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‘The Crucible of the Malayan Nation’: The University and the Making of a New Malaya, 1938–621

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 September 2009

A. J. STOCKWELL
A. J. STOCKWELL*
Affiliation:
Department of History, Royal Holloway, University of London, Egham, Surrey, TW20 0EX, UK. Email: [email protected]
*
*Postal address for correspondence: Department of History, Royal Holloway, University of London, Egham, Surrey, TW20 0EX, UK. Email: [email protected].
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Abstract

Like so many features of the British Empire, policy for colonial higher education was transformed during the Second World War. In 1945 the Asquith Commission established principles for its development, and in 1948 the Carr–Saunders report recommended the immediate establishment of a university in Malaya to prepare for self-government. This institution grew at a rate that surpassed expectations, but the aspirations of its founders were challenged by lack of resources, the mixed reactions of the Malayan people and the politics of decolonisation. The role of the University of Malaya in engineering a united Malayan nation was hampered by lingering colonial attitudes and ultimately frustrated by differences between Singapore and the Federation. These differences culminated in the university's partition in January 1962. In the end it was the politics of nation-building which moulded the university rather than the other way round.

Type
Research Article
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 43 , Issue 5 , September 2009 , pp. 1149 - 1187
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008

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Footnotes

1

I acknowledge with thanks comments on earlier versions of this article from participants in the ‘Conference on Asian Horizons,’ National University of Singapore, Singapore August 2005; the ‘Imperial History Seminar’ of the Institute of Historical Research, London, and the Centre of South East Asian Studies, School of Oriental and African Studies, London.

References

2 Carr-Saunders, A. M., New Universities Overseas (London: Allen & Unwin, 1961), pp. 30–31Google Scholar.

3 Educational Policy in British Tropical Africa, Cmd. 2374 (1925). This was produced by the Advisory Committee on Native Education in the British tropical African dependencies, which later became the ACEC and extended its remit to the whole of the colonial empire. The ACEC consisted of civil servants, former colonial administrators and also church and educational representatives. In 1938 its membership of 20 included Professor Reginald Coupland (Beit Professor of Commonwealth History at Oxford), Dr Raymond Firth (then reader in anthropology at the London School of Economics) and Sir Richard Winstedt (former member of the Malayan Civil Service, president of Raffles College 1921–1931, director of education in Malaya 1924–1931 and Malay scholar).

4 Ashton, S. R. and Stockwell, S. E. (eds.), Imperial Policy and Colonial Practice 1925–1945: British Documents on the End of Empire (pt. 1) (London: HMSO, 1996), pp. lxxvi–lxxixGoogle Scholar.

5 Such institutions included Imperial College of Tropical Agriculture at St Augustine, Trinidad; Fourah Bay College in Sierra Leone; Prince of Wales’ College at Achimota, Gold Coast; Higher College at Yaba, Nigeria; Makerere College at Kampala, Uganda; King Edward VII Medical College and Raffles College, Singapore; Gordon Memorial College, Khartoum, the Sudan; and the Central Medical School at Suva, Fiji. See D. J. Morgan, The Official History of Colonial Development: Volume I; the Origins of British Aid Policy, 1924–1945 (London: Macmillan, 1980), p. 107. See also Ashby, Eric, Universities: British, Indian, African; a Study in the Ecology of Higher Education (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1966)Google Scholar. For the principles and practice of colonial educational policies before the war, see Clive Whitehead, ‘Education in British colonial Dependencies, 1919–39: A Re-Appraisal’ in Comparative Education, Vol. 17, No. 1 (March 1981), pp. 71–80.

6 Attempts were subsequently made, for example, by Curzon's Indian Universities Act of 1904, to develop residential, teaching universities. In 1917–1919 and running in parallel with the Montagu–Chelmsford constitutional reforms, the Calcutta University Commission placed emphasis on teaching functions, residential character, autonomy and provision of subjects relevant to Indian culture.

7 Minutes of the 96th meeting of the ACEC, 20 July 1939, CO 859/2/7, The National Archives (TNA), Kew.

8 Nicolson, Nigel (ed.), The Harold Nicolson Diaries 1907–1964 (London: Phoenix, 2005 ed.), p. 171Google Scholar.

9 Thomas to G. E. C. Gent, 11 Oct. 1939, CO 273/651/14, TNA.

10 Sanger, Clyde, Malcolm MacDonald: Bringing an End to Empire (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1995), p. 150Google Scholar. MacDonald was secretary of state for the colonies, 1935 and 1938–1940; governor-general, south east Asia, 1946–1948; commissioner-general, south east Asia, 1948–1955; chancellor, University of Malaya, 1949–1961; high commissioner, India, 1955–1960.

