Identity

The bedroom of Hock Gwee Thian’s house in Singapore: Inside an intricately designed Peranakan home

A unique and vibrant culture has taken root in the bustling streets of Singapore, whose members are known as Peranakans. The term ‘peranakan’ originates from the Malay word ‘anak,’ meaning child and has come to signify being locally born.1 Yet it crucial to mention the freighted task of defining the term ‘peranakan,’ for their shifting political and cultural dynamics that have come to characterise this community has led to a rich and multifaceted history. In fact, in Southeast Asia there are Peranakan Indians who are Hindu and called Chitty Melaka, as well as Peranakan Indian Muslims called Jawi Pekan, in addition to Eurasian Peranakans and Peranakan Chinese, to name a few.

However, this discussion will focus on the Chinese Peranakans in Singapore. The history of the Chinese Peranakans in Singapore traces back to the arrival of traders from the southern province of China, who settled in the Malay Archipelago. Not only did they establish a trade network, but they married local Malay women. This intermarriage gave rise to a unique blend of cultural practices, traditions and languages.2 After Sir Stamford Raffles signed a treaty in 1834 which led to the establishment of trading posts in Singapore, these traders migrated to Singapore and left an indelible mark on its architectural landscape. The shophouses, bungalows, and mansions they established in Singapore reflected the rich tapestry of cultures and traditions in which the Peranakan Chinese community engaged with throughout their history.3

Indeed, one way to explore the rich history of the Chinese Peranakan community is by taking a closer look at their homes, which also helps reflect a relationship between identity, space and architecture. The Peranakan home is a tangible symbol of the cultural fusion that defines Singapore. These homes are often built with a blend of Chinese, Malay and European architectural influences, which reflect the multicultural fabric of Singapore and the peaceful coexistence of various ethnic and cultural groups. However, there is no architectural style that can be exclusively attributed to the Peranakan Chinese, like the Peranakan people themselves, housing developed with an array of variations each reflecting a specific place, time and economic circumstance in which it was created. Therefore, this discussion will look at the memoir of William Gwee Thian Hock’s whose narration provides an illustration on how identity was forged in their living space. Yet, as one steps into the world of the Peranakan home, it is a complicated space, thus this discussion will also focus solely on the bedroom as an example of how space and identity were harmoniously woven together.

 

Figure 1. An extraordinary presentation of a bridal suite in a Peranakan home.4

William Gween Thian Hock’s memoir, A Nyonya Mosaic, is set in Singapore in 1910 and narrates the childhood of his Nyonya mother through her own eyes. Throughout there are scenes of happy celebrations, as well as disease and death. Hock’s scenes of a wedding are particularly intricate and colourful, and does well to shed life on the lived experiences in these homes. Moreover, figure 1 helps capture the narrative in Hock’s memoir by presenting a reconstructed Chinese Peranakan bedroom, arranged to recreate the ambiance of a wedding day for the bride and groom. Together, these two sources illustrate a contact zone where a diverse array of cultures intersect and interact.

As stated in Hock’s memoir, ‘the bridal room was on of the focal points’ and as figure 1 illustrates significant preparation and thought had gone into its spatial layout.5. Figure 1 is a striking statement to the intricate beauty that characterises a Chinese Peranakan bedroom. Within this frame, one can witness a unique cultural fusion of Chinese, Malay and European traditions blending together to create a functional space. For example, the two canopy beds display European influence, whereas its ornate carvings are quintessentially Chinese.

Hock notes ‘I was rather taken aback when few days before [the wedding] I discovered that the beautifully carved wooden ranjang loskan would bot be used for the wedding. I have always associated this bed with weddings and there were even people who knew it by the name of ranjang kahwen (wedding bed). It seemed that it was no longer fashionable to use this ornate bed, and in its place, a Victorian four-poster brass bed had been chosen … the embroidered curtain around it, the embroidered bedsheet, the embroidered pillowcases and all thh other trimmings that festooned the bed had transformed it into a most charming wedding bed.’6

Indeed, in figure 1 on closer inspection ornate wood carvings are present and are quintessentially Chinese. For example, one can locate auspicious motifs such as dragons, phoenixes, magpies and mandarin ducks which signify harmony between the marrying couple. Furthermore, another interesting aspect of this bridal suite is the carpet. These rich tapestry-like carpets are referred to as ‘Irish carpets,’ which were produced in factories owned by Scottish textile manufactures in Ireland. They are made of velvet and have a smooth finish with saturated colours. The colours are exuberant, replicating the hues of tropical flowers that are important to Chinese culture.7 This spatial arrangement highlights their diverse identity.

