Chapter 9: The Chinese Community in Singapore - Culture, Identity, and Connections
Lim Tai Wei’s chapter is about the “soft” side of Singapore’s Chinese community. Not the money, not the politics, not the diplomatic handshakes. Instead, he looks at culture, food, education, traditions, and identity. The stuff that shapes how a community actually lives day to day.
Here’s the thing about Singapore’s Chinese community. It’s not one thing. It’s layers on top of layers, built up by waves of migration over more than a century. And each wave changed the flavor of what “Chinese in Singapore” means.
Three Things to Know First
Lim starts with three key points that frame everything else in the chapter.
First, Singapore is multicultural. Being Chinese is one thread in a larger Singaporean identity, especially for anyone born after independence in 1965. You’re Singaporean first, Chinese second.
Second, Singapore is a migrant society. The Chinese community arrived in waves. Coolies from southern China in the 1800s. Merchants and traders. Women from Guangdong who came to work as maids and nannies, sworn to stay single. Each wave settled in, adapted, and mixed with what was already there.
Third, all that mixing created something new. Not Chinese, not Malay, not British. Something uniquely Singaporean. A hybrid culture that borrows from everywhere and belongs to the island.
The Early Arrivals and the Big Bosses
The first big waves of Chinese migrants were laborers. Overcrowded rooms, bad sanitation, rat infestations, secret societies. It was rough.
But some people rose out of that. Lim highlights figures like Lim Nee Soon, a rubber and pineapple plantation owner who represented the Teochew community. Or Tan Kah Kee, a rubber trader and philanthropist who became a symbol of overseas Chinese identity.
These wealthy leaders didn’t just build businesses. They got politically active. Singapore became a base for fundraising to support Sun Yat-sen’s revolution against the Qing dynasty.
The Peranakans: The Original Hybrid Culture
One of the most interesting parts of this chapter is about the Peranakans, also called Straits-born Chinese. These were Chinese who had been in Southeast Asia so long that they intermarried with locals and created their own culture.
Peranakan culture is a mix. As one museum exhibit put it, their identity “expressed itself in speech (Malay), food (Chinese and Malay mix), dress (of Malay inspiration) and material culture (Chinese architecture and household utensils given a local inflection).”
Some Peranakans moved easily between the Straits-born world and the broader Chinese community. Dr Lim Boon Keng, the first Chinese Queen’s scholar from colonial Singapore, was Peranakan but deeply versed in Chinese culture. That kind of bridge-building is a recurring theme in Singapore’s story.
After Independence: Language and Unity
When Singapore became independent in 1965, things changed fast. Modern shipping made the old coolie labor obsolete. Workers moved into service jobs and skilled trades as Singapore industrialized.
Then in 1979, the government launched the Speak Mandarin Campaign. This was a big deal. Singapore’s Chinese population spoke different dialects: Cantonese, Teochew, Hokkien, Hainanese. They didn’t always understand each other. Mandarin became the common language. It unified the dialect groups and had a side benefit: it made it easier for Singaporeans to do business with Taiwan and mainland China after Deng Xiaoping’s reforms.
New Migrants in the 21st Century
The chapter spends a lot of time on contemporary Chinese migration. By 2010, mainland Chinese migrants made up almost 9% of the total population. A 2012 survey ranked Singapore as the third most popular destination for wealthy Chinese emigrants, right after North America. The Wall Street Journal summed up the appeal: it’s safe, orderly, wages are higher, and it already has a Chinese majority so there’s cultural familiarity.
But new migration created tension. The government responded by setting up a National Integration Council and a Community Integration Fund to sponsor projects that help new migrants fit in. PRC nationals also started their own clubs, like the Tian Fu Club for people from Sichuan.
Deputy PM Teo Chee Hean acknowledged the friction but urged people not to let anti-foreigner sentiment undo decades of cohesion-building. Jim Rogers put it bluntly: nearly everyone in Singapore is an immigrant or the family of one. By 2012, 30% of Singaporean marriages were between a local and a foreigner, up from 23% in 2002.
Nanyang University: A Community Achievement
One major “soft” contribution was education. The Chinese community set up Nanyang University (Nantah), the first Chinese-medium university in Singapore. PM Lee Kuan Yew visited twice. Queen Elizabeth toured the campus in 1972. Nobel laureate Yang Chen Ning served as external examiner. By 1978 it moved to bilingual instruction, and in 1980 it merged with the University of Singapore to become NUS. Its alumni records eventually went to Nanyang Technological University, now one of the top-ranked universities in the world.
Chinatown: Not Just for Tourists
Chinatown is Singapore’s largest conserved historic district. It’s actually four areas combined: Telok Ayer from the 1820s, Kreta Ayer from the 1830s, Tanjong Pagar from the 1880s, and Bukit Pasoh from the 1920s.
It used to be the heart of the Chinese community. Now it’s a mix of heritage tourism and living community, shaped by new migrants. A CNN article from 2010 noted how southern dialects like Cantonese, Hokkien, and Teochew were giving way to mainland Mandarin as new migrants opened shops and restaurants. One local resident predicted that “the Singapore Chinatown of the future will take on a wider representation of what makes Chinese people Chinese.”
Ancestral Worship: Continuity Across Generations
Lim gives an interesting section on ancestral worship traditions. For older Singaporeans, tomb-sweeping pilgrimages connect them to their roots. Some even travel to ancestral hometowns in China. Younger generations do it less. But the practices continue locally. Cemeteries used to be organized by dialect group and clan. Now, because of limited space, Singapore uses multiracial multistorey columbaria.
There’s a great detail about Tiong Bahru. “Tiong” in Hokkien means “to pass away.” The area used to be a Hokkien cemetery. When the graves were removed, the British built art deco public housing there. Today it’s a trendy bohemian neighborhood where you can find Taoist altars inside streamline moderne apartments. That kind of layering is very Singapore.
Food: Where Culture Really Lives
If there’s one area where Chinese cultural influence is most visible and most loved, it’s food.
The original southern cuisines are everywhere: Cantonese dim sum, Teochew seafood, Hokkien noodles. But Singapore reinvented them. Hainanese chicken rice, kaya toast, lo hei (the tossed salad you eat at Chinese New Year while shouting “Huat Ah!” for prosperity) are all local creations. They carry the name of Chinese origins but were actually invented in Singapore.
New migrants keep adding to the menu. North-eastern Chinese dishes, Hong Kong’s cha chaan teng cafes, Taiwanese night market snacks. Food is the most honest barometer of how cosmopolitan Singapore’s Chinese community has become.
The Bigger Picture
Lim ends on a balanced note. Not everyone is happy about immigration. But as one report pointed out, in multicultural Singapore, the line between “native” and “immigrant” is blurry. The majority Chinese are themselves descendants of immigrants from China.
The chapter’s argument is simple: Singapore has always been a migrant society, and the Chinese community has always been at the center of that story. Each wave brings something new while the older layers remain. The result is a culture that’s Chinese in origin but Singaporean in character, constantly evolving as new people arrive and old traditions adapt.
That ongoing mixing is what makes Singapore’s Chinese community different from Chinese communities anywhere else in the world.
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