Making health public : English language newspapers and the medical sciences in colonial Malaya (1840s–1941)
The print and broadcast media are traditionally vital vehicles for both the transmission of information and framing of discussion on health, medicine, and diseases. However, their roles have been largely peripheral in medical historiography. In this respect, this paper explores...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2011
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/10356/91454 http://hdl.handle.net/10220/7293 |
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| Institution: | Nanyang Technological University |
| Language: | English |
| Summary: | The print and broadcast media are traditionally vital vehicles for both the
transmission of information and framing of discussion on health, medicine, and
diseases. However, their roles have been largely peripheral in medical historiography. In
this respect, this paper explores the position of English language newspapers in colonial
Malaya in identifying and disseminating epidemiological data as well as commentaries
on public health issues and policies. These discussions provided a crucial platform in
linking public health discourses to a more literate and influential lay public and adding to
broader debates on the governance of the colony. Collectively, the articles and editorials
of the print media in British Malaya were not only indicative of the extent of
involvement of colonial civil society in public health. Their narratives also reflected
underlying tensions between state and society in addition to sociocultural anxieties over
the fluid labor and capital flows of the colonial political economy. |
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