It is interesting to note Hock’s statement that, ‘it seems so unfortunate that a wedding so oriental in flavour should suddenly find a western touch in it just for the pride of being “modernised”‘8 Hock’s statement reflects the disappointment felt in witnessing the groom’s attire change to a western-style lounge suit. But as stated in Elizabeth LaCouture’s influential work Dwelling in the World: Family, House and Home in Tianjin China, 1860-1960, this was a symbol of modernity. For individuals living in a Chinese urban home ‘modernity was not defined through Western and Chinese temporalities and cultures. To be modern meant to be comfortable dwelling in both of these worlds.’9 This perspective is crucial as it shows how such a community navigated their identities in a changing world. Clearly, they drew from their cultural heritage while incorporating aspects of Western culture, not as a contradiction, but as a means of adapting to the complexities of modern, cosmopolitan life.

This brief exploration of a traditional Peranakan wedding and the Peranakan bedroom effectively highlights how this community accepted, adopted and assimilated diverse cultures to form a cosmopolitan community of their own, based on their understanding of the world and conceptions of the modern.

  1. David HJ Neo, Sheau-Shi Ngo, Jenny Gek Koon Heng, ‘Popular imaginary and cultural constructions of the Nonya in Peranakan Chinese culture of the Straits Settlements,’ Ethnicities, 20:1 (2020), p.25. [↩]
  2. Patricia Ann Hardwick, ‘”Neither Fish nor Fowl”: Constructing Peranakan Identity in Colonial and Post-colonial Singapore,’ Folklore Forum, 38:1 (2008), p. 37. [↩]
  3. Roland G., Knapp, Peranakan Chinese home: Art and culture in daily life (2017), p.6. [↩]
  4. Figure 1, ‘Image of a reconstructed Peranakan bridal suite,’ in Roland G., Knapp, Peranakan Chinese home: Art and culture in daily life (2017), p.142. [↩]
  5. William Gwee Thian Hock, A Nyonya Mosaic: Memoirs of a Peranakan Childhood, (2013), p. 76. [↩]
  6.   Hock, A Nyonya Mosaic, p. 78. [↩]
  7. Knapp, Peranakan Chinese home, p.144.  [↩]
  8. Hock, A Nyonya Mosaic, p. 104. [↩]
  9. Elizabeth LaCouture, Dwelling in the World: Family, House and Home in Tianjin China, 1860-1960, (New York, 2021), p. 153. [↩]

Building on Tradition: From Kampong to High-Rise, the ‘tropical city’ and its manifestation in Singapore

The elusive topic of tropicality has pervaded conversations surrounding the design and function of Singaporean architecture since the imposition of Western architectural styles and layouts following the ratification of the Treaty of Singapore in 1819. This article will argue that the categorisation of Singapore as a ‘tropical city’ comprised of ‘tropical architecture’ is the product of colonial power that was integrated into the production of knowledge about the built environment and is therefore inherently responsible for the continuation of discourses that associate Southeast East cities as the ‘other’ to those in Western, temperate climates.1 However, as architects like Mr Tay Kheng Soon illustrate the term ‘tropical city’ has also served as a reclamation of Singaporean independence and the celebration of the city’s culture and agency through a selective incorporation of European modernity.2 This article analyses a Straits Times interview conducted in 1989 by Patrick Daniel and Caroline Chan of the Singaporean architect Mr Tay Kheng Soon who applied his vision of the tropical city to Singapore to detach the independent city-state from the epistemic conquest of British hegemony.3

Figure 1: Article in The Straits Times, “Concept for future city: Living in a work of art”.4

