Hostname: page-component-7479d7b7d-qlrfm Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-10T15:23:03.620Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

A Demographic Profile of the Chinese in Singapore

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 August 2009

Warwick Neville
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

This paper attempts to appraise just one facet of the Chinese community in Singapore — its demographic character and the degree to which this is distinctive within the broader setting of Singapore society at large. The information available as the basis for such an analysis is limited and more definitive statements on trends and differences will be possible as the statistics compiled from the 1980 census become available.

Important changes are occurring within the Chinese community which have considerable significance for the republic but for which there is no direct basis of comparison with other ethnic communities. These considerations have not been examined here but include the changing behaviour in matters of kinship, associations and societies, marriage, religion, and similar elements central to the Chinese community. Perhaps the most significant of these currently is the issue of language and the active promotion by government of Mandarin not only as the official Chinese language but as a substitute for dialects in circumstances where, until now, they have been dominant. Although surveys of language use have been carried out recently, these have been too small and too specialized to provide a basis for general conclusions, and again it is to be hoped that the 1980 census data will provide an updated benchmark for this parameter comparable to that of earlier censuses.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Southeast Asian Studies , Volume 12 , Issue 1 , March 1981 , pp. 142 - 158
Copyright
Copyright © The National University of Singapore 1981

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Statistics cited as current or without any specified date are all for the year 1977. Although more recent figures are available for some variables this optimizes comparability of the main data bases, namely, Department of Statistics, Report on Survey of Households, April 1977 (Singapore, 1978)Google Scholar; Department of Statistics, Report on the Registration of Births and Deaths and Marriages 1977 (Singapore)Google Scholar; Ministry of Labour, Report on the Labour Force Survey of Singapore 1977 (Singapore, 1978)Google Scholar; and Singapore Family Planning and Population Board, Report of the Second National Family Planning and Population Survey in Singapore 1977 (Singapore)Google Scholar.

1 Other parameters have been cited as showing no such convergence. Perhaps most significant is the case of language: Kuo, E.C.Y., “A Sociolinguistic Profile of Singapore”, Sociology Working Paper no. 52 (Singapore, 1976), pp. 29–30Google Scholar. However, alternative criteria could be used to achieve significantly different results.

2 Neville, Warwick, “The Birth Rate in Singapore”, Population Studies 32, no. 1 (1978):113–33CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed; Chen, Peter S.J., “Ethnicity and Fertility: The Case of Singapore”, Sociology Working Paper no. 65 (Singapore, 1979), p. 25Google Scholar; Chen-tung, Chang, Fertility Transition in Singapore (Singapore, 1974)Google Scholar.

4 Neville, Warwick , “Singapore: Ethnic Diversity and Its Implications”, Annals of the Association of American Geographers 56, (1966):236–53 [reprinted in Population Geography: A Reader ed. Demko, G.B., Rose, H.M., and G.A. ] (New York. 1970), pp. 431–48Google Scholar.

5 Yeh, Stephen H.K., “Singapore: Residential Mobility and Public Housing”, Migration and Development in South-East Asia: A Demographic Perspective, ed. Pryor, Robin J. (Kuala Lumpur, 1979), pp.165–74Google Scholar.

6 Hassan, Riaz, Families in Flats: A Study of Low Income Families in Public Housing (Singapore, 1977)Google Scholar; Chen, Peter S.J. and Ling, Tai Ching, Social Ecology of Singapore (Singapore, 1977)Google Scholar.

7 Singapore Bus Service Survey, Mar. 1979; Ministry of Environment Survey, Apr. 1979