Asian Women Writers' Collective
The Asian Women Writers' Collective, formerly known as the Asian Women Writers Workshop, was an organization of British Asian women writers. Founded by the writer and activist Ravinder Randhawa in 1984, the AAWC provided a platform for several British Asian women to enter writing, including Ravinder Randhawa, Meera Syal, Leena Dhingra, Tanika Gupta and Rukhsana Ahmad.
History
The Asian Women Writers' Workshop was founded in London in 1984. Its aim was to support creative writing by Asian women and increase access to publishers. It was initially supported by the Black Ink Collective, and funded by the Greater London Council. After the GLC's 1986 abolition, it received funding from Greater London Arts Association and Lambeth Council.The group grew from a core group of eight South Asian members to a national membership of over a hundred, participating together in creative writing exercises and sharing work with each other. In 1987 they changed their name to the Asian Women Writers' Collective, with some political debate over whether to include the term "Black" in their name in recognition of political blackness. As Asha Sen recounts:
In 1991, the AAWC lost its Arts Association funding. In 1992, moving beyond its original South Asian membership, the collective explicitly adopted a wider definition of the term "Asian", to include those from China, Japan, Korea and Turkey.
Two AAWC anthologies – Right of Way and Flaming Spirit – opened up opportunities for previously unpublished AAWC members. Though the AAWC was based in London, its postal membership scheme enabled writers outside London to receive feedback on their writing, so that Flaming Spirit also included writers based in Sheffield, Birmingham, Manchester and Cardiff.
From 1996, Lambeth Council started cutting funding and the organization ceased activity around early 1997. Its papers are held at the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery.