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GRADUATE
COMMUNITY > MA CANDIDATES
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, MA Candidate
Although my real name is Ismail F. Alatas, I am more popularly known as Aji. I am joining the history department at NUS after graduating from the University of Melbourne, Australia (I did my BA (hons) majoring in history). History has always been my passion ever since I was very young. Being at NUS is a truly fantastic opportunity for a student whose main interest is Southeast Asian history like me. My main interest in studying history has always been to examine the epistemological transition from traditional/religious worldview to a secular one. My honours thesis, now published in the journal Studia Islamika, deals with the secularization of traditional Malay weltanschauung that came about as a result of the introduction of nationalist thoughts. My second book, also deals with the same theme, that is a study on the Islamic conception of knowledge, a critique of Positivism. As for other interests, I like reading and writing classical Malay poems. Apart from academic obsession, my hobbies are going out with friends (really enjoy good companies), smoking cigars, and dancing. Somehow, at times I enjoy being reduced to doing what others might call 'un-intellectual behaviour'.
Thesis Title: Securing Their Place: The Bā’alawi, Prophetic Piety and the Islamic resurgence in Indonesia
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Michael Feener
My thesis seeks to observe the way tariqa Bā’alawiyya(a sufi order) has been reconstructed by its Masters to suit the modern development of Indonesia. In terms of time frame, the thesis covers more contemporary time beginning in the 1950s and 1960s and moving to the 1990s. It elucidates the reconstruction of the tariqa by its spiritual masters and their conversation with the development in Indonesia. This is important because the masters of the tariqa, the Bā’alawi, were Arab diaspora and thus managing the tariqa became synonymous with managing ethnic identity. By looking at scholarly networks, rituals, Bā’alawi-Javanese interaction as well as the popular culture, the thesis connects the resurgence of the Bā’alawi and their tariqa to the wider Islamic revivalism in the country. Their success lies on the way in which the Bā’alawi reconstructed their tariqa into a set of mass ritual highly accessible to the masses and in which the doctrine of Prophetic piety was relegated. This particular doctrine, became acceptable as it could relate to the public discourse on religion and thus helping the Bā’alawi to be accepted in the wider Muslim context. At the same time, the doctrine of Prophetic piety helped to secure the Bā’alawi’s superiority in relation to the indigenous Indonesian by virtue of their familial connection to the Prophet. The result was the contemporary ambivalent position held by the Bā’alawi in Indonesia, on the one hand they were regarded as integrated Indonesian while on the other hand they were regarded as scholars with intimate Middle Eastern connections and of superior class from the ordinary Indonesians by means of their genealogy. This ambivalent position was performed by the Bā’alawi in their rituals and witnessed clearly by the indigenous spectators.
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, MA Candidate
An average but hardworking student who is ever passionate about history, I graduated from NUS with a BA (Hons) in 2007. I enter the MA programme with the aim to learn and find out more. My upbringing and religious belief play an important role in shaping my research interests. As such, I am very interested in the study of Buddhism, Chinese religions, Chinese diaspora, modern Chinese history and Singapore history. Apart from reading, writing and conducting research, I enjoy spending my free time cycling, jogging, watching cartoons (especially Crayon Shin-chan) and telling lame jokes.
Thesis Title: Nanan Migrants and their Temple Networks: Singapore Feng Shan Si and Beyond, 1836-2006
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Huang Jianli
Established in 1836 by migrants from Nanan (南安) county in Fujian province of China, the Singapore Feng Shan Si (Xinjiapo Feng Shan Si 新加坡凤山寺), with a history of 170 years, was gazetted as a national monument in 1978. This study attempts to introduce the Singapore Feng Shan Si as a lens through which to view the larger issue of how the Nanan migrants, as an overseas Chinese community, brought their religious belief from Southern China to Singapore, and established an extensive religious network. It aims to illustrate these temple networks and demonstrate how such linkages were shaped by the political, social, and demographic changes over this long period from 1836 to 2006. Through exploring the Feng Shan Si temple networks, this study seeks to elucidate on how religion both defines and expresses the Nanan migrants as a diasporic community in Singapore and beyond.
