This book examines the Singapore government’s controversial practice of recruiting students from ... more This book examines the Singapore government’s controversial practice of recruiting students from China and granting them full scholarships on the condition of a service “bond”. It offers detailed ethnographic accounts of the Chinese “foreign talent” students’ educational and cross-cultural experiences in Singapore to illustrate the complex intersections between international mobility and educational desire. In doing so, the book presents contemporary Singapore society’s concerns over immigration and cross-cultural encounters from a unique perspective.
In a globalized world with increasing international migration and encounters of difference, educa... more In a globalized world with increasing international migration and encounters of difference, education is presented with new challenges and opportunities regarding diversity, including teacher diversity. This paper focuses on teachers with immigrant backgrounds and explores how they potentially add constructive diversity to the receiving country's education system. The empirical setting of this paper is Singapore, an Asian city-state seldom featured in teacher diversity research. Drawing from a broader study involving online surveys and qualitative interviews, this article examines the discourses of five immigrant teachers chosen for their insightful perspectives. We found that the teachers consciously engaged their foreigner/outsider identities by drawing on their biographical and educational backgrounds; they sought to add value to aspects of the Singapore school system which they perceived to be lacking, while negotiating with dominant values and teaching practices. Their negotiations, however, remain delimited in significant ways. The paper argues that immigrant teachers represent an undertapped and underappreciated resource for greater educational diversity in Singapore and beyond.
Even as the world remains under the shadows of COVID-19, war, inflation, and economic slowdown – ... more Even as the world remains under the shadows of COVID-19, war, inflation, and economic slowdown – all in a wider context of deglobalization – the story for international student mobility (ISM) going forward may well be one of resilience, reconfiguration, and renewal. The authors argue that the resilience of ISM as a field of activities has possibly to do with the remarkable versatility of ISM as a container of social promise and hope and as a locus of individual fantasy and desire.
Research in education has long noted teachers’ role in assisting social and ideological reproduct... more Research in education has long noted teachers’ role in assisting social and ideological reproduction. Separately, scholarship has also investigated the use of extra-curricular activities in equipping disadvantaged students with social and cultural capital, to embark on social mobility. Positioned at the intersection of these two apparently disparate strands, this paper presents a case in which teachers’ extra-curricular work is seen to simultaneously enact subtle socio-ideological reproduction, and the facilitation of social mobility attainment. Specifically, the paper draws on a study of how teachers in a lower-status junior college in Singapore prepare their students in applying for prestigious state-sponsored scholarships. Through teachers’ extra-curricular work of allying and aligning, social mobility and social reproduction are simultaneously made possible, yet also exist in some tension. Thus, this paper offers a unique sociological perspective on teachers’ extra-curricular work and its significance for broader issues of meritocracy, social mobility, and social reproduction.
International student mobility (ISM), defined as the movement of students to pursue tertiary educ... more International student mobility (ISM), defined as the movement of students to pursue tertiary education outside their countries of citizenship, has conventionally been understood in terms of micro social actors’ behaviours of cultural capital accumulation and macro-level institutional processes following the logics of neoliberal globalization and knowledge economy. The COVID-19 pandemic has abruptly and severely impacted ISM, plunging the latter into what seems to be a “crisis”. Taking this fluid juncture as an opportunity for reflection and re-thinking, this paper reexamines ISM through the discursive lens of “crisis”. Broadening the “crisis” perspective beyond the pandemic to include a longitudinal view over the twentieth century through to the present, the paper considers the ways in which movement and recruitment of international students may be seen as consequences of as well as responses to “crises” of various natures – geopolitical, economic, and social. The author’s own work on student mobilities in Asia is drawn upon for illustration. The paper ends by briefly considering both the immediate crises confronting ISM, as well as various broader global uncertainties lying ahead.
Inquiry-based learning is becoming a widely recognized and used
pedagogical approach. However, ex... more Inquiry-based learning is becoming a widely recognized and used pedagogical approach. However, existing research has largely focused on inquiry learning in science education, neglecting fields such as social studies (SS). In Singapore, inquiry learning in SS received an impetus when a component called “Issue Investigation” (II) was introduced into the compulsory secondary school syllabus of 2016. Given the recency of this introduction, there has been a lacuna of empirical research. Addressing both these research gaps, this paper presents qualitative findings from a preliminary study of Singapore secondary school SS teachers’ perspectives and experiences relating to II. Building on a recognition of teacher agency and of the role teachers play in mediating curriculum and teaching/ learning, this paper focuses on how teachers interpret the nature of inquiry learning in SS in the Singapore context. Findings suggest that teachers held broadly two conceptions of II: some saw it as aimed towards working out practical solutions to societal issues in the spirit of participative citizenship; others treated it akin to a social science inquiry process that fostered critical and analytical thinking. In addition, the challenges teachers encountered in implementing and enacting II, and their coping strategies are also briefly discussed.
Existing migration research has framed ‘middling migrants’ mainly in terms of transnational fluid... more Existing migration research has framed ‘middling migrants’ mainly in terms of transnational fluidity and flexibility, thus overlooking the issue of integration. This article adds to a burgeoning scholarship advocating a more locally embedded perspective (e.g. Meier, 2015b. Migrant Professionals in the City: Local Encounters, Identities, and Inequalities. New York and London: Routledge) by investigating the integration of immigrant teachers working in mainstream primary and secondary schools in the Asian city–state of Singapore. It is found that these immigrant teachers faced differentiated formal inclusion with respect to legal settlement, whereas their professional integration experiences also diverged between those who embodied certain ‘mainstream’ characteristics and those who did not. In negotiating professional integration, ‘non-mainstream’ immigrant teachers adopted a spectrum of strategies, but on the whole prioritised the pragmatic imperative to ‘fit in’, resulting in what may be termed muted diversification. In terms of broader ethnic and migration scholarship, this account serves to highlight the ways in which locally specific institutional and sociocultural conditions differentially shape middling migrants’ experiences in respect to settlement and work. With regard to the Singaporean context, this article fills an empirical gap in migration research while also reflecting on the accommodation and management of diversity in education.
COMPARE: A Journal of Comparative and International Education, 2020
The global landscape of higher education is an uneven field where
players like nation-states are ... more The global landscape of higher education is an uneven field where players like nation-states are placed in hierarchical and centre-periphery relations. This paper focuses on the global field of international student mobility (ISM) and investigates China’s place in the field using an analytical framework consisting of three key categories of ‘capital’: economic, human, and symbolic. Drawing on existing scholarship and author’s first-hand ethnographic research, the paper examines the case of China as both a source and a destination of ISM, and analyses the flows and accrual of these three forms of capital as consequences of outbound and inbound student mobilities. Analyses show that in a global ISM field characterised by asymmetries and inequalities, China’s place is arguably semi-peripheral economically and symbolically. It is argued that this country-focused macro perspective complements existing ISM scholarship’s emphasis on social reproduction at individual and private levels.
Journal of Studies in International Education , 2019
In recent years, scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) has proliferated across vari... more In recent years, scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) has proliferated across various social science disciplines. Of late, an interest in the ethics and politics of ISM seems to be emerging, as more scholars begin to consider critically questions about rights, responsibility, justice, equality, and so forth that inhere in the thorny relationships between ISM stakeholders. To date, however, these discussions remain largely scattered. Bringing together these scattered conversations in literature, this article outlines elements of a framework for (re)thinking the ethics and politics of ISM. The proposed framework identifies eight key ISM actors between whom various ethical and political relationships arise, where these relationships range from the social to the institutional. Furthermore, the framework discusses four sets of concepts from the literature deemed pertinent in thinking further about ISM ethics and politics. This proposed framework is aimed at stimulating further conversations and efforts to make ISM more socially equitable and sustainable.
