Gender Matters in the Singapore Mutiny

Abstract

In 1915 a rebellion broke out among the Fifth Light Infantry of the British Indian Army which was stationed in Singapore. Several historical studies on the Singapore Mutiny are already available but so far no analysis has been offered of the ways in which gender issues became entwined within British constructions of the significance of the rebellion. This article explores some gender matters arising from the Singapore Mutiny. It considers how the British colonizers created gendered interpretations of the uprising with images of lecherous as well as treacherous Indian rebels targeting British womanhood. A comparison is suggested between the ways in which the British mythologized the Singapore Mutiny and their constructions of the significance of the Indian Mutiny of 1857. (authors)