Tay envisioned an “intelligent tropical city” and argued that a tropical city could emancipate Singaporeans from the economic dominance of Britain in the region.5 He aimed to re-politicise urban planning by separating the city from the “mono-cultural compactness” of colonial offices and housing by designing Singapore to be a “work of art” and a compact city capable of “increasing business opportunities” and “providing a medium for intense, social, cultural and economic exchange.6 By using the tropical city concept, Tay identifies that the architectural aesthetics of tropicality were attached to colonial and post-colonial power relations and seeks to separate Singapore from these streams of power. By designing a city which prioritises “poly-cultural compactness”  to form a  “support structure for their [people’s] activities… and yet contribute to the cooling of the city as a whole” he illustrated that colonial power was ingrained in the construction of Tropicality. Equally, he highlights that Signporean architects had the necessary tools to begin deconstructing this discourse.7

The introduction of ‘tropical architecture’ established a sphere of knowledge which ran through Imperial networks during the colonisation of Singapore and was utilised by the Colonial Office to ‘other’ Southeast Asian architecture in opposition to temperate architecture.8 The term tropical architecture prioritises the climate in its terminology whereas temperate architecture is categorised by regional geographic zones or nations, imposing a homogenous staticity onto Singaporean urban development.9 Tropicalisation involved the surface-level modification of Western governmentalities to tropical conditions rather than the necessary transformation.10 Tay emphasises that in the 1980s tropicality was not considered “another symbol of modernity” and he asserted that the “big bland blocks” of highrises that covered the city were “still a sign of the captive mind”.11 Indeed, the “captive mind” he refers to in the Straits Times interview illustrates the power-knowledge concept and the overt control colonial powers had over conceptions of tropical architecture and their subsequent limitation of the built environment to benefit colonial wealth and power.12  The perpetuation of this reductive understanding of the city’s needs justified the colonial administration’s choice to prioritise Singapore’s sanitation and fears of reassuring contamination issues, rather than holistically solving civic issues through the optimisation of the built environment.13

Tay’s Straits Times interview and his successive proposals for tropical urbanism began to combat the circulation of British colonial networks and their epistemic conquest over the focal point of Singapore’s housing strategies by proposing socio-economic structural problems were addressed which would in turn resolve sanitation issues.14 By proposing that the tropical city is defined by its interconnectedness, Tay defined the tropical city by its, “combination of tropical rain forest with the city by increasing transpiration”.15 To establish Singaporean independence from colonial power relations Tay designed a climate-responsive built environment, working in favour of its citizens.16 His holistic approach to the city and its economy assimilated tropical architecture into the tropical climate rather than adopting temperate architectural models that exacerbate the urban heat island effect.17 As Chang explains, the architectural aesthetics of tropicality are inseparably bound to colonial and postcolonial power relations and the implementation of Western hegemony through ideals of social order and the application of policy.18 These concepts are closely linked to the sanitisation movement and the colonial government’s preoccupation with contamination, these fears greatly influenced the structure and organisation of Singapore’s housing and the developments that occurred beyond the European socio-spatial enclaves of the city.19

Tay’s reclamation of the term ‘tropical city’ reflects the complex relationship between language and the built environment in Singapore’s postcolonial legacy. Alongside other regional architects, Tay produced a deviating discourse on tropical architecture that challenged the cultural and economic supremacy of the West by proposing a multi-tiered city. By prioritising the city’s functionality, his urban planning methods and vision were ahead of their time and later were used to distinguish Singaporean identity as heterogonous and separate from Western notions of tropicality.