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, MA Candidate
I’m happy to be here to learn about the writing of history. I once wrote an undergraduate thesis exploring novels about life in the Dutch East Indies. Whatever one may think of the colonial enterprise, the writers moved me because there was a lot of nostalgia for a world that didn’t exist anymore. However for many of them childhood was vivid. I identify with that somewhat because there are just some things from an era past that you keep with you. I have since shifted my interest to the history of both traditional and modern China. I am intrigued because even though (a) I grow up Chinese, and (b) I can read and write Chinese, somehow China’s history and culture remain very foreign to me. There is so much to find out I learn loads that’s new to me every day. I may not be smart but I am definitely very nerdy. My favourite activity is reading (fiction, not ‘readings’). When I am not in school I am in the alternative worlds (they exist) of anime, manga and video games. If those worlds disappeared I shall cease to exist.
Thesis title: A Cultural History of Friendship among Gentlemen in Ancient China
Despite the fact that we can garner clear ideas of values held by the literate elite, few have dealt with friendship specifically on its own terms. At a broad glance, Confucian texts are vague about whether friendship has a conceptual value on its own. Friends instead appeared to be an avenue through which the ideal gentleman demonstrated qualities of trustworthiness and humaneness. And yet it seems that some kinds of comradeship and brotherly respect or trust were often involved when the literate elite dealt with one another. I wish to develop an argument on the extent to which cultural history helps to illuminate dynamic cultural processes that created the Chinese worldview towards friendship/fraternal love and explore the nuances in the notion of friendship in Chinese terms.
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, MA Candidate
I am from Thailand and it is indeed a pleasure to be here. Before enrolling in NUS, I was a lecturer in the History Department at Srinakharinwirot University in Bangkok, Thailand for 5 years. For my MA in Thailand, my interest was in Chinese History, thus, my research project was on Early Ming China. After graduating with an MA, I researched and wrote books on Thai History. In my application to NUS, I chose to examine relations between Thailand and Singapore in the 19th century.
Thesis Title : The Coronation Ritual and Thai Kingship in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Bruce Lockhart
This research studies the concept of Thai traditional kingship, role of the Coronation ritual in the maintenance of the symbolic authority and social center of the Thai monarchy and changes in the ritual forms and changes in leader’s points of view in the nineteenth to early twentieth centuries. An aim of the thesis is to make readers understand the significance of kingship in the Thai society through the coronation ritual. In addition, the research attempts to answer the question : why have the Thai kings maintained such a powerful hold over the minds of the Thais from the absolute monarchy period until today through rituals?
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, MA Candidate
Hi, I’m E Mei from Beijing and I graduated from Peking University. I took history as my major and International Affairs as my double major in PKU.. I’m enjoy traveling, reading and writing. I’d like to be a good story teller.
Thesis Title: Taiwanese Activities in Mainland China during the Anti-Japanese War
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Thomas DuBois
From 1895 to 1945, Taiwan became the Japanese colony. It brought lots of extremely changes to the society and people of Taiwan. My research is focus on the different attitudes and activities of Taiwanese toward Japanese occupation. Why and how they sustain or combat the Japanese occupation. And I also want to pay attention to the influence of their activities.
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, MA Candidate
Hello! My name is Fathie Bin Ali Abdat and I am a Singaporean Arab of Hadhramawti (Yemeni) extraction. I ended up here when my grandfather escaped the turbulent tribal conflicts plaguing the country. As an offspring of mixed marriages, I also have Pakistani, Indian and Chinese blood. Despite my unique background, my interests are simple and include following the Red Army (Manchester United)'s fortunes, spending time with my girlfriend and chilling at coffeeshops after amateur Sunday football matches.
Thesis Title: Black Muslims: Nation of Islam Movement in America
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Ian Gordon
My dissertation seeks to elucidate light on the Nation of Islam (NOI) movement in America, which was an enigmatic politico-religious group that attempted to address the excesses of racist white America in the 1960s. While similar movements elsewhere characteristically possessed a limited lifespan, the NOI has outlived its supposed expiry date which makes it a worthy subject deserving of greater study and analysis on its leaders ,structures, ideologies and influence on macro-domestic American policies.
