Manchester University Press
1 ‘Qu’est-ce qu’une nation?’
Abstract
Chapter 1 considers what it means to understand Singapore as a straight nation where heteronormativity – the expression of a particular, prescribed form of heterosexuality – is the condition upon which subjectivity and admission into the nation rest. In contrast to liberal orthodox theories of the nation that view it as functioning on logics of inclusion, this chapter draws attention to nationalism’s investment in producing figures of otherness. Across the formal discourses of the state – the way the state narrates the nation – ethnicity and ‘race’ are less vivid markers of difference, in part because of the specifics of Singapore’s postcolonial condition. I want to suggest that across this discursive terrain, the otherness that nationalism requires finds its expression more perspicuously in the governance of sexuality and desire. Heteronormativity thus becomes a key modality through which nationalism is transmitted in Singapore and forms a dividing line that outlines what I call the counter-nation – the collection of the various groups of people that nationalism renders other in order to replicate and reproduce itself.
Abstract
Chapter 1 considers what it means to understand Singapore as a straight nation where heteronormativity – the expression of a particular, prescribed form of heterosexuality – is the condition upon which subjectivity and admission into the nation rest. In contrast to liberal orthodox theories of the nation that view it as functioning on logics of inclusion, this chapter draws attention to nationalism’s investment in producing figures of otherness. Across the formal discourses of the state – the way the state narrates the nation – ethnicity and ‘race’ are less vivid markers of difference, in part because of the specifics of Singapore’s postcolonial condition. I want to suggest that across this discursive terrain, the otherness that nationalism requires finds its expression more perspicuously in the governance of sexuality and desire. Heteronormativity thus becomes a key modality through which nationalism is transmitted in Singapore and forms a dividing line that outlines what I call the counter-nation – the collection of the various groups of people that nationalism renders other in order to replicate and reproduce itself.
Chapters in this book
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- Acknowledgements vi
- List of abbreviations ix
- Introduction 1
- 1 ‘Qu’est-ce qu’une nation?’ 33
- 2 Three faces of the straight nation 67
- 3 The work of kinship 98
- 4 Xenologizing queerness 124
- 5 Heteronormativity (un)contested – or, the will to assimilation 152
- Epilogue 186
- Index 197
Chapters in this book
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- Acknowledgements vi
- List of abbreviations ix
- Introduction 1
- 1 ‘Qu’est-ce qu’une nation?’ 33
- 2 Three faces of the straight nation 67
- 3 The work of kinship 98
- 4 Xenologizing queerness 124
- 5 Heteronormativity (un)contested – or, the will to assimilation 152
- Epilogue 186
- Index 197
