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Immigrants and Associations: Chinese in nineteenth-century Singapore
Abstract
The society built up by Overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia has always been remarkable for its wealth of voluntary associations. In the various historical and sociological studies of Southeast Asian Chinese which have appeared the importance of associations has been duly stressed, although in respect of only two settlements have we been given full treatment of their structure and significance. In this paper I shall consider the associations which Singapore Chinese created and modified in the course of the nineteenth century. Studying this earlier period of Singapore history we can see how the Chinese members of the colonial society adapted their social organization to the conditions of a trading settlement in which, while they often amassed great riches, they were not their own political masters. At the end of the paper I shall consider the Singapore evidence within the wider setting of Southeast Asia and put forward certain general conclusions which may be taken up in other papers on the same theme.
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“In Malaya, an area in which much information about these societies has been gathered, the several fraternal orders not only organized much of the social, economic, political, and recreational life of the Chinese community, but also played a significant role in the industrial and political development of the British colony.”
From Rules of A Chinese secret society in British Columbia (1964) · cites this paper as Freedman, 1960
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Metadata
- Authors
- Freedman, M.
- Affiliations
- London School of Economics and Political Science (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Freedman, Maurice
- Venue
- Comparative Studies in Society and History
- Publisher
- Cambridge University Press (CUP)
- Published
- 1960-10
- Volume
- 3
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 25-48
- ISSN
- 0010-4175 (ISSN-L)
- 1475-2999
- OpenAlex
- W2045706074
- Cited by
- 89
- References
- 27
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 2 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 2 · 2020: 4 · 2019: 3 · 2018: 6 · 2017: 2 · 2016: 5 · 2015: 3 · 2014: 3 · 2013: 4 · 2012: 4
- FWCI
- 17.82
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Comparative Studies in Society and History (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Demography › Diaspora, migration, transnational identity
- Social Sciences › Anthropology › Legal and cultural studies analysis
- Social Sciences › Cultural Studies › Asian American and Pacific Histories
- Keywords
- Chinese immigrants, civil society organizations, Singapore Chinese, Southeast Asian Chinese, colonial society, social organization, Chinese diaspora
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