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, MA Candidate
I am Guo Jing Yu (Gabriel is fine too) and I am a fresh graduate of the department’s honour’s program. My interest in history developed at a relatively late period in my schooling life (I was a science student in secondary school, commerce in JC and planned to do economics in NUS) and I am lucky to be encouraged in this aspect by friends and lecturers some of whom I have bonded very well with. At the moment, my interest is in East Asian history, especially popular and everyday culture. In my spare time, I am an amateur ecologist and chemist, maintaining a four feet fish tank of predatory fishes that I am trying to convert by the goodness of my heart to a vegetarian diet. Purists may smirk but I believe that nature can be defied somehow. Apart from that, I am an amateur mechanic physicist dealing with the motion of round solid masses on an eight-foot table of green velvet. Besides these, I spend the rest of my time pissing friends and girlfriend off and when enough storm gathers, sit quietly in a corner and wait out the rain with Jack Daniel’s and rolling tobacco, listening to some Kitaro in a self directed fantastic illusion of being high cultured.
Thesis title: Popular Culture in Cultural Revolution Shanghai
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Thomas DuBois
This thesis investigates popular culture, especially aspects of it that has a frivolous and deviant nature. Things that this would include are gambling, prostitution and drug abuse. I intend to look into how popular culture and its specific manifestations fitted into the worldview of the people in Shanghai during the Cultural Revolution. The interaction between state discourse on these aspects and popular participation would be an important part of the thesis.
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, MA Candidate
Hi! I graduated from NUS in 2003 with a degree in History. After that, I spent two years working in the government basically to learn and experience more (and yes, also to save up some money). Outside of everyday responsibilities, I enjoy playing music, reading comics, vegetating in front of the TV and sleeping.
Thesis Topic: Academic Perspectives of History: A History of JSEAS
Supervisor: Dr Maitrii Aung-Thwin
My fascination with history comes from a basic affection for stories, initially of the military variety, and later of people and society in general. I am also interested in how history is used and understood by different sections of society and this curiosity forms the basis of my thesis. By taking the Journal of Southeast Asian Studies as the start point, and with lots of luck, I hope to better understand the many layers of Southeast Asian history, how the editors, contributors and readers of the journal grapple with the complexities and expound on the possibilities of their chosen field(s) of study, and how they communicate their ideas to their peers and the interested public.
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, MA Candidate
I’ve graduated recently with my B.A. (Hons) but after loitering about NUS for four years as if it was a second home, and thoroughly enjoying my tango with Clio, I couldn’t resist two more years’ worth. Other than History, I indulge in soccer, volunteer work, computer games, and occasional playwriting as an alumnus of the Theatreworks’ Writers’ Lab. I’m a junkie for unhealthy food, including Pepsi and chicken wings; only a few individuals (mostly female) can offer me organic food or vegetables and get away with it. I think about losing weight all the time.
Thesis Title: Reclaiming the Ivory Tower: Decolonization and English-educated Student Activism in Singapore, 1949-1975
Supervisor: Dr Quek Ser Hwee
Twelve weeks of research and probing into the political activism of the English-educated students of the precursors of the National University of Singapore (NUS) for my Honours thesis has spurred my passion and interest for the subject. In my Masters thesis, I hope to pursue the topic further by examining aspects of these students’ political, ideological and cultural interaction with processes developing in the region provoked by decolonization, and other agents and actors.
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, MA Candidate
As a future inductee of that noble profession known in Singapore variously as General Education Officer, or just school teacher, I have embarked on this journey as a graduate student of the department with the aim of learning more about history which hopefully will better equip me to handle the exacting demands of my future career. My quest here, on a more personal note, also represents the renewal of a life-long affair with history, with which I have been most intimately acquainted with and enraptured by since the days of my childhood. History, academic pursuits and work aside, I am an inveterate collector of action figures, models and movies-related memorabilia. While I have little passion for physical activities, my progressively widening girth (owing perhaps to my claim to fame as foodie) has compelled me to concede the utility of the occasional jog or swim which I undertake these days with some regularity.
