NTU, Sociology
J. Patrick Williams is Associate Professor of Sociology at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. He has published widely on the behaviors and experiences of people who self-identify as subcultural and is particularly interested in the social construction of subcultures, subcultural identities, and subcultural authenticity. He is an associate editor of the journal Deviant Behavior and an editorial board member of the journal DIY, Alternative Cultures and Society. He has authored and/or edited several books, including Authenticity in Culture, Self, and Society (Ashgate, 2009), Subcultural Theory: Traditions and Concepts (Polity Press, 2011), Studies on the Social Construction of Identity and Authenticity (Routledge, 2020), and Interpreting Subcultures: Approaching, Contextualizing, and Embodying Sense- Making Practices in Alternative Cultures (Bristol University Press, 2024).
Subcultures as multicultural phenomena
In Singapore, multiculturalism has been typically conceived of in terms of ethnicity, language, and/or religion. Such conceptions, while perhaps expedient for governmental and bureaucratic processes, assume simple links between cultures and social groups. Sociological scholarship has for many decades demonstrated that culture is not tied in rigid ways to specific populations based on such social categories, but rather is spread through interacting networks of people. Further, what have traditionally been thought of as subcultures may well exemplify contemporary multiculturalism in a pluralistic society. Subcultures are not groups of people or segments of a population; they are structures and processes of meaning-making that enable individuals to interact with each other to accomplish personal and/or social actions and goals. In this talk, I will discuss various forms of contemporary subcultures—whether based on expressive distinction, non-normativity, or marginality—to show the extent to which Singapore exists as a multicultural society beyond ethnicity, language, and/or religion.