To explore the Chinese language education and cultural roots of contemporary Chinese Singaporeans through the film Wet Season

Abstract

Wet Season is a film by Chinese-Singaporean director Anthony Chen. First, the film tells the story of Ah Ling, a female middle school Chinese teacher, who encounters marriage, career and cultural crises. Secondly, Wet Season reveals the psychological conflicts between ethnic education and national education, ethnic identity and national identity of the overseas Chinese community. It stimulates the audience to think about the future of Chinese education and Chinese culture in Singapore, and tries to arouse the attention and reflection of the society.

The rootless drift of Chinese Singaporeans is a psychological state that developed mainly in the 20th century. Before the 20th century, overseas Chinese had a clear sense of their homeland and their identity was relatively stable. Since the second half of the 20th century, with the establishment of modern countries, overseas Chinese have blurred their sense of motherland and gradually weakened their sense of identity with their ancestral country. Coupled with other economic, political and cultural reasons, the plight of the spiritual world of overseas Chinese has become increasingly obvious. In order to meet the challenges of a new historical period and new social outlook, overseas Chinese groups, including Singaporean Chinese, need to face up to cultural differences and constantly update their cultural cognition. The Chinese culture represented by the Confucian tradition needs to be reconstructed in the new context to meet the requirements of the globalization era.