Creative Process in Writing Short Stories by Female Domestic

Workers

Helvy Tiana Rosa

, Ilza Mayuni

, Emzir

Doctoral Student, Universitas Negeri Jakarta, Indonesia

Universitas Negeri Jakarta, Indonesia

Keywords: creative process, short stories, female workers, domestic workers, writing skills

Abstract: As one of the creative works, writing a short story requires imaginative ability, which often associated with

a certain level of creativity and intellectual capacity as well as enough time to complete the work. However,

the publication of short stories by some Indonesian female migrant domestic workers in Hong Kong, since

2005, demand more explanation. This research is intended to explain the creative process of writing literary

fiction of Indonesian female domestic workers, who did not possess a high education level, and must write

under constant obstructions from their employees as well as limited time available for them to write. This

research was conducted in Hong Kong, using qualitative research with case study methods. The resources

the researcher were including video, photo and text documents, archive notes, in-depth interview, direct ob-

servations, and engaged observations. This research establishes eight episodes of the creative process for the

female-domestic-worker writers from beginning to the end. High education and flexible time are not abso-

lute pre-requisites. Anyone could write a short story, including a marginalized person, as long as he or she

has strong determination and passion for overcoming the challenges in their creative journey.

1 INTRODUCTION

In 2005, the Indonesian literary community was

surprised by the publication of short stories collec-

tion, written by several female Indonesian domestic

workers in Hong Kong. The renowned literary writer

Taufiq Ismail called their work as,” A breakthrough

in Indonesian literary” (Nadia ed. 2005). Two thou-

sand Indonesian migrant workers attended the book

launching in support of their colleagues. Later on,

more and more publications of short stories came

out from the Indonesian migrant workers community

in Hong Kong and other countries, from female and

male writers.

The surprise came from the fact that most of the

Indonesian domestic workers only graduated from

elementary school. Short stories written by them

challenged the long-held assumption that the crea-

tive process in writing literary fiction required high

academic education. Many great Indonesian literary

writers have their degrees from various educational

backgrounds. A lot have even master or doctoral

degrees (Rampan ed. 2000).

This view was supported among others by Anto-

niou and Moriarty (2008), who emphasized the im-

portance of reading and learning the experience of

other writers. To get the idea for writing, or to over-

come writer’s block, Antoniou suggested the writers

watch movies, read, exploring the current cultural

climate and keep challenging their ideas and belief.

Another study by Doyle (1998), suggested that the

creative process in the writing of literary fiction

required the writer to have enough time and oppor-

tunity “for a particular way of being a withdrawal

from the hurly-burly of everyday life."

In general, the creative process of the Indonesian

domestic workers in Hong Kong who published their

short stories could be explained with the creative

process theory by Sadler-Smith (2015) which added

an element to the earlier theory by Wallas (1926) as

well as the theory from Rhodes (1961). However, a

closer look at their creative process in writing liter-

ary fiction, in particular, found an unexplainable

process. The research by Doyle mapped out the

creative process model of writing literary fiction.

The model was established from the interviews of

Rosa, H., Mayuni, I. and Emzir, .

Creative Process in Writing Short Stories by Female Domestic Workers.

DOI: 10.5220/0008996201810189

In Proceedings of the International Conference on Education, Language and Society (ICELS 2019), pages 181-189

ISBN: 978-989-758-405-3

181

five professional writers, with some of them were

teachers of writing, and all of them were free to

manage their own time to finish their fiction works.

The case in this research was different. The mi-

grant-domestic-worker writers neither had a high

educational degree nor the free time to follow the

creative process as described in the studies by

Doyle. Despite their shortcomings, they successfully

managed to write short stories.This research wanted

to fill in the unexplainable creative process of the

female-domestic-worker’s writers.

2 METHODS

The design of this research is qualitative approach,

i.e., a process to learn and understand based on the

methodology to investigate social phenomena and

human problems. With this approach, the researcher

developed an elaborate description, studying the

words, detailed reports from the respondents, and

conducting a study within a real environment.

To support this, the researchertook the case study

method. Case study research as an empirical study to

investigate a contemporary phenomenon in real life,

in which the boundaries between the event and the

context was not clear yet. In general, the case study

method was personal research method and a review

about unique personal experience (Crozier, Denzin&

Lincoln 1994).

