidarity between Malay inmates and guards in perpetrating abusive and discriminatory treatment towards Malay transvestites. In the course of explaining an empirical phenomenon in the Singapore prison, this article has examined Singapore's history and ethnic demography, the ethnic Malay minority's lack of socio-economic development and modernisation vis-a-vis the ethnic Chinese majority, geo-politics, the ideology and strategic choices of the state's political elite and their implications for inter-ethnic interactions between Malays and Chinese. As this article will argue, prison culture, rather than being divorced from larger society, is in effect able to …


Women Warriors In Asia, Tobias Frederik Rettig, Vina Lanzona Jul 2008

Women Warriors In Asia, Tobias Frederik Rettig, Vina Lanzona

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

No abstract provided.


Image Worship In Chinese Popular Religion, Margaret Chan Jul 2008

Image Worship In Chinese Popular Religion, Margaret Chan

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

No abstract provided.


Religion And Spaces Of Technology: Constructing And Contesting Nation, Transnation, And Place, Lily Kong May 2006

Religion And Spaces Of Technology: Constructing And Contesting Nation, Transnation, And Place, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

In this paper, I focus on one particular technological development that has come to influence religious practice in significant ways-religious broadcasting. Whereas computer-mediated communications now garner growing research attention, I have chosen to remember the influence of the older technology of broadcasting for its continued influence on myriad lives. In bringing this focus to bear on another major phenomenon, that of trans nationalism, I have come to understand how religious broadcasting does not contribute in a straightforward, linear fashion to perpetuating transnational identities and communities, but is instead implicated in the assertion of the national in the face of transnational …


Impact Of War And Military Service On Income Inequality In Northern Vietnam, Bussarawan Teerawichitchainan Mar 2006

Impact Of War And Military Service On Income Inequality In Northern Vietnam, Bussarawan Teerawichitchainan

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

During the 1940s-1970s Vietnam experienced nearly continuous wars. Military service was almost a rite of passage for young men growing up during these decades. Evidence indicates that families during wartime viewed military service as a locus for upward mobility, as the socialist regime promised veterans various incentives, including educational benefits, employment preference, and Communist Party membership. While this series of wars over the span of three decades has left a profound imprint on the early life course trajectories of men in Vietnam, there is surprisingly little research detailing the long-term consequences of military service. Based on the Vietnam Longitudinal Survey, …


Music And Moral Geographies: Constructions Of "Nation" And Identity In Singapore, Lily Kong Feb 2006

Music And Moral Geographies: Constructions Of "Nation" And Identity In Singapore, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

In this paper, I attempt to pull together sociological and geographical perspectives in the study of music to understand the ways in which pop and rock music are socio-cultural products with political and moral meanings and implications. I examine state engineering of moral panics, focusing on a case study of pop and rock music in post-independence Singapore. Such engineering is aimed at political and ideological ends, in particular, "nation"- building outcomes. In engineering moral panics through both discursive and legislative acts, the contours of a moral geography are delineated at various spatial scales. First, at the scale of the national …


Southeast Asian Warfare, 1300-1900, Handbook Of Oriental Studies, Section Three: South-East Asia, Volume 16 By Michael W. Charney [Book Review], Tobias Frederik Rettig Jan 2006

Southeast Asian Warfare, 1300-1900, Handbook Of Oriental Studies, Section Three: South-East Asia, Volume 16 By Michael W. Charney [Book Review], Tobias Frederik Rettig

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

No abstract provided.


Religious Schools: For Spirit, (F)Or Nation, Lily Kong Aug 2005

Religious Schools: For Spirit, (F)Or Nation, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

In this paper I draw attention to the study of 'unofficially sacred' sites in geographies of religion, which provide significant insights into the construction of religious identity and community, and the intersections of sacred and secular. I show that such sites deserve as much attention as places of worship (the more conventional focus in the geographical study of religion) in our understanding of the place of religion in contemporary urban society. In particular, using the case of Islamic religious schools in Singapore, I examine how Muslim identities and community are negotiated within multicultural and multireligious contexts, and particularly within one …


The Korean Language And The Effects Of Its Honorifics System In Advertising: Deferential Vs. Informal Speech As Regulatory Prime On Persuasive Impact, Jin K. Han, Yong Seok Sohn, Kun Woo Yoo Jul 2005

