Right of Way – Book
| Series name | Publications |
| Description | The Asian Women Writers Collective (AWWC) published their first anthology, ‘Right of Way’, with The Women’s Press in 1989. During this period there was a core group of eight members in the organisation and most of them are represented in the anthology. The book consists of short stories and poems of which we have digitised the following: “Pedal Push” by Ravinder Randhawa, which deals with the themes of marriage, racism and independence; Leena Dhingra’s “The Debt”, follows final year film student Anjali Dutta, who travels to Bombay to work on a documentary film about rural development and soon discovers that the India she idealises is far from her deepest expectations; disability and the joys and sorrows of motherhood are the topics of the poem, “Baby Talk I” by Rahila Gupta; “The Nightmare” by Rukhsana Ahmad, explores a mother’s disillusionment after an unwanted abortion and unhappy marriage; “Blood Lust to Dust” by Rahila Gupta, is a poem dedicated to Balwant Kaur, an Asian woman who was murdered by her husband in front of her children at a South London refuge. The poem was read at the Balwant Kaur memorial campaign; and “The Traveller” by Meera Syal, discusses the concepts of autonomy and freedom. |
| Date of Creation / Publication | 1988 |
| Creator | Asian Women Writers Collective |
| Associated Person/ Organisation | Randhawa, Ravinder |
| Location | |
| Collection and Reference Number | Asian Women Writers Collective (AWWC) (GB 2661 AWWC) |
| Catalogue Number | AWWC/PUB/RW |
| Copyright | Asian Women Writers Collective/ individual writer / publisher |
| Access to originals | The originals are located in the SALIDAA archive. |
| Series notes | The Asian Women Writers Collective published two major anthologies of short stories and poetry, 'Right of Way' in 1989 and 'Flaming Spirit' in 1994. Both anthologies required a lengthy and intensive selection process as the AWWC received a large volume of submissions. They also published an in-house collection of new works, 'Read On', in February 1990, and a collection of poetry, 'Read On 2' in 1994. Their fifth publication, 'When I Say No' contains writings from workshops conducted in five cities throughout England. |
| Collection notes | The materials from the Asian Women Writers Collective archives consist of two categories: items which belong to publications such as short stories, poems and writings from workshops and administrative and outreach material such as membership information, correspondence and information about events hosted by the organisation. |
