Why would a foreign-born overseas Chinese endeavor to reconnect with or return to China? While scholars have generally attributed such acts to the emigrant’s primordial affinity to the ancestral homeland, or his nationalistic concerns for China, historian Philip Kuhn’s recent conception of “corridors” allows us to instead focus on the personal and socio-economic reasons behind the emigrant’s engagement with China. This article examines a well-known effort by a third-generation overseas Chinese from Singapore, Lim Boon Keng (1869–1957), who re-established a corridor to China and eventually returned to work in Xiamen. Lim was secure with his racial hybridity and with the fact that he was an overseas Chinese; and it was in response to the changing socio-economic conditions in Singapore that he acknowledged Chinese culture and China, and hoped to use them to ensure the welfare and continual prosperity of his Straits Chinese community in their place of residence.
Purchase
Buy instant access (PDF download and unlimited online access):
Institutional Login
Log in with Open Athens, Shibboleth, or your institutional credentials
Personal login
Log in with your brill.com account
Alatas, Syed Hussien . The Myth of the Lazy Native: A Study of the Image of the Malays, Filipinos and Javanese from the 16th to the 20th Century and its Function in the Ideology of Colonial Capitalism. London: Frank Cass, 1997.
Anderson, Benedict . Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. 2nd ed. London and New York: Verso, 1991.
Anderson, Benedict . “Long-Distance Nationalism.” In The Spectre of Comparisons: Nationalism, Southeast Asia and the World, 58–74. London and New York: Verso, 1998.
Chan, Shelly . Diaspora’s Homeland: Modern China in the Age of Global Migration. Durham: Duke University Press, 2018.
Chan, Shelly . “The Case for Diaspora: A Temporal Approach to the Chinese Experience.” Journal of Asian Studies 74, no. 1 (2015): 107–128.
Chen Yusong 陳育菘. “Ji Lin Wenqing yi gourou qi Huang Zunxian chen ke shi” 記林文慶以狗肉起黃遵憲沉屙事. Nanyang xuebao南洋學報 17 (1961): 29–30.
Chin, James . “Merchants and Sojourners: The Hokkiens Overseas, 1570–1760.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Hong Kong, 1998.
CO 273/572: Straits Settlements Original Correspondence. The National Archives, United Kingdom.
DeBernardi, Jean . “Lim Boon Keng and the Invention of Cosmopolitanism in the Straits Settlements.” In Managing Change in Southeast Asia: Local Identities, Global Connections, edited by Jean DeBernardi , Gregory Forth , and Sandra Niessen , 173–187. Montreal: Canadian Council for Southeastern Asian Studies, 1995.
Duara, Prasenjit . “Nationalists Among Transnationals: Overseas Chinese and the Idea of China, 1900–1911.” In Ungrounded Empires: The Cultural Politics of Modern Chinese Transnationalism, edited by Donald M. Nonini and Aihwa Ong , 39–60. New York: Routledge, 1997.
Dunlop, S. , W. A. Pickering , V. Cousins , H. Hewetson , A. Knight , and A. P. Talbot . Report on the Census of Singapore, 1881. Singapore: Straits Settlements Government Press, 1882.
Hirschman, Charles . “The Making of Race in Colonial Malaya: Political Economy and Racial Ideology.” Sociological Forum 1, no. 2 (1986): 330–361.
Hirschman, Charles . “The Meaning and Measurement of Ethnicity in Malaysia: An Analysis of Census Classifications.” The Journal of Asian Studies 46, no. 3 (1987): 555–582.
Khor Eng Hee . “The Public Life of Dr. Lim Boon Keng.” Academic exercise, History Department, University of Singapore, 1958.
Kiong Chin Eng . “The Teaching of Kuan Hua in Singapore.” Straits Chinese Magazine 11, no. 2 (1907): 105–108.
Kuhn, Philip . Chinese Among Others: Emigration in Modern Times. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2008.
Lee, Guan Kin 李元瑾. Lin Wenqing de sixiang: Zhongxi wenhua de huiliu yu maodun 林文慶的思想:中西文化的匯流與矛盾. Singapore: Singapore Society of Asian Studies, 1990.