11 See Whitehead, Clive, ‘Sir Christopher Cox: An Imperial Patrician of a Different Kind’ in Journal of Educational Administration and History, Vol. 21, No. 1 (January 1989), pp. 28–42CrossRefGoogle Scholar, reprinted in Whitehead (ed.), Colonial Educators: The British Indian and Colonial Education Service 1858–1983 (London: I. B. Tauris, 2003), pp. 188–205; and Whitehead, ‘Cox, Sir Christopher William Machell (1899–1982)’ in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004). Cox's papers as educational adviser have been catalogued by Whitehead; see CO 1045, TNA.

12 See obituary in The Times, 25 September 1967, and also CO 1045/118 for McLean's papers on colonial development and welfare. Kenneth Pickthorn (MP for the University of Oxford, president of Corpus Christi College and member of the ACEC) had originally been appointed chairman of the Malayan commission but withdrew ‘owing to the difficult political situation at the time.’

13 On Channon's influence on policy and his role of liaising between the Colonial Office and UK universities, see ‘Overseas Colleges in Special Relationship,' AC11/1/1, Archive of University of London; CO 859/45/2, CO 859/45/3 and CO 859/86/4; Ashby, Universities, pp. 206–211, 215–216, 220ff, 481–524; Pattison, Bruce, Special Relations: The University of London and New Universities Overseas, 1947–1970 (London: University of London, 1984), p. 17ffGoogle Scholar; Maxwell, I. C. M., Universities in Partnership: The Inter-University Council and the Growth of Higher Education in Developing Countries 1946–70 (Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press, 1980), pp. 6–10Google Scholar.

14 For the McLean Commission, see CO 273/651/9 and /14, CO 273/660/13 and Higher Education in Malaya: Report of the Commission Appointed by the Secretary of State for the Colonies, June 1939, Colonial no. 173 (HMSO, 1939).

15 Lee, Edwin and Yong, Tan Tai, Beyond Degrees: The Making of the National University of Singapore (Singapore: Singapore University Press, 1996), pp. 53, 59–60Google Scholar; McOwan had, however, been lecturer in chemistry at St Andrew's University before he was appointed professor at Raffles.

16 104th meeting of the ACEC, 27 June 1940, CO 859/20/12; 105th meeting, 18 July 1940, CO 859/20/13.

17 Thomas to Gent, 11 October 1939, CO 273/651/14. When it was first suggested that Shenton Thomas should be invited to the ACEC, Gent pointed out that he ‘would not be attracted by the special prospect of the presence of Prof. Channon at the meeting,’ adding ‘I shd. not bring his name into the initial invitation.’ Gent to Cox, 25 May 1940, CO 859/20/12.

18 Roff, W. R., The Origins of Malay Nationalism (New Haven, CT, USA: Yale University Press, 1967), pp. 239–40Google Scholar.

19 104th meeting of the ACEC, 27 June 1940, CO 859/20/12.

20 Ibid.

21 Channon to Cox, 21 August 1940, CO 273/660/13.

22 Some indication of the wartime depletion of Raffles College and its post-war rehabilitation is provided in its calendars, reports and magazines. See CO 1045/482, BW 90/616 and BW 90/617, TNA.

23 Channon to Cox, 12 November 1940, CO 859/45/2.

24 Ashby, Universities, vii, p. 475. Copies of Channon's memo are at CO 859/45/2 and CO 859/45/3, and extracts are reproduced in Ashby, Universities, pp. 481–492.

25 Other members were Fred Clarke (director, Institute of Education, London), Julian Huxley (zoologist and philosopher), B. Mouat Jones (vice-chancellor, Leeds University), W. M. Macmillan (historian, journalist and critic of colonial maladministration) and Margery Perham (reader in colonial administration, Oxford).

26 Report of the Subcommittee on Higher Education, Colonial Office, 15 May 1943, Misc. no. 507, para 103, CO 1045/196 (Channon report). The report is reproduced in Ashby, Universities, pp. 492–524.

