Announcing a groundbreaking collection of love stories written by Sikh women about Sikh women living in the United States and Canada. We believe at the heart of every Sikh woman, there are multiple love stories that inhabit the mind, body, and soul. The geography, politics, and social climate of the United States and Canada have shaped these love stories into unique and fascinating narratives.
What does your love story look like? This collection of stories will allow Sikh women to tell their stories within our communities and within the broader American context in our own humorous, dramatic, and engaging voices. We hope to humanize the complexities and nuanced experiences of Sikh women manifesting love.
We request that only North American (United States and Canada) women who have a love story to share commit to this project. We also request that the writing, although non-fiction, be written in a story format, creatively written and not so much an academic or analytical essay.
SUBMISSION RULES: Work submitted must be non-fiction and autobiographical. Author must self-identify as a Sikh and American or Canadian woman.
WORD COUNT: Word count for submissions must be between 1500 - 4000 words, double-spaced.
DEADLINE: Final story draft due by January 15th, 2013.
DETAILS: Please send your commitment to submit in the body of your email to [email protected] by September 27th, 2012. Please remember to include:
Final submissions do not guarantee publication, but our project is committed to honoring every woman's story.· Name (full name)
· Age
· Location
· Contact information (e-mail address/phone number)
· The themes that will shape your narrative (one to two sentences)
· Please indicate if you want editorial support for this writing process. The editorial support is optional.
CONTACT: Please email [email protected] for questions.
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NOTE TO INTERNATIONAL WRITERS
For more information and guidelines about submissions from the UK, UAE, India, Australia, and Singapore, please email [email protected]
We first start by expanding upon the notion of love as a Sikh to not only include romantic love, but also the daily love that manifests in our day-to-day lives. In our journeys as Sikh American women, love can be expressed through lovers holding hands, singing a shabad, eating a good meal to nourish one's body, hiking an unknown terrain, traveling a new country, supporting a dear friend, holding a sick child close, fighting for civil and human rights or even embarking on the journey to falling in love with ourselves as women, human beings, and spiritual beings. These stories are dynamic and in constant motion and not limited to what is listed above.
A love story may not have the ending we expect, but the journey itself helps navigate the terrain. The journey towards love may be hard and arduous and feel like there is no end in sight while it can also be light and effortless, urging us to keep dreaming the dream. It is important to note that we as Sikh American women have the freedom to unpack the notion of love and what it means to us according to our life experiences.
Sikhism encourages women and men to embody love at the core of their existence. This collection of stories is an important opportunity for Sikh American women to express their love stories in their authentic voices, and to see our selves in one another while respecting our individual choices and differences. So the journey begins.
These stories will be published in an anthology in the form of memoirs, creative non-fiction stories, and essays. We have provided a list of categories below to assist you in determining what your love story is. Your narrative can span across the categories below creating a rich sense of how you love on multiple levels in infinite ways.
What influences (personal, social, political, cultural, pop-culture, and religious) have shaped your understanding of love and how it has manifested in your life? How does Sikhism influence the way you love in your life? How do other's thoughts and stereotypes affect how you navigate this search for love? We want you to describe, in detail, creatively your relationship with love.
We have very little literature written by Sikh American women about Sikh American women, so the act of writing your own love story becomes revolutionary for future generations. These narratives create artistic, literary, and political space for Sikh women in North America. Narratives create much-needed dialogue amongst Sikh American women and beyond. Narratives help us drop judgment and pick up compassion as a way to connect to one another. The act of documenting your life story is an act of self-definition, an act of resistance against social, cultural, media, and political forces that want to define women as less than humane. This is a seminal and critical act for the future generations of Sikh American women and men.
Please review categories below and feel free to combine themes and ideas and expand upon this limited set of themes.
