The Evolution of Channel 5 and Suria

Erika, Yunchu, Gabriel, Gary, Shanwen and Kay NTU CS8090 2014

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References

“20 Most Memorable SBC (Channel 8) Dramas of the 1980s”. Remember Singapore. 10 March 2014. Web. 25 October 2014. “A Sense of Pride and Loyalty: Jek”. The Straits Times. 1 April 1973. Web. 25 October 2014.

Abdullah Tarmugi. “Speech by Mr Abdullah Tarmugi, Minister for Community Development and Minister-in-charge of Muslim Affairs”. Launch and Preview of Suria 12. Ministry of Information & the Arts. Mandarin Hotel Ballroom 3. 27 June 1996. Web. 25 October 2014.

“Bani Buang”. Tribute SG. n.d. Web. 25 October 2014.

Bergman, Justin. “Singapore’s New Wave of Nostalgia”. Wall Street Journal. 22 November 2013. Web. 25 October 2014.

Boon, Chan. “50 Years of TV in Singapore”. The Straits Times. 1 June 2013. Web. 25 October.

“From Black and White to Colour…”. Remember Singapore. 13 August 2011. Web. 25 October 2014.

Hamid, Abdul Shahnawaz. “Secularisation: Coming To a Malay TV Channel near You”. Muslimbuzz. 11 July 2012. Web. 25 October 2014.

“Kasih Berbisik (HD)”. xinmsn entertainment. Microsoft 2014. Web. 25 October 2014.

Lee, Thean-jeen & Kang, Keagan. “Your Say: Why Crime Dramas Like “Code of Law” Are Hot and Trending”. Media Exchange. October 2012. Web. 25 October 2014.

10. Lim, Kit Siang. “Tele comes of age… after only six weeks”. The Straits Times. 2 April 1963. Web. 25 October 2014.

11. Mahbubani, Gretchen. “High hopes and old problems for the new station”. The Straits Times. 26 March 1980. Web. 25 October 2014.

12. Mahbubani, Kishore. “Singapore’s biggest blessing: safety”. The Sunday Times. 10 May 2013. Web. 25 October 2014.

13. Seah, May. “TV50 Special: A Life of Drama and Variety”. Today Online. 3 December 2013. Web. 25 October 2014.

14. Singapore. Media Development Authority. Malay Programme Advisory Committee 2006/2008. Report by Malay Programme Advisory Committee 2006/2008. Singapore: 2008. Web. 25 October 2014.

15. Tan, Kenneth Paul. Cinema and Television in Singapore: Resistance in One Dimension. Leiden: Brill, 2008. Print.

16. “Television Singapura”. Singapore Infopedia. National Library Board, n.d. Web. 25 October 2014.

17. Yong, Judy. “Raja: This could be the start of a cultural, social revolution”. The Straits Times. 16 February 1963. Web. 25 October 2014.

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How to view this blog in a way that will make sense

Hello!

This tumblr blog is a collaboration between five students - Erika, Yunchu, Shanwen, Gary, Gabriel and Kay. This blog is our project for our CS8090 module, entitled FIlm and Television in Singapore. 

This blog is meant to function as a timeline and as a history of two particular channels in Singapore - Channel 5 and Suria, which air English and Malay programmes respectively, today. Given that we've started right at the beginning of Singapore's television history, before programmes were separated into channels by languages, things may seem a little messy. We've done our best to track the progress of these two channels in particular, covering past and present programmes and comparing the changes! All our posts are in chronological order, but tumblr's reverse chronological presentation makes things a little awkward. In order to view this project from the very beginning of time where we intend for you to begin (haha), please do not scroll down but add this to the end of the URL in your browser's address bar instead:

/tagged/tvproject/chrono

Things should make sense from here on out. 

Thank you, and we hope you enjoy reading through our work!

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Suria as an educational tool, or just another mouthpiece?

The government has used Suria as a tool to spread the usage of proper Malay within the Malay-speaking community in Singapore. The Media Development Authority's Malay Program Advisory Committee Report had deemed the improper usage of Malay to be a concern, continuing the local trend of promoting the 'proper' usage of a language. 

This ongoing obsession has gone beyond plaguing local television, with the Speak Good English campaign as a prime example. Due to the uniquely multi-racial and multi-lingual society we live in, many Singaporeans do not speak wholly in one language all the time and occasionally mix in words from English or other languages. However, the MDA uses Suria to promote the use of grammatically sound, pitch perfect Malay at all times, despite being aware of the reality of the average Singaporean Malay person using a mix of Malay and English in their daily speech. In an apparent bid to keep Suria a "Malay channel" instead of recognising the fluidity of Malay as a language and the adaptability of its users, MDA seems determined to keep the usage of English words to a minimum. 

