LITTLE MANILA : THE PRODUCTION AND REPRODUCTION OF SOCIAL SPACES IN SINGAPORE

Abstract

In the media and academic discourses, Little Manila has always been presented as a "Filipino worker enclave" highlighting its general composition of domestic helpers, construction and manual laborers. This paper questions such an assumption and argues that we should look further this narrow definition and explore the dynamics inside this "cultural and ethnic enclave". This paper suggests that there exists two Little Manilas, one viewed and constructed from the dominant majority where this image of a "worker enclave" dominates and the other, often ignored one, based from the Filipinos' perspective. It is this second meaning which we focus on and examine in this paper.