8 Things You Need to Know about 12th S R Nathan Fellow Professor Wang Gungwu

IPS’ 12th S R Nathan Fellow is Prof Wang Gungwu, who is one of the most well-known historians and scholars in Asia.
Get to know a different side to Prof Wang as he candidly shares about what he does in his free time, how he relates to Singapore and his early memories as a student in the country.
Prof Wang’s public lecture series is titled, “Living With Civilisations: Reflections on Southeast Asia’s Local and National Cultures”. In his lectures, he will look at how the cultures of our region and in Singapore interacted with civilisations, which in turn shaped local identities and cultures. Understanding the history of Singapore from this perspective will give us insight to how the country’s modern identity is being shaped and enable us to better understand our region’s place in the modern world order.
His lectures will be livestreamed on IPS' Facebook page: / live
Find out more about Prof Wang and his lecture series here: nus.edu/3yFqyxR
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[@Diderot68]

I wish you good health, Sir. You are one of the most respected scholars in Singapore.

[@jiayu3322]

Sir. You are greater than you know. Thank you.

[@ivangim1]

Prof Wang, you are right to say Singapore will eventually have its own culture over time. For the Singaporean Malay, Chinese, Indian and Eurasian are already distinguishable from their overseas counterparts of the same origin. We think, talk, dress, live, work, play and hope in life quite differently from those folks back in their own country.

[@fongfattchee777]

文明 vs. 文化?
Why is understanding the difference important to our personal moral philosophy, our families and our firms?
In a firm or a military unit we apply Tactics, Techniques and Procedures to capture the method and culture of inspection and diligence to transmit the essence of quality.
We have international and globalized Management Standards and we apply the Annex SL as part of the section of the ISO/IEC Directives part 1 that prescribes how ISO Management System Standard (MSS) standards should be written.
The top-level headers are :
1. Scope
2. Normative references
3. Terms and definitions
4. Context of the organisation
5. Leadership
6. Planning
7. Support
8. Operation
9. Performance evaluation
10. Improvement
The idea is that being Thai or Anglo-Saxon or Chinese or indian would not imperil your ability to deliver values across cultures.
Indians do leverage their 文明 by incorporating devotions to Ayudha Pooja during a specific day of their work year. However, these practices are non-central to the essence of modernity and value-creation across humanity.
Why is understanding the distinction between 文明 vs. 文化 relevant in the context of modernity? Is the importance academic and largely artificial?