Lee, Guan Kin 李元瑾. “Lin Wenqing zouxiang Xiamen daxue: Yige Xinjiapo Huaren de xungen licheng” 林文慶走向廈門大學:一個新加坡華人的尋根歷程. Nanyang xuebao 南洋學報 52 (1998): 5–21.
Lee, Guan Kin 李元瑾. “Wei Lin Wenqing xiang lishi tao gongdao” 为林文庆向历史讨剬道. Lianhe zaobao 联合早报, July 23, 1995.
Lee, Edwin . The British as Rulers: Governing Multiracial Singapore, 1867–1914. Singapore: Singapore University Press, 1991.
Lew See Fah . “Straits Chinese Youths.” Straits Chinese Magazine 5, no. 20 (1901): 140.
Lian, Shisheng 连士升. Xianren zaji 闲人杂记. Singapore: Shijie Shuju, 1963.
Lim, Boon Keng . “Criticism on ‘Malthus on Population’ by Rev. W. Drury.” Proceedings of the Straits Philosophical Society for the Year 1910–1911, 1910, 53–54.
Lim, Boon Keng . “Ethical Education for the Straits Chinese.” Straits Chinese Magazine 8, no. 1 (1904): 25–30.
Lim, Boon Keng . “Our enemies.” Straits Chinese Magazine 1, no. 2 (1897): 52–58.
Lim, Boon Keng . “Race Deterioration in the Tropics.” Straits Chinese Annual, 1909, 2–5.
Lim, Boon Keng . “Straits Chinese Reform ii: Dress and Costume.” Straits Chinese Magazine 3, no. 10 (1899a): 59.
Lim, Boon Keng . “Straits Chinese Reform iii: The Education of Chinese.” Straits Chinese Magazine 3, no. 11 (1899b): 104–105.
Lim, Boon Keng . “The Chinese in British Malaya.” Proceedings of the Straits Philosophical Society for the Year 1910–1911, 1910, 159–162.
Lim, Boon Keng . “The Chinese in Malaya.” In Present Day Impressions of the Far East, edited by W. Feldwick , 875–882. London, Globe Encyclopedia, 1917.
Lim, Boon Keng . The City of Amoy Now Named Sze-Ming or the Island that Remembers the Ming: With a Brief Description of the University of Amoy. Xiamen: The Amoy University Press, 1936.
Lim, Boon Keng , trans. The Li Sao: An Elegy on Encountering the Sorrow by Ch’u Yuan of the State of Chu. Shanghai: The Commercial Press, 1929.
Lim, Boon Keng . “The Renovation of China.” Straits Chinese Magazine 2, no. 6 (1898): 89–91.
Lim, Boon Keng . “The Role of the Babas in the Development of China.” Straits Chinese Magazine 7, no. 3 (1903): 98–99.
Lim, Boon Keng . “The So-Called Clash of Races in Malaya.” Straits Chinese Annual, 1930: 1–11.
Lim, Boon Keng . “We are a Peculiar People.” Straits Chinese Magazine 6, no. 24 (1902): 167–168.
Lin, Xiaosheng林孝勝 . “Kaibu chuqi de xinhua shehui” 開埠初期的新華社會. In Xingjiapo Huashe yu Huashang 新加坡華社與華商, 1–27. Singapore: Yazhou yanjiu xuehui, 1995.
Lin, M. C. [Lim Boon Keng]. “Straits Chinese Educational Needs.” Straits Chinese Magazine 8, no. 1 (1904): 9–11.
Moore, Donald , and Joanna Moore . The First 150 Years of Singapore. Singapore: Donald Moore Press, 1969.
Nanyang Siang Pau 南洋商報. Singapore, 1923–1938.
Ong, Soon Keong . “Chinese, But Not Quite: Huaqiao and the Marginalization of the Overseas Chinese.” Journal of Chinese Overseas 9, no. 1 (2013): 1–32.
Ong, Soon Keong . Coming Home to a Foreign Country: Xiamen and the Overseas Chinese, 1843–1938. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, forthcoming.
Ong, Soon Keong . Preface to Taxiang de shengren—Lin Wenqing de rujia sixiang 他鄉的聖人——林文慶的儒家思想, by Yan Chunbao 嚴春寶, 3–6. Guilin: Guangxi shifandaxue chubanshe, 2017.
