Essays and short stories from members of the GoaWriters group, a network that has been active in Goa since after 2006. Ways of Belonging has been published by Goa,1556 in collaboration with the Goa Writers group. It was released in early 2024, during the Goa Arts and Lit Fest.

What does it mean to belong — to a place, a language, a memory, a people?

Ways of Belonging is a powerful and diverse anthology of short fiction that explores these urgent questions through the lens of contemporary life in Goa and beyond.

Its writers are members of Goa Writers, a collective of authors rooted in or connected to Goa; this collection brings together fresh voices and seasoned storytellers alike. Each story navigates the shifting terrain of identity, home, displacement, and return — often with wit, lyricism, and emotional clