This article is about the recent talk on the integration of the Indian community, not just different subgroups of Indians into the entire indian community, but more of the integration of the indian community as a whole into society. Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, Minister for Community Development Youth and Sports gave a speech at SINDA (Singapore Indian Development Association) addressing the need for the Indian community, albeit being small, to be fully integrated instead of just focusing on community integrations. Hence, he focused on two issues, integration at a community level and integration as a whole.
This issue reinforces the importance for different cultural and racial groups to achieve some form of integration especially when Singapore has become home to thousands of immigrants who work here.
One of the things that i felt a strong conviction about is the integration of different cultural groups and communities together. Having been born and raised in Singapore and being a minority group member of the society, i have observed several patterns of integration in Singapore. I realized that most things were done at the community level. One basic example, GRCs have different tyes of committees to take care of different racial groups and to make sure that these racial groups come together and feel a sense of belonging in this country. Most often than not, this is the type of practice that segregates us as a society in a very subtle way.
What about Mendaki, SINDA, CDAC (Chinese development assistance council) etc and such organizations are created for the purpose of bringing a certain ethnic group together. These groups come together to not only for a sense of social unity and cohesion but also creates bonding ethnic relationships close to cultural and racial values.
My question is, is Singapore or CAN Singapore be a truly culturally integrated society where we don't just focus on integrating people from a certain ethnic or cultural group within their own community but also on a national scale? Another example here reinforces my point. If we look at the grassroots level programmes, they have malay/indian activity executive committees to plan and organize events for the respective racial groups. These events are designed to bring harmony between the respective racial groups and the community at large. Sometimes i wonder how that is going to happen if events and activities are planned by Indians. Perhaps these communities only exist so that racial groups can feel that they are a part of something in society but at the end of the day it only de-emphasizes the identity of the country as a whole.
There is alot of emphasis on community level bonding but what about integration of all ethnic groups into society. The article's main focus was about immigrant Indians such as expatriates who have started to move into the heartlands even more than they are moving into expensive condominiums. Hence, as we see a greater influx of immigrants coming into this country, we should be aware and alert on how our own people are integrated into society as a whole before we can even consider thinking about how we can go about integrating the immigrant groups. Then again, immigrant groups carry a different culture with them. E.g. Indians from India are not like the Indians from Singapore. The same goes for the Chinese and the Malays.
Groups work with interaction, interdependence, shared values and strive to achieve a collective identity. It is definitely a challenge trying to keep within your own culture and at the same time integrating as one big Singaporean culture. Group dynamics are therefore complex and require a lot of effort for groups to take that step to integrate into a larger group, with a national identity. It satisfies a group's need for inclusion and enables and aids socialization where people start to follow a different set of rules. That will certainly help our country in achieving unity amongst its people who will, at the end of the day, share the same core values and beliefs and feel a part of a bigger purpose. One day, i wish we can come to a point where we can call ourselves Singaporeans more often instead of Chinese, Indians and Malays alone. I might be being pretty Utopian in my standards but it helps us to reflect on how difficult it is for groups, who have shared values, customs and social beliefs and practices to stop looking at themselves as one entity of 'Chinese people' or Indian people' but instead, 'Singaporeans' who for example, speak Singlish no matter what racial group we belong to. Now that is what i call full integration of different groups into one big group: the Singaporean group.
I doubt that full integration of Cultural groups are possible. The fact that we are so diverse as a country yet living in harmony is a testament to our culture. Our culture is one of diversity.
ReplyDeleteThere are just too many factors distinguishing one cultural group from the other. Be it as trivial as skin colour to as controversial as religious practices.
I would personally be satisfied, not with integration, but with acceptance. A sign of this would be an end to jokes against other cultures, something prevalent among teenagers nowadays.
I believe that if a country is fully of one culture there can be a certain about of near full cultural integration. As a alien living in singapore i have noticed even though the surface is of harmony and "full integration(ish)" of the singapore people there is undertone from the various groups that it is not. I believe that if one follow maslows hierarchy and ALL the people reach its top full integration of cultural groups is possible.
ReplyDeletei think the idea of different groups present in Singapore is difficult for the government to ensure all groups are fully integrated and relate to each other without cultural barriers. There ought to be disagreements and segregation. Even while we are in school, we see different groups of classmates 'hanging out' with their own ethnic groups. As the saying goes 'birds of the same feather flock together'. its inevitable to achieve full integration among different groups in society. that is my point.
ReplyDeleteI give my praises to Mr Lee Kuan Yew!! who see this big picture that multi racial harmony is very important when he first held his PAP election. His hard work has not come in vain. We owe a big thanks to him!
ReplyDeleteI think they have done good job like anonymous says. However, there could still be some improvement in the way the government looks at integrating different racial groups. Although it might not be easy, but i strongly believe the government does have a good and strong influence over the people in Singapore. It will be a good thing for these groups to be more integrated into one culture.
ReplyDeletefull integration is going to be difficult or may like Xamuel said, impossible? it is tough to admit that certain racial groups would never want to integrate into the 'bigger picture' and from what i have seen minority groups play a big role in that. Perhaps, the majority group of any country, especially Singapore needs to take the first step in helping minority groups integrate. It takes everyone ti create a singular culture and to look at themselves as one. Such as hey, we are Americans and hey we are Singaporeans, no matter what skin colour i have or what language i speak.
ReplyDeleteThis boils down personal willingness and desire to bring different races closer together. Then we can successfully as a nation truly come together. If just one or two are the only willing ones to join Malays, Indians and Chinese together, it won't work. It has to be a nation's effort. One person can't bring a nation step forward, only a nation as a whole can bring itself forward. That is when we have to look at ourselves and ask what can i do to make a difference. It starts with themselves and everyone must do it. Not just a couple of people.
ReplyDeleteSinda and these organisations are a chance to go back to our own roots and culture and there are places where we can come close together with other races and it happens at schools and offices. There must always be a balane in everything, including this.
Honestly, everything the government does is always to pretend as if they are interested in making a singular singaporean culture. I think we should just depends less on the government and take our own initiative to make sure that we can call ourselves Singaporeans at the end of the day and not simply 'Indians' or 'Malays' or 'Chinese' which really distorts and segregates group unity and racial groups respectively. And the majority race has a major role to play in that making sure they do not start being too 'clan'-ish as i like to put it. The Indians and Malays sometime shy away because of that. So yes, this is what i really feel about group issues as such.
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