  1. Chang Jiat-Hwee, A Geneology of Tropical Architecture: Colonial Networks, Nature and Technoscience (New York, 2016), p.7. [↩]
  2. Chang, A Geneology of Tropical Architecture, p.1. [↩]
  3. Chang Jiat-Hwee, “Deviating Discourse: Tay Keng Soon and the Architecture of Postcolonial Development in Tropical Asia”, The Journal of Architectural Education, 63:2 (2010): 153. [↩]
  4.  Kheng Soon Tay, “Concept for the future city: Living in a work of art”, The Straits Times, Singapore, 8th May 1989, p.16 Accessed at: https://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/newspapers/digitised/article/straitstimes19890508-1.2.49.2 (Accessed 24/10/2023) [↩]
  5.  Kheng Soon, “Concept for the future city: Living in a work of art”. [↩]
  6. Ibid. [↩]
  7. Ibid. [↩]
  8. Chang, A Geneology of Tropical Architecture, p.5 [↩]
  9. Ibid, p.6 [↩]
  10. Chang Jiat-Kwee, “Tropicalizing Planning, Sanitation, Housing and Technologies of Improvement in Colonial Singapore, 1907-1942”, in Robert Pecham and David Pomfret (eds.) Imperial Contagions: Medicine, Hygiene and Cultures of Planning in Asia, ( Hong Kong, 2013), p.41. [↩]
  11. Kheng Soon, “Concept for the future city: living in a work of art”.  [↩]
  12. Chang, A Geneology of Tropical Architecture, p.6. [↩]
  13. Chang, “Tropicalizing Planning, Sanitation, Housing and Technologies”, p.37. [↩]
  14. Chang, “Deviating Discourse”: 154. [↩]
  15. Kheng Soon, “Concept for the future city: living in a work of art”. [↩]
  16. Ibid. [↩]
  17. Chang, “Deviating Discourse”: 157. [↩]
  18. Chang, A Geneology of Tropical Architecture, p.2. [↩]
  19. Chang, “Tropicalizing Planning, Sanitation, Housing and Technologies”, p.38. [↩]

Malacca: Internal Diversity and the Homogenisation of the Malayan National Identity

The first chapter of Reading Bangkok explores the historical origins of Bangkok from the fall of the Ayutthaya kingdom towards the early 20th century. Ross King’s primary argument lays upon the idea that Bangkok (and by extension, Siam) holds a dualistic identity, a surface level (masked) identity and an internal identity.[1] Bangkok’s ethno-religious diversity of Buddhist Thai, Lao, Khmer, Muslim Patani, Christian-Portuguese and Chinese serve the foundation of Bangkok’s internal identity, not predicated on any singular ethno-religious background. While on the surface, rigid and homogeneous notions of a singular ‘Siamese’ identity upheld barriers to distinguish the local from the foreign in the name of European-inspired ‘modernity’.

I would argue that this phenomenon of masking diversity is evident in other cities of Southeast Asia, namely Malacca (and, by extension, Malaysia). The colonial administration encouraged the construction of separate and rigid ethno-religious identities, providing them the agency to define the parameters of a grand ‘Malayan’ identity.

Sin Yee Koh highlights that Malaysia’s ethno-religious diversity has been masked by a rigid Malay-centric vision of Malaysian identity.[2] Unlike Siam, this surface-level identity has not been applied through local, elite-driven movements towards ‘modernity’ but by British-driven efforts to homogenise Malaysia’s diverse population under an anglo-centric understanding of ‘Malayan identity’.

This is exemplified in Thomas Newbold’s 1839 Political and Statistical account of British Settlements in the Straits of Malacca, namely, Malacca. Newbold acknowledges Malacca’s ethno-religious diversity, however, it appears that his census has inconsistencies with broadly constructed identities that appear to segregate and simplify the city’s population. Newbold incorporates the diverse peninsular Malay, Acehnese, Moluccan and Bugi population under a broad Malay category.[3] But at the same time, he produces a specific ‘Javanese’ category despite its similar origins to the broadly defined ‘Malay’ ethnic group.[4] Additionally, Newbold includes both broad religious and ethnic groups within his census to categorise people of unidentifiable or fluid backgrounds. Those with South-Asian ancestry that do not fit under the ‘Chuliah’ or ‘Bengali’ categories were identified as ‘Hindoo’.[5] Those who were not identified as ‘European’ but followers of the Christian faith (no matter what ethnic group) fit under the broad Christian category.[6]

This census highlights two ideas. Firstly, the colonial administration failed to provide agency to Malacca’s internal diversity and created broad categories that compartmentalised the city’s population for easier administration. Secondly, the desire for simplification highlights a highly rigid notion of identity, one that disregards demographic fluidity for concretely define categories of identification.