Immigrant-background teachers make up a fragment of the teacher population in
mainstream Singapor... more Immigrant-background teachers make up a fragment of the teacher population in mainstream Singapore schools. Though modest in terms of number, the presence of these teachers in the Singapore teaching workforce is arguably significant in other ways. To date, little research attention has been paid to this unique group of teachers. Based on a Ministry of Education-National Institute of Education (MOE-NIE) funded study (OER 16/17 YPD), this article provides an overview of the characteristics and experiences of immigrant teachers in mainstream Singapore primary and secondary schools, with a focus on the practical challenges and value tensions they encounter in the professional settings. Findings show that immigrant teachers are generally well integrated into the Singapore education system notwithstanding certain challenges. Meanwhile, some teachers’ experiences of negotiating with value differences suggest that immigrant teachers may have the potential to add diversity to the education system, although this potential appears to be limited by the pragmatic imperative of professional integration.
While scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) has proliferated in recent times, under... more While scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) has proliferated in recent times, understanding of educational mobilities within the Asian region remains limited, empirically and theoretically. This paper contributes to this nascent intra-Asian ISM perspective through offering a comparative overview of two contemporary empirical cases: Chinese students recruited as 'foreign talent' by Singapore and Indian students headed to China to study English-medium MBBS degrees. Using an analytical framework based on integrating key existing theoretical approaches in ISM scholarship, this paper compares the two cases in terms of the push–pull conditions/factors underlying them, as well as the physical, socioeconomic, and cultural im/mobility outcomes for the two groups of students. Although both groups may be regarded as belonging to Asia's vast rising middle classes, the more academically and socially advantaged Chinese students in Singapore are found to enjoy more favourable outcomes than their less privileged Indian counterparts. Theoretically, this paper underscores the divergences between the two cases as manifestations of an increasingly class-differentiated landscape of international student/youth mobilities in Asia.
In existing scholarship on migrant encounters, there is a tendency to dismiss fleeting encounters... more In existing scholarship on migrant encounters, there is a tendency to dismiss fleeting encounters between random strangers in public spaces as superficial, or to treat such encounters as insipid and ambivalent events. Little attention has been given to fleeting encounters that are antagonistic and emotively charged. This paper focuses on one such encounter that took place in a public bus in Singapore in 2012, involving intensely emotive verbal exchanges between a female migrant from China and an elderly local Chinese-Singaporean woman. Interpreting this encounter as a form of situational stratification, the paper draws on Lacanian psychoanalysis to decode the symbolic logics underlying the heated verbal exchange, thereby revealing how migrant diversities in the Southeast Asian city-state are textured by the intersections of gender, sexuality, class, race/ethnicity. The paper argues that psychoanalysis deserves more attention as an under-utilized perspective for reading fleeting encounters.
Scholarship to date agrees that the internet has weakened the Chinese
Party-state’s ideological a... more Scholarship to date agrees that the internet has weakened the Chinese Party-state’s ideological and discursive hegemony over society. This article documents a recent intervention into public discourse exercised by the Chinese state through appropriating and promoting a popular online catchphrase—“positive energy” (zheng nengliang). Analysing the “positive energy” phenomena using Laclau and Mouffe’s theory of hegemony and discourse, the authors argue that the relative effectiveness of this hegemonic intervention rests on the semantic versatility of “positive energy”, which enables “chains of equivalence” to be established between the label’s popular meanings, on the one hand, and its propagandist meanings, on the other.
Existing scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) often draws on Bourdieu to interpret... more Existing scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) often draws on Bourdieu to interpret such mobility as a strategy of capital conversion used by privileged classes to reproduce their social advantage. This perspective stems from and also reinforces a rationalistic interpretation of student mobility. A shift of focus to interAsian educational mobilities involving non-elite individuals and institutions can reveal logics of behavior and of social interaction that are at discrepancy with the dominant perspective, thereby advancing the theorization of educational mobilities. This paper examines a case of Indian youths of less affluent backgrounds pursuing English-medium medical degrees (MBBS) at a provincial university in China. Through ethnography, the paper illustrates how various parties – individual, organizational and institutional – to this somewhat ‘unlikely’ project of knowledge mobility follow the discrepant logics of compromise and complicity to seek to realize their educational desires, social aspirations, and organizational objectives amidst realities of class disadvantage and resource inadequacy.
In recent years, the Singapore government’s pro-immigration
policy – specifically, its recruitmen... more In recent years, the Singapore government’s pro-immigration policy – specifically, its recruitment of so-called foreign talent – has caused a palpable rise in anti-immigrant sentiments and discourses amongst natives of the city-state. Drawing on Lacanian psychoanalysis, a perspective so far marginal in migration research, this article offers a provocative reading of Singapore’s desire for foreign talent and the local society’s reception of these subjects. The article focuses on the ways in which frustrated Singaporeans seem to find foreign talent immigrants, especially those from mainland China, to be lacking and undesirable. Lacan’s theories enable the bold interpretations that: (1) foreign talent is not meant to fill a lack but precisely to produce it and (2) foreign talent stands for Singapore’s and Singaporeans’ unobtainable object of desire, which ultimately signifies the gaps and inconsistencies in the symbolic order confronting them. Moving away from existing conceptual frameworks and theoretical approaches, the article illustrates what a psychoanalytic lens of desire can contribute to migration and mobility research.
Immigration has been a “hot button” issue in Singapore in recent years. This paper provides an ov... more Immigration has been a “hot button” issue in Singapore in recent years. This paper provides an overview of the key policies, trends, and issues relating to immigration, population, and foreign workforce in the city-state. The paper begins by looking at Singapore’s current immigration landscape, and then examines the city-state’s foreign manpower regime, which constitutes the institutional foundation for immigration to Singapore. The highly intertwined immigration and foreign labour policies are then explained along two fundamental underlying dimensions – economy and demography. The paper ends by looking at local grassroots society’s reactions to the influx of immigrants in recent times, and the ways in which the Singapore government has since tried to address such concerns.
Studying abroad is an increasingly prevalent form of transient migration. How do international st... more Studying abroad is an increasingly prevalent form of transient migration. How do international students understand their relationship with the host society and host nationals? Based on in-depth interview data, this article investigates the ways in which international students from China at a Singaporean university understand the idea of 'integration' (or rongru in Chinese). It is found that these Chinese students tend to define 'integration' in terms of friendly and everyday social interactions, but their understanding has a more or less assimilationist underlying assumption. This explains their generally modest self-evaluations of their success at 'integration'. This article argues that this social and somewhat assimilationist understanding of integration might be explained in terms of the Chinese students' cultural-linguistic ideologies about rongru, and the characteristics of their social space, position and circumstances in Singapore as academically capable 'foreign talent' students on Singaporean government scholarships.
The discourse of ‘rights defence’ (weiquan), referring to the grassroots’ struggle for legal redr... more The discourse of ‘rights defence’ (weiquan), referring to the grassroots’ struggle for legal redress after their lawful interests are encroached upon, has gained increasing popularity in China in the last two decades. Given the ubiquity of the Internet nowadays, rights defence activities also take place online; in a small number of cases, they develop into a form of online activism. But what determines or contributes to the online visibility of some rights defence cases and the invisibility of others? In this paper, we investigate this by examining three highly visible workers’ rights defence campaigns in comparison with three similar cases that received almost no attention. Analysing the various actors involved, we argue that online rights defence tends to become visible and develop into online activism when one key actor, the state, which ought to be an impartial source of justice, is perceived to be collusive or to be playing an active role in the encroachment of people’s rights and interests.
