ARE OUR ties with our past still strong? Will our heritage straddle generations?

For a small nation, barely past the half-century mark, many would argue we are still in the process of building a national heritage.

But as the Singapore Heritage Festival draws to a close — with events at the predictable historic areas like Chinatown, Little India, and Kampong Glam, and the Singapore River — it becomes clear that much of Singapore’s heritage is still deeply entrenched in its immigrant roots.

Our ancestral roots — Cantonese, Teochew, Hainanese, Javanese, Bugis, Nyonya, Tamil, Malayalee, Sindhi, to name just a few — the cultures and peoples that multi-racial Singapore is made up of, seems very much alive.

While heritage is kept alive in these little ethnic bubbles, we must now look forward to the future and the next generation to carry the torch that could light the way for a heritage that flows from new generations of migrants weaving into the current fabric of society.

Pioneer Singaporeans are quick to talk about community, their links to cultural roots, the kampong spirit, and coming together as a people in the face of the great adversities of the past. But as they try their level best to pass on these stories and traditions of a very different nation, it is critical to understand how much value heritage holds for the next generation.

Will the stories, traditions, practices, and even artefacts and heirlooms, often passed down generation upon generation become lost to us in years to come?

In this week’s Friday Focus, we speak to Millenials to find out what heritage means to them. We also speak with Prof Kwok Kian Woon, the former President of the Singapore Heritage Society to get his views on the topic.