Changing Geographies and the Geography of Change: Some Reflections

Abstract

To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography and the 75th anniversary of the teaching of geography in the Department of Geography, National University of Singapore, the home of the Journal, this article, based on personal reflections and “objective” academic materials, provides an overview of developments in geography in the Department and Journal. The paper argues that the department's and Journal's“identities”, since the post‐World War II period, have been shaped by Singapore's changing domestic politics, the changing university academic environment, the personalities and academic interests of heads of the department and the Journa's editors, the state of the changing regional and global political economic environment, and the individual research interests of faculty in the department, and reflects a complex mix of colonial/post‐colonial, modern/post‐modern, North‐South and East‐West discourses. While a defined Singapore school of geography has yet to emerge, the article shows that both the department and the Journal have made major strides in meeting the challenges of globalisation and, in the process, have gained international visibility and academic legitimacy. In particular, the Journal has consolidated its position as a major voice for academics in lesser developed countries, its platform for “tropical world” discourse and maintaining its edge in the colonial/post‐colonial and modern/post‐modern discourses of states within the tropics.

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