This article examines a recent bizarre phenomenon on China’s Internet – the enormous popularity o... more This article examines a recent bizarre phenomenon on China’s Internet – the enormous popularity of a scatological Chinese neologism called diaosi, which literally translates as ‘dick string’. Seeing the diaosi phenomenon as a case of ‘infrapolitics’, a space of nuanced discursive practices mediating overt online politics and benign online entertainment, we analyse the ways in which an infrapolitical practice such as the diaosi phenomenon fuses political critique, cultural processes of identity construction and meaning-making as well as cyber ritual communion. Specifically, we interpret the infrapolitics of diaosi as simultaneously an instantiation of a prevalent scatological online culture that defies hypernormalization, a collective identity-making that seeks to create critical social solidarity and a practice and politics of cultural intimacy
This book examines the Singapore government’s controversial practice of recruiting students from ... more This book examines the Singapore government’s controversial practice of recruiting students from China and granting them full scholarships on the condition of a service “bond”. It offers detailed ethnographic accounts of the Chinese “foreign talent” students’ educational and cross-cultural experiences in Singapore to illustrate the complex intersections between international mobility and educational desire. In doing so, the book presents contemporary Singapore society’s concerns over immigration and cross-cultural encounters from a unique perspective.
In a globalized world with increasing international migration and encounters of difference, educa... more In a globalized world with increasing international migration and encounters of difference, education is presented with new challenges and opportunities regarding diversity, including teacher diversity. This paper focuses on teachers with immigrant backgrounds and explores how they potentially add constructive diversity to the receiving country's education system. The empirical setting of this paper is Singapore, an Asian city-state seldom featured in teacher diversity research. Drawing from a broader study involving online surveys and qualitative interviews, this article examines the discourses of five immigrant teachers chosen for their insightful perspectives. We found that the teachers consciously engaged their foreigner/outsider identities by drawing on their biographical and educational backgrounds; they sought to add value to aspects of the Singapore school system which they perceived to be lacking, while negotiating with dominant values and teaching practices. Their negotiations, however, remain delimited in significant ways. The paper argues that immigrant teachers represent an undertapped and underappreciated resource for greater educational diversity in Singapore and beyond.
Even as the world remains under the shadows of COVID-19, war, inflation, and economic slowdown – ... more Even as the world remains under the shadows of COVID-19, war, inflation, and economic slowdown – all in a wider context of deglobalization – the story for international student mobility (ISM) going forward may well be one of resilience, reconfiguration, and renewal. The authors argue that the resilience of ISM as a field of activities has possibly to do with the remarkable versatility of ISM as a container of social promise and hope and as a locus of individual fantasy and desire.
Research in education has long noted teachers’ role in assisting social and ideological reproduct... more Research in education has long noted teachers’ role in assisting social and ideological reproduction. Separately, scholarship has also investigated the use of extra-curricular activities in equipping disadvantaged students with social and cultural capital, to embark on social mobility. Positioned at the intersection of these two apparently disparate strands, this paper presents a case in which teachers’ extra-curricular work is seen to simultaneously enact subtle socio-ideological reproduction, and the facilitation of social mobility attainment. Specifically, the paper draws on a study of how teachers in a lower-status junior college in Singapore prepare their students in applying for prestigious state-sponsored scholarships. Through teachers’ extra-curricular work of allying and aligning, social mobility and social reproduction are simultaneously made possible, yet also exist in some tension. Thus, this paper offers a unique sociological perspective on teachers’ extra-curricular work and its significance for broader issues of meritocracy, social mobility, and social reproduction.
International student mobility (ISM), defined as the movement of students to pursue tertiary educ... more International student mobility (ISM), defined as the movement of students to pursue tertiary education outside their countries of citizenship, has conventionally been understood in terms of micro social actors’ behaviours of cultural capital accumulation and macro-level institutional processes following the logics of neoliberal globalization and knowledge economy. The COVID-19 pandemic has abruptly and severely impacted ISM, plunging the latter into what seems to be a “crisis”. Taking this fluid juncture as an opportunity for reflection and re-thinking, this paper reexamines ISM through the discursive lens of “crisis”. Broadening the “crisis” perspective beyond the pandemic to include a longitudinal view over the twentieth century through to the present, the paper considers the ways in which movement and recruitment of international students may be seen as consequences of as well as responses to “crises” of various natures – geopolitical, economic, and social. The author’s own work on student mobilities in Asia is drawn upon for illustration. The paper ends by briefly considering both the immediate crises confronting ISM, as well as various broader global uncertainties lying ahead.
Inquiry-based learning is becoming a widely recognized and used
pedagogical approach. However, ex... more Inquiry-based learning is becoming a widely recognized and used pedagogical approach. However, existing research has largely focused on inquiry learning in science education, neglecting fields such as social studies (SS). In Singapore, inquiry learning in SS received an impetus when a component called “Issue Investigation” (II) was introduced into the compulsory secondary school syllabus of 2016. Given the recency of this introduction, there has been a lacuna of empirical research. Addressing both these research gaps, this paper presents qualitative findings from a preliminary study of Singapore secondary school SS teachers’ perspectives and experiences relating to II. Building on a recognition of teacher agency and of the role teachers play in mediating curriculum and teaching/ learning, this paper focuses on how teachers interpret the nature of inquiry learning in SS in the Singapore context. Findings suggest that teachers held broadly two conceptions of II: some saw it as aimed towards working out practical solutions to societal issues in the spirit of participative citizenship; others treated it akin to a social science inquiry process that fostered critical and analytical thinking. In addition, the challenges teachers encountered in implementing and enacting II, and their coping strategies are also briefly discussed.
Existing migration research has framed ‘middling migrants’ mainly in terms of transnational fluid... more Existing migration research has framed ‘middling migrants’ mainly in terms of transnational fluidity and flexibility, thus overlooking the issue of integration. This article adds to a burgeoning scholarship advocating a more locally embedded perspective (e.g. Meier, 2015b. Migrant Professionals in the City: Local Encounters, Identities, and Inequalities. New York and London: Routledge) by investigating the integration of immigrant teachers working in mainstream primary and secondary schools in the Asian city–state of Singapore. It is found that these immigrant teachers faced differentiated formal inclusion with respect to legal settlement, whereas their professional integration experiences also diverged between those who embodied certain ‘mainstream’ characteristics and those who did not. In negotiating professional integration, ‘non-mainstream’ immigrant teachers adopted a spectrum of strategies, but on the whole prioritised the pragmatic imperative to ‘fit in’, resulting in what may be termed muted diversification. In terms of broader ethnic and migration scholarship, this account serves to highlight the ways in which locally specific institutional and sociocultural conditions differentially shape middling migrants’ experiences in respect to settlement and work. With regard to the Singaporean context, this article fills an empirical gap in migration research while also reflecting on the accommodation and management of diversity in education.
COMPARE: A Journal of Comparative and International Education, 2020
The global landscape of higher education is an uneven field where
players like nation-states are ... more The global landscape of higher education is an uneven field where players like nation-states are placed in hierarchical and centre-periphery relations. This paper focuses on the global field of international student mobility (ISM) and investigates China’s place in the field using an analytical framework consisting of three key categories of ‘capital’: economic, human, and symbolic. Drawing on existing scholarship and author’s first-hand ethnographic research, the paper examines the case of China as both a source and a destination of ISM, and analyses the flows and accrual of these three forms of capital as consequences of outbound and inbound student mobilities. Analyses show that in a global ISM field characterised by asymmetries and inequalities, China’s place is arguably semi-peripheral economically and symbolically. It is argued that this country-focused macro perspective complements existing ISM scholarship’s emphasis on social reproduction at individual and private levels.
Journal of Studies in International Education , 2019
In recent years, scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) has proliferated across vari... more In recent years, scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) has proliferated across various social science disciplines. Of late, an interest in the ethics and politics of ISM seems to be emerging, as more scholars begin to consider critically questions about rights, responsibility, justice, equality, and so forth that inhere in the thorny relationships between ISM stakeholders. To date, however, these discussions remain largely scattered. Bringing together these scattered conversations in literature, this article outlines elements of a framework for (re)thinking the ethics and politics of ISM. The proposed framework identifies eight key ISM actors between whom various ethical and political relationships arise, where these relationships range from the social to the institutional. Furthermore, the framework discusses four sets of concepts from the literature deemed pertinent in thinking further about ISM ethics and politics. This proposed framework is aimed at stimulating further conversations and efforts to make ISM more socially equitable and sustainable.
