Defining Islamic modernity through creative writing: a case study of Indonesian domestic workers in Hong Kong

ABSTRACT Indonesian domestic workers (IDWs) have been frequently stereotyped as uneducated and submissive women with little or no bargaining power in transnational labour migration. This article examines why and how literacy practices help foster the activism of IDWs in Hong Kong. In particular, I seek to understand the significance of IDWs’ writing in relation to Islamic modernities. Using the framework of alternative modernities, I argue that the creative process of IDWs’ writing sheds light to their attempts to exercise individual and collective agency. Specifically, the article looks at the role of Forum Lingkar Pena (Pen Circle Forum, FLP) Hong Kong, an IDW writing community, to reveal how its collective literacy practices help affirm Islamic values as part of a modernisation process on IDWs’ own terms.