The Korean Language And The Effects Of Its Honorifics System In Advertising: Deferential Vs. Informal Speech As Regulatory Prime On Persuasive Impact, Jin K. Han, Yong Seok Sohn, Kun Woo Yoo

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

A very prominent feature of the Korean language is its extensive honorifics system, where the speaker is obliged to adopt a level of speech (deferential vs. informal) befitting the status of the target audience. As the context for using deferential (informal) speech parallels the setting for prevention (promotion) focus, we set out to examine whether the Korean honorifics system itself functions as a natural prime for regulatory orientation. In Study 1, we find that deferential (informal) speech style activates prevention (promotion) focus in the addressee. Accordingly, we show that ad copies in deferential (informal) speech style resulted in regulatory fit …


Questioning Proximity: East Asian Tv Dramas In Indonesia, Charlotte Setijadi Jan 2005

Questioning Proximity: East Asian Tv Dramas In Indonesia, Charlotte Setijadi

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The study of transnational cultural flows has been of continuing interest among media and communication researchers, with recent studies focusing on cultural flows within geographically and culturally adjacent nations. It is often suggested that the level of “cultural proximity” that exists determines the success of cultural exchange between countries regarded to possess similar cultural traits. This notion, that local audiences will have preference for cultural commodities from countries with which they share cultural ties in recognition of their own culture, has enjoyed much intellectual currency in recent times, especially in relation to analyses of regional media markets. The danger of …


Religious Processions: Urban Politics And Poetics, Lily Kong Jan 2005

Religious Processions: Urban Politics And Poetics, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

In this paper, I will explore the ways in which processions, by their very visibility, foreground the relationships between the secular and the sacred, while contributing to a construction of identity and community, and simultaneously surfacing fractures therein. Using the example of multireligious yet secular Singapore, I will examine (a) the state's management of religious processions, including the regulation of time and space for such events, as well as regulations over noise production; (b) the tactics of adaptation, negotiation and resistance that participants engage in at an everyday level in response to the state's ideologies, policies, laws and strategies; (c) …


In Search Of Permanent Homes: Singapore's House Churches And The Politics Of Space, Lily Kong Aug 2002

In Search Of Permanent Homes: Singapore's House Churches And The Politics Of Space, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This paper focuses on one category of the 'unofficially sacred'-namely, those secular spaces which are used for worship and, in particular, residential spaces which are turned into 'house churches'. Using the case study of a house church in Singapore, the paper examines issues about the politics of religion in urban landscapes in a secular and simultaneously multireligious state. Contrary and in addition to current wisdoms about the politics of religious space, it is argued that various politics are observed: a politics of inclusion; a politics of hybridisation and in-betweenness; a politics of appropriation and nationalisation; and a politics of impermanence …


French Military Policies In The Aftermath Of The Yên Bay Mutiny, 1930: Old Security Dilemmas Return To The Surface, Tobias Frederik Rettig Jan 2002

French Military Policies In The Aftermath Of The Yên Bay Mutiny, 1930: Old Security Dilemmas Return To The Surface, Tobias Frederik Rettig

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This paper provides a brief summary of the Yên Bay mutiny of 10 February 1930, before examining its links to a wider insurrectionary attempt by the Vietnamese Nationalist Party in parts of Tonkin and the reasons why the attempted insurrection was to begin at Yên Bay but not in other garrison towns. It then places the mutiny in a context in which the use of Vietnamese soldiers in French service was necessary in order to maintain French supremacy as a colonial and protectorate power in French Indo-China. But instead of focusing on the mutiny itself and its causes, the main …


Religion And Modernity: Ritual Transformations And The Reconstruction Of Space And Time, Chee Kiong Tong, Lily Kong Jan 2000

Religion And Modernity: Ritual Transformations And The Reconstruction Of Space And Time, Chee Kiong Tong, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

In this paper, we use the case of Chinese religion in Singapore to examine the relationships between religion and modernity, and between social processes, on the one hand, and spatial conceptions, forms and structures and temporal practices, on the other. Specifically, we look at how traditional Chinese rituals are being modified, reinterpreted and invented to fit with modern living. Such ritual transformations entail reconstructed notions of space and time. Through such transformations, modernity does not simply lead to the demise of religious beliefs and practices but allows for a continued role for religion in providing a meaning system for Chinese …


Introduction: Hong Kong After The Reversion: In Search Of A Post‐Colonial Order, Tuck Hong James Tang Jan 1999

Introduction: Hong Kong After The Reversion: In Search Of A Post‐Colonial Order, Tuck Hong James Tang

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The political handover of Hong Kong on 1 July 1997 turned out to be a non-eventwith little political drama. Emotions ran high when the Union Jack was loweredand was replaced by the Chinese national flag (wuxing hongqi), peacefully endingover one and a half centuries of British colonial rule in Hong Kong. The handovertook place smoothly, despite the heavy rain, without political and social turbulence.The Sino-British disagreement over the abolition of the Legislative Council marredthe occasion, but the swearing-in of a pro-Beijing Provisional Legislative Councilwas largely accepted as a fait accompli.


Exalting The Past: Nostalgia And The Construction Of Heritage In Children's Literature, Lily Kong, Lily Tay Jun 1998

Exalting The Past: Nostalgia And The Construction Of Heritage In Children's Literature, Lily Kong, Lily Tay

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

In this paper, we analyse the portrayal of Singapore in local children's literature and seek to understand why such a portrayal was prominent, and to what effect. We argue that this literature is characterized by a nostalgic recollection of past times and places. This emergence of the past as an important concern in Singapore is not limited to the literary arena, but reflects a larger condition: a broader adult yearning to transcend the constrictions of present place and time. We suggest that this nostalgia has surfaced because of the phenomenal changes in Singapore, which have caused people to come face …


Popular Music In A Transnational World: The Construction Of Local Identities In Singapore, Lily Kong Apr 1997

Popular Music In A Transnational World: The Construction Of Local Identities In Singapore, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

As an area of geographical inquiry, popular music has not been explored to any large extent. Where writings exist, they have been somewhat divorced from recent theoretical and methodological questions that have rejuvenated social and cultural geography. In this paper, I focus on one arena which geographers can develop in their analysis of popular music, namely, the exploration of local influences and global forces in the production of music. In so doing, I wish to explore how local resources intersect with global ones in a process of transculturation. Using the example of English songs by one particular songwriter and artiste …


Ideology, Social Commentary And Resistance In Popular Music: A Case Study Of Singapore, Phua Siew Chye, Lily Kong Jun 1996

Ideology, Social Commentary And Resistance In Popular Music: A Case Study Of Singapore, Phua Siew Chye, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Popular music as a site of struggles over meaning is focused upon, where the social and political relations between different groups in Singapore society are mirrored. How ruling elites and everyday people make use of the same cultural form--popular music--for different purposes is examined.


Making "Music At The Margins"? A Social And Cultural Analysis Of Xinyao In Singapore, Lily Kong Jan 1996

Making "Music At The Margins"? A Social And Cultural Analysis Of Xinyao In Singapore, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Formalist critics and aestheticians have argued that music does not possess any kind of "extra-musical" significance, that there is no meaning beyond the form and structural relations of the notes. For them, music exemplifies the laws of mathematical harmony and proportion rather than the social and political contexts within which it is produced, reproduced and consumed. This view has been challenged by a number of social theorists: Max Weber, Theodor Adorno and Edward Said have all argued for an understanding of music within its social, cultural, economic and political contexts. Such analysis of popular music is now unquestioned. Indeed, it …


Popular Music And A Sense Of Place In Singapore, Lily Kong Jan 1996

Popular Music And A Sense Of Place In Singapore, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This paper illustrates how popular music written, produced, and performed by Singaporeans provides a means through which the culture and society of Singapore may be understood. Music with English language text conveys a sense of place and reflects a distinctively Singaporean spirit and identity. The paper examines four themes: the portrayal of Singapore's multiracial population which reflects a unique cultural synthesis; the Singaporeans' concept of urbanity, manifested as the simultaneous attraction and repulsion towards the city and the desire for nature and the rustic; the distinctive social engineering in Singapore; and the way in which global issues are imported into …


The Commercial Face Of God: Exploring The Nexus Between The Religious And The Material, Lily Kong Jan 1996

The Commercial Face Of God: Exploring The Nexus Between The Religious And The Material, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This paper explores the nexus between the cultural and the material by examining the ways in which religion and the economy are integrated in the context of economy-driven Singapore. The mutually constitutive relationships between the cultural and the material are explored through a discussion of the role of the state, capital and religious institutions in pulling together the sacred and the secular. Specifically, the analysis focuses on how the state harnesses religion ideologically in its economic development strategies; how capital harnesses the potential of religion in commercial enterprises in practical terms; and how religious institutions themselves behave as financial institutions. …


Folktales And Reality: The Social Construction Of Race In Chinese Tales, Lily Kong, Elaine Goh Sep 1995

Folktales And Reality: The Social Construction Of Race In Chinese Tales, Lily Kong, Elaine Goh

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This paper illustrates how folktales are a repository of primary material for the geographer. Using the example of The Strange Tales of Liaozhai, we discuss how these tales are not purely fictive constructs but constitute instead fictive, historical and projected realities. As an example of the value of such analysis, we discuss Chinese constructions of race as revealed in the tales.