Immigrant-background teachers make up a fragment of the teacher population in
mainstream Singapor... more Immigrant-background teachers make up a fragment of the teacher population in mainstream Singapore schools. Though modest in terms of number, the presence of these teachers in the Singapore teaching workforce is arguably significant in other ways. To date, little research attention has been paid to this unique group of teachers. Based on a Ministry of Education-National Institute of Education (MOE-NIE) funded study (OER 16/17 YPD), this article provides an overview of the characteristics and experiences of immigrant teachers in mainstream Singapore primary and secondary schools, with a focus on the practical challenges and value tensions they encounter in the professional settings. Findings show that immigrant teachers are generally well integrated into the Singapore education system notwithstanding certain challenges. Meanwhile, some teachers’ experiences of negotiating with value differences suggest that immigrant teachers may have the potential to add diversity to the education system, although this potential appears to be limited by the pragmatic imperative of professional integration.
While scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) has proliferated in recent times, under... more While scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) has proliferated in recent times, understanding of educational mobilities within the Asian region remains limited, empirically and theoretically. This paper contributes to this nascent intra-Asian ISM perspective through offering a comparative overview of two contemporary empirical cases: Chinese students recruited as 'foreign talent' by Singapore and Indian students headed to China to study English-medium MBBS degrees. Using an analytical framework based on integrating key existing theoretical approaches in ISM scholarship, this paper compares the two cases in terms of the push–pull conditions/factors underlying them, as well as the physical, socioeconomic, and cultural im/mobility outcomes for the two groups of students. Although both groups may be regarded as belonging to Asia's vast rising middle classes, the more academically and socially advantaged Chinese students in Singapore are found to enjoy more favourable outcomes than their less privileged Indian counterparts. Theoretically, this paper underscores the divergences between the two cases as manifestations of an increasingly class-differentiated landscape of international student/youth mobilities in Asia.
In existing scholarship on migrant encounters, there is a tendency to dismiss fleeting encounters... more In existing scholarship on migrant encounters, there is a tendency to dismiss fleeting encounters between random strangers in public spaces as superficial, or to treat such encounters as insipid and ambivalent events. Little attention has been given to fleeting encounters that are antagonistic and emotively charged. This paper focuses on one such encounter that took place in a public bus in Singapore in 2012, involving intensely emotive verbal exchanges between a female migrant from China and an elderly local Chinese-Singaporean woman. Interpreting this encounter as a form of situational stratification, the paper draws on Lacanian psychoanalysis to decode the symbolic logics underlying the heated verbal exchange, thereby revealing how migrant diversities in the Southeast Asian city-state are textured by the intersections of gender, sexuality, class, race/ethnicity. The paper argues that psychoanalysis deserves more attention as an under-utilized perspective for reading fleeting encounters.
Scholarship to date agrees that the internet has weakened the Chinese
Party-state’s ideological a... more Scholarship to date agrees that the internet has weakened the Chinese Party-state’s ideological and discursive hegemony over society. This article documents a recent intervention into public discourse exercised by the Chinese state through appropriating and promoting a popular online catchphrase—“positive energy” (zheng nengliang). Analysing the “positive energy” phenomena using Laclau and Mouffe’s theory of hegemony and discourse, the authors argue that the relative effectiveness of this hegemonic intervention rests on the semantic versatility of “positive energy”, which enables “chains of equivalence” to be established between the label’s popular meanings, on the one hand, and its propagandist meanings, on the other.
Existing scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) often draws on Bourdieu to interpret... more Existing scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) often draws on Bourdieu to interpret such mobility as a strategy of capital conversion used by privileged classes to reproduce their social advantage. This perspective stems from and also reinforces a rationalistic interpretation of student mobility. A shift of focus to interAsian educational mobilities involving non-elite individuals and institutions can reveal logics of behavior and of social interaction that are at discrepancy with the dominant perspective, thereby advancing the theorization of educational mobilities. This paper examines a case of Indian youths of less affluent backgrounds pursuing English-medium medical degrees (MBBS) at a provincial university in China. Through ethnography, the paper illustrates how various parties – individual, organizational and institutional – to this somewhat ‘unlikely’ project of knowledge mobility follow the discrepant logics of compromise and complicity to seek to realize their educational desires, social aspirations, and organizational objectives amidst realities of class disadvantage and resource inadequacy.
In recent years, the Singapore government’s pro-immigration
policy – specifically, its recruitmen... more In recent years, the Singapore government’s pro-immigration policy – specifically, its recruitment of so-called foreign talent – has caused a palpable rise in anti-immigrant sentiments and discourses amongst natives of the city-state. Drawing on Lacanian psychoanalysis, a perspective so far marginal in migration research, this article offers a provocative reading of Singapore’s desire for foreign talent and the local society’s reception of these subjects. The article focuses on the ways in which frustrated Singaporeans seem to find foreign talent immigrants, especially those from mainland China, to be lacking and undesirable. Lacan’s theories enable the bold interpretations that: (1) foreign talent is not meant to fill a lack but precisely to produce it and (2) foreign talent stands for Singapore’s and Singaporeans’ unobtainable object of desire, which ultimately signifies the gaps and inconsistencies in the symbolic order confronting them. Moving away from existing conceptual frameworks and theoretical approaches, the article illustrates what a psychoanalytic lens of desire can contribute to migration and mobility research.
Immigration has been a “hot button” issue in Singapore in recent years. This paper provides an ov... more Immigration has been a “hot button” issue in Singapore in recent years. This paper provides an overview of the key policies, trends, and issues relating to immigration, population, and foreign workforce in the city-state. The paper begins by looking at Singapore’s current immigration landscape, and then examines the city-state’s foreign manpower regime, which constitutes the institutional foundation for immigration to Singapore. The highly intertwined immigration and foreign labour policies are then explained along two fundamental underlying dimensions – economy and demography. The paper ends by looking at local grassroots society’s reactions to the influx of immigrants in recent times, and the ways in which the Singapore government has since tried to address such concerns.
Studying abroad is an increasingly prevalent form of transient migration. How do international st... more Studying abroad is an increasingly prevalent form of transient migration. How do international students understand their relationship with the host society and host nationals? Based on in-depth interview data, this article investigates the ways in which international students from China at a Singaporean university understand the idea of 'integration' (or rongru in Chinese). It is found that these Chinese students tend to define 'integration' in terms of friendly and everyday social interactions, but their understanding has a more or less assimilationist underlying assumption. This explains their generally modest self-evaluations of their success at 'integration'. This article argues that this social and somewhat assimilationist understanding of integration might be explained in terms of the Chinese students' cultural-linguistic ideologies about rongru, and the characteristics of their social space, position and circumstances in Singapore as academically capable 'foreign talent' students on Singaporean government scholarships.
The discourse of ‘rights defence’ (weiquan), referring to the grassroots’ struggle for legal redr... more The discourse of ‘rights defence’ (weiquan), referring to the grassroots’ struggle for legal redress after their lawful interests are encroached upon, has gained increasing popularity in China in the last two decades. Given the ubiquity of the Internet nowadays, rights defence activities also take place online; in a small number of cases, they develop into a form of online activism. But what determines or contributes to the online visibility of some rights defence cases and the invisibility of others? In this paper, we investigate this by examining three highly visible workers’ rights defence campaigns in comparison with three similar cases that received almost no attention. Analysing the various actors involved, we argue that online rights defence tends to become visible and develop into online activism when one key actor, the state, which ought to be an impartial source of justice, is perceived to be collusive or to be playing an active role in the encroachment of people’s rights and interests.
