Conjuring the tropical spectres : heavy metal, cultural politics in Singapore and Malaysia

The evolution of moral panics is dependent on the particular social context and the ability of certain issues to trigger concern within society. In this paper, the authors have employed a cross-comparative study of the heavy metal music subcultures in Singapore and Malaysia to understand the differe...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Fu, Kelly, Liew, Kai Khiun
Other Authors: Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: 2011
Subjects:
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/10356/91558
http://hdl.handle.net/10220/7007
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Institution: Nanyang Technological University
Language: English
id sg-ntu-dr.10356-91558
record_format dspace
spelling sg-ntu-dr.10356-915582020-03-07T12:15:50Z Conjuring the tropical spectres : heavy metal, cultural politics in Singapore and Malaysia Fu, Kelly Liew, Kai Khiun Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information DRNTU::Social sciences::Sociology::Culture DRNTU::Humanities::History::Asia::Singapore The evolution of moral panics is dependent on the particular social context and the ability of certain issues to trigger concern within society. In this paper, the authors have employed a cross-comparative study of the heavy metal music subcultures in Singapore and Malaysia to understand the differences in the issues that generate such panics based on the socio-political context of each country and its current concerns. Although the youth involved in both cases are marginalised male Malays, the framing of their alleged deviance and criminality permits, in the case of Singapore, only a limited possibility for moral panic creation given the conservative socio-political governance that limits allegations such as 'Satanism'. In the case of Malaysia, where a 'large-scale' moral panic involving black metal emerged in 2001, the recent trend towards Islamisation gave fodder for the condemnation of black metal based on the allegations of the anti-Islamic behaviour of Muslim youth involved in the black metal scene. In both cases, such groups were exploited by parties claiming to defend the social fabric of the moral majority, but in the latter case it took on grave implications due to the extent of the state and public response. This paper thus argues that the framing of these moral panics is an important component determining the relative 'success' of the panic or its ability to capture public and state imaginings. Accepted version 2011-09-07T08:02:07Z 2019-12-06T18:07:52Z 2011-09-07T08:02:07Z 2019-12-06T18:07:52Z 2006 2006 Journal Article Liew, K. K., & Fu, K. (2006). Conjuring the tropical spectres: heavy metal, cultural politics in Singapore and Malaysia. Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, 7(1), 99-112. 1464-9373 https://hdl.handle.net/10356/91558 http://hdl.handle.net/10220/7007 10.1080/14649370500463182 155428 en Inter-Asia cultural studies © 2006 Taylor & Francis. This is the author created version of a work that has been peer reviewed and accepted for publication by Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, Taylor & Francis.  It incorporates referee’s comments but changes resulting from the publishing process, such as copyediting, structural formatting, may not be reflected in this document.  The published version is available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14649370500463182. 15 p. application/pdf
institution Nanyang Technological University
building NTU Library
country Singapore
collection DR-NTU
language English
topic DRNTU::Social sciences::Sociology::Culture
DRNTU::Humanities::History::Asia::Singapore
spellingShingle DRNTU::Social sciences::Sociology::Culture
DRNTU::Humanities::History::Asia::Singapore
Fu, Kelly
Liew, Kai Khiun
Conjuring the tropical spectres : heavy metal, cultural politics in Singapore and Malaysia
description The evolution of moral panics is dependent on the particular social context and the ability of certain issues to trigger concern within society. In this paper, the authors have employed a cross-comparative study of the heavy metal music subcultures in Singapore and Malaysia to understand the differences in the issues that generate such panics based on the socio-political context of each country and its current concerns. Although the youth involved in both cases are marginalised male Malays, the framing of their alleged deviance and criminality permits, in the case of Singapore, only a limited possibility for moral panic creation given the conservative socio-political governance that limits allegations such as 'Satanism'. In the case of Malaysia, where a 'large-scale' moral panic involving black metal emerged in 2001, the recent trend towards Islamisation gave fodder for the condemnation of black metal based on the allegations of the anti-Islamic behaviour of Muslim youth involved in the black metal scene. In both cases, such groups were exploited by parties claiming to defend the social fabric of the moral majority, but in the latter case it took on grave implications due to the extent of the state and public response. This paper thus argues that the framing of these moral panics is an important component determining the relative 'success' of the panic or its ability to capture public and state imaginings.
author2 Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information
author_facet Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information
Fu, Kelly
Liew, Kai Khiun
format Article
author Fu, Kelly
Liew, Kai Khiun
author_sort Fu, Kelly
title Conjuring the tropical spectres : heavy metal, cultural politics in Singapore and Malaysia
title_short Conjuring the tropical spectres : heavy metal, cultural politics in Singapore and Malaysia
title_full Conjuring the tropical spectres : heavy metal, cultural politics in Singapore and Malaysia
title_fullStr Conjuring the tropical spectres : heavy metal, cultural politics in Singapore and Malaysia
title_full_unstemmed Conjuring the tropical spectres : heavy metal, cultural politics in Singapore and Malaysia
title_sort conjuring the tropical spectres : heavy metal, cultural politics in singapore and malaysia
publishDate 2011
url https://hdl.handle.net/10356/91558
http://hdl.handle.net/10220/7007
_version_ 1681042996673380352