Music And Cultural Politics: Ideology And Resistance In Singapore, Lily Kong Jan 1995

Music And Cultural Politics: Ideology And Resistance In Singapore, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This paper focuses on popular music written and produced by Singaporeans to illustrate the nature of social relationships based on ideological hegemony and resistance. Analysis is based on two groups of music: 'national' songs supported by the government in the 'Sing Singapore' programme; and songs brought together in Not the Singapore song book. Interviews with local lyricists and analysis of video productions provide supplementary information. Music is used by the ruling elite to perpetuate certain ideologies aimed at political socialization and to inculcate a civil religion that directs favour and fervour towards the nation. Music is also a form of …


From Empire Defence To Imperial Retreat: Britain's Postwar China Policy And The Decolonization Of Hong Kong, James T. H. Tang May 1994

From Empire Defence To Imperial Retreat: Britain's Postwar China Policy And The Decolonization Of Hong Kong, James T. H. Tang

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Attempts to examine Hong Kong as an issue in British postwar colonialpolicy often emphasize the unique nature of the colony, andtherefore a special case in British decolonization. Hong Kong hasbeen regarded as an unconventional colonial entity, an anachronismin the modern world. But others argue that the word colony is not anappropriate term to describe it, except in the most severely technicallegal sense, because of its spectacular industrial and economicdevelopment since the end of the Second World War.' Nonetheless,Hong Kong has existed as a British crown colony since I842, and itscolonial political structures have remained more or less the same untilthe …


Ideological Hegemony And The Political Symbolism Of Religious Buildings In Singapore, Lily Kong Feb 1993

Ideological Hegemony And The Political Symbolism Of Religious Buildings In Singapore, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Cultural geographers have for too long ignored the association between the 'religious' and the 'political', concentrating instead on separating the 'religious' from the sociopolitical and economic forces in society. The challenge is taken up in this paper in an analysis of the contemporary meanings and values of religious buildings in Singapore as invested by the state. Attention is paid to the state's conceptions of religion and religious space and the roles it plays in influencing such space. The ways in which, through its various roles, the state in Singapore plays a significant part in influencing context and hence in shaping …


Negotiating Conceptions Of 'Sacred Space': A Case Study Of Religious Buildings In Singapore, Lily Kong Jan 1993

Negotiating Conceptions Of 'Sacred Space': A Case Study Of Religious Buildings In Singapore, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

In this paper, I approach the study of religious place from a re-theorized cultural geographical stance. Using multi-religious Singapore as a case study, I examine the tensions which arise over the meanings and values associated with religious buildings because of the conflict between state hegemony on the one hand and the oppositional meanings and values of religious groups and individuals on the other. I also examine the ways in which individuals negotiate their conceptions of sacred space in order to cope with changes imposed on their religious places by the state. Primarily, my argument is that conflict is avoided because …


The Sacred And The Secular: Exploring Contemporary Meanings And Values For Religious Buildings In Singapore, Lily Kong Jan 1992

The Sacred And The Secular: Exploring Contemporary Meanings And Values For Religious Buildings In Singapore, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The study of human environmental experiences has engaged a range of disciplinary attention, with work deriving chiefly from environmental psychologists and geographers. However, most research has focused on the sensory aspects of environmental experience, while the intangible, immeasurable experiences of environments have been somewhat neglected. Certainly, the meanings and values that are invested in places, which form part of the interaction between humans and environments, have not been sufficiently researched. My intention in this paper is to address one aspect of this silence, namely the ways in which humans experience their religious environments, and more particularly, the symbolic meanings and …


Confucius, Mencius And The Notion Of True Succession, John N. Williams Apr 1988

Confucius, Mencius And The Notion Of True Succession, John N. Williams

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

No abstract provided.


Singapore, Kirpal Singh Jan 1983

Singapore, Kirpal Singh

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

No abstract provided.