"Goh's theoretically sophisticated and creative analysis of Singapore's society, space and culture and his brilliant critique of the city's official policies of self-representation is a marvellous tour de force. An astute urban semiotician and interpreter

"In Contours of Culture Robbie Goh has achieved what many specialists in cultural studies have attempted only metaphorically, by successfully fusing the materiality of spatiality with the symbolic realm of cultural processes. The result is an absorbing an

"This is a remarkable book. By taking a series of readings of Singapore's urban culture, it chronicles the emergence of a new city form which, through the coming together of quite particular narratives of modernity, nationhood and identity may well be pro

Robbie Goh is Associate Professor and Head of the Department of English Language and Literature of the National University of Singapore. Educated at the National University of Singapore and the University of Chicago, he is the author of Sparks of Grace The Story of Methodism in Asia, the editor (with Brenda S. A. Yeoh) of Theorizing the Southeast Asian City as Text, the editor (with Shawn Wong) of Asian Diasporas Cultures, Identities, Representations, and the author of numerous articles on urban and Asian cultures, and Anglophone literatures.