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Censorship as Performance – The case of a Singapore Reality TV Show

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Published
Publication date9/09/2015
Host publicationMedia, Margins and Popular Culture
EditorsEinar Thorsen, Heather Savigny, Jenny Alexander, Daniel Jackson
Place of PublicationLondon
PublisherPalgrave Macmillan
Pages202-215
Number of pages14
ISBN (electronic)978-1-137-51281-9
ISBN (print)978-1-349-56631-0
<mark>Original language</mark>English

Abstract

Singapore is known for its tight censorship. Index on Censorship named Singapore ‘censorship city’ in 2009 (Index on Censorship, 2009); and in 2014, Singapore fell to its record lowest position of 150th out of 180 in the world press freedom index (Reporters Without Borders, 2014). Many scholars have written about the widespread censorship in the nation state and its media industry (Kuo and Chen, 1983; Tan and Soh, 1994). Singaporean media scholar Lee (2007: 62) argued that media producers will never be able to alleviate their fears and self-censorship unless the authorities ‘rescind the OB [out-of-bound] markers and other open-ended laws’. George’s (2005: 11) theory of ‘calibrated coercion’ also postulated that the Singaporean state’s use of overt repression is calibrated ‘for maximum effectiveness at minimum cost’.