上世纪五六十年代的冷战时期，"南洋"这个地理文化区域出现了大量的少儿期刊，具有明确的教育理念，凸显了儿童作为历史和文化概念、以及未来国民的重要意义。新加坡建国后，本地出版的少儿期刊在编写和内容方面，更强调少年儿童是国家进步的核心力量，着重于用教育将儿童形塑为"理想国民"。此论文集的重要学术价值正是把儿童出版这一文化研究课题带入了新加坡的历史语境。 全书收录的11篇论文主要对期刊《马来亚少年》、《世界儿童》、《南洋儿童》、《儿童乐园》和《少年乐园》等的研究；也收录本地出版人口述历史的访问，以及对本地出版公司出版建制和发行网络构成的梳理和论述。 本书由八方文化创作室出版。

In Networks beyond Empires, Kuo examines business and nationalist activities of the Chinese bourgeoisie in Hong Kong and Singapore between 1914 and 1941. The book argues that speech-group ties were key to understanding the intertwining relationship between business and nationalism. Organization of transnational businesses and nationalist campaigns overlapped with the boundary of Chinese speech-group networks. Embedded in different political-economic contexts, these networks fostered different responses to the decline of the British power, the expansion of the Japanese empire, as well as the contested state building processes in China. Through negotiating with the imperialist powers and Chinese state-builders, Chinese bourgeoisie overseas contributed to the making of an autonomous space of diasporic nationalism in the Hong Kong-Singapore corridor.