This article examines a recent bizarre phenomenon on China’s Internet – the enormous popularity o... more This article examines a recent bizarre phenomenon on China’s Internet – the enormous popularity of a scatological Chinese neologism called diaosi, which literally translates as ‘dick string’. Seeing the diaosi phenomenon as a case of ‘infrapolitics’, a space of nuanced discursive practices mediating overt online politics and benign online entertainment, we analyse the ways in which an infrapolitical practice such as the diaosi phenomenon fuses political critique, cultural processes of identity construction and meaning-making as well as cyber ritual communion. Specifically, we interpret the infrapolitics of diaosi as simultaneously an instantiation of a prevalent scatological online culture that defies hypernormalization, a collective identity-making that seeks to create critical social solidarity and a practice and politics of cultural intimacy
With the rise of educational mobilities worldwide, students’ experiences of educational sojourn, ... more With the rise of educational mobilities worldwide, students’ experiences of educational sojourn, especially that of the Chinese Mainland students, have come under greater research attention in recent years. Amongst diverse kinds of Chinese students/scholars abroad, this paper focuses on a type that finds themselves in a unique country under equally unique circumstances: Chinese students studying at pre- and undergraduate levels in Singapore under Singapore’s government-sponsored “foreign talent” scholarship schemes. Based on an ethnographic study conducted over a 16-month period in China and Singapore, this paper presents an overview account of these Chinese student-scholars’ sociocultural experiences in Singapore under three headings: (1) privilege—how Singapore’s “foreign talent” policy endows considerable privileges, opportunities, but also responsibilities on these Chinese students; (2) prejudice—how and why these PRC “foreign talents” encounter certain local discourses of discrimination and exclusion; and (3) predicament—how they sometimes experience complex and conflicted feelings about being made Singapore’s “foreign talent.”
SOJOURN: Journal of Social Issues in Southeast Asia
Singapore’s constitutive sociocultural hybridity has meant that this postcolonial island-nation’s... more Singapore’s constitutive sociocultural hybridity has meant that this postcolonial island-nation’s national identity has always been a problematic construct. The developmental state’s pragmatism and self-re-inventiveness further undermine the efforts to construct a stable national identity, frustrating the desire for an authentic nationhood in the essentialist and positive sense. Focus on the more recently arrived “foreign talent” subjects who inhabit the margins of the Singaporean imagination of the national body informs an alternative analytical angle on the question of Singaporean national identity. It is suggested that a sense of national togetherness and belonging emerges through constructing these national Others as “inauthentic”. Examination of two particularly visible and controversial types of “foreign talent” in Singapore — foreign sports professionals and foreign students who have received scholarships from the Singapore government — and of the ways in which they are discursively framed suggests that the “foreign talent” unwittingly constitute a relative and negative solution to Singapore’s national identity problem.
International Student Mobilities and Voices in the Asia-Pacific, 2022
The COVID-19 pandemic, by causing disruptions to the temporalities and spatialities of internatio... more The COVID-19 pandemic, by causing disruptions to the temporalities and spatialities of international student mobility on a scale previously unimaginable, triggered heightened emotional reactions from international students. In this chapter, we examine and comment upon the emotional turmoil experienced by four international students amidst the pandemic as witnessed in their “letters to the coronavirus”. By unpacking and analyzing the narratives of these four differently situated international students, we shed light into how they have navigated—each in their own ways—educational desire and despondency, familial and social disconnectedness, and sometimes senses of self-doubt and disillusionment. We also draw attention to their coping strategies, in particular their exercise of emotional labor which involved heroic acts of resilience, hope, and optimism in the face of great adversity. Ultimately, we argue that both the emotional experiences of international students and their ways of emotional coping are topics worthy of greater attention in future research on international student mobility.
This chapter builds a conceptual framework for understanding the relationship between educational... more This chapter builds a conceptual framework for understanding the relationship between educational mobility (with a focus on international student mobility) and citizenship based on an exploration of existing literature and applies this framework to examine empirical findings. Conceptually, citizenship is conceived on two varied levels: narrowly as a nationally based legal status and more broadly as an informal sense of belonging and agency in transnational contexts. It is argued that citizenship in the narrower definition intersects with student mobility mainly around the issues of skill formation and population strategies under the framework of the nation-state. In contrast, educational mobility relates to the broader notion of citizenship through the concept of “global citizenship,” which in turn comprises two different emphases – the cultural and the political. Having set out such a conceptual scheme, the chapter uses two recent empirical studies of student mobilities within Asia – a case of Chinese “foreign talent” students in Singapore and a case of Indian medical students in China – to provide insights into how individuals experience the complex and sometimes conflicting relationships between international educational mobility and citizenship. To date, intra-Asia educational mobility has received limited research attention, and thus potentially offers a unique perspective on citizenship and education.
In this brief commentary, I sketch out some general contours of this nascent research field of in... more In this brief commentary, I sketch out some general contours of this nascent research field of international students in China, focusing on what we already know, what we don’t know yet, and what could be on the research agenda next.
Yang and Cheng underscore the locally embedded rationales that underpin both institutional and in... more Yang and Cheng underscore the locally embedded rationales that underpin both institutional and individual experiences of contemporary higher education (HE). Drawing on two empirically researched case studies, comprising of (1) student mobility between China, India, and Singapore and (2) transnationalization of HE involving cross-border provision of educational programs in Singapore, they reveal how uneven mobilities and transnational linkages continue to be shaped by global hierarchies of knowledge, prestige, and reputation. They further suggest that current preoccupations with fourth industrial revolution’s impact on HE is colored by technocratic and technophilic discourses that ignore ‘on the ground’ experiences of the disadvantaged and marginalized. As such, critical and culturalist perspective is both timely and essential to advance a more complex understanding of an increasingly mobile and transnationalized HE landscape.
This chapter approaches interculturality and issues of Orientalism and Occidentalism from an empi... more This chapter approaches interculturality and issues of Orientalism and Occidentalism from an empirical case of higher education student mobility. Specifically, it focuses on the experiences and discourses of a group of mainland Chinese undergraduate students funded to study at a Singaporean university by the Singapore government’s “foreign talent” scholarship programmes. Through ethnographically showing the ways in which these “PRC scholars” develop certain stereotypical imaginations about their local Singaporean peers—arguably an act of neo-Occidentalisation—this chapter illustrates that intercultural prejudice, essentialisation and misunderstanding occur in more complex contexts and directionalities than the simplistic scenario of the West orientalizing the East. This chapter further argues that, on the one hand, the Chinese students’ Occidentalisation of their Singaporean “other” should be interpreted in view of the former’ own educational and sociocultural backgrounds, and on the other hand, it should also be understood as a form of coping mechanism against the frustration and failure of their desires to develop meaningful contact and deeper communication with their local hosts.
This chapter examines the notion of ‘eliteness’ in the context of Chinese middle school education... more This chapter examines the notion of ‘eliteness’ in the context of Chinese middle school education. It is argued that, as opposed to the usual Western connotation of the term which often refers to class/socioeconomic privilege, elitism in the Chinese schooling context has been predominantly defined in academic terms, more or less founded on the meritocratic principle. With first-hand ethnographic materials, it is demonstrated how this academically elitist educational system is structured and how it in turn structures the students’ subjectivities. In addition, a recent trend in Chinese mainstream education – collaborative programmes with Western schools – is furthered discussed, and it is argued that a less progressive form of elitism – one that resembles more closely the way the term is understood in Western context – is infiltrating and transforming mainstream public Chinese schooling. (http://www.taylorandfrancis.com/books/details/9781138799615/)
The university today is in flux, and so is the nature of learning and what it means to be a unive... more The university today is in flux, and so is the nature of learning and what it means to be a university student. While terms like ‘neoliberalism’ and ‘globalisation’ have been spoken of so frequently these days – both in academic and non-academic contexts – that they border on becoming hollow clichés, not engaging with these concepts and their implications for higher education transformations worldwide would not only represent a loss of a critical intellectual opportunity but, more seriously still, also the potential risk of seeing the university and the student slip into shapes and forms that we might retrospectively find unsettling and undesirable. Learning under neoliberalism, edited by Hyatt, Shear and Wright (2015), and Figuration work, authored by Gritt B. Nielsen (2015), are two good examples of such critical engagement. In this essay, I take turns to review these two recently published works, summarising their scopes and notable contributions for readers who are interested in an anthropological/ethnographic take on critical higher education studies from the Euro-American perspective.
