Browsing by Author "Yeo, Wan Ting"
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- PublicationEmbargo'I feel like I'm fighting fire': Teaching the young and educationally disadvantagedThis paper explores the emotional realities of teaching educationally disadvantaged students between the ages of 7 and 8 in Singapore. Data was collected via semi-structured face-to-face interviews with 9 primary school Mathematics teachers and analysed using inductive, grounded theory approach and thematic analysis. From a Conservation of Resources theory lens, findings show that educationally disadvantaged students are far from a homogeneous group as there is great diversity in the sources of disadvantage and obstacles to learning, contributing to the emotional weight borne by teachers of educationally disadvantaged students. Possible recommendations are also discussed.
WOS© Citations 2Scopus© Citations 4 304 1 - PublicationRestrictedNational campaigns as tools for the dissemination of ideology in Singapore: a study of National Courtesy Campaign posters(2015)Yeo, Wan TingNational campaigns do not happen by chance – they are carefully curated government projects that are heavily invested in the dissemination of nation-building ideologies. As such, national campaigns are arguably extensions of governance. This dissertation is interested in investigating social campaigns launched at a national level. What are national social campaigns? How effective are they at disseminating nation-building ideologies? How do they contribute towards nation-building?
This dissertation also argues that because national campaigns aim to steer a society towards or away from specified traits, attitudes or behaviours, they are necessarily ideologically-charged. By extension, campaign posters are sites that reproduce the ideologies that inform a country’s nation-building. To help make sense of campaign posters, the arguments put forth by Kress and Van Leeuwen are employed. Specifically, the analysis of visual images, language and the co-semiosis of visuals and language in this dissertation is guided by the interactional systems delineated by them. After understanding the content of campaign posters, this dissertation taps on Lazar’s concepts of communitization and informalization to make sense of how this content is delivered to and received by their viewers.
Singapore presents a particularly interesting case study for national campaigns. Even though it is a relatively young nation, its prolific use of national campaigns has earned it the nickname of “Campaign City”. On top of the sheer volume of national campaigns, the reach of these campaigns has attracted the attention of many observers as well. Since before it earned its independence, the intrusive nature of its several of national campaigns have earned the Singapore government much criticism about its paternalistic rule. Further, beginning in the late 1970s, the Singapore government became an active and ardent supporter of the ‘Asian’ values discourse, championing it as the antidote to social ills imported from the West. This culminated in a massive nation-wide initiative to return Singaporean youths to their cultural roots – an initiative that has come to be known as the ‘Asianizing’ Singapore movement.
Under such a socio-political climate, the National Courtesy Campaign was introduced. Although not launched as part of the ‘Asianizing’ Singapore movement, this dissertation argues that ideologies supporting the movement were deliberately reproduced in the National Courtesy Campaign posters simply because it was a viable avenue for the dissemination of ideologies that supported it. In Singapore, the plethora of national campaigns, many of them occurring concurrently, reproducing fundamental nation-building ideologies would mean that Singaporeans are reminded of the same ideologies from different directions. Over time, the constant and persistent exposure to these ideologies would cause these ideologies to no longer be seen by the population as such, but as taken-for-granted, commonsensical ideas or notions that constitute the foundation of their society.424 67