27 Channon report, para. 48.

28 Sir Arthur Dawe to Sir George Gater, 20 May 1943, CO 859/45/3.

29 See correspondence in AC 11/1/1 and Ashby, Universities, pp. 211–212.

30 Oliver Stanley, 13 July 1943, House of Commons Debates, 391, col. 48–52, 57–9, 62–4, 66–9.

31 Walter Elliot had held ministerial office in the National Governments of Baldwin and Chamberlain and had refused Churchill's offer of the governorship of Burma in 1941 (which went to Dorman Smith). The Elliot enquiry recommended three centres of higher education for British West Africa; see Report of the Commission on Higher Education in West Africa, Cmd. 6655 (1945).

32 Asquith, son of a former prime minister, was a high court judge. His terms of reference were ‘[t]o consider the principles which should guide the promotion of higher education, learning, and research and the development of universities in the colonies; and to explore means whereby universities and other appropriate bodies in the United Kingdom may be able to cooperate with institutions of higher education in the colonies in order to give effect to these principles.’ The original papers of the Asquith Commission are at CO 958/1-3, TNA. See also Report of the Commission on Higher Education in the Colonies, Cmd. 6647 (1945).

33 Irvine was a chemist and vice-chancellor of St Andrews. See Report of the West Indies Committee of the Commission on Higher Education in the Colonies, Cmd. 6654 (1945).

34 Quoted in Gater to Cox, 23 May 1945, CO 1045/1476.

35 Gater to T. Lloyd, 9 May 1945, CO 859/86/4.

36 Ashby, Universities, p. 214.

37 See Maxwell, Universities in Partnership.

38 Bayly, C. A., ‘Eric Thomas Stokes, 1924–1981’ in Proceedings of the British Academy, Vol. 97 (1998), pp. 467–498Google Scholar.

39 See Report of the Committee on Higher Education [Robbins report], Cmd. 2154 (1963) and Report of the Sub-Committee on Oriental, Slavonic, East European and African Studies [Hayter report] (London: University Grants Committee, 1961). Hayter followed up an earlier enquiry chaired by Scarborough, Lord, Report of the Interdepartmental Commission of Enquiry on Oriental, Slavonic, East European and African Studies (London: Foreign Office, 1947)Google Scholar. See also, Philips, C. H., ‘Modern Asian Studies in the Universities of the United Kingdom’ in Modern Asian Studies, Vol. 1, No. 1 (1967), pp. 1–14CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Hayter, William, ‘The Hayter Report and After’ in Oxford Review of Education, Vol. 1, No. 2 (1975), pp. 169–172CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

40 See Gelfand, Michael, A Non-Racial Island of Learning. A History of the University College of Rhodesia from Its Inception to 1966 (Gweru, Zimbabwe: Mambo Press, 1978)Google Scholar; Blackstone, Tessa, Gales, Kathleen, Hadley, Roger and Lewis, Wyn, Students in Conflict: LSE in 1967 (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1970), pp. 1 and 153–161Google Scholar; Kidd, Harry, The Trouble at LSE 1966–1967 (London: Oxford University Press, 1969), pp. 15–19Google Scholar.

41 Thompson, F. M. L., ‘The Humanities’ in Thompson, F. M. L. (ed.), The University of London and the World of Learning, 1836–1986 (London: Hambledon, 1990), p. 71Google Scholar.

42 ‘Overseas Colleges in Special Relationship,’ AC 11/18, appendix IV. For a recent, celebratory history of London University's external programme, see Jones, Christine Kenyon, The People's University: 150 Years of the University of London and Its External Students (London: University of London Press, 2008)Google Scholar.

43 Extracts from Priestley's diary in Malaya, August–September 1946, and his ‘Note for the Governor-General,’ 13 September 1946, BW 90/550.

44 Author of books such as Empire or Democracy: A Study of the Colonial Question (London: Gollancz, 1939), Barnes became closely involved in the shaping of Labour's colonial policy soon after he returned to Britain in late 1932 from South Africa, where he had farmed and worked as a journalist.

45 Pickering also played a key part in establishing medical schools at Nottingham and Southampton Universities.

46 Others who had been considered included the editor of The Economist, Geoffrey Crowther, on account of his ‘political experience and understanding,’ and Professor W. K. Hancock, the Australian historian then at Oxford, but he could not be spared from his duties directing the official history of the Second World War, BW 90/550.