This reflects the reality of Singapore's television industry - television is but a means of not-so-subtle social engineering, presenting the facade of a community which speaks a perfect form of their mother tongue and nothing else. This is mirrored in other channels like Channel 5 and Channel 8, where Singlish and dialects are censored, respectively. Unfortunately, it doesn't appear to be changing any time soon as according to Kenneth Tan, “Mediacorp remains a national broadcaster, in line with the government’s vision of the media as an instrument of nation building – and so it has an obligation not only to entertain, but also to educate the mass audience.”

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Changes in Suria's TV Programmes

The foremost challenge that Suria faces is that of revenue generation, as it cannot depend solely on the local Malay community. Suria needs to tap into the regional countries, such as Malaysia and Indonesia, and this need was identified when Suria was known as TV12. In 1996, the then-Minister of Community Development and Minister-in-charge of Malay affairs Dr Abdullah Tarmugi was quoted as saying that Malay programmes needed more revenue such that better quality productions could be produced. 

This is because the Malay community was growing to have a sophisticated taste and demanded local programmes of a better quality. This came about as the Malay-speaking audience had become increasingly liberal as more shows from the US and UK trickled in, and as Malaysia and Indonesia's high quality television shows proved themselves to be a competitor of note. The advent of cable television heightened the need for better programmes, as international broadcasts were readily available and provided even greater competition for local productions. As a result, Malay television programmes have attempted to replicate concepts and themes seen in international programmes. This phenomenon is not limited to Suria, as several Channel 5 programmes appear to have been utilising the same tactic.

However, this change has not been received well on all fronts. As demonstrated with shows like Munah and Hirzi Action!, the conservative Muslim community in Singapore took offence to this particular show being aired on Suria as it was in conflict with traditional Islamic values. One blogger in particular, Shahnawaz Abdul Hamid, calls Suria's programming a "secularisation" of Malay television as there is a lack of traditional Islamic values being portrayed and an increasing amount of consumerist advertisements. It appears that Suria's liberal approach after privatisation is certainly not well-received from everyone!

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Changes in Channel 5's TV programmes

Channel 5 TV shows have evolved over the years, from the early days of Under One Roof and Phua Chu Kang to current shows like The Noose, Code of Law, Point of Entry, and Our Makan Places. The first reason for the evolution from family sitcom-style dramas to parodies, law enforcement and reality shows is competition with overseas television shows, especially those from the US and UK. Given that Singapore has been airing plenty of overseas shows and has a high cable TV saturation rate, along with the increasing availability of TV shows from outside of Singapore on the internet, local productions have to up the ante in order to compete and continue to retain viewership.

Hence, shows like Code of Law and Point of Entry took a cue from the Hong Kong police drama genre and shows such as Law and Order from the United States, which had an incredibly successful run of 20 seasons over 20 years. In order to compete, Code of Law appears to closely follow Law and Order’s tried-and-tested formula of having a TV series showcase both the law enforcement and legal aspects involved in solving and prosecuting a crime, while using Singaporean tales and settings in order to anchor it to our local context. Shows like Code of Law and Point of Entry seem to exist for the faction of dubious Singaporeans who believe that local productions simply cannot measure up to shows from countries with more seasoned industries. In any case, the penetration rate of Channel 5 (54.2%) certainly gives critics of Singaporean TV shows pause.

Another reason for moving away family melodramas is audience fatigue, as observed by Brenda Chan. Hence, there must be some exploration into other alternate genres - genres that are sufficiently distant from everyday experiences that audiences already know intimately, yet still sufficiently localised so as not to be too distant from Singaporean viewers. Despite audience fatigue from family-centred dramas, the longevity of Under One Roof and Phua Chu Kang, which ran until the 2000s cannot be underestimated - Singaporeans still value family as part of a conservative society with family values, after all.

With shows like Our Makan Places, though, there is a separate motive - aside from appealing to the common love of food among Singaporeans, Our Makan Places also buys into the nostalgia industry currently booming in Singapore. Given our rapid urbanisation and transition “from Third World to First”, a phrase coined by Prime Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew and made popular by countless repetition, much of Singapore’s old infrastructure and visual landscapes have vanished under the banner of upgrading and change. As Singaporeans start to realise that we have not had the chance to appreciate historical sites and create a culture of our own, Singaporeans have started to hanker after the old. As such, Our Makan Places ties together our national interest with food and the impulse to retain old traditions in a bid to savour our heritage.

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Our Makan Places is a reality TV show hosted by Gurmit Singh and Michelle Chia, and each episode features both of them taking the viewers on a tour around Singapore to discover delicious food places which had been lost and now relocated. This certainly buys into the great Singaporean love for food, and also the recent wave of nostalgia sweeping through Singapore.

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Code of Law and Point of Entry are two other popular television shows aired on Channel 5. Both are crime dramas, with Code of Law incorporating police and legal aspects in a fashion similar to that of Law & Order, a popular tv show with numerous spin offs in the US. Both utilise local settings and local content, such as previous true cases of crime in Singapore, to give the shows a local flavour.

