新华侨华人与民间关系发展——以中国-新加坡民间关系为例

以新加坡的中国大陆新移民为视点,在民间关系研究的框架内,探讨和阐述了新华侨华人和跨国华人的概念特征、新华侨华人与中—新民间关系的发展、海外民间关系发展的时代价值以及民间关系的模式特征和意义。研究显示,国家关系的建立,为民间关系打开了交流和交往的正式而广泛的渠道;民间关系的良性互动,为国家关系的改善、发展和地区关系的整合,奠定了厚实的民间基础;跨国移民之于民间关系、国家关系和地区关系的多元探寻,为全球化时代的移民个人和国家关系的发展,提供了双赢互利的方向。     

新加坡中华总商会与亚洲华商网络的制度化

新加坡中华总商会在亚洲华商网络的制度化中有重要的作用 ,从总商会的纵向联系和横向交往看 ,它是联接东南亚和东亚华商网络的关键性枢纽。这一组织在建构海外华人社会与商业网络过程中不断地发展 ,逐渐成熟的制度化的华商网络对 2 0世纪海外华人社会及其与中国的互动关系有着深刻的影响 ;与此同时 ,它也成为本土化、区域化和全球化进程中的不可或缺的环节     

移民时代新加坡华人帮群社会建构的个案研究——以“福建人”闽帮总机构为例

以华人移民的帮群社会结构特征为切入点,对福建人建构闽帮社群的三个历史发展阶段:即以祖先崇拜文化建构恒山亭坟山组织的阶段、以神明信仰文化建构天福宫庙宇组织的阶段,以"科层化"组织为特点的现代华人社团组织阶段进行了分析研究,结果显示:在新加坡闽帮总机构百余年的发展演变中,为适应移民人口的增加和华人社会自身发展的需要,闽帮社群经历了一个制度化建构的历史过程。此一演进的过程亦是帮内凝聚与整合不断提升的过程。     

身似断云零落——20世纪初期新加坡的妹仔

随着华人向新加坡移民的增多,妹仔也成为新加坡华人社会之一特殊群体。论文以社会性别为研究视角,在梳理妹仔研究现状和妹仔习俗流变的基础上,探究20世纪初期新加坡华人妹仔在社会转型过程中的历史境遇,进而解析中西文明冲突与交融背景下性别、阶级、种族等多重因素在政治、经济和社会层面的纠合。在近代社会新陈代谢的过程中,政府颁布废婢法令,妹仔习俗逐渐走向衰落。妹仔习俗作为内嵌于东方传统父权制社会形态的元素,在西方文明东渐的殖民背景下,不可避免地成为中西文明冲突与融合的一个角力点。     

侨批公会的建立与跨国侨批网络的制度化（1911—1937）——以潮汕为例的研究

本文以潮汕侨批业为个案研究,利用跨国主义理论,探讨了侨批网络的内部整合与制度化问题。认为侨批网络的制度化表现首先是侨批公会的建立,继而是侨批公会网络的形成,侨批公会网络再通过其制度化机制进入以中华总商会为中心的更高层次的华人社团网络。侨批网络的扩大加强了其对外的集体交涉能力,从而维护了侨批网络的正常运转。在此运作模式中,新加坡中华总商会起着领导核心的作用。侨批网络的运作模式对研究跨国华人商业网络有重要的启示意义。     

To Swear or Not to Swear?: Britain,Southeast Asia and the Attempt to Reform the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, 1964–1971

ABSTRACT

This article seeks to explore the British government’s perception of the role of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council as a method of strengthening cohesion amongst the Commonwealth community, and in particular delves into the constitutional and diplomatic challenges that the British government faced in its attempt to utilise the Judicial Committee in order to maintain close ties with its former Southeast Asian colonies in the 1960s. Suggestions were made by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Privy Council Office from the mid-1960s that newly-independent republics such as Singapore and Malaysia should be allowed to send its citizens to London as members of the Judicial Committee in order to dilute the prejudice against the Committee as a remnant of colonial rule. However, the proposals were rejected by the Lord Chancellor’s Office on the grounds that Asian judges were of insufficient calibre to sit as members of the Judicial Committee, and that citizens of republics were unable to swear an oath of loyalty to the British monarch as was required for all Privy Counsellors. The Privy Council Office were of the opinion that a new system could be introduced whereby the Judicial Committee member would not have to be a fully-fledged Privy Counsellor and therefore would not have to swear the oath, while the Commonwealth Secretariat put forward its argument that Asian judges were good enough to ensure standards of the Judicial Committee would not be lowered. However, the Lord Chancellor’s Office argued that such non-Privy Counsellors would only be ‘second-class’ constituents of the Judicial Committee whose rulings would be unacceptable to countries such as Australia and instead proposed the creation of a Commonwealth Court of Appeal which the Foreign Office deemed unrealistic. In the end, no judges from the Asian republics were allowed sit on the Judicial Committee, resulting in Malaysia and Singapore abolishing their appeals to the Judicial Committee in 1984 and 1994 respectively.     

Generative spaces of gender and feminist geography in Singapore: entanglements of the personal and political

Abstract

While geographers’ work in Southeast Asia has yet to engage substantively with theoretical developments in gender/feminist studies generated by Anglo-American academic centers, we argue that Singapore has proven to be somewhat of an exception. Focusing on the National University of Singapore, this article discusses how the development of gender and feminist geography in Singapore has benefitted from being able to engage with international debates in feminism through the country’s and NUS’ internationalization efforts, and working in the English language. Using the notion of generative spaces, we highlight first, the importance of using our teaching to engage in feminist activism to encourage feminist change in the classroom, as well as within our immediate communities and further afield; and second, the nascent yet significant contributions of feminist geographers based in Singapore to feminist theorization from and about the Global South.     

Girls on film: Affective politics and the creation of an intimate anti-trafficking public in Singapore through film screenings

The interstices between film and politics occupy a prominent place in recent scholarship in political geography and cognate disciplines, focusing on the ways film establishes relations between viewers and characters. Such processes often utilise affective referents to create ‘intimate publics’. This paper focuses on the relations human trafficking films establish between ‘victims’, viewers and anti-trafficking stakeholders in creating an intimate anti-trafficking public in Singapore. I argue that the third world girl is rendered a moral object of sympathy both through trafficking film and performances by anti-trafficking stakeholders in the cinema. However, in comparison to both film viewers and anti-trafficking stakeholders she is cast as muted and lacking agency. Intimate anti-trafficking publics can emerge through the harnessing of negative emotions that, in this case, privilege the plight- but not the agency – of the female child trafficking victim and are inculcated through film storylines and cinematic performances.     

Geographical Imaginations of 'New Asia-Singapore'

‘Geographical imaginations’ constitute an important aspect in geographic research, enriching our understanding of places and societies as well as the contested meanings people have towards spaces. The marketing and development of tourist destinations offers a fertile ground for the exercise of geographical imagination. This paper explores how tourism marketing distils the essence of a place, and ‘imagines’ an identity that is attractive to tourists and residents alike. Such spatial identities, however, are seldom hegemonic and are often highly contested. Using the case of the ‘New Asia-Singapore’ (NAS) campaign launched by the Singapore Tourism Board, we explore the geographical imaginations involved in tourism marketing, and its consequent effects on people and place. Specifically we discuss the role and rationale of tourism planners in formulating the NAS campaign; the actions of tourism entrepreneurs in creating NAS commodities; and the reactions from tourists and local residents towards the NAS images. We argue that the nexus of policy intent, entrepreneurial actions and popular opinions yields invaluable insights into the highly contested processes of tourism development and identity formation.