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Yesterday’s malls as today’s heritage. This book unearths Singapore’s latent histories, cultures and communities that grew within its now ageing modern shopping centres, envisioned in the 1960s futuristically as “Arcades in the Air”. Contributors for this edited book highlight some of such unexpected narratives from the pioneering “Planned Shopping Centres”. They include: malls as historical and photographical sites, as homes for pioneering arcade gamers, youths cultures and veteran rock musicians, and as platforms for artistic imaginations and exhibitions. As largely individually owned shops units within the buildings, the older malls have also fostered more diverse and autonomous communities and businesses. Amidst Singapore’s constantly changing urban landscape, these otherwise dated shopping centres stand precariously as venerable sites of collective social and cultural memories. Includes essays from: Chua Beng Huat, Yu-Mei Balasingamchow, Darren Soh, Roy Kheang, Eunice Lim, Elena Yeo, Steve Ferzacca, Kar-men Cheng, Wee Li Lin
Liberalizing, Feminizing and Popularizing Health Communications in Asia provides insights into the manner in which biomedical discourses are communicated and portrayed in Asia in light of the rapidly evolving socio-cultural, technological and epidemiological undercurrents. Highlighting the more pluralized and interactive dynamics in the appropriation and dissemination of medical and public health knowledge, its specific case studies challenge the notions of the one way transmission of medicine by modern Western trained doctors and public health officials to ignorant patients and masses, particularly in the non-Western world. With specific examples drawn from popular media, this volume examines the extent to which these developments have given the broader public both greater access to information and choices. Multidisciplinary in scope and truly international in focus, it relates the everyday of health communications to more macro social trends on the Asian continent and will be of interest to scholars within science and technology studies, media and cultural studies and sociology alike.
This book discusses contemporary film in all the main countries of Southeast Asia, and the social practices and ideologies which films either represent or oppose. It shows how film acquires signification through cultural interpretation, and how film also serves as a site of contestations between social and political agents seeking to promote, challenge, or erase certain meanings, messages or ideas from public circulation. A unique feature of the book is that it focuses as much on films as it does on the societies from which these films emerge: it considers the reasons for film-makers taking the positions they take; the positions and counter-positions taken; the response of different communit...
Early twentieth century China went through a tumultuous period, marked by the end of an ancient monarchy, political instability and profound cultural upheaval. The medical discourse both reflected and contributed to these transformations. Western medicine arrived in China as part of missionary, foreign imperialist and internal modernization efforts. In various ways it interacted with Chinese practices and belief systems. The contributions in this volume explore important episodes of this multi-faceted process, describing key institutions, personalities and their respective motives and interests. Collectively, the chapters reveal a complex web of interlocking dimensions, which evade simple categorizations of Western or Chinese, exploitive or supportive, traditional or modern.
Korean Wave is intended to offer a firsthand account of the amazing spread of Korean popular culture to Asian countries and beyond. It is meant to contribute to the fostering of an Asian cultural community. Korean dramas, movies, music, fashion and food have enabled people from different Asian countries to share a common culture experience.
Transnational Memory and Popular Culture in East and Southeast Asia explores the significance of transnational popular culture in the formation and mediation of collective memories across the region. It looks at case studies including: the politics of cinematic remembering of Hong Kong films on Southeast Asia, the digital and holographic enshrinement of departed celebrities like Wong Kar Kui, Bruce Lee and Teresa Teng and the dredging of personal memories of the encounters with the Korean Wave in Singapore. In addition, it explores how cultural memories are used as focal points of staging cultural revival and movements in Singapore and Taiwan. Contrary to the assumptions of the importance of newness in modern popular culture productions, the continued relevance of this otherwise dated material reflects the significance of these texts in the development and strengthening of collective cultural memories. The discussion of such issues has often been grounded geo-spatially on the “national” and contemporary contexts, this volume will develop a more temporalized and transnational perspective in the shaping of otherwise local cultural identifications.
Goh held: social welfare; political and constitutional evolution; development economics and finance; the armed forces and defence industry; the education system, from schools through higher education to the research institutes; Chinese studies, from Confucianism to 'China watching'; and cultural development, with special emphasis on the creation of the Singapore Symphony Orchestra. Goh Keng Swee: A Legacy of Public Service will be read by present and future generations of public servants, by Singaporeans in general, and by all students and laypersons with an interest in the modern history of Singapore - social, economic, political, military, and cultural - to which a characteristically simple and frugal Dr. Goh contributed both decisively and unreservedly.
The League of Nations Health Organisation was the first international health organisation with a broad mandate and global responsibilities. It acted as a technical agency of the League of Nations, an institution designed to safeguard a new world order during the tense interwar period. The work of the Health Organisation had distinct political implications, although ostensibly it was concerned «merely» with health. Until 1946, it addressed a broad spectrum of issues, including public health data, various diseases, biological standardization and the reform of national health systems. The economic depression spurred its focus on social medicine, where it sought to identify minimum standards for living conditions, notably nutrition and housing, defined as essential for healthy lives. Attracting a group of innovative thinkers, the organization laid the groundwork for all following international health work, effective until today.
This pioneering study provides an essential guide to the formative years of Drama Box, a leading Chinese-language theatre company in Singapore. How Wee Ng presents a compelling narrative of how Drama Box has emerged as a prominent force in the field of theatre for social intervention, effectively amplifying the voices of marginalised communities and establishing itself as a foremost advocate of cutting-edge, socially oriented artistic practice. Ng’s in-depth analysis of Drama Box’s most influential works during this pivotal period, and his meticulous examination of the social, political, and economic contexts of their productions, illuminate the remarkable balance the company has achieved in its engagement with government policy, censorship, and financial imperatives, while fiercely defending its artistic autonomy. As well as unveiling the remarkable history of Drama Box, the book offers readers a unique lens through which to understand the complex relationship between the arts and state authority, and the broader socio-cultural and political landscape of contemporary Singapore.
Singapore has faced many pandemics over the centuries, from plague, smallpox and cholera to influenza and novel coronaviruses. By examining how different governments responded, this book considers what we can learn from their experiences. Public health strategies in the city-state were often affected by issues of ethnicity and class, as well as failure to take heed of key learnings from previous outbreaks. Pandemics are a recurrent and normal feature of the human experience. Alongside medical innovation and evidence-based policymaking, the study of history is also crucial in preparing for future pandemics.