THEMES
1. The love story with yourself: What does the on going journey towards falling in love with ourselves as Sikh womenlook like? Do the roles of daughter, sister, life-partner, mother, aunt, influence the way you love yourself in a Sikh framework? Why is it important to embody self-love as Sikh American women? Sikh American women are re-negotiating their familial and professional roles to honor themselves as Waheguru's daughters or figuring out that connection in their own time and space. Sub-themes include:
a. Love of physical body, mind, and soul that has been given to you; moving away
de-humanization and objectification to move towards self-acceptance and compassion
b. Overcoming health issues
2. The love story between you and Waheguru: What do our stories with Waheguru look like? Has it evolved, digressed? What does it mean to have a loving relationship with Waheguru? What life moments bring you closer to Waheguru? What sustains this sacred relationship? How do you see this love manifest in the physical world? Is it through the Punjabi language, through kirtan-shabad, through travel, through movement, through family, food, cooking, through art or music?
3. The romantic Sikh love story: How do our stories of adoration, love, sexuality, and preference shape our identities, our roles, and our perspectives? How have the men and women in our lives played a role in celebrating this journey with us and how have they hindered it? How does Waheguru embody our relationships?
4. Love stories expressed in a humorous and engaging ways: Because, sometimes Sikh American love is pretty funny. A few topics to consider but not limited to:
- That crazy love affair between Sikh parents and their children
- That crazy love affair between Sikh mothers and daughters
- 10 reasons your Anand Karaj did not go exactly as planned?
- The birds and the bees talk
- The Marriage Pressure Cooker - pressure to marry for the sake of marrying
- The long list and short list on
- disastrous marriage set-ups
- awkward dates
- marriage meetings
- meeting and dating the sardar from hell
No matter how uncomfortable these situations may have been at the time, we know re-counting the story with detachment and humor can be healing and satisfying.
4. The love story (ies) in a Sikh family: What do our love stories with our children look like? A Kaur. A Singh. Is there a love story between you and your sister, mother, grandmother, aunt, brother, father, uncle, or grandfather? What does a family love story look like in the United States or Canada as a Sikh American woman. These stories can also include friendships.
6. The love story with the world and humanity: The love story with the world and humanity: For Sikh American women, kirathkaro, or the relationship between Sikh American women and their work has become a love affair that is deep, complex, and spiritual. Does an internal love nurtured and created by you empower you to make the world a better place, to commit to social change?
7. Based on recent events, a new category has been added to include the experience of Sikh women in the aftermath of the Wisconsin tragedy. We wish to provide a space to share your narrative in how this tragedy affected you or your perception of love, being loved, expressing love, and encourage you to share your story in the spirit of healing.
We will leave you with prose inspired by Puran Singh, writer, philanthropist, environmentalist of Punjab, and how he understands love:
Love in the Sikh framework is "Ajar Vastu,"
a thing that cannot be absorbed;
it tends to overflow the banks of the heart.
Love is the simple, inmost state of life,
which depends on no outward condition of life.
As the seed is to the pine tree,
love is to the true woman.
The latter is the whole of it in stuffy of growth,
leafage, blossom, and fruitage.
Love has hands and feet and it works.
Love is called "Ajar Vastu,"
a thing that cannot be absorbed;
it tends to overflow the banks of the heart.
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The Guru trusts with infinite faith the essential nobleness of human nature. The river flows and it does universal good. The star shines, the lamps burn - all do universal good. Beauty is forever altruistic, intellectual more than physical, and spiritual more than intellectual, if relief of human distress and the bestowing of peace and power to souls in struggle is altruism. So a Sikh is a true householder, a true citizen, a worthy patriot, and a humanitarian woman, whenever the call comes. And she is intensely human all the while. {edited to include women as the Guru intended}--
(Excerpts from an essay titled "Love" by Puran Singh, The Spirit of the Sikh, Part II, Volume II, Panjabi University, Patiala, pp. 170-196.)
In reflecting on Puran Singh's lens of spiritual love, this life-breath sustains us, enraptures us while safely grounding us in the world we live in.
To respect our potential partnership, please refrain from re-creating or duplicating this material to honor the integrity of this project and the Love Stories editors, editorial board, and writers.
Thank you for your attention. The Sikh American Women and Their Love Stories Project