The colonial administration was arguably not blind towards Malacca’s internal diversity as Newbold does acknowledge local Eurasian populations. However, this fluidity is disregarded as a form of ‘impurity’. The Portuguese-descent population, which have resided in Malacca for 400 years and are highly inter-mixed with the peninsular Malay and Chinese populations, are regarded as ‘degenerated’ and ‘impoverished’.[7] However, the Dutch population are deemed ‘respectable’ due to their ‘pure’ lineage to elite officers of the previous Dutch colonial government in Malacca.[8]

As the colonial administration engaged in the segregation of Malacca’s demographic diversity, this provided ample agency for the administration to construct an understanding of a broader ‘Malayan’ identity. Newbold creates a dichotomous relationship between the ‘native’ and the ‘foreigner’, with the peninsular Malay population labelled as ‘native’ and all other populations seen as ‘foreign’.[9] This constructed identity removes agency from the domestic population and provides power to the colonial administration to define Malayan identity for themselves.

Koh’s analysis supports this as the colonial administration’s assertion of what it meant to be ‘native’ constructed a national identity that emphasised the importance of the ‘native’ Malay over the ‘foreign’ Chinese and Indian population.[10] Much like in Siam, a homogenous identity masked Malaya’s internal demographic diversity under rigid definitions of race and religion, emphasising the indigenuity of a native ‘Malay’ population as the primary representation of Malayan identity. The ‘mask’ of the ‘native’ dominated nationalist politics and arguably dominates local Malaysian politics today.

 

Bibliography:

Primary Source:

Newbold, Thomas John, Political and Statistical account of the British Settlements in the Straits of Malacca, viz. Pinang, Malacca and Singapore; with a History of the Malayan States on the Peninsula of Malacca, vol. 1. (London, 1839).

Secondary Sources:

King, Ross, Reading Bangkok (Hawaii, 2011).

Koh, Sin Yee, Race, Education and Citizenship: Mobile Malaysians, British Colonial Legacies, and a Culture of Migration (New York, 2017).

[1] Ross King, Reading Bangkok (Hawaii, 2011), p. 1.
[2] Sin Yee Koh, Race, Education and Citizenship: Mobile Malaysians, British Colonial Legacies, and a Culture of Migration (New York, 2017), pp. 88-89.
[3] Thomas John Newbold, Political and Statistical account of the British Settlements in the Straits of Malacca, viz. Pinang, Malacca, and Singapore; with a History of the Malayan States on the Peninsula of Malacca, vol. 1. (London, 1839), p. 136.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Ibid., pp. 136-137.
[6] Ibid.
[7] Ibid., p. 138.
[8] Ibid., pp. 137-138.
[9] Ibid., p. 44.
[10] Koh, Mobile Malaysians, pp. 88-89.

Defining National Identity and Claiming Modernity: The United States Consulate, Yokohama.

 The United States Consulate, Yokohama United States Consulate Text

The Ansei Treaties of 1858 ended Japan’s national exclusion through the development of treaty ports such as Yokohama, involving the country in an international trade network dependent on foreign accommodations and concessions. It has been suggested that the treaty ports became a “place of intersection for modern imperialism”. [1]  This is evidenced in The Far East publication’s article on the United States Consulate, which demonstrates a conflict between America’s cultural assumptions of its Japanese hosts and the necessity for a productive coexistence.[2]

The article places significance on the location and arrangement of the American Consulate buildings, implying that the physical landscape of the Treaty Ports acted as an authoritative stamp of foreign power, despite the lack of formal territorial possession. It states: “The building is directly opposite the Saibansho” and lists the varying functions of the Consulate itself. The spatial proximity of the buildings creates an impression of American dominance, where the Consulate acted as the capital of success. Indeed, the presence of the Consul’s private residence alongside national corporations, such as the US post office, implies that the infiltration of the US into Yokohama occurred on both a public and private level. Seemingly, traditional boundaries between administrative, commercial and domestic space were largely discarded in favour of the pervasion of a ‘total’ American identity. Social measures such as the importation of American food and the introduction of baseball were important accompaniments to this policy of cultural distinction from the Japanese.[3]

Despite this, the ensuing discussion of commerce in Yokohama presents a conflict between the retention of an American national identity and the necessity for interaction with Japanese industry. The writer’s commending tone toward American commercial success is heightened by the deliberate contrast with Japanese efforts of industrialisation. The writer suggests that the local community comprised of “loafers”, who were better off shipped across to America where they could experience the true meaning of modernity. This implies that American inhabitants of Yokohama subscribed to stereotypes that the Japanese were “essentially feeble” and that foreigners had a “moral imperative” to improve the situation of this isolated outpost.[4] Emphasis of “increased business” as a result of the Pacific Mail Company steamers suggests that the treaty port of Yokohama fostered solely American ambitions which dragged Japan into an international modernity, both physically and psychologically.