Singapore’s economy was historically tied to labour immigration. In fact, since the 1819 British ... more Singapore’s economy was historically tied to labour immigration. In fact, since the 1819 British colonisation of this then sparsely-populated Southeast Asian island, it was mainly the immigrants from the vicinity and later the wider region, notably China, who made up the original population of what was to become today one of the most prosperous nation-states in the world. Whether it be historical coincidence or necessity, the interesting fact is that today’s Singapore relies on immigrant labour no less than it did before. However, the current reliance grew out from a vastly different set of economic, social, and political circumstances compared to that of the colonial Singapore. This article looks at Singapore’s current dependence on foreign labour and the Singapore state’s foreign labour strategies and policies against the dual backgrounds of the citystate’s post-independence (1965) economic development and the concept of ‘new international division of labour’.
"Over the past decade the debate over multiculturalism has intensified in the Western context. Li... more "Over the past decade the debate over multiculturalism has intensified in the Western context. Liberal criticism of multiculturalism has achieved a limited degree of success whilst proponents continue to argue for multiculturalism based on ‘politics of difference’. In the British context, one recent representative figure has been Tariq Modood. In this article, I first argue that Modood’s multiculturalism is largely based on those same premises that have already been contested by earlier liberal critics, and thus adds little to the debate. Confronted with this deadlock, I present a critique of Modood’s multiculturalism, but from alternative angles of utilitarianism and moral consequentialism, based on which Modood’s theorem can in fact be seen as detrimental to the group whose interests he purports to champion: the British Muslims. Finally, I briefly consider a ‘(non)politics of indifference’ based on certain traits of British culture as a potential solution to the multicultural
conundrum."
凭借过去30年的改革开放,伴随着日益增长的财政收入,中国社会已进入快速转型之中。儒家的传统价值观和管理社会的思维模式正和涌入的外国文化和观念相碰撞。此外,人口结构的变化和社会发展的趋势也深深地影... more 凭借过去30年的改革开放,伴随着日益增长的财政收入,中国社会已进入快速转型之中。儒家的传统价值观和管理社会的思维模式正和涌入的外国文化和观念相碰撞。此外,人口结构的变化和社会发展的趋势也深深地影响中国人的价值观、社会行为和人际关系的架构。随着中国社会变得更加开放和多元化,不同群体之间的关系也越发紧张。政府和人民,穷人和富人之间的和谐互动,成为确保中国社会的稳定和未来发展的关键因素。通过对这个课题的探讨,学生能够了解:中国人口变化的影响;中国社会多元化及其挑战;中国社会转变的影响。
This course aims to provide the students with a comprehensive introduction to contemporary China ... more This course aims to provide the students with a comprehensive introduction to contemporary China from a sociological perspective. A wide range of topics will be discussed from a qualitative and descriptive approach, including China’s social, cultural and political institutions; social groupings and identities; and various aspects of the social structure. Documentary films will be used throughout the course to make for a lively learning experience, and students will form small groups to make short in-class presentations about specific topics pertaining to various aspects of contemporary China.
This eight-week tutorial course aims to introduce the student to an anthropological approach to t... more This eight-week tutorial course aims to introduce the student to an anthropological approach to the understanding of education through reading and discussing a number of monographs and articles. Anthropology is the study of human societies and cultural forms based on the method of participant observation—deeply immersing oneself in sociocultural settings to understand and write about (hence ‘ethnography’) them. The anthropology of education also treats education as a domain of culture and social organization, and asks after the social relations, power relations, cultural logics and ideas/values etc that explicitly or implicitly shape educational practices. Thus, this course emphasizes education as both an integral part to the larger society and its political and cultural systems and also as a socio-cultural domain in its own right. In the course readings, discussions, and writings, students are encouraged to keep on thinking in what ways educational practices, whether policy or pedagogy, are social, cultural and political phenomena. Pitched at an introductory level, the scope of the course aims to be broad, and covers both school education and higher education in various national and cultural contexts.
Located at the intersection of an attempt to experiment a discourse analytical approach to the st... more Located at the intersection of an attempt to experiment a discourse analytical approach to the study of trade unions and a curiosity about the identities of maritime unions, this study comparatively investigates the discursive identity constructions of three seafaring trade unions of distinct characters in India, which is one of the most important maritime manpower supply countries.
Discourse analysis, consisting mainly of analysing documentary materials and interview discoursal data, demonstrates that the three unions through their respective discursive practices construct drastically different organisational identities. Union A, the most established union with the longest history, constructs itself with a sense of superiority, by asserting its ‘only-ness’, ‘highness’ and seemingly sidelining its own ordinary members; Union B, the overtly Marxist union, is found to indeed construct itself along Marxist lines through the deployment of radical discourses that are critical of capital and government but sympathetic with labour; and Union C, the union exclusively for maritime officers, positions itself as an elite union above the other two ratings’ unions mainly through constructing the image of elite officers. The ideology and discourse of neoliberalism is found to transcend the identity schemas of Union A and C, and this is countered by the Marxism/anti-neoliberalismof Union B.
However, despite the divergence at the discursive level, through examining the actual practices of the three unions , significantly the disciplining of members for organisational survivals, it is found that there is in fact a practical convergence which seems to render the discursive identity constructions insignificant. Yet, instead of adopting a realist dismissal of discursivity, through identifying the ways even fundamental and transcending practicalities are ‘deeply pigmented’ by identity discourses, the thesis concludes that the relationship between discursivity and practice is deeply interlocking and constitutively imbricated; in other words, discourse permeates and percolates both the ideational and practical aspects of organisations so deeply that it is neither extricable nor compartmentalisable.
In this paper, I attempt to critically re-theorize mobility in order to go beyond the predominant... more In this paper, I attempt to critically re-theorize mobility in order to go beyond the predominant “rationalistic” assumption in mobility/migration research. The pivotal notion in this attempt is that of desire, which not only challenges the analytical calculus in relation to mobility (“cost-benefit”, “push-pull”, state policy making, etc.), but further raises questions about the place of the subject, understood as the author or origin of desires and actions (including, of course, mobility). Specifically, I pursue two routes. In the first, the distinctions Emile Benveniste (1971) made between the speaking subject, the subject of speech, and the spoken subject (see also Silverman, 1983) are transfigured into the analytics of mobility as the mobilizing subject, the subject of mobility, and the mobilized subject. Importantly, the last of these is to be distinguished from the mobile subject; to put it simply, my central question here is: “if mobility occurs empirically, whose desire is behind it?” Along the second route, inspired by the Deleuzian philosophy and politics of desire (Goodchild, 1996), the subject is decentered, and desire is the “plane of immanence”. The world’s social and material mobility infrastructures are seen as stratified desires—investments of desire in particular assemblages of machinic processes—that prevent desire’s autoproduction. Mobility, conceived from Deleuzian perspective as deterritorialization, then is an operation of repression, and the empirical challenge here is to identify or construct occasions for desire’s investment in immediate socio-economic territory, i.e. reterritorialization. In the paper, I tease out the intersections and divergences between these two theoretical routes.
Over the past two decades, the Singapore government’s “foreign talent” policy has resulted in rap... more Over the past two decades, the Singapore government’s “foreign talent” policy has resulted in rapid increases in the number of immigrants in the small and densely populated island-state, apparently causing considerable local discontent and anxiety. This paper offers a set of psychoanalytic interpretations of the “foreign talent” situation in Singapore by drawing eclectically and unorthodoxically on certain Lacanian/Žižekian theoretical insights. Among other points, it is argued that the recruitment of “foreign talent” could be interpreted as the deliberate production of lack; that both for the Singapore state facing the “big Other” of the global knowledge economy and for the native Singaporeans facing the “big Other” of their authoritarian state, “foreign talent” occupies the position of the objet petit a; and, furthermore, that the local population’s relation with the (Mainland Chinese) “foreign talent” is a mixture of desire, quasi-racist discrimination, and simultaneous identification and rivalry.
