POWA Writing Programme
In 2006 driven by the need to create a collective space through which women could share their stories of surviving gender based violence, we set up the Writing Programme, and invited women throughout the country to send us their short stories, poems and personal essays that told stories of survival.
Since its inception there have been four anthologies published:
2005 - Breaking the Silence: Dreaming of living
2006 - Breaking the Silence: Positive Living Gender
2007 - Breaking the Silence: Murmurs of the girl in me
2008 - Breaking the Silence: Journeys to recovery
In 2008 we reviewed the project’s structure and after much consideration decided to change it from a competition, to a programme, and by so doing set it up as a space that could be entered/occupied by as many voices as possible.
In 2009 as part of the change to the structure of the programme and also as way of further extending our help to aspiring writers, in addition to the publication of the anthology we added a number of components to the programme.
These included:
- The development of a writer’s guide called – The wayward woman’s guide to writing
- The development and conducting of a series of writer’s workshops, held annually in different provinces
- Setting up of a mentoring space designed to respond to the kinds of questions that most aspiring writers are likely to ask themselves
Book Launch
We invite you to join People Opposing Women Abuse (POWA) to celebrate
the launch of Breaking the Silence: Stories from the Other(ed) Woman, and
the call for entries to the 2010 POWA Women’s Writing Project.
DATE: Friday 26 March 2010
TIME: 16h00 to 19h00
VENUE: Xarra Books, Newtown
RSVP: Nehwoh Belinda
Tel: 011 642 4345
Email: nehwoh@powa.co.za by 23 March 2010
The theme for the 2010 women's writing project is: Love and Revolution
Love and Revolution are two words that are rarely used together. Where love is associated with passion, desire and romance, revolution is often associated with revolt, uprising, riot and change, these seemingly opposing emotions. Yet often when we talk about love, what we are really talking about is not just the feeling of love, but its power to transform us in ways that not even we could have imagined, and the more it begins to appear that love and revolution are in fact two sides of the same coin. Sometimes the most revolutionary act is to love. And sometimes the revolution is an act of love.
This year, POWA is calling for poems, short stories and personal essays that tell of your experience of love, be it romantic love, the love of family, the love of friends, the love of community, that has touched you in revolutionary ways that have altered the way you see and approach life.