Since 1976, the Federation of Worker Writers and Community Publishers (FWWCP) developed a community for working-class people to write and publish. Founded by working-class writers with the purpose of making writing accessible to all, the FWWCP continued publishing through 2007 and then rekindled this work in 2008 through TheFED: A Network of Community Writers and Publishers that continues today. Here, you can browse the growing collection of over 2,350 publications, administrative documents, photos, videos, and more.
GETTING STARTED
WHY THIS COLLECTION MATTERS
Roy Birch
"The voices heard through the work of The Federation of Worker Writers, and its offspring, The FED, are those of the marginalised and the excluded, and they proclaim the poetry of difference, and the right of that difference to full inclusion as a component of true social stability, and the right of all humans to express humanity, and, more importantly, to be heard and taken notice of. The archive of the FWWCP/The FED is potentially an extremely valuable mechanism for change through social education. The archive is essential."
past-Chair TheFED
Sally Flood
“I think that I am the oldest member in the group. It’s a great feeling to be part of this Federation. It changed my life actually…The archive is a great idea, a lovely idea, coz we were once told that we were irrelevant to literacy [by the Arts Council], so no I think this is great that we have got to this point.”
FED Executive Board Member
Nick Pollard
"There are thousands of voices and testimonies, poems, short stories and anecdotes from communities across the UK, and it is an important record of the everyday lives of the generations living through the transitions leading to – and through – the advent of neoliberalism – as imagined, recorded, written, published and distributed by themselves – and no-one else!"
Heeley Writers (1980-2007)Hackney Writers (1982-3)
Pecket Well Learning Community (2010-14)
Occupational Therapy without Borders (reciprocal member 2005-7)
Federation Editor (1991-2007)
Federation exec member (1985-8; 1991-2007)