Black Areas: Urban Kampongs and Power Relations in Post-war Singapore Historiography

Seng, Loh Kah

doi:10.1355/sj22-1a

Cited by 11 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…11 11 Clancey (2003) and Loh (2007) are rare exceptions that see the colonial beginnings of Singapore’s housing programme as consequential. …”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

The modern model family at home in Singapore: a queer geography

Oswin¹

2010

Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers

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The two meanings of 'domestic', as both residential dwelling and national territory, collide unusually forcefully in Singapore since its Housing Development Board (HDB) provides most housing in this city-state. While many scholars have interrogated the boundaries between homely ⁄ unhomely and foreign ⁄ domestic in Singapore by examining gender, ethnic ⁄ racial and class politics of HDB, in this paper I argue for the analytical usefulness of considering Singapore housing and citizenship as heteronormative; and, more broadly, for the value of a queer theoretical approach in advancing critical geographies of home. Combining archival research with contemporary observation, I examine discourses of respectable domesticity and proper family across Singapore's colonial and postcolonial periods in order to understand not just the exclusion of gays and lesbians, but also the 'queering' of a range of figures such as the single mother, the migrant worker, the unfilial child, and many others. Since the production of this range of non-heteronormative others is produced by a much more complex set of cultural logics than a focus on the deployment of a sexual binary can capture, the queer theoretical approach I argue for understands heteronormativity not as a universal policing of a heterosexual-homosexual binary, but as the geographically and historically specific coincidence of race, class, gender, nationality and sexual norms. key words Singapore heteronormativity queer geography postcoloniality family home housing

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“…11 11 Clancey (2003) and Loh (2007) are rare exceptions that see the colonial beginnings of Singapore’s housing programme as consequential. …”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

The modern model family at home in Singapore: a queer geography

Oswin¹

2010

Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers

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“…Hack and Margolin (2010), for example, feel that Singapore history should be viewed as a series of discontinuities rather than a story of linear progress. Other historians have, mostly recently, also produced work that moves beyond the mainstream (Aljunied, 2009; Barr & Trocki, 2007; Dobbs, 2003; Loh, 2007; Warren, 1986, 1993). Similarly, there are other ways of dividing Philippine history, and perhaps the divisions are not so useful to begin with.…”

Section: Alternative Historiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The nature of historical representation on Wikipedia: Dominant or alterative historiography?

Luyt

2011

J. Am. Soc. Inf. Sci.

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Given their ease of use and capability for interactivity, new media are seen as having the potential to make visible previously marginalized voices. The online presence of the writing of history is increasing, and this potential would be a welcome development for the field as it would create a much richer set of easily available historical perspectives. However, this article suggests that the achievement of this promise is fraught with difficulty and that a more likely outcome is a mapping of the status quo in historical representation onto the new media. To illustrate this, I present an analysis of the Wikipedia accounts of Singaporean and Philippine history. For Singapore, alternative historical visions are not as developed as those for the Philippines, and this is reflected in the nature of the respective Wikipedia accounts. I suggest that a possible means to achieve something more of the promise of digital media for history is for information professionals to take a keener interest in Wikipedia, with an eye to helping include accounts of documented historical perspectives that are ignored by mainstream historiographical traditions.

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“…In 1961, they housed some 200,000-250,000 mostly low-income people out of a population of 1.7 million (HDB AR, 1961, p. 4). They were the strategic sites of contestation between the state and society in postwar Singapore and officially viewed to be 'black areas' (Loh, 2007). The term was central to the discourse of 'squatter' clearance employed by the HDB and its colonial predecessor, the Singapore Improvement Trust (SIT).…”

Section: 'Insanitary Congested and Dangerous': Representing The Urbamentioning

confidence: 99%

Dangerous Migrants and the Informal Mobile City of Postwar Singapore

Seng

2010

Mobilities

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Black Areas: Urban Kampongs and Power Relations in Post-war Singapore Historiography

Cited by 11 publications

References 34 publications

The modern model family at home in Singapore: a queer geography

The modern model family at home in Singapore: a queer geography

The nature of historical representation on Wikipedia: Dominant or alterative historiography?

Dangerous Migrants and the Informal Mobile City of Postwar Singapore

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