1st Edition
Nationalism and Decolonisation in Singapore The Malayan Generation, 1953 – 1963
1: Why Malayan? 2: The Origins of Malayan Nationalism; 3: Mass Movements and Education, 1953–55; 4: Political Parties, 1954–55; 5: Associationalism, 1955–56; 6: Transitional Politics, 1955–57; 7: Electoral Politics, 1957–61; 8: The Meaning of Self-Determination, 1961–63; 9: Legacies; Index
Biography
Thum Ping Tjin is a historian and Visiting Fellow at Hertford College, University of Oxford, UK, and also the founder and Managing Director of New Naratif.
“Nationalism and Decolonisation in Singapore does important work in moving Chinese voices, and especially Chinese-language newspapers, to centre-stage in the history of Singapore’s turbulent 1950s-60s. In doing so, it recognises that ‘decolonisation’ was as much a battle over what sort of postcolonial state and society should emerge – Malayan or Singaporean; liberal, socialist or communist; English language dominated in education or more multilingual – as it was about how to gain independence. This book should be read both by those sympathetic to this book’s contention that the Malayan Communist Party’s role in the ‘Malayan left’ has been exaggerated, and by those who will continue to disagree with that argument. It adds rich texture to the story of how modern Singapore emerged out of a maelstrom of protest, passion, and anticolonial creativity and conflict.”
– Karl Hack, Open University, UK
