EVALUATING ALTERNATIVE HISTORIES : CHINESE MIDDLE SCHOOL STUDENT MOVEMENTS AND LEFTIST LEADERS IN PRE-INDEPENDENCE SINGAPORE

Abstract

In recent years, there has been a rise in alternative views pertaining to the pre-independence history of Singapore. The subject matter of these works orientate around issues such as the Chinese Middle School Student Movements as well as the role of the leftist leaders within the political context of their era. Since the late 1970s however, the Singapore government's heavy hand in the shaping of the national history of Singapore became pronounced, with the aim of utilizing history in order to engage in nation-building endevours. Such initiatives, cumulating in the launch of the National Education Programme in 1997, however have implications for the writing of alternative history in Singapore. The didactic use of history entails the selective choice of facts by the state in order to inculcate certain lessons of the past. This in turn is reinforced by the state's tight custodianship of sources resulting in the silencing of certain facets of the Middle School Student Movements as well as the leftist leaders of the 1950s-60s; both are linked to communism and are cast in a negative light. As such, the contention of alternative scholarship with regards to such historiographical trends involves the divorcing of both the student movements and the leftist leaders from the label of communism. By providing a plurality of viewpoints with which to interpret the both leftist leaders and student movements, alternative histories restore agency to both; no longer only subjugated under the rubric of communism - the silence about both students and leftist leaders have been broken.