The reasons for using a case study method for

this research:

1.1. Literary fiction in the format of short stories

written and published by a group of Indonesian

domestic workers was a new phenomenon,

which challenged the common belief in literary

writing; hence their creative process was essen-

tial to be studied upon

1.2. The aspect and context about the creative pro-

cess in fiction writing, in this case, short stories,

from Indonesian domestic workers in Hong

Kong, in real life, was still unknown to many

people.

1.3. This research was intended to reveal a few

research questions like ‘what,' ‘why' and ‘how'

really was the phenomenon of the subject being

studied.

1.4. This research took many sources and data gath-

ering techniques in the effort to answer the re-

search questions.

To identify their creative process in writing of

their literary works, I went to Hong Kong a few

times to interview them. They had worked in Hong

Kong from 2003-2015.

I selected five out of them based on the follow-

ing criteria:

1. their short stories had been published as books

2. their readers appreciated them, and fellow writ-

ers acknowledged them

3. their works had won competition(s)

4. they inspired and drove other Indonesian domes-

tic workers to write

The selected respondents were:

a) Bayu Insani: finished elementary school, mar-

ried, left her kids in Indonesia. Her short story

which was reviewed for this research is Curhat

Buat Nanda (Sharing for Nanda) (Insani 2011)

b) Ida Raihan: did not finish the elementary

school, not married. Her short story which was

reviewed for this research is Lorong MTR

(MTR’s Alley) (Raihan 2010)

c) Jaladara: finished the senior high school, not

married. Her short story which was reviewed

for this research is Surat Berdarah untuk Pres-

iden (Blood Letter for Mr. President] (Jaladara

in Senja 2010)

d) Susie Utomo: finished the senior high school,

married, left her kids in Indonesia. Her short

story which was reviewed for this research is

Penjajah Di Rumahku (Invaders in My Home)

(Utomo, 2010).

e) Syifa Aulia: finished the senior high school,

left her kids in Indonesia. Her short story

which was reviewed for this research is Yani

Gugat (Yani Sues) (Syifa 2006).

3 LITERATURE REVIEW

This study intersected two major topics, i.e., creative

process and literature, especially from female do-

mestic workers. In working-class literature, studies

done by Coiner (1995), Lauter (2014) laid down the

foundation for further studies especially for work-

ing-class women's literature. In Indonesia, the work-

ing-class literary was spearheaded by writers like

Wowok Hesti Prabowo, who published Djournal

Sastra Boemipoetra (Journal of Native’s Literary)

every five years and Wiji Tukul, a labor activist who

disappeared following a riot in 1998.

As we are embracing the age of migration, mi-

grant workers are an integral part of that phenome-

non (Castles, Miller & Haas 2014). Consequently,

we also see the rise the migrant literature, as shown,

among others by Frank S. (2008), Jin (2008) and

Lennon & Nilsson (2017). However, none of them

able to explain the creative process of the migrant

workers to produce literary works such as short

ICELS 2019 - International Conference on Education, Language, and Society

182

stories. The researcher argues that understanding this

creative process is essential for the theoretical de-

velopment in literary study, in particular, the migrant

worker literature study. Practically, understanding

this creative process would open the opportunity to

replicate the process for other migrant domestic

workers in similar situations, as part of their capacity

development. Study from Dustmann (1994) found

that writing and speaking fluency among migrant

workers could increase their earning position.

Eneste (2009) suggested that the creative process

about why and how the writers create their works

need to be disclosed for the public, especially those

who want to write and those who have been in-

volved in the writing industry. Eneste wrote four

volumes of books “Proses Kreatif Mengapadan

Bagaimana Saya Mengarang” (Creative Process:

Why and How Do I Write), which documented tes-

timonies from the Indonesian master story writers

like Budi Darma, Putu Wijaya, Danarto, Seno Gumi-

ra Ajidarma, Afrizal Malnaand Ayu Utami. Erneste's

books revealed the creative process of those masters

was started from the reasons and drives to write, the

obstacles and challenges in the writing process as

well as activities before, during and after writing.

Sugihastuti (2000) argued the research about the

creative process of literary writing from someone or

group of people could be useful to understand their

writing works and also the background as well as the

intention of the writer(s). Understanding this is im-

portant because, through their works, the writers talk

about the problems in society. However, Ratna

(2011) argued they do not reveal the reality itself but

their interpretation of the reality, both as an individ-

ual member of the society and as the creative pro-

cess to give meaning to the problems of the con-

structed society. Wallas, as quoted in Glaveanu et.al

(2013) explained the four steps of the general crea-

tive process, i.e., preparation, incubation, illumina-

tion, and verification, while Rhodes (1961) defined

that creativity should always consist of 4P (person,

process, press, dan product).

