October 16 - 18, 2007 

The Singaporean Self: Confronting the Other through Alienation and Desire in Perth

Cheryl Naruse

Department of English

University of Hawai'i at Manoa

Only becoming independent and sovereign in 1965, Singapore has emerged as one of the most economically successful and controversial postcolonial nations in South East Asia. In spite of Singapore’s celebrated story of economic success, measured through its passage from Third-World to First-World status in a short matter of time, Singapore has anotorious reputation of having a controlling, socially conservative government. The film Perth (2004), described by some film critics as “Singapore’s Answer to [Martin Scorsese’s] Taxi Driver” (Ricketts Video News), addresses the generational and societal alienation of subjects in post-modern Singapore.

Perth tells the story of Harry Lee, a representation of a first-generation Singaporean who is alienated from society by the unforgiving march of capitalist progress, who is driven to express his anxiety in forms of extreme violence. Harry exemplifies three levels of alienation. First, in a Marxist sense, as an alienated worker, Harry feels a disconnect with Singapore’s capitalistic society and therefore a detachment from himself as a Singaporean; this alienation is exacerbated by the tensions between capitalist ideals and the Singaporean state’s attempts to control the individualistic tendencies that capitalism promotes. The second level of alienation can be read through Harry’s relationship to his son. Singapore’s capitalist agenda promotes differing social values between first and second generation Singaporeans, which results in an inability for Harry and his son to relate to each other. The third level of alienation is caused by Singapore’s immigration policies where, through governmental encouragement, the constant movement of foreign workers to Singapore disrupts any sense of a national narrative and thus national community. The three levels of alienation Harry experiences result in his longing to emigrate out of Singapore and can be read through the souvenirs he has collected.

Perth offers questions of Singaporean “vernacular sensibility”: how has Singaporean history affected Singaporean identity politics? How does the national capitalist class agenda determine nation formation and ideology? Will the lives of alienated first-generation Singaporean dismissed as historically irrelevant?  For the transnational, Perth presents the narrative of an alienated worker under late capitalism and given the effectiveness of the capitalist structure, it is difficult to imagine capitalism as limited phenomenon. 

For scholars in diaspora studies, the vernacular of Singapore may provide new ways of conceiving diasporic movement through space in a transnational sensibility. Ultimately, Perth destabilizes notions of how the self/other is constituted through alienation and new desires under postcolonial and late capitalist conditions.

 

About Cheryl Naruse

 

Return to conference homepage