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  • 2022

    What We Inherit: Growing Up Indian

    A follow-up to Perempuan and Growing Up Perempuan , What We Inherit tells the stories of Indian women (and a few men) in Singapore entirely in their own words. They question the expectations foisted upon them, discover new avenues into old traditions and carve out spaces for joy amid anger and sorrow. At a time when the bonds between us seem at constant risk of breaking, What We Inherit turns our attention towards community in all its complexities. It’s a reminder of how we honour, betray and ultimately bear witness to each other… and ourselves. Distributed by Ethos Books (buy it here).

  • 2018

    Growing Up Perempuan

    Growing Up Perempuan is the follow-up to Perempuan: Muslim Women in Singapore Speak Out. Growing Up Perempuan is a collection of stories written by women, for women. It offers stories of love and loss, strength and endurance, confidence and courage – stories that inspire and empower. This is a book about challenging the status quo and learning to chart our own paths instead of having the world define them for us. Buy it here.

  • 2016

    Perempuan: Muslim Women in Singapore Speak Out

    Perempuan includes 31 personal accounts by young Muslim women in Singapore. The first-of-its-kind e-book offers essays and poems that explore issues of gender and sexuality, body image, and cultural identity. Perempuan is written mostly in English, with a couple of stories appearing also in Malay. Learn more here.

  • 2007

    Small Steps, Giant Leaps: A history of AWARE and the women's movement in Singapore

    Part 1 of this book provides an overview of feminism and a history of women’s activism and achievements in Singapore prior to the founding of AWARE in 1985. Part II of this book is about AWARE.

  • 2000

    Rape: Weapon of Terror

    Rape has been used throughout history to incite fear and reinforce the notion that women’s bodies are a commodity and a battleground. Through the case studies from Haiti, Bosnia, Rwanda, Afghanistan, Myanmar, Kashmir, Aceh, East Timor, Iran Jaya and Jakarta, these ideas are further explained and discussed.

  • 1999

    The Three Paradoxes: Working Women in Singapore

    This book analyses how policy-makers continue to be challenged on how to utilize the talents of each of Singapore’s citizen, and yet maintain certain family policies with respect to women. It provides useful perspectives contributing to an understanding of the factors influencing women’s behavior in organisations and the society and, more importantly, highlights good practices and give invaluable suggestions which can help overcome some of these obstacles.

  • 1999

    The Singapore Council of Women and the Women's Movement

    Dr Phyllis Ghim Lian Chew’s work documents in scrupulously researched detail a now half-forgotten and under-appreciated movement, which struggled for women’s betterment in the years just preceding Independence. In the first flush of Independence came many of the legal benefits for which the Singapore Council of Women had been calling with such vehemence and commitment, through the 1950s. This article first appeared in the Journal of Southeast Asian Studies in 1994, and is reprinted with permission.

  • 1998

    Empowerment Booklet 1: How I Became AWARE

    This autobiography of AWARE founding member Hedwig Anwar briefly traces her childhood and teenage years, through the Japanese occupation. She went on to become the only female graduate from the University of Malaya to graduate with a first-class Honours degree in her year and went on to study in London on a scholarship. She worked in various libraries in Singapore and Malaya before serving as Director of the National Library in Singapore from 1965 until her retirement in 1988. She was AWARE’s third president from 1989 to 1991.

  • 1998

    Empowerment Booklet 2: The Empowerment of Women

    Dr. Kanwaljit Soin elaborates on the difference between sex and gender and elucidates the concept of gender-role socialisation. She goes on to explain that gender ideology is often used to justify cultural beliefs by deeming them natural or inborn. She also elaborates on the concept of empowerment through economic intervention, education, awareness-building and women’s organisations. She ends by stressing that men, too, can benefit from the empowerment of women.

  • 1998

    Empowerment Booklet 3: Women, Work and Family

    Dr. Phyllis Ghim-Lian Chew sheds light on the plight of the working woman: a double workload, not enough financial compensation and less time for children. Additionally, the family is in a state of transition: it is disintegrating and fragmenting. The only solution is not to live by the male standard and instead create a new paradigm which requires the participation and efforts of men as well as women.

  • 1996

    The Ties that Bind: In search of the modern Singapore family

    This book takes an honest look at how far women in Singapore have progressed. The essays cover a wide spectrum of topics ranging from a historical overview of the Singapore family to a look at multi-generational and nuclear living arrangements. It also documents the struggle of low-income female heads of households as well as women’s changing status from full-time mothers to full-time professionals. There are also reflections on living in an extended family, a personal experience of ageing and one male’s view on how men see women. The last essay looks at the impact of national policies on women and their family.

  • 1992

    Boy, boy! Girl, girl! - A Story of Growing Up

    When AWARE began to look into the ways in which girls and boys are brought up in Singapore, we realised that the two sexes are not treated in the same way. This difference begins even before birth, with different expectations, preferences, and practices. We decided to present our ideas in the form of an illustrated book, in which two couples are followed from the birth of their children to the birth of their grand-children. One of these families believes in treating boys and girls equally and the other family treats them differently. You will recognise yourselves and your neighbours in the scenes and characters of this little book.

  • 1988

    The Singapore Woman

    In the last two decades, Singapore women have made much progress, both for themselves and for their society, by breaking away from traditional roles and entering almost every field of economic and social life. This booklet is an effort to take a snapshot of the Singapore woman as she is in the 1980s and a look at the challenges that lie ahead for her. This is not a definitive statement of the status of women in Singapore. It simply tries to provide the reader with a handy guide to some of the facts and figures, while also offering some food for thought.

  • 1988

    Men, Women and Violence

    This handbook aims to create a sense of awareness in the general public about the crimes of violence against women childen and the elderly. It also contributes to the public awareness of citizens’ rights in the context of such crimes and provides information on preventive measures, police and legal procedures and various other strategies for coping when caught in violent situations. This is also a guide for those who want to take that first difficult step out of a violent situation.