KAMPUNG is a collaborative platform where creators of different backgrounds intersect, explore and express a community's identity. The output of every collaboration is a community publication. In every edition, we explore a different theme and archive the narrative through a dialogue-driven and socially engaged process.
After the warm reception we received for our first two editions, Kampung will be collaborating with Jurong-based social service agency, Loving Hearts Multi-service Centre, to create two intergenerational projects.
Issue 3: Coming of Age
The topic of aging is commonly associated with the elderly but rarely drawn in comparison to the process of growing up. We would like to extend the conversation of aging to youths, and facilitate an intergenerational dialogue on aging and imagining an age-friendly society.
Kampung Jurong Issue 3 is a guide to aging that showcases the reflections of five pairings of youth and elderly as they explore thematic questions on aging and growing up. Each youth X elderly pair will discuss the following questions:
- How do you know you have grown old/grown-up?
- How was your experience growing old?
- How has the community supported you?
We will then invite the five pairs to articulate their reflections through a form of their interests, ranging from photo essays to sketches, to interviews. The publication will be divided into two parts- the first half features the articles/works by the youths, while the other half features the elderly's perspectives in elderly-friendly text. All the works will be synthesised into a guide to aging, printed in the middle section of the publication.
This publication will be distributed across different institutions in the elderly care sector.
Issue 4: Lost and Found
Heritage is often recounted on a grand scale. However, much of our identity comprises of smaller everyday objects that elude our collective memory and archive.
Issue 4 is an ode to the heritage behind ordinary preloved objects and traces its renewed lives with new owners. We will hold an open call to invite individuals to share preloved items that they would like to give away to someone with knowledge of its history. Interested contributors will pick an item of their interest and meet the owners. They will then inherit a selected item respectively and explore its renewed life from their point of view to interrogate how we ascribe meaning and value to the material.
This publication will be distributed across different community institutions in Jurong.
We will launch the two Issues tentatively in late February 2021. The launch event will be held at Loving Heart Multi-service centre, with an activity designed and curated based on the narrative of the two issues.
Who We Are
Pok Yue Weng
Pok Yue Weng by day filmmaker and other times amateur publisher. He is fond of hoarding printed matter and the tactile feel of flipping pages.
Yuqi Ong
Yuqi Ong writes and teaches. She enjoys any project that has an intersection
between art and community engagement.
What We Need & What You Get
Kampung is a non-profit project that we run on top of our full-time jobs. In order for it to be sustainable, we require funding for the print and logistics of the project. Our print run is 500 copies for each issue. Many of you may ask about the viability of having an online presence versus an actual physical zine. We believe that physical copies of the publication can engage and activate readers with more immediacy, especially in consideration of the wide range of demographics in a community. However, we will be exploring digital copies as well to further the distribution across different platforms.
Your support of funding will go into cost of design and printing, events and workshop for our participants, professional editing, as well as other collaterals.
The Impact
As a simultaneous act of finding and making of identity, KAMPUNG serves as space for contributors to have an internal excavation of their ideas and voices, and an external excavation of stories in the community. We hope that the publication could evoke in readers a deeper consciousness about the idea of community and invite them to re-look at ordinary spaces with a greater sense of wonder.
For these two issues, our aim is to increase the accessibility of our platform for the elderly in Jurong in order to integrate their voices and bridge the intergenerational gap in engaging purposeful dialogue. Beyond the quantifiable, we hope to cement these small acts of meaning-making and imaginative exercises in our neighbourhood culture.
If you have backed the project and are looking for other ways to support us (or you can't back us right now), we would like to invite you to:
1. Support us on our social media platforms and share our project:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kampungmakers/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kampungmakers/
Website: https://aboldkampung.wixsite.com/kampung
2. Join our project or our future editions as a contributor. As an interdisciplinary platform, we welcome people of different backgrounds and talents beyond writing. Alternatively, you could refer friends who you think might be interested in sharing his or her skillsets.
3. Distribute our print publication at your event or place.
4. Become a platform partner and explore potential collaborations with your community.
Thank you so much for your support!