Amabile (2012) found that motivation, creative

thinking skills, and expertise are essential and de-

terminant factors in any creative process. However,

Duckworth (2007) showed that motivation alone is

not enough. Her research suggested that passion and

perseverance are the two main factors to overcome

any shortcomings and to achieve success in the long

term. She called those factors as ‘Grit'.

Doyle (1998) proposed a model to explain the

creative process of fiction writing. By interviewing

professional writers, Doyle found the episodes in the

process of writing a short story, which was seed

incident, writingrealm, interruptions, fictionworld,

revisioning, and completion, and sharing of work.

However, as the subjects of Doyle's research were

highly educated, award-winning writers, with some

of them were teachers in writing, her model could

not explain the creative process of writing short

stories of female domestic workers.

These workers stayed in their employer's house;

hence they were made to work almost 24 hours per

day, six days a week, with practically continuous

various house works, which left them with virtually

no time to write. Their formal education was limited,

as most of them were only got elementary or junior

high school education. However, with such limited

time, constant obstruction, and limited reference to

literary works, these female domestic workers have

been able to write and publish their short stories

since 2005. There were more than 50 Indonesian

domestic workers who wrote short stories. Some of

them were very productive and gained fame among

Indonesian migrant workers. A few journalists and

writers from Hong Kong had put their attention to

them and their works.

This research maps out the creative process of

fiction writing by these female domestic workers,

start from their profile, their motivation, and how

they managed to find ways to keep writing despite

the almost impossible obstacles.

4 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

All of these female Indonesian workers had some

characteristics in common: honest, open mind, per-

sistent, never give up, kind, like to help others, like

to share, imaginative, like to learn, critical, and dare

to step out from the comfort zone. All of them joined

Forum Lingkar Pena Hong Kong to learn how to

write and later on, became part of the organization.

They also won writing competitions and had their

works published as an anthology or on their name.

Four of five writers used an alias name, except Ida

Raihan who chose to use her real name.

The respondents maintained their perseverance

to write for a few good reasons: they wanted to share

the stories about their works, their employers, their

community, their dreams as well as to express their

longing for their home village. They also wrote to

escape from their harsh reality. They collected the

facts of the story (i.e., background, characters, and

flow) from facts and realities faced by themselves or

told by their friends. They put up imaginative ele-

ments and changed the angle to create the fictional-

ized version of those facts of life.

Creative Process in Writing Short Stories by Female Domestic Workers

183

They mainly took Hong Kong as the background

for their stories, from the shelters for troubled mi-

grant workers to Hong Kong courtrooms, and some-

times they made their home village as the back-

ground to enrich their story. Main characters were

most likely Indonesian female domestic workers

from their networks. Due to the limitation of time

and literary references, they tend to keep their main

characters as domestic workers, which they knew

very well, to represent their sorrows, hopes, happi-

ness, and other feelings. Supporting roles were taken

from their employers, their spouses, and children in

Indonesia, fellow domestic workers, and also the

Hong Konglaw enforcement officers and judges.

The flow of their stories followed the conven-

tional approach: introduction, problem, conflict,

climax, finishing. The way they developed the flow,

however, was quite different from one to another.

Some respondents developed the flow before started

writing, but others changed the flow in the middle of

the writing process.

As a short story required tight and dense flow, all

respondents usually developed only one conflict to

the climax of the story. Their flow was often ‘for-

ward flow' in which they started by introducing the

main character(s) and her problem(s), then move

forward to the conflict, climax, and ending. From the

five stories from five respondents, only one was

finished with a happy ending. The rest was ended

tragically or with deep sorrow. This kind of ending

was designed to open the eyes of the readers about

the hard reality they were facing in their daily lives.

The creative process in the writing of literary

works by these Indonesian migrant domestic work-

ers could be explained in general by the theory from

Sadler-Smith (2015), who expanded the earlier theo-

ry from Wallas. Smith argued that new develop-

ments from recent creativity research, including

neuroscience and intuition, should be added to Wal-

las’ four-stage model of the creative process.

From the earlier model from Wallas, i.e., Prepa-

ration, Incubation, Illumination, Verification, Sad-

ler-Smith suggested adding one more process be-

tween Incubation and Illumination, which is Intima-

tion. Intimation process, according to Sadler-Smith,

was needed to deliver a more authentic representa-

tion of Wallas' explanation of creativity. The five-

stage creative process then became: Preparation,

Incubation, Intimation, Illumination, Verification.