Ong, Soon Keong . “To Save Minnan, To Save Ourselves: The Southeast Asia Overseas Fujianese Home Village Salvation Movement.” In On the Margins of China, edited by Sherman Cochran and Paul Pickowicz , 243–266. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2010.
Ong, Soon Keong . “Yuemo shi Huaren: ‘Huaqiao’ yu haiwai Huaren de bianyuan hua” 約莫是華人:『華僑』與海外華人的邊緣化. Huaren yanjiu guoji xuebao 華人研究國際學報 9, no. 1 (2017): 41–66.
Png, Poh-seng . “The Straits Chinese in Singapore: A Case of Local Identity and Socio-cultural Accommodation.” Journal of Southeast Asian History 10, no. 1 (1969): 95–114.
Rudolph, Jurgen . Reconstructing Identities: A Social History of the Babas in Singapore. Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998.
Saw, Swee-Hock . Singapore Population in Transition. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1970.
Skinner, G. William . “Creolized Chinese Societies in Southeast Asia.” In Sojourners and Settlers: Histories of Southeast Asia and the Chinese, edited by Anthony Reid , 51–93. Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1996.
Song, Ong Siang . One Hundred Years’ History of the Chinese in Singapore. Reprint, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984.
Straits Settlements . Annual Report on the Chinese Protectorate. Singapore: Government Printing Office, 1888–1894.
Tan, Tek Soon . “Chinese Local Trade.” Straits Chinese Magazine 6, no. 23 (1902): 89–97.
Trocki, Carl A. Singapore: Wealth, Power and the Culture of Control. London and New York: Routledge, 2006.
Turnbull, C.M. A History of Singapore, 1819–1988. 2nd ed. Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1989.
Wang, Gungwu . “Lu Xun, Lim Boon Keng and Confucianism.” Papers on Far Eastern History 39 (1989): 75–177.
Wang, Gungwu . “The Chinese as Immigrants and Settlers: Singapore.” In China and the Chinese Overseas, 185–199. Singapore: Times Academic Press, 1988.
Wen, Yuanning 溫源甯. “Dr. Lim Boon Keng.” The China Critic 7, no. 22 (May 1934): 519.
Wong, Owen , and Lee Guan Kin . “The Search for Identity Among the Singapore-Born Chinese at the Turn of the Twentieth Century.” Chinese Scholars 5 (1973): 1–30.
Wu, Lien-teh . Plague Fighter: The Autobiography of a Modern Chinese Physician. Cambridge: W. Heffer, 1959.
Yao, Souchou . “Ethnic Boundaries and Structural Differentiation: An Anthropological Analysis of the Straits Chinese in Nineteenth Century Singapore.” Sojourn: Journal of Social Issues in Southeast Asia 2, no. 2 (1987): 209–230.
Yong, C. F. “British Attitudes Towards the Chinese Community Leaders in Singapore, 1819–1941.” In Chinese Leadership and Power in Colonial Singapore, 287–307. Singapore: Times Academic Press, 1992.
Yong, C. F. Tan Kah-Kee: The Making of an Overseas Chinese Legend. Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1987.
All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
---|---|---|---|
Abstract Views | 1410 | 378 | 146 |
Full Text Views | 77 | 12 | 1 |
PDF Views & Downloads | 184 | 30 | 0 |
Why would a foreign-born overseas Chinese endeavor to reconnect with or return to China? While scholars have generally attributed such acts to the emigrant’s primordial affinity to the ancestral homeland, or his nationalistic concerns for China, historian Philip Kuhn’s recent conception of “corridors” allows us to instead focus on the personal and socio-economic reasons behind the emigrant’s engagement with China. This article examines a well-known effort by a third-generation overseas Chinese from Singapore, Lim Boon Keng (1869–1957), who re-established a corridor to China and eventually returned to work in Xiamen. Lim was secure with his racial hybridity and with the fact that he was an overseas Chinese; and it was in response to the changing socio-economic conditions in Singapore that he acknowledged Chinese culture and China, and hoped to use them to ensure the welfare and continual prosperity of his Straits Chinese community in their place of residence.
All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
---|---|---|---|
Abstract Views | 1410 | 378 | 146 |
Full Text Views | 77 | 12 | 1 |
PDF Views & Downloads | 184 | 30 | 0 |