Thesis title: Sino-Thai Relations during the Fifth Reign (1868-1910)
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Bruce Lockhart
Sino-Thai relations in the past two centuries can at best be described as a roller-coaster ride of sorts, with multiple ‘ups and downs’. While the latter century has been the subject of greater academic interest, the 19th century has not fared as well. This thesis proposes to examine the relations (both official and informal) between Siam and Qing China during the reign of Rama V and attempt to elucidate the various factors affecting these ties or lack thereof.
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, MA Candidate
Also a graduate of the History Department, it is an understatement for me to say that I am delighted to be back with the History Department once again. A fan of Asian history, I can often been seen lying on the AS1 benches in deep contemplation, with a book on my face. Outside the world of books, I enjoy softball, bowling, swimming and travelling.
Thesis title: Centering the Man in the Margins: Re-examining Liu Yung-fu
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Bruce Lockhart
Liu Yung-fu/Luu Vinh Phuc (1837-1917) is the leader of the Black Flags, one of the groups in the Sino-Vietnamese land border region involved in the Sino-French War. His greatest claim to flame was his involvement in the deaths of French adventurer/explorers Francis Garnier (1873) and Henri Riviere (1883). This led to a historiographical tug-of-war in the 1950s and 1960s between Chinese and Vietnamese scholars, who attempted to style him as a patriot, anti-colonial leader or peasant leader, amongst other things. My research attempts to re-visit the 19th century in order to gain a better understanding of this enigmatic ‘Black Tiger general’ and also the region that he represents.
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, MA Candidate
After I received my degree in the states, I came back to Singapore where I spent many years of my life. Since then, I worked in a Japanese company as O.L (a.k.a. Office Lady) and traveled around Asia before entering NUS in Spring 2006.
Thesis topic: Japan's Path / Struggle For Modernization: Tenko ("Ideological Apostasy")
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Gregory Clancey
My interests are in Japanese intellectual and religious history. My current research focuses on some liberal prewar intellectuals who initially opposed military aggression but later underwent “ideological apostasy” by changing their positions and supporting the war in order to avoid persecution.
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, MA Candidate
A fresh graduate from the Department of History [B.A. (Hons.), 2006], I am indeed excited to stay on and pursue my M.A. here at NUS. An avid fan of museums, I am a weekend volunteer docent at the Asian Civilisations Museum where I spook visitors talking about the headhunting Dayaks and explaining the various myths and symbolisms surrounding Hindu gods. I travel as much as I can during the holidays and enjoy spending springtime in Europe. Some of my favourite places include Paris and Annecy in France, Florence and Trieste in Italy and Munnar, a hill-station in Kerala, India . A self-confessed sweet-junkie, I wish I had a steady supply of fine Leonidas chocolates from Belgium, hazelnut macaroons from Ladur ée in Paris and our very own Hilton cheesecake. Oh and one day, I hope to meet Julia Louis-Dreyfus from Seinfeld and take her out on a date!
Thesis topic: The Power of Print: Tamil Newspapers in Malaya & The Imagining of a Tamil Cultural Identity, 1930-1945
Supervisor: Professor Merle Ricklefs
The 1930s can be said to be a period when the print press began to take off in a significant way in Southeast Asia, particularly in Malaya and Singapore. While several Tamil newspapers were printed in Malaya and Singapore in the pre-World War II period, very little academic work has been produced about them; at least in relation to how these newspapers were platforms for the imagining of a Tamil cultural identity at an epoch when the Tamil diaspora in Malaya continued having strong homeland attachments. My thesis primarily aims to look at how editors in Malaya and Singapore thought and shaped their ideas on Tamilness and how they used their papers as mediums to promote such an ‘imagined’ Tamil cultural identity, since during this same time period, the Dravidian Movement and a Tamil Renaissance were taking place concurrently in Tamil Nadu, South India.