47 Minutes of the 152nd meeting of the ACEC, 19 June 1947, CO 987/3, TNA.

48 Minute by H. T. Bourdillon, 9 October 1947, CO 717/160/8, TNA.

49 Ibid.

50 As reported by Sir F. Gimson (governor, Singapore) to Sir T. Lloyd (CO), 8 December 1948, CO 537/3758, TNA.

51 Freda Gwilliam (assistant educational adviser to the secretary of state), in minutes of the 179th meeting of the ACEC, 18 May 1950, CO 987/5.

52 See Report of the Commission on University Education in Malaya, Colonial No. 229 (London: HMSO, 1948). According to correspondence in 1949–1950 between Walter Adams and George Allen, the papers of the Carr-Saunders Commission were sent by surface mail for deposit in the archives of the new university, BW 90/551.

53 The Straits Times, 1 May 1948. For press cuttings on reactions to the Carr-Saunders report, see BW 90/551 and CO 717/161/3.

54 Boh, Lim Tay (ed.), A Symposium on the Carr-Saunders Report on University Education in Malaya (Singapore: International Student Service, 1948)Google Scholar. The symposium was held on 15 May 1948, and contributors included Lim Tay Boh, later lecturer, senior lecturer, professor of economics in the University of Malaya and vice-chancellor of the University of Singapore; Eu Chooi Yip, a graduate of Raffles College, secretary of the Malayan Democratic Union and later member of the Malayan Communist Party; Sardon bin Jubir, president of the Malay Union, Singapore, and later leader of UMNO Youth and cabinet minister in the federal government of independent Malaya; Tan Chee Khoon, president of the Medical College Union and later ‘Mr Opposition’ in the federal parliament of independent Malaysia; and Wan Abdul Hamid of the Raffles College Union.

55 The Straits Times, 3 May 1948.

56 These phrases extracted from MacDonald's foundation day speech are taken from Students’ Union Magazine, University of Malaya, 1953–54 (Singapore, 1954), pp. 35–36; Inter-University Council for Higher Education Overseas 1946–54, Cmd. 9515 (London, 1955); Kim, Khoo Kay, 100 Years: The University of Malaya (Kuala Lumpur: University of Malaya Press, 2005), p. 48Google Scholar.

57 See Lewis, L. J., ‘Higher Education in the Oversea Territories 1948–58’ in British Journal of Educational Studies, Vol. 8, No. 1 (November 1959), p. 8CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Inter-University Council for Higher Education Overseas, p. 3; Lee and Tan, Beyond Degrees, pp. 114–115.

58 See Patricia Pui Huen Lim, ‘University Research in Malaya 1949–1961: With a Bibliography of Staff Research and a List of Theses and Academic Exercises Submitted to the University of Malaya’ (fellowship dissertation, The Library Association, 1968).

59 Parkinson, C. Northcote, A Law unto Themselves: Twelve Portraits (London: Murray, 1966), p. 118Google Scholar; Parkinson, C. Northcote, Parkinson's Law: Or the Pursuit of Progress (London: John Murray, 1959.)Google Scholar. See also the vignette of Parkinson by C. Mary Turnbull, a former member of the history department, in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004).

60 Lewis, ‘Higher education,’ p. 15.

61 Sanger, Malcolm MacDonald, pp. xxii, 314, 318–319, 336.

62 Wah, Yeo Kim, ‘Student Politics in University of Malaya, 1949–51’ in Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, Vol. 23, No. 2 (1992), p. 358CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

63 Anderson, Patrick, Snake Wine: A Singapore Episode (London: Chatto & Windus, 1955)Google Scholar.

64 Parkinson, A Law unto Themselves, p. 141; Lee and Tan, Beyond Degrees, pp. 103–105.

65 Inter-University Council, pp.19–22.

66 See CO 1022/345. For Caine's articles on ‘The problems of the University,’ see Straits Budget, 18 June, 25 June and 2 July 1953.

67 Professor R. A. Robinson was seconded by chemistry department to lead this work; he was later succeeded in the Kuala Lumpur branch by Professor Frederick Mason.

68 Sir D. MacGillivray (deputy high commissioner) to J. Paskin, 4 February 1953, enclosure, CO 1022/440, TNA; extract from draft minutes of the ACEC, 13 December 1952, CO 1022/285; minutes of the ACEC, annex, 12 November 1953, CO 1022/286.