Concerning short story as literary work, Stanton

(1966) categorized the intrinsic or essential elements

to build up literary works as a theme, facts of the

story, and literary device. The theme was the main

idea, the essence of the message they wanted to

convey, to share his/ her thought, feeling, or opinion

about life, hence the readers could relate to it.

Figure 1: The Five Stage Creativity Process (Sadler Smith,

2015)

Facts of the story were the notes of the imaginary

events, which consisted of character, flow, and

background. Overall, it was called a factual struc-

ture. The literary device helped the writer to inte-

grate the theme with the facts, by using a title, con-

flict, point of view, symbolism, irony, and the likes.

In short, the literary device could work as the meth-

od to choose and arrange the details of the story.

For the creative process in writing literary fiction

in particular, Doyle (1998) did an interesting study

by interviewing five professional writers and dis-

sected their creative process from a psychological

point of view. Doyle found that all of those writers

had similar patterns in their respective creative pro-

cess in writing fiction:

Figure 2: The Creative Process in the Writing of Literary

Fiction

a. Seed incident: the events which began the

story, which was intriguing, puzzling or haunt-

ing them beyond the narrative logic of their

daily life

b. Writingrealm: conditions that were construct-

ed to allow their creative work to happen. They

were not always to be a place, but rather occa-

ICELS 2019 - International Conference on Education, Language, and Society

184

sions for a particular way of being, a with-

drawal from the everyday life

c. Fictionworld: the imaginative experience in

which the characters and the events unfolded

in the mind of the author and expressed in

words. During this experience, the author

should be able to find the viewpoint and the

narrative voice to maintain the existence of his/

her characters and events. In search of the nar-

rative voice, the author might find him/her al-

ternated between reflective thought in the writ-

ing realm and non-reflective thought in the fic-

tion world.

d. Interruptions: during his/ her works, the au-

thor might be impacted by their personal and

professional worlds. Their works could be ac-

celerated if they got a positive impact, such as

approval from the book editor or other positive

experience or delayed even changed its course

because of negative experiences like sickness

or rejection.

e. Revisioning: this is the stage when the author

shared his/her work to close friends or col-

leagues to get feedback revised his/her writ-

ings, from which the author could get the bene-

fit of getting other perspectives and changed

his/her work.

f. Completion and the Sharing of Work: com-

pletion meant the creative episode was over,

and the author got the sense to finish his/ her

work.

Albeit the closest to explain the creative process

in writing the literature fiction, Doyle's model inher-

ently assumed fiction writers should have a particu-

lar high education level and freedom to manage their

own time to finish their creative works.

Hence, the model is not enough to explain the

creative process from persons who do not have the

required high education level and freedom to control

their time. This research finds that the creative char-

acter and the passion of the person are more funda-

mental to determine whether someone could start

and finish his/ her creative journey or not, regardless

of the limitation of the education level and the lim-

ited time available for them.

Creativity: Although they had limited formal

education, the respondents possessed the creative

traits as suggested by Munandar (2009): had big

sense of curiosity, ask a lot of questions, have a lot

of ideas, freedom of expression, sense of beauty,

standout in art sense, self-expression, not easily

influenced by others, high sense of humor, active

imagination, originality, independent, explore new

things, elaborative. This research also found that

their creativity level improved over time, as they

wrote more and got more feedback from their sur-

roundings.

Figure 3: The Creative Process in the Writing of Literary

Fiction of Indonesian Migrant Domestic Workers

Passion and Perseverance (Grit): The respond-

ents also showed a big passion for sharing their

stories through writing and perseverance to over-

come the shortcomings and boredom during their

creative journeys. As female domestic workers could

work up to almost 24 hours per day, six days per

week, and whose lives were almost entirely depend-

ent on their employers' policy, these writers had to

push themselves hard to finish each story.

This research finds eight reasons which motivat-

ed them to keep on writing, despite all the problem-

atic challenges: (1) to speak out about misery or

injustice around them, (2) to deliver reasonable,

moral values, (3) to entertain the readers, (4) to

proof to their own self, (5) to get more revenue, (6)

to be known or recognized by the community, (7) to

fulfill the dream, (8) as a way to escape from the

reality, especially when it got bitter (escapism).