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The Noose is a comedy television series into its seventh season on Channel 5. The show, which is a parody of local news programmes, has won awards in 2010 and 2011 at the Asian Television Awards.

The Noose’s satirical tone reflects Singapore’s growing cynicism, as evidenced in the Singaporean blogosphere’s increasing skepticism towards public institutions. The Noose’s provision of slapstick local comedy and its occupancy of the 8.30pm prime after-dinner time slot reflects its purposeful function as a mode of stress relief for Singaporeans, as we lead increasingly hectic lifestyles.

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Another show which reflects the changing times is Seksa, which is promoted as a way to teach Malay-speaking youth to handle issues like premarital sex. According to MDA, information-heavy and educational shows like this are acceptable and appropriate as the Malay community is more willing to accept negative behaviour being shown onscreen, as long as the message about it being negative was obvious. In any case, Suria is certainly more liberal than it was in the past as it does not censor moderately graphic material.

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“ Munah and Hirzi Action!” , which debuted on October 2012 is a comedy drama loosely based on the lives of the eponymous youtube stars. The show eschewed the use of established or upcoming TV celebrities, as Munah and Hirzi were both unknown outside of their Youtube channel at the time, which has close to 17 million views and about 70,000 subscribers at the moment. The more conservative factions of the Malay community took offence at their content and their appearances on MediaCorp TV’s Suria channel, and expressed their disapproval fervently. However, this particular TV show is meant to cater to the Internet-savvy younger viewers, and it reflects the differing values and attitudes that Suria is willing to represent.

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“Kasih Berbisik”, which debuted on 1st October 2014, is a drama-cum-thriller set against the backdrop of urban Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. The plot deals with a traditional dancer being entangled in a sordid love triangle that involves her ex-lover, friends and husband. Mystery, lust and murder abound as she struggles in handling her relations with the three men. Thus, recent productions tend to stray away from traditional productions like “Pak Awang Temberang” that which featured folk stories and traditional kampung life to something more akin to Western programming - in other words, tackling more risque subjects. This is in order to cater to a younger audience that might be more accepting of such content that may be considered “negative behaviour”, which would have been unthinkable merely 40 years ago.

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On 30th January 2000, Prime 12 was renamed Suria. Instead of airing Tamil, Malay and foreign-language programmes, Suria only aired Malay TV shows. The current slogan Sinar Bersama Anda means Shines With You, and reflects the channel’s aim to represent the Malay community in Singapore.

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Phua Chu Kang was Singapore’s longest running sitcom, with its debut in 1997 and its last episode in 2007. It was then followed up with a sequel in 2009, which is still on air.

  Phua Chu Kang, or PCK as it is colloquially known, is centred around a caricature of a local “Ah Beng” contractor with trademark yellow boots and a large facial mole. The show is unique in its use of Singlish, a pidgin form of English, which the government has tried very hard to eradicate with movements such as the Speak Good English Movement.

PCK is also unique in that it spans almost two decades, showing its adaptability to the different concerns Singaporeans had over time.

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Under One Roof aired from 1995-2003 on Channel 5, and it had a diverse cast of multi-racial characters. It was centred around a middle-class Chinese family, and featured their Malay and Indian neighbours. The mode of a family sitcom reflects the emphasis the government places on family values such as filial piety, and the use of English as the lingua franca between the Chinese, Malay and Indian characters accurately reflected the success of the government’s implementation of the bilingual policy where English was primed to be the common language between all ethnicities. In addition, the English medium made it easily accessible to international audiences, and it was also aired in Australia, France, Malaysia, Taiwan and the Philippines.

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On 31st January 1984, SBC launched a new channel, SBC 12. SBC 12 would later become Suria, but SBC 12’s then-goal was to promote arts and cultural appreciation for Singaporeans. SBC 12 also covered many sports events, such as the Malaysia Cup, the SEA Games and ASEAN Games, FIFA World Cup and the English Premier League.

  Malay programmes were shifted over from SBC 5 to STV 12 in 1994, and then over to Prime 12 in 1995. Prime 12 also showed programmes in Tamil and foreign languages such as Swedish, French, German, Dutch and so on. The migration of Malay and Tamil programmes to one channel signify their decreasing dominance in Singaporean society, as English became more widely spoken and the Chinese retained their numerical majority.

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On 26th March 1980, Radio Television Singapura was corporatised and became Singapore’s latest statutory board, known as Singapore Broadcasting Corporation (SBC). Parliament determined that the government would retain control over SBC so that air time for ethnic minorities in Singapore would not be reduced in order to cater to the majority populations.

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Shortly after independence, TV Singapura joined Radio Singapura and was renamed Radio TV Singapura (RTS). In May 1974, RTS began colour TV test transmissions with half-hour slots twice a day, without much success. It took the broadcasting of the FIFA World Cup Soccer Finals on 7 July 1974 to garner a favourable response from the public.