A Community of Writing at NUS College
25 November
On 25 November 2024, the NUSL Writers’ Centre and NUSC Alumni Relations teams collaborated to host "A Community of Writing at NUS College," a reading featuring student, alumni, and faculty creative writers. The event was hosted in the heart of the Library in the Writers’ Centre, where desks and chairs were pushed aside for the evening as participants gathered round the Centre’s couch, eagerly listening to the heartfelt and personal writings of our guests.
Our guests included NUSC faculty members Dr Carissa Foo and Dr Roweena Yip, with Dr Roweena generously moderating the panel for us. Readers included alumnae Rachelle Chua ’24 and Ong Yun Ning ’24, and students Mahima Hari ’25 and Tricia Sin ’25. Our readers shared writing across a range of genres, including fiction, poetry, and other cross-genre writing, followed by a Q&A section where participants asked questions about writing, sustaining a creative practice, and our readers’ favourite books.
We were joined by a range of attendees, current students as well as alumni from across many different classes. Panellists reflected on the power of creative writing to bring communities together, noting that they had formed lasting writing communities through creative writing modules offered at NUSC. As the night went on, the readers delved into a range of themes including love, loss, mortality, and other intricate aspects of the human experience.
The night was a testament to the power of creative practices, and how they strike a poignant a chord across a wide range of lived experiences. Dr Roweena Yip shared, "Hearing these writers share how their undergraduate experiences at NUSC have nourished their proclivity for writing and literature inspires me to continue supporting the rich creative lives of our students. The generosity and openness with which all these writers spoke also reminds me about the power and value of art in creating communities across institutional contexts and constraints. Thank you to all the writers and to the organisers of this event, hopefully with many more of these to come!"
- Others - NUS College Alumni Relations