Constant Obstruction: Time, External Fac-

tors: During my research, the female migrant do-

mestic workers were still not protected by the La-

bour Law that existed at that time. Their employers

could get them to work up to 20 hours per day, six

days a week, with only a few short-time breaks in

between, and at any time, could call them to do

various works. This combination of long working

hours and ‘sudden call’ tendency made them very

difficult to manage their own time, including their

time, not to mention to allocate time to write. With-

out any chance to make a time plan, they wrote at

any time available for them, no matter how sudden,

or they had no chance but to take up their resting

time.

As female workers who stayed in the house and

strangers in a foreign country, their life was practi-

cally dependent on their employers. They had only a

small chance to manage their own private life, as the

rest should be under the permission of the employ-

Creative Process in Writing Short Stories by Female Domestic Workers

185

ers, including what they could and could not do in

the house. The respondents told that writing was not

part of the approved activities by most employers.

An employer tore down the paper with a handwritten

story when it was found. Another employer forbade

a domestic worker to use electricity and Wi-Fi to

write. For them, writing should belong to the intel-

lectuals, not to migrant female domestic workers.

Constant working demand and sometimes har-

assment made writing was a strenuous activity to do

by the female domestic workers. Their challenges

were as follow:

1. They were always undermined, considered as not

smart enough to write by their employers as well

as by the general public

2. They were vulnerable to unpleasant sayings or

actions, including the threat of physical abuse;

hence, they were afraid of their employers. Most

of the employers forbade them to write

3. Their employers forbade them to write because it

was not part of their job, and it was perceived as

not suitable for blue-collar workers like them.

4. Their employers didn't allow them to use their

laptop to save electricity bill in the house

5. Their employers refused to allow them to use

home facilities for writing

Ideation: In this research, the respondents fol-

lowed the 10Di+ method (Rosa 2003) to take inspi-

rations from their daily life, from their own experi-

ence (what they saw, heard, tasted), from their

friends' stories, and reading, watching or strolling

while watching their employers' children or old

persons.

Figure 4. The Creative Process in the Writing of Literary

Fiction of Indonesian Migrant Domestic Workers

After the ideation process, they usually: (1) took

a rest, as their writing time was part of their break

time, (2) wrote while doing other activities like writ-

ing on a piece of paper while cooking, wrote while

waiting for the children of the employers and other

empty times, (3) adjusted with situation dynamics.

For them, writing is not about mood, but about using

the available time and situation, the best they could,

(4) wrote in discreet when they didn't have any more

choice.

Writing process: Doyle identified two alternat-

ing conditions in which the authors used their crea-

tivity to write, i.e., writing realm and fiction world.

During the process, the authors went back and forth

between reflective and non-reflective thought, got

unfolded by the characters and events and might

develop a different point of view. However, the

process might take months or even years to get com-

pleted. The authors in this study did not have the

time and the resources to go through the same pro-

cess. They hardly could control their writing time as

their schedule was controlled by external factors,

their primary job as a domestic worker and the ap-

proval –or in many cases the ignorance— from their

employers. Hence, they wrote as soon as they had

time, during waiting times, cutting down their sleep

time or even using their toilet time.

Due to these limitations, as well as the limited

access to literary references, the fiction works from

the female-domestic-workers writers whom the

researcher interviewed, tend not too imaginative.

Their characters and story plots were usually mirror-

ing their own lives.

Four out of five had been more productive when

they got a new contract with better, more supportive

employers. Hence, the following factors played as a

supporting role for their creativity and productivity:

1. The employers appreciated the domestic helper

as a professional service and treated them equal-

2. The employers paid them at least at the minimum

wage level as stipulated by the Hong Kong labor

law.

3. The employers gave them a day off once a week

and every public holiday.

4. The employers supported their efforts for capaci-

ty development, allowed them to write after the

working hours and even encouraged one of them

to take a college degree

5. Hong Kong had a particular creative atmosphere,

allowed the respondents to get inspiration and

ideas.

6. The public library was free and comfortable

enough for the respondents to pursue their thirst

for knowledge, as well as free Wi-Fi access in

public areas

7. The presence of a writing community like Forum

Lingkar Pena significantly helped them to devel-

ICELS 2019 - International Conference on Education, Language, and Society

186

op their writing skills and to get community

recognition, which was essential to boost their

spirit and to hone their craft.