69 Report of the Commission on University Education in Malaya, p.18.

70 Hirschman, Charles, ‘Educational Patterns in Colonial Malaya’ in Comparative Education Review, Vol. 16, No. 3 (October 1972), p. 500CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

71 Silverstein, Josef, ‘Burmese and Malaysian Student Politics: A Preliminary Comparative Inquiry’ in Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, Vol. 1, No. 1 (1970), p. 10ffCrossRefGoogle Scholar.

72 The education ordinance was largely based on the Report of the Committee on Malay Education (Kuala Lumpur: Government Printer, 1951), chaired by Leonard Barnes, although its conclusions had been contested by a report on the education of Chinese Malayans complied by Dr W. P. Fenn and Dr Wu Tek-yao.

73 See Colonial Office, ‘Memorandum explanatory of Sir D. MacGillivray's proposals for national schools in Malaya,’ 14 July 1956, CO 1030/51, TNA.

74 ‘Education for Self-Rule: Government Plans in Malaya’, The Times, 31 January 1956, p. 7.

75 Sir Alexander Carr-Saunders, ‘Report on a visit to the University of Malaya,’ July 1950, BW 90/1017.

76 ‘Education for Self-Rule’, The Times, 31 January 1956, p. 7.

77 For the Malayan government's concern over the growth of the Chinese schools and their failure to meet ‘the greater need of the new Malaya,’ see despatch no. 232 from MacGillivray (high commissioner, Malaya) to A. Lennox-Boyd (secretary of state for the colonies), 2 March 1955, CO 1030/51.

78 Lee and Tan, Beyond Degrees, p. 164.

79 Ibid., p. 113. See also Anderson, Snake Wine, pp. 115–116.

80 Gimson to J. Griffiths (secretary of state), 10 September 1951, CO 717/202/7.

81 For the activities of the Anti-British League, the arrests of 1951 and the role of Corridon, see CO 717/202/7; Yeo, ‘Student Politics,’ pp. 346–380; Puthucheary, Dominic and Jomo, K. S. (eds.), No Cowardly Past: James Puthucheary; Writings, Poems, Commentaries (Kuala Lumpur: INSAN, 1998), pp. 8–11, 57–61Google Scholar. See also Weiss, Meredith L., ‘Still with the People? The Chequered Path of Student Activism in Malaysia’ in South East Asia Research, Vol. 13, No. 3 (2005), pp. 287–332CrossRefGoogle Scholar, which focuses on campus unrest in the 1960s.

82 The new president, W. R. Rasanayagam, declared the Union to be critical of colonialism but opposed to Communism, Students’ Union Magazine, University of Malaya, 1953–54 (Singapore), pp. 2–3.

83 Puthucheary and Jomo, No Cowardly Past, pp. 11–14; Lee Yew, Kuan, The Singapore Story (Singapore: Times Editions, 1998), pp. 161–165Google Scholar. See also Harper, T. N., The End of Empire and the Making of Malaya (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), pp. 297–299CrossRefGoogle Scholar. A convert to Communism in the 1930s but never a member of the Communist Party, Pritt was expelled from the Labour Party in 1940. He espoused movements for colonial freedom in the 1950s; in 1953 he vainly defended Jomo Kenyatta and others in the notoriously rigged trial at Kapenguria (Kenya), and in 1954 he was awarded the Stalin Peace Prize.

84 See Colonial Students in Britain: A Report by the PEP (London: Political and Economic Planning, 1955); A. T. Carey, Colonial Students: A Study of the Social Adaptation of Colonial Students in London (London: Secker & Warburg, 1956); A. J. Stockwell, ‘Leaders, Dissidents and the Disappointed: Colonial Students in Britain as Empire Ended’ in Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, Vol. 36, No. 3 (September 2008), pp. 487–507.

85 Carr-Saunders, ‘Report on a visit to the University of Malaya’, July 1950, BW 90/1017.

86 Memo by Dussek, 18 March 1949, CO 537/4781. Dussek had been the first principal of Sultan Idris Training College, 1922–1936, and from 1925 had combined this position with that of assistant director of education in charge of Malay schools.

87 Notwithstanding the decrease in the Malayan Chinese attending Hong Kong University after the University of Malaya opened, the number was as high as 161 in 1950. The figure for Malayans studying in Australia in 1953 was 509. Turnbull, C. M., ‘The Malayan Connection’ in Kit-ching, Chan Lau and Cunich, Peter (eds.), An Impossible Dream: Hong Kong University from Foundation to Re-establishment, 1910–1950 (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 2002), p. 116Google Scholar; and Inter-University Council, p. 3. See also Harper, Norman, ‘Asian Students and Asian Studies in Australia’ in Pacific Affairs, Vol. 31, No. 1 (March 1958), pp. 54–64CrossRefGoogle Scholar. In The Reluctant Politician: Tun Dr Ismail and His Time (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2006), Ooi Kee Beng describes the student experience of a future Malayan/Malaysian statesman who proceeded to the University of Melbourne after graduating from King Edward VII Medical College in 1946.

