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Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

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 …


Refocusing On Qualitative Methods: Problems And Prospects For Research In A Specific Asian Context, Lily Kong Mar 1998

Refocusing On Qualitative Methods: Problems And Prospects For Research In A Specific Asian Context, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

A recent issue of Area (1996, Volume 28.2) devoted space to six papers on focus groups, attesting to their increasing importance as a means of obtaining qualitative data. The papers provided interesting insights into the use of focus groups in specific research and cultural contexts, and raised three main issues in my mind. The first is a continuing misunderstanding as to the nature of knowledge, which surfaces in discussions of, and approaches to, the use of qualitative methods such as focus groups. The second is the range of related techniques that are actually involved in the qualitative method, known as …