SINGAPORE - As a port city that goes back hundreds of years, Singapore has seen vast changes in what constitutes its hinterlands and this has shaped its present-day identity.
The study of Singapore's history as a port city can supplement colonial and nation-state narratives, historian Tan Tai Yong said on Wednesday (Jan 30) at an IPS-Nathan lecture at Yale-NUS College.
He said the functions of port cities - with their hinterlands dependent on economic conditions - often shape the composition, social structure and development of mercantile groups as well as institutions.
