Brief Introduction Top

Formerly a graduate student from NUS, I am currently a PhD candidate in the UCLA Dept of Sociology.

Teaching Areas Top

This semester: SC 1101E Making sense of society; SC 2213 Childhood and Youth
Previously:
Science, Technology and Society; Biotechnology and Society; Sociology of Mass Communication; Economy and Society; Sociology of the Family; Classical and Contemporary Theory; Research Methods

Current Research Top

-For my dissertation research, I am trying to explain the institutional integration between different schools of psychotherapy in the late 70s and 80s in the United States

-A paper on the structural sources of occupational coalescence in the ill-defined 'wellness field' encompassing complementary and alternative healing, marginal psychotherapies, and new religious practices

-I am also working on a paper on 'institutional prisms' as a mechanism of incremental social change, using data from the field of psychotherapy

Research Interests Top

Sociology of Culture; Science, Technology and Society; Work, Occupations and Professions; Economic Sociology; Theory and Method

Publications Top

SHORTER ARTICLES/COMMENTS IN JOURNAL

• "The Future of Integration: The Relationship between Traditional Chinese Medicine and Biomedicine" in Chinese Heritage Centre Bulletin, No.3, pg 33-35
  http://www.chineseheritagecentre.org/bulletin/jun2004/jun2004.pdf
   
  

BOOK REVIEWS

• Book Review on Robert Bartholomew's "Exotic Deviance: medicalizing Cultural Idioms-From Stangeness to Illness" in Asian Journal of Social Science, vol 31, no. 3.
  
   
  

CONFERENCE PAPERS

• "The Structural Sources of Occupational Coalescence: Investigating the Hybridity of Wellness Practices" at the American Sociological Association 101st Meeting, Regular Session on Jobs, Occupations, and Professions.
  
   
  
• “The Blurring of Boundaries between Alternative Healing and Religious Practices”, at the 5th Inter-Asean University Seminar on Social Development, National University of Singapore
  
   
  

PAPERS FOR SEMINAR, PUBLIC TALK, LECTURE

• "Investigating the Hybridity of ‘Wellness’ Practices" Department of Sociology, UCLA. Theory and Research in Comparative Social Analysis. Paper 28.
  http://repositories.cdlib.org/uclasoc/trcsa/28 UCLA
   
  

THESES/DISSERTATIONS

• The Blurring of Boundaries at the Periphery: Explaining the Eclecticism and Syncretism of Alternative Healing, Psychotherapeutic, Motivational and Spiritual Movements. Masters Thesis, National University of Singapore.
  
   
  
• The Traditional Chinese Medicine Code of Ethics in Singapore: Process of Construction and Impact on Practitioners. Honours Thesis, National University of Singapore.