Printed in Hong Kong and distributed by Chung Hwa Book Company (中华书局), Published by Chung Hwa Book Company (中华书局), this set of geography textbooks were used by Chinese-medium secondary schools in Singapore in the 1950s and 1960s.While the titles of the textbooks can be translated as "Local Geography”( 本国地理), its content of the three volumes covers the geography and various ethnicities of China, and not the region. A section, however, was dedicated to Chinese migration and the overseas Chinese community.Before World War II, the majority of the local Chinese community staunchly regarded China as their motherland and “local” to them did not mean Singapore but China. This mindset started to change after 1949, with the founding of the People’s Republic of China, and the Chinese community increasingly identified with their land of residence. However, some Chinese-medium schools continued to use reprints of pre-WW2 China-centric textbooks.
