In the 50 years since the establishment of the Republic of Singapore, ‘Indian’ has been a word spread and repeated — and thus shared as a common-sense word. Itis one of the four motifs — ‘ Chinese/Malay/Indian/Other’ (CMIO) — that are used to talk about (the self as one of ) the people of Singapore. This paradigm involved a process of institutionalisation, and was used more stringently up until the early 1990s. The CMIO model has encountered changes that have made it more flexible. That is, it holds daily accessed meaning within the condensed words that signify Singapore’s character. In doing so, it is different from what it was at the start of its emergence and institutionalisation, but it also survives as a habitual common-sense model used in conducting everyday life here. Little India is an area that refers to the ‘Indian’ of the CMIO paradigm. It is a geographical space in which the numerical minority of the ‘Indian’ is markedly visible. The area’s ‘Indian’ roots go as far back to the 1820s. With independence and the establishment of the Republic of Singapore, it has been highlighted for its unique stability, having been marked out as a conservation site in the 1980s and having a history associated with the ‘Indians’ since the 1820s. Just as importantly, the area regrets the fact that from just before the Japanese occupation of Singapore, and into its first three decades as a Republic, immigration to Singapore was largely curtailed. Consequently, the Singaporean ‘Indian’ largely constituted persons born and bred here. As a corollary to all of the above, from 1965 to the mid-1990s, the ‘Indian’ of Singapore was easier to describe in terms suited to CMIO-like thinking-as-usual. She or he was predominantly ‘South’ Indian, Tamil speaking, more prominently Hindu and generally of the middle classes.

The following sections are included: Introduction, Data, Multicultural Identity, Markers of Malay Identity — Strengths in Some Aspects, and Dilution in Others, Differences in Generational Perceptions of Malayness, Strong Sense of Malayness but Evidence of Some Cosmopolitan/Globalized Identity, Malay Identity in Relation to Multiculturalism and Other Ethnic Groups, Interethnic Understanding of Malayness/Engagement with Malayness, The Fluid and Dynamic Nature of Malay identity, References.

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