When the COVID-19 global pandemic struck in early 2020, governments around the world reacted by c... more When the COVID-19 global pandemic struck in early 2020, governments around the world reacted by closing international and national state borders, banning or restricting international and interstate travel, and resorting to enforced lockdowns and curfews. The economic and social impacts of these sudden restrictions in movements have been devastating with the lived experiences of everyone impacted. The employed became unemployed, industries whose entire business models are dependent on human interactions such as tourism, hospitality and entertainment collapsed, supply chains were disrupted, remote working and studying became the norm, families were separated from each other and professional and education opportunities were lost. People around the world frustrated by the impact the pandemic has had on them, and by the systemic and new inequalities that emerged, voiced their anger through street protests and in the online space with the pandemic fuelling both extreme right wing and left wing fervour. The rapid move to the online space to conduct almost every kind of human activity meant a complete reliance on the digital resulting in new kinds of inequalities and challenges. The rise of the digital in the time of forced immobilities has also created completely new opportunities born out of necessity. While mobility was once the life blood for human and individual necessity, progress and advancement, immobility has shown itself to create perils and privileges never really realised. For example, workers not required to be ‘on site’ are able to set up home offices to work from home. This special issue thus asks the questions: • How has immobility affected the once mobile? • What old and new inequalities have resulted as consequences of restricted or banned human movements? • What political movements are being created because of forced immobility? • How have communities responded to forced immobility and to the once mobile? • What are the impacts of immobility on migrants and migration? • What are the relationships between the digital and immobility?
CALL FOR PAPERS_CIES2019. This proposed panel seeks empirically-based/informed contributions arou... more CALL FOR PAPERS_CIES2019. This proposed panel seeks empirically-based/informed contributions around the notion of "socially sustainable educational mobility". For details, please see attached CFP.
This webinar examines the changing nature of international student mobility in the context of the... more This webinar examines the changing nature of international student mobility in the context of the ‘rebalancing’ of the global political economy, which has contributed to a steady increase in the number of international students in Asia, and the COVID-19 pandemic, which has disrupted migration globally. Through cases presented by the three speakers, it explores how these factors are reshaping mobility and the infrastructures that mediate it, to and within the region.
Journal of Studies in International Education, 2019
In recent years, scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) has proliferated across vari... more In recent years, scholarship on international student mobility (ISM) has proliferated across various social science disciplines. Of late, an interest in the ethics and politics of ISM seems to be emerging, as more scholars begin to consider critically questions about rights, responsibility, justice, equality, and so forth that inhere in the thorny relationships between ISM stakeholders. To date, however, these discussions remain largely scattered. Bringing together these scattered conversations in literature, this article outlines elements of a framework for (re)thinking the ethics and politics of ISM. The proposed framework identifies eight key ISM actors between whom various ethical and political relationships arise, where these relationships range from the social to the institutional. Furthermore, the framework discusses four sets of concepts from the literature deemed pertinent in thinking further about ISM ethics and politics. This proposed framework is aimed at stimulating fur...
It is a common perception that as long as people have the resources to access the internet, they ... more It is a common perception that as long as people have the resources to access the internet, they are in a position to make their voice heard. In reality, however, it is obvious that the vast majority of internet users are not really able to make themselves ‘visible’ and that their concerns receive little attention. Thus, it is more accurate to suggest that the internet offers ordinary people the potential of this power. Under what conditions can this potential be realized and what are the associated implications? Drawing upon the concept of symbolic power, and utilizing a recent example from China, this article addresses these often overlooked questions. It shows that it is not easy to materialize the potential of symbolic power on the internet. What the internet makes easy is to produce follow-up discourse once a powerful symbol has appeared. With the aid of supporters and their follow-up discourses, the symbol creates a symbolic network and takes roots in the society quickly and deeply. Finally, some thoughts on symbolic power in the context of China are also provided in the framework of discourse and social change.
This article examines a recent bizarre phenomenon on China’s Internet – the enormous popularity o... more This article examines a recent bizarre phenomenon on China’s Internet – the enormous popularity of a scatological Chinese neologism called diaosi, which literally translates as ‘dick string’. Seeing the diaosi phenomenon as a case of ‘infrapolitics’, a space of nuanced discursive practices mediating overt online politics and benign online entertainment, we analyse the ways in which an infrapolitical practice such as the diaosi phenomenon fuses political critique, cultural processes of identity construction and meaning-making as well as cyber ritual communion. Specifically, we interpret the infrapolitics of diaosi as simultaneously an instantiation of a prevalent scatological online culture that defies hypernormalization, a collective identity-making that seeks to create critical social solidarity and a practice and politics of cultural intimacy.
It is a common perception that as long as people have the resources to access the internet, they ... more It is a common perception that as long as people have the resources to access the internet, they are in a position to make their voice heard. In reality, however, it is obvious that the vast majority of internet users are not really able to make themselves ‘visible’ and that their concerns receive little attention. Thus, it is more accurate to suggest that the internet offers ordinary people the potential of this power. Under what conditions can this potential be realized and what are the associated implications? Drawing upon the concept of symbolic power, and utilizing a recent example from China, this article addresses these often overlooked questions. It shows that it is not easy to materialize the potential of symbolic power on the internet. What the internet makes easy is to produce follow-up discourse once a powerful symbol has appeared. With the aid of supporters and their follow-up discourses, the symbol creates a symbolic network and takes roots in the society quickly and d...
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pedagogical approach. However, existing research has largely
focused on inquiry learning in science education, neglecting fields
such as social studies (SS). In Singapore, inquiry learning in SS
received an impetus when a component called “Issue Investigation”
(II) was introduced into the compulsory secondary school syllabus of
2016. Given the recency of this introduction, there has been a lacuna
of empirical research. Addressing both these research gaps, this
paper presents qualitative findings from a preliminary study of
Singapore secondary school SS teachers’ perspectives and experiences
relating to II. Building on a recognition of teacher agency and
of the role teachers play in mediating curriculum and teaching/
learning, this paper focuses on how teachers interpret the nature of
inquiry learning in SS in the Singapore context. Findings suggest that
teachers held broadly two conceptions of II: some saw it as aimed
towards working out practical solutions to societal issues in the spirit
of participative citizenship; others treated it akin to a social science
inquiry process that fostered critical and analytical thinking. In addition,
the challenges teachers encountered in implementing and
enacting II, and their coping strategies are also briefly discussed.
players like nation-states are placed in hierarchical and centre-periphery relations. This paper focuses on the global field of international student mobility (ISM) and investigates China’s place in the field using an analytical framework consisting of three key categories of ‘capital’: economic, human, and symbolic. Drawing on existing scholarship and author’s first-hand ethnographic research, the paper examines the case of China as both a source and a destination of ISM, and analyses the flows and accrual of these three forms of capital as consequences of outbound and inbound student mobilities. Analyses show that in a global ISM field characterised by asymmetries and inequalities, China’s place is arguably semi-peripheral economically and symbolically. It is argued that this country-focused macro perspective complements existing ISM scholarship’s emphasis on social reproduction at individual and private levels.
mainstream Singapore schools. Though modest in terms of number, the presence of these teachers in the Singapore teaching workforce is arguably significant in other ways. To date, little research attention has been paid to this unique group of teachers. Based on a Ministry of Education-National Institute of Education (MOE-NIE) funded
study (OER 16/17 YPD), this article provides an overview of the characteristics and experiences of immigrant teachers in mainstream Singapore primary and secondary schools, with a focus on the practical challenges and value tensions they encounter in the professional settings. Findings show that immigrant teachers are generally well integrated into the Singapore education system notwithstanding certain challenges. Meanwhile, some teachers’ experiences of negotiating with value differences suggest that immigrant teachers may have the potential to add diversity to the education system, although this potential appears to be limited by the pragmatic imperative of professional integration.
Party-state’s ideological and discursive hegemony over society. This article documents a recent intervention into public discourse exercised by the Chinese state through appropriating and promoting a popular online catchphrase—“positive energy” (zheng nengliang). Analysing the “positive energy” phenomena using Laclau and Mouffe’s theory of hegemony and discourse, the authors argue that the relative effectiveness of this hegemonic intervention rests on the semantic versatility of “positive energy”, which enables “chains of equivalence” to be established between the label’s popular meanings, on the one hand, and its propagandist meanings, on the other.
policy – specifically, its recruitment of so-called foreign talent –
has caused a palpable rise in anti-immigrant sentiments and
discourses amongst natives of the city-state. Drawing on
Lacanian psychoanalysis, a perspective so far marginal in
migration research, this article offers a provocative reading of
Singapore’s desire for foreign talent and the local society’s
reception of these subjects. The article focuses on the ways in
which frustrated Singaporeans seem to find foreign talent
immigrants, especially those from mainland China, to be lacking
and undesirable. Lacan’s theories enable the bold interpretations
that: (1) foreign talent is not meant to fill a lack but precisely to
produce it and (2) foreign talent stands for Singapore’s and
Singaporeans’ unobtainable object of desire, which ultimately
signifies the gaps and inconsistencies in the symbolic order
confronting them. Moving away from existing conceptual
frameworks and theoretical approaches, the article illustrates
what a psychoanalytic lens of desire can contribute to migration
and mobility research.
which constitutes the institutional foundation for immigration to Singapore. The highly intertwined immigration and foreign labour policies are then explained along two fundamental underlying dimensions – economy and demography. The paper ends by looking at local grassroots society’s reactions to the influx of immigrants in recent times, and the ways in which the Singapore government has since tried to address such concerns.
pedagogical approach. However, existing research has largely
focused on inquiry learning in science education, neglecting fields
such as social studies (SS). In Singapore, inquiry learning in SS
received an impetus when a component called “Issue Investigation”
(II) was introduced into the compulsory secondary school syllabus of
2016. Given the recency of this introduction, there has been a lacuna
of empirical research. Addressing both these research gaps, this
paper presents qualitative findings from a preliminary study of
Singapore secondary school SS teachers’ perspectives and experiences
relating to II. Building on a recognition of teacher agency and
of the role teachers play in mediating curriculum and teaching/
learning, this paper focuses on how teachers interpret the nature of
inquiry learning in SS in the Singapore context. Findings suggest that
teachers held broadly two conceptions of II: some saw it as aimed
towards working out practical solutions to societal issues in the spirit
of participative citizenship; others treated it akin to a social science
inquiry process that fostered critical and analytical thinking. In addition,
the challenges teachers encountered in implementing and
enacting II, and their coping strategies are also briefly discussed.
players like nation-states are placed in hierarchical and centre-periphery relations. This paper focuses on the global field of international student mobility (ISM) and investigates China’s place in the field using an analytical framework consisting of three key categories of ‘capital’: economic, human, and symbolic. Drawing on existing scholarship and author’s first-hand ethnographic research, the paper examines the case of China as both a source and a destination of ISM, and analyses the flows and accrual of these three forms of capital as consequences of outbound and inbound student mobilities. Analyses show that in a global ISM field characterised by asymmetries and inequalities, China’s place is arguably semi-peripheral economically and symbolically. It is argued that this country-focused macro perspective complements existing ISM scholarship’s emphasis on social reproduction at individual and private levels.
mainstream Singapore schools. Though modest in terms of number, the presence of these teachers in the Singapore teaching workforce is arguably significant in other ways. To date, little research attention has been paid to this unique group of teachers. Based on a Ministry of Education-National Institute of Education (MOE-NIE) funded
study (OER 16/17 YPD), this article provides an overview of the characteristics and experiences of immigrant teachers in mainstream Singapore primary and secondary schools, with a focus on the practical challenges and value tensions they encounter in the professional settings. Findings show that immigrant teachers are generally well integrated into the Singapore education system notwithstanding certain challenges. Meanwhile, some teachers’ experiences of negotiating with value differences suggest that immigrant teachers may have the potential to add diversity to the education system, although this potential appears to be limited by the pragmatic imperative of professional integration.
Party-state’s ideological and discursive hegemony over society. This article documents a recent intervention into public discourse exercised by the Chinese state through appropriating and promoting a popular online catchphrase—“positive energy” (zheng nengliang). Analysing the “positive energy” phenomena using Laclau and Mouffe’s theory of hegemony and discourse, the authors argue that the relative effectiveness of this hegemonic intervention rests on the semantic versatility of “positive energy”, which enables “chains of equivalence” to be established between the label’s popular meanings, on the one hand, and its propagandist meanings, on the other.
policy – specifically, its recruitment of so-called foreign talent –
has caused a palpable rise in anti-immigrant sentiments and
discourses amongst natives of the city-state. Drawing on
Lacanian psychoanalysis, a perspective so far marginal in
migration research, this article offers a provocative reading of
Singapore’s desire for foreign talent and the local society’s
reception of these subjects. The article focuses on the ways in
which frustrated Singaporeans seem to find foreign talent
immigrants, especially those from mainland China, to be lacking
and undesirable. Lacan’s theories enable the bold interpretations
that: (1) foreign talent is not meant to fill a lack but precisely to
produce it and (2) foreign talent stands for Singapore’s and
Singaporeans’ unobtainable object of desire, which ultimately
signifies the gaps and inconsistencies in the symbolic order
confronting them. Moving away from existing conceptual
frameworks and theoretical approaches, the article illustrates
what a psychoanalytic lens of desire can contribute to migration
and mobility research.
which constitutes the institutional foundation for immigration to Singapore. The highly intertwined immigration and foreign labour policies are then explained along two fundamental underlying dimensions – economy and demography. The paper ends by looking at local grassroots society’s reactions to the influx of immigrants in recent times, and the ways in which the Singapore government has since tried to address such concerns.
deeper communication with their local hosts.
conundrum."
Discourse analysis, consisting mainly of analysing documentary materials and interview discoursal data, demonstrates that the three unions through their respective discursive practices construct drastically different organisational identities. Union A, the most established union with the longest history, constructs itself with a sense of superiority, by asserting its ‘only-ness’, ‘highness’ and seemingly sidelining its own ordinary members; Union B, the overtly Marxist union, is found to indeed construct itself along Marxist lines through the deployment of radical discourses that are critical of capital and government but sympathetic with labour; and Union C, the union exclusively for maritime officers, positions itself as an elite union above the other two ratings’ unions mainly through constructing the image of elite officers. The ideology and discourse of neoliberalism is found to transcend the identity schemas of Union A and C, and this is countered by the Marxism/anti-neoliberalismof Union B.
However, despite the divergence at the discursive level, through examining the actual practices of the three unions , significantly the disciplining of members for organisational survivals, it is found that there is in fact a practical convergence which seems to render the discursive identity constructions insignificant. Yet, instead of adopting a realist dismissal of discursivity, through identifying the ways even fundamental and transcending practicalities are ‘deeply pigmented’ by identity discourses, the thesis concludes that the relationship between discursivity and practice is deeply interlocking and constitutively imbricated; in other words, discourse permeates and percolates both the ideational and practical aspects of organisations so deeply that it is neither extricable nor compartmentalisable.
This special issue thus asks the questions:
• How has immobility affected the once mobile?
• What old and new inequalities have resulted as consequences of
restricted or banned human movements?
• What political movements are being created because of
forced immobility?
• How have communities responded to forced immobility and to
the once mobile?
• What are the impacts of immobility on migrants and migration?
• What are the relationships between the digital and immobility?