Cover design by Matt3r design and research

Update: Snr Minister of State Desmond Lee (MND, MHA) will be the guest of honour  and present books in appreciation to contributors after his address.

****Please note change in programme and we appreciate punctuality in attendance. Audience to be seated in Auditorium by 2.55pm. 

Dress code: Casual

Saturday 9 April 2.30pm – 5.30 pm @  The URA Centre, 5th Floor Auditorium.  45 Maxwell Road, 069118.

Please register here: http://peatix.com/event/159461

Programme:

2.30pm : Registration

3pm to 4 pm: Launch Programme:

Welcome Address: Editors

Presentation by Jon Cooper, War Archeologist : Stories Behind Battle at Cemetery Hill and The Adam Park Project

Slide Presentation of WWII @ Bukit Brown

Minister Desmond Lee Address,  followed by Presentation of Book to Contributors and Sponsors

4pm-4.30 pm:  Refreshments

4.35 pm – 5.45 pm Presentations on Panel Discussion

“The Role of Community Engagement — Shared Experiences”

Dr Chua Ai Lin, president Singapore Heritage Society : The Multiple Spaces of Bukit Brown (based on a paper with Dr Terence Chong)

Kok Heng Leun :  “Socially-Engaged Art: Bukit Brown”  – Key Note address by the  Artistic Director of Drama Box and recently-appointed Nominated Member of Parliament (NMP). At the 2015 Singapore International Arts Festival, Heng Leun conceptualised an ambitious triple-bill production on Bukit Brown and the contestation over land use entitled ‘It Won’t Be Too Long’. In particular, the part called ‘The Lesson’ was a forum theatre piece around the construction of a fictional MRT station, and was performed in Drama Box’s inflatable Goli Theatre to audiences in Toa Payoh Central. ‘It Won’t Be Too Long’ received rave reviews and was one of ST Life’s Best Theatre productions of the year.

Following Heng Leun’s presentation, Chua Ai Lin and Jon Cooper will each respond briefly before the discussion is opened to the floor.”

Moderator: Assoc Prof Darren Koh, Head -Master of Taxation Programme, School of Law, UniSIM. Special interests, Chinese cemetery practices and  culture

5.45 pm: Ends

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The Singapore Heritage Society (SHS) and Ethos Books with All Things Bukit Brown (atBB)  will launch  WWII @ Bukit Brown on Saturday April 9, 2016  –  a collection of stories, essays  and poems  which looks at the Japanese Occupation in the Second World War (1942-1945) and the impact on Singapore from the perspective of those interred at Bukit Brown Cemetery.

The highlight  of the book is  stories shared by descendants from family oral archives and albums of their ancestors who survived  or perished  in  the darkest chapters of Singapore’s history.

Bukit Brown remains the largest cemetery in Singapore for the war dead in situ, and buried with them are many untold stories of bravery, resilience, tragedy, survival and amid the darkness, hope.  The book offers new material and insights into the human tragedy of war as an act of commemoration, adding  another layer to the already vast literature on WWII in Singapore.

“The stories have taken us to the Endau Settlement in Johor, to Taiping (Malaysia) and to the battlefields of Europe  in ways so unexpected they took our breath away,” said Claire Leow and Catherine Lim, the co editors of the book.   “It is a slow and at times painful unraveling of family history, lost in memory but for the persistence of descendants. It has taken seven decades for some of these fragments to be pulled together, and we see this not as a one-off book but a first step in the difficult journey of “re-discovery” and “re-membering”. The narratives also re-affirm to us Singapore’s place in regional and global historical narratives. We hope it serves as a curtain raiser to 2017, the 75th Anniversary of the Fall of Singapore. ”

The stories are nested  around essays – which provide context and background –   written by the community of volunteers, who have come to be known as brownies  under the banner of All Things Bukit Brown. They are neither historians nor academics but the editorial team conduct regular guided walks on site which in themselves are learning journeys as they expand on their body of knowledge from engaging with descendants and a myriad web of networks including academics and historians.

“Bukit Brown has unexpectedly turned out to be a touchstone about the loss of heritage – tangible and intangible – in a Singapore eager to modernise and develop,” Chua Ai Lin, President of SHS. “The book is an important evolution of the civil society movement to uphold Bukit Brown as a site of national significance, and illuminates one of its more fragile narrative threads. It brings together at once the strategic and personal importance of the site, and SHS is pleased to once again support All Things Bukit Brown, which has evolved from a volunteer base guiding weekly public tours and regular customised tours, to hosting exhibitions and participating in arts programmes to reach as broad a support base as possible to save what is left of the site.”

The book has been made possible with a grant from National Heritage Board and the help of generous contributions to the Singapore Heritage Society from its members and other well wishers.

The Editorial Team behind WWII@Bukit Brown, acknowledges in gratitude the support and encouragement  of  a community too many to name, and in recognition of this  support have gifted the copyright for the book to the Singapore Heritage Society for the work they have done in heritage education and advocacy and Ethos Books for their support of home grown writing.

Singapore Heritage Society (SHS)  was founded in 1987 and is a non-profit, non-governmental organisation and registered charity with Institution of Public Character (IPC) status. It Singapore’s leading organization dedicated to research, education and advocacy on Singapore’s history, heritage and identity. SHS is behind many significant publications on Singapore history including Syonan: Singapore under the Japanese, 1942-1945 (1992); Memories and the National Library: Between Forgetting and Remembering (2000); Spaces of the Dead: A Case from the Living (2011).

The Ethos Books imprint was founded in 1997 by Pagesetters Services Pte Ltd. The imprint focuses on publishing works by Singapore writers. The main genres are poetry, literary fiction, creative non-fiction, memoirs, and Heritage books. It has worked with the SHS before in jointly publishing “Spaces of the Dead. A Case from the Living”. Other heritage books published include “Faith in Architecture”; “Teo Eng Seng: Art and Thoughts”; “Memoirs of a Migrant”; and “The Politics of Defeat”.

All Things Bukit Brown (atBB) is the banner for a community of volunteers who conduct independent research and guided walks on Bukit Brown Cemetery. Since they came together as a community in 2012, they have collectively organised public talks with partners such as the NUS Museum and Chui Huay Lim Club, two exhibitions and successfully nominated Bukit Brown Cemetery as the first site in Singapore to be placed on the World Monuments Fund Watch list 2014-2016. Claire Leow and Catherine Lim, co-founders of the blog, bukitbrown.com,  are the editors for the book, backed by a volunteer editorial team from within the community.

We are grateful to the Urban Redevelopment  Authority URA for sponsorship of venue for the launch.

Cover design by Matt3r design and research