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, MA Candidate
I graduated from NUS in 2005 with a First Class Honours BA degree in History. After two years in the working world, I returned to the History Department to pursue an MA. I’m particularly interested in East Asian and Singapore history. During my spare time, I listen to an eclectic array of music, watch Korean dramas and support Manchester United.
Thesis Title: British Policy and the Japanese in Singapore, 1890-1930
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Albert Lau
The Japanese community in Singapore had evolved into a sophisticated network of socio-economic, intellectual and political relations by the inter-war period. Yet British policy towards this Japanese community has hitherto been a neglected area of Singapore history. My research will address this topic by examining British perspectives on Japanese maritime commerce. Such commerce comprised complex webs based on immigration, customs, shipping, and political activities. My research will therefore extend our understanding of the Japanese in Singapore beyond the lens of international relations. I also aim to contribute to the globalization of Singapore’s history by contextualizing it against the backdrop of global maritime networks.
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, MA Candidate
I am currently pursuing an MA in History. My undergraduate studies with the NUS History Department helped to deepen a passion that has started from a young age. It also opened me to a broad range and varieties of issues over the past and the ways it has been presented. The postgraduate level is for me an essential stage to master the historian’s craft. In my free time, I dabble in Classical Music and enjoy collecting vintage recordings (both studio and live) of renowned conductors, instrumentalists and opera singers between the 1900s and 1960s. To me they constitute a very special form of historical documents.
Thesis Title: Border-crossing Socialization and Informational Flow in the Chinese Journalistic Diaspora, 1881 – 1937
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Huang Jianli
My MA dissertation explores the border-crossing socialization and informational flow in the Chinese journalistic diaspora spanning coastal China and Southeast Asia from the late Nineteenth Century to the outbreak of China’s War with Japan in 1937. In doing so, I seek to deal with two main issues. The first issue concerns the forms in which border-crossing socialization took place among the Chinese journalists from China and the overseas Chinese communities in Southeast Asia, the different levels of networking – national, transnational, translocal, as well as the various, sometimes intertwining institutions of networking – the Qing and the Republican states, professional news organizations and civic organizations. The second issue concerns how socialization among the journalists gave rise to border-crossing knowledge transmission, production and re-production in terms of news making, news sharing and professional know-how. The border-crossing knowledge production that took place as a result of the socialization was manifested in the case of the manager of the Sin Chew Jit Poh in Singapore, Lin Aimin, who actively cultivated informal relationships and patronages with important figures in the Shanghai journalistic, intellectual and cultural circles as well as the Nationalist Government. Through this socialization, the Sin Chew Jit Poh became the only Chinese newspaper from Southeast Asia selected for a nationwide news indexing project called Master-Key to the News initiated in 1933 by the Sun Yat-sen Institute for Advancement of Culture and Education. Through this research, I seek to explore how the agency of overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia played a role in China’s journalistic field and how the role played by this agency led to the formation of a diasporic journalistic field with Singapore, Hong Kong and Shanghai as nodal points and coastal China and Southeast Asia as the geographical areas of coverage.
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, MA Candidate
I worked as a security guard for the 10 years between JC and NUS, graduating last semester. Came to university hoping to learn everything I can about war and picked up a love for critical analysis along the way. I enjoy a good tussle over post-modernism and objectivity. Hope to pick up some kung-fu on transmission of passion and knowledge-building (especially about war) to new undergrads to return the favour.
Thesis Title: Pound-wise, Penny-foolish: A Reassessment of Australia's Inter-War Defense Policies
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Brian Farrell
Recent revisionist scholarship produced overwhelming documentary evidence suggesting an impressive record of inter-war Australian defence policymaking despite “over-reliance” on British advice and assurances. This positive verdict leaves the undeniable poor outcome of these policies (The bulk of Australia’s trained airmen and soldiers were stuck in Europe and the Middle East when Japan struck south) unexplained. My research attempts to reconcile the two seemingly incompatible bodies of evidence by distinguishing between Australia’s hard-headed policy choices and subsequent shortcomings in policy management.