However, the researcher find that over the years,

some of the writers have developed more imagina-

tive writing ability, especially those who keep writ-

ing and publishing their stories as magazine or

newspaper articles, or books. The researcher believe

the continuous act of writing and publishing fictional

stories have helped them to broaden their imagina-

tion as well as sharpen their writing skills. External-

ly, the support and acknowledgment from their

friends, fellow writers, media, and other concerned

individuals and groups, also have been helping them

to keep pushing up their ability for imaginative writ-

ing.

Figure 5. Imagination as the Function of Knowledge and

Time

Revision: the authors in Doyle's study and the

authors in this study did send their draft of works to

their close circle to get feedback and then revised

their writings. However, due to the different charac-

ters of each respective social circle, the researcher

could safely assume that the quality of the input was

not equal.

As professional writers, Doyle's respondents had

their circles comprised of fellow professional writ-

ers, teachers in writing, and other intellectuals. Such

circles could be expected to provide more scholarly

feedback, with references to broad literary works.

The respondents in this research had a different

social circle with female domestic workers as the

primary members. With their limited education and

also probably unrelated interest, the researcher could

tell that the feedback would be mostly based on

personal likes or dislikes, which hardly could be

explained.

Publication: the authors in this study completed

their work as soon as possible with minor revisions

because they did not have the time and resources to

rewrite.

The publication of the short stories by the Indo-

nesian domestic workers brought a new perspective

for Indonesian literary study. Female domestic

workers always took the central role, and their prob-

lems became the point of conflict in their stories.

Non-female domestic workers could not match the

originality of the idea and the way the stories were

told.

Digital communication technology also plays an

essential role in the creative process of all writers.

The technology enables them to search for almost

any information they needed for free and almost

instantly. Social media also provided them the op-

portunity to share their works and got feedback from

the readers; hence, they could make adjustments and

corrections as needed. They also had blogs where

they put their stories online, searchable, and readable

from around the world.

Two short stories, i.e. ‘SuratBerdara-

hUntukPresiden’ (Bloody Letter forPresident)

byJaladara and ‘Penjajah di Rumahku’ (Invaders in

My House) by SusieUtomo were nationally pub-

lished, discussed in international literary events such

as Ubud Writers and Readers Festival 2011 and

Hong Kong Literary Festival 2013 and were trans-

lated into English and Germany.

5 CONCLUSION

This research explains the model to understand the

creative process of literary writing of female migrant

domestic workers or group of people whose main

features are limited formal education, limited time

available, and facing constant obstruction. The re-

searcher finds that the Indonesian female domestic

workers were creative persons, albeit the limitation

of their formal education. It is also shown that over

the years, creative writing ability might develop, and

the researcher believes it will keep getting better as

long as they keep on writing fiction. Passion and

perseverance were the two main factors for them to

be able to write and publish their fiction works de-

spite constant obstructions, in terms of the limited

time available and practically constant demand from

the employers.

They got the seeds of ideas to write from the

facts and stories around them by using the 10di+

process, which interlinked from one to another. They

constructed their fiction world as close as possible to

their reality because they neither had the luxury of

time nor the broad literature reference to develop a

more profound, more sophisticated imaginary fiction

world. Writing fiction allowed them to speak out

about their despair, sorrow, happiness, and other

feelings from them and other female domestic work-

Creative Process in Writing Short Stories by Female Domestic Workers

187

ers. Hence writing fiction became their social re-

sponsibility. The fiction world also served as their

imaginary escape from their harsh reality.

From the academic perspective, studying the cre-

ative process of literary writing from the female-

domestic-workers writers will add substantial insight

into the migrant worker literary study, to understand

more about their views, thoughts, and feelings about

their world and toward others. It will also provide

essential material for the discourse of literary be-

yond the ivory tower.

From the practical point of view, understanding

their creative process allows government and other

stakeholders to design literacy programs to empower

migrant workers, especially female workers. Other

studies have shown that better literacy skills would

empower migrant workers and enable them to im-

prove their living standards and move up on the

vertical social ladder to get better jobs.

These findings open up the possibility to repli-

cate the creative process as well as the environment

to encourage more migrant workers to express their

thinking and feeling through writing fiction. Coun-

tries that have a similar working climate with Hong

Kong, like Taiwan and Singapore, could have more

significant opportunities to succeed.

The researcher also concludes that at the individ-

ual level, literary writing could be done by anybody,

regardless of the formal educational background and

the time available. As long as someone has the pas-

sion and perseverance, he or she could improve his

or her expertise and develop his or her creative

skills. Indeed, writing a short story requires a crea-

tive process, which may differ from one person to

another, but the process is learnable and doable.

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