88 J. L. Keith (director of colonial students) to Raja Sir Uda bin Raja Mahmud, 24 September 1953, CO 1028/27. A member of the Malayan Civil Service since 1924, Raja Uda was the Federation's first commissioner for Malaya to be appointed to the United Kingdom (1953–1954); he became governor of Penang after independence.

89 CO 876/139, TNA. An additional teacher-training course was later launched at Brinsford Lodge in Wolverhampton. These programmes were discontinued in the 1960s. In September 2001, 500 Kirkby alumni (including Tuanku Bainum, the Raja Permaisuri of Perak and former Raja Permaisuri Agong) held a reunion in Kuala Lumpur to mark the 50th anniversary of the embarkation of the first cohort for Kirkby.

90 Channon report, para 102.

91 Gimson to J. D. Higham, 12 July 1951, CO 717/202/7.

92 Yeo, ‘Student Politics,’ p. 366ff; CO 717/193/3; CO 1022/196.

93 See, for example, Colonial Office Minutes in CO 1028/28.

94 Bayly, Christopher and Harper, Tim, Forgotten Wars: The End of Britain's Asian Empire (London: Allen Lane, 2007), p. 506Google Scholar.

95 ‘Education for Self-Rule’, The Times, 31 January 1956, p. 7.

96 Report of the Commission of Enquiry on the University of Malaya 1957, sessional paper of the legislative assembly, Singapore, Cmd. 54 (1957), para 21.

97 For the text of the speech and its repercussions, see BW 90/1657.

98 Report of the Commission of Enquiry on the University of Malaya 1957, para 18.

99 The four professors were E. M. Glaser (physiology), J. W. H. Lugg (biochemistry), R. C. R. Morell (English), J. C. Cooke (maths and dean of science). On 22 October the acting vice-chancellor, Professor E. H. G. Dobby, wrote in confidence to S. J. Worsley, secretary of the IUC, ‘[T]he Glaser resignation turns on the dispute about the promotion merit of Dr Toh Chin Chye.’ See BW 90/1657. As regards Caine's successor, in January 1957 Council appointed Professor (later Tan Sri Sir) Alexander Oppenheim to serve as vice-chancellor for not more than 2 years. In fact, he remained vice-chancellor of the unitary university until 1962 and continued as vice-chancellor in Kuala Lumpur until 1965. Oppenheim had joined the maths department of Raffles College before the war.

100 In addition to the Report of the Commission of Enquiry on the University of Malaya 1957, see CO 1030/569 and DO 35/9773, TNA.

101 R. Aitken to A. Lennox-Boyd, 21 December 1957, CO 1030/569.

102 Ibid.

103 Goode to Iain Macleod, 23 November 1959, CO 1030/652, para 9.

104 Report of the Nanyang Commission, 1959 (Singapore: Government Printing Office, 1959), p. 27; see also BW 90/554 and DO 35/8194.

105 Report of the Nanyang University Review Committee, misc 1 of 1960, presented to the legislative assembly by the minister for education, 6 February 1960. See also CO 1030/1090. For the esprit de corps of Nanyang students in the face of adversity, see Lee and Tan, Beyond Degrees, pp. 169–172.

106 Quoted in Van Der Kroef, Justus M., ‘Nanyang University and the Dilemmas of Overseas Chinese Education’ in The China Quarterly, Vol. 20 (October–December 1964), p. 96CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

107 Enright, D. J., Memoirs of a Mendicant Professor, (Manchester, UK: Carcanet, 1990), p. 128Google Scholar; see also Carr-Saunders, New Universities Overseas, p. 201 n. 6.

108 Yong Nyuk Lin, quoted in The Times, 13 June 1960, p. 8.

109 ‘More Students, Lower Standards’, The Times, 18 July 1960, p. 9.

110 ‘Political Spur to Growth of a University’, The Times, 11 May 1960, p. 11.

111 For the shift of the university to Kuala Lumpur and its early development, see Khoo, 100 Years, pp. 63–101.