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, MA Candidate
My name is Panu Wongcha-um and you can call me Panu. I was born and lived in Bangkok, Thailand but I spent the last ten years of my adult life going to school and university in Melbourne, Australia. I did my Bachelor of Arts at the University of Melbourne and did my Honours thesis on piracy in the Malacca Straits. Although I had work experiences in places like the Thai Ministry of Foreign Affairs and H.M. King Bhumibol’s NGO, the Chaipattana Foundation, my main passion remains in the learning of history, not to mention the student lifestyle that comes with it. In my pastime I do the ordinary things like listening to music, playing music, reading, drinking, exercising, going to see live bands, and traveling.
Thesis topic: “Food in Thailand as a site of Thai culture and identity”
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Maurizio Peleggi
Food not only provides a daily sustenance, it is also a cultural and historical object. In Thailand the art of gastronomy is of national importance. Because food is so essential to everyday life, it is one of the most important historical and cultural sites that can be analyzed. Thai food is a new and exciting site through which to explore Thai history not only in terms of the nation-state but also with reference to the Thai people and their culture in general. The human love affair with food is not only reflected by its economic value, but also by the way it has helped defined who we are. The rituals of food reflect region, values and identity. The cultural experience from the kitchen space to the consumption of food, from the art of cooking to table manners, defines complex identities between the individual and the community, between the family and the nation. Food also compliments other forms of identity signifiers and demarcates various identity categories such as race, class and gender. In the Thai context, food reflects the social interaction at all levels from the royal household to the street vendors.
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, MA Candidate
I earned my BA in Wuhan University of China. Now I am a MA candidate here. When I am not studying, I like doing sports and traveling. I am also crazy about architecture and painting. I’ve read almost all the biographies about famous painters of Picasso’s period when I was an undergraduate. Reading and listening to music are what I am always doing.
Thesis Topic: Franciscan Missionaries in Enshi Minority Area, 1890-1930
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Thomas DuBois
In the field of missionary research, there have been two schools for long time. One school sees missionaries part of cultural imperialism. The other school considers them God’s missions whose task was to bring people all over the world under God’s blessing. In my research, I would like to give it a historical perspective in that minority area. I aim to find out what they did and why they did so and illustrate Qing government and foreign countries’ reaction to such events. I will give greater attention to local custom and beliefs so that I can analyze effect of local peoples’ ignorance and special personality in those events.
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, MA Candidate
As a lover of History I am really happy to be able to pursue my M.A. studies at NUS, immediately after completing my B.A. degree. While much of my undergraduate studies were devoted to the study of military history, I am also interested in cultural and political history as well as historiographical concepts and methodologies.
Thesis title: Japanese Production of Knowledge on Southeast Asia 1914-1940
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Teow See Heng
Japanese interest in Southeast Asia as a region increased significantly during the First World War and its aftermath, a development that took place together with increasing numbers of Japanese migration to and economic activity in Southeast Asia during this period. Through a study of print materials produced by Japanese government authorities, private organizations and individuals, I will explore Japanese perceptions and representations of Southeast Asia. I will also attempt to assess the impact of such knowledge produced.
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, MA Candidate
I spent an enjoyable four years as a NUS History undergraduate and am glad to have the opportunity to further my interest in the subject with the department for another two years. History aside, I love travelling, museums, postcards, chocolates and curling up with a good read at Starbucks.
Thesis Title: A Study of the Representations of the Straits Chinese community in museums
Supervisor: Assoc Prof Maurizio Peleggi
This thesis uses the museum as a prism to study the complex hybrid identity of the Straits Chinese community and to explore the impact of nations and regional histories on their group identity. Using a comparative approach, this thesis examines the visual narratives and representations of the history of the Straits Chinese community in Baba museums in Singapore, Malacca and Penang. Through the objectification and deliberate emphasis, marginalization and absences of selected aspects of the community’s history, heritage and memory, these museums promote certain interpretations of the community’s hybrid culture and identity. While some common themes emerge across the museums, differing local histories contributed to significant differences as well.
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