This description devalues The Far East’s article as a measured assessment of industrial development in the 19th century. Instead, it suggests that the concept of ‘modernity’ which was fostered during this time was a Western mediated phenomenon, rather than a progression which occurred on Japanese soil. It is true that Japan’s trade increased after foreign intervention- by the end of the twentieth century, Japan and China together supplied one third of the world’s silk.[5]  However, in contradiction, there was never one obsolete power in Yokohama. The intersection of West and East created a territorially ambiguous space where both powers met through commercial necessity. Cultural assumptions of Japanese inadequacy still prevailed but were reshaped and overridden by the necessity for interaction. Japan retained autonomy over the division of space in the port, where institutions were “lined up” and jockeying for valuable access to the water.[6] The derogatory description of the local community suggests that American survival depended on interactions with local Japanese as physical isolation was both impossible and detrimental. Imports from the West have been described as “the first step toward prosperity” for new Meiji Imperialism. The state propagated an image of aspirational Japan who acted as a facilitator of international trade, inserting themselves into the narrative of modernity which the Far East implies was exclusively ‘Western’.[7] Consequently, whilst the American presence was notable in Yokohama, it did not exist without interdependence on the locals, which stimulated a search for national identity on both parts. This made the treaty ports a unique setting, where national identities were forged and redefined in an environment of divergence.

 

 

Bibliography

Primary Source

Anglin, James, “The United States Consulate”, The Far East, Vol.1, No.18, (Yokohama February 1871), pp.5-6.

Secondary Sources

Ambaras, David, Japan’s Imperial Underworlds: Intimate Encounters at the Borders of Empire, (Cambridge 2018).

Bytheway, J, “The Arrival of the Modern West in Yokohama: Images of the Japanese Experience 1859-1899”, in Donna Brunero and Stephanie Villalta Puig, Life in Treaty Port China and Japan, (Singapore 2018), pp.246-267.

Hoare, James, The Japanese Treaty Ports 1868-1899: A Study of the Foreign Settlements, (London 1970).

Roden, Donald, “Baseball and the Quest for National Dignity in Meiji Japan.” The American Historical Review, vol. 85, no. 3, (Oxford 1980), pp. 511–534.

Taylor, Jeremy, “The Bund: Littoral Space of Empire in the Treaty Ports of East Asia”, Social History, Vol. 27, No.2, (2002), pp. 125-142.

Xu, Yingnan, “Industrialization and the Chinese Hand-Reeled Silk Industry (1880-1930)”, Penn History Review, Vol. 19, No.1, (Pennsylvania 2012), pp.27-46.

 

 

[1] David Ambaras, Japan’s Imperial Underworlds: Intimate Encounters at the Borders of Empire, (Cambridge 2018), p.71.

[2] James Anglin, “The United States Consulate”, The Far East, Vol.1, No.18, (Yokohama February 1871), pp.5-6.

[3] James Hoare, The Japanese Treaty Ports 1868-1899: A Study of the Foreign Settlements, (London 1970), p.111. Donald Roden, “Baseball and the Quest for National Dignity in Meiji Japan”, The American Historical Review, vol. 85, no. 3, (Oxford 1980), p.512.

[4] Roden, “Baseball and the Quest for National Dignity”, p.152.

[5] Yingnan Xu, “Industrialization and the Chinese Hand-Reeled Silk Industry (1880-1930)”, Penn History Review, Vol. 19, No.1, (Pennsylvania 2012), p.31.

[6] Jeremy Taylor, “The Bund: Littoral Space of Empire in the Treaty Ports of East Asia”, Social History, Vol. 27, No.2, (2002), p.134.

[7] J. Bytheway, “The Arrival of the Modern West in Yokohama: Images of the Japanese Experience 1859-1899”, in Donna Brunero and Stephanie Villalta Puig, Life in Treaty Port China and Japan, (Singapore 2018), p.256.