Neoliberal Visions, Post-capitalist Memories: Heritage Politics and the counter-mapping of

Singapore’s cityscape.

Dr Liew Kai Khiun & Dr Natalie Pang Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information

Nanyang Technological University

Mapping the City-state

• 704 km²• Population: 5.2 million• Airports, seaports: Global

Connectivity and local restrictions

• Competing and complementary needs: New living and historical/natural spaces

Geometric-ized to Lifestylized: Mapping Exercises of the Colonial and Contemporary Nation-state in Singapore

• Demarcation, Zoning and Griding for Colonial Capitalism, Industrialization and neo-liberal political economy

• Scripting and Masterplaning

• Topographical to Cinematical

New Media, the Digital Revolution and the Insurgent Citizenry in Singapore

• GoogleEarth, photoshop and the Democratization of Mapping

• Facebook and the Digital Networked Mapping: Re-mining, re-configuration and re-platforming of archival materials

• Towards the Historical Nation: Counter-mapping and the Resistance against Disappearance

Empire Nation-State Insurgent Citizenry

Vision Hegemonic Futuristic Organic

Political Economy Colonial Capitalism Neo-Liberal Capitalism Post-Capitalist

Spatiality Colonial Port City Global Garden City Place-based City (Newman 2010: 168-9)

Temporalities GMT Utopic Historical

Anxieties Decline Staticity Plasticity

Authorship Guardianship Custodianship Co-Authorship

Politics Expansionist Developmentalist Conservationist

Technology Geometric Imaging Pixelating

Agent Colonial Surveyor Urban Planner Netizen Reconfigurator

Cartographic Production

Single Mapped Paper Building Models Resurrected Networked Images

Knowledge Repository

Museum Memory Presence

Singapore’s Mapping Vision

Resurrection & Re-appearance • Mining, digitalization and

the cyberpublic sharing of official and personal archival illustrations

Co-authored Rejuvenation • Engaging/Collaboration

with state agencies in Mapping Exercises

Resuscitation • Efforts in historicizing

place with archival maps and real-time images

Map of the former Royal Naval Base

A proposal for the Rail Corridor exhibited in the premises of the Urban Redevelopment Authority

Real time traffic conditions used by conservationists to argue against new road development through the Bukit Brown Cemetery

Conclusion

• New Media and the multiple surfacing and re-layering of cartographic imaginations

• The Futuristic and Historical: State-civil society relations and the negotiations of contrasting mapping visions