Planting Angsana Tree

Cohesion and Resistance during Singapore’s Urbanization

Abstract

Planting Angsana tree, integral to Singapore's "Garden City" vision in the 1960s, provided immediate lushness, ample roadside shade, and transformed Singapore into desirable urban areas. However, as political and aesthetic visions evolved, the tree's prominence waned due to misalignment with new urban ideals and recurring disease. This paper explores this rise and fall of Angsana tree’s history along the urbanization of Singapore, intersecting the domains of nature (with a focus on plants), politics (urban planning), and space (the physical realm), and questioning how urban studies can overlook the intricate relationships between human and more-than-humans as the formation of the city is not only purely led by human's intentions but also plants' story. This study advocates for a more mobile positioning analytical framework that acknowledges the agency of more-than-human subjects and their contributions to urban transformation. It first argues that planting is a joint practice, process and a close interaction between human and more-than-humans, which helps us to go beyond the universal and simply statement of urban greening. Second, this study embodies the botanical study with historical analysis of planting Angsana, by examining how the Angsana tree's lifecycle—growth, adaptation, and eventual decay aligns with and resists human urbanization goals. This goes further shift from the traditional understanding of nature by either scientific or social constructed to contextualizing more-than-humans within the social and ecological fabric of the city.