해협 화인 지식인 림분컹의 ‘조국’ 근대화 구상과 ‘싱가포리안’의 탄생

초록

This study examines the formation and transformation of identity in the modern Chinese diaspora through the life and thought of Lim Boon Keng, a Straits Chinese intellectual from Singapore. Focusing on his advocacy of Confucianism as a civil religion and his vision of China’s modernization, it explores how Straits Chinese communities sought a renewed sense of ‘Chineseness’ while living as subjects of the British Empire. By analyzing Lim’s presidency at Xiamen University and his conflicts with New Culture intellectuals, the study highlights the ideological tensions between Nanyang Chinese communities and mainland China. It further traces the shift in Lim’s outlook from a transnational Chinese community toward the realities of Singapore and Malaya amid the Sino-Japanese War, the Cold War, and decolonization. The article argues that Lim should be understood not simply as a Chinese nationalist or diaspora intellectual, but as a complex figure whose life embodied the overlapping identities of China, the ancestral homeland, Nanyang, and Singapore. Through his career, the study reveals the historical continuity between projects for the modernization of the Chinese “homeland” and the emergence of a distinct Singaporean identity.

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