November 2025

This November, Penang Monthly explores language, place and memory. As GTLF returns, we highlight Penang’s multilingual streets and the dialects that keep local history alive.

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A publication of Penang Institute, Penang Monthly is the voice of Penang - an inspiring read for the curious Malaysian, featuring stories about the people, ideas, and issues shaping the state's well-being. Sign up for a free account to enjoy unlimited access to all our articles.

Sustaining the Dignity of the Dying

6 min read

Cancer is a traumatic and painful experience for both patients and their families. However, with the right care and support, the situation can be very different indeed.

by Emilia Ismail

The Crude Dynamics of the Price of Petrol

7 min read

The price of oil dropped threefold within the first 20 days of this year, alongside a Ringgit that sorely depreciated against the US Dollar. With our dependency on oil money, how bad is the situation?

by Dr. Lim Kim-Hwa & Tim Niklas Schoepp

The costs of inequality: Not just a case of “poor envy”

6 min read

In 2014, “inequality” was undeniably the buzzword in the public policy domain, partly thanks to Thomas Picketty’s unlikely bestseller, Capital in the 21st Century.

by Nicholas Chan

The letter in English: Ipoh’s place on the Sun Yat-Sen trail

5 min read

In the turmoil at the beginning of the 20th century, secret letters were commonplace. And it was with a letter from Dr Sun Yat-Sen, mysteriously written in English, addressed to her great-great grandfather, that Chan Sue Meng began the painstaking work of piecing her family history together.

by Carolyn Hong

Penang’s aviation and maritime sectors by the numbers

3 min read

Penang International AirportPenang International AirportPenang International Airport is the country’s third busiest airport in terms of passenger tr...

by Penang Monthly

Soldering a regional platform for semiconductors

7 min read

The annual Semicon Singapore event, a regional exposition of the semiconductor industry, has been taking place for the last 21 years. However, this time around,...

by Ong Wooi Leng

Penang’s semiconductor industry moves from assembly to R&D

4 min read

Since the opening of Malaysia’s first Free Industrial Zone in the 1970s, Penang’s economy has been thriving, based on export-oriented labour-intensi...

by Ong Wooi Leng

Seeing art in passing time and peopled space

6 min read

Lee: Engaging pioneering communities.Art today can involve the most ordinary of people doing the most ordinary of things, fulfilling the Beuysian dictum o...

by Ooi Kok Chuen

Through the eyes of a refugee child

5 min read

When Universiti Malaya anthropology lecturer Kamal Solhaimi Fadzil began his project last year, he was not sure it would get anywhere. It seemed a tough job, an...

by Carolyn Hong

Remembering Krishen Jit

5 min read

Krishen Jit was a history academic at Universiti Malaya and he sustained his “Talking Drama” column in New Sunday Times for many years. Thus, people...

by Kee Thuan Chye

Does Malaysia’s animation industry have a future?

8 min read

There is much to see when we look east. As kids, many of us would have wished for a robotic blue cat with a magic pocket, or at least a desk with a drawer that...

by Ch’ng Chin Chin

The Athi Nahappan Report revisited Part 2: Local elections are part of a larger reform agenda

13 min read

The most cited recommendation of the Athi Nahappan Royal Commission of Enquiry must be the restoration of local government elections. Today, half a century late...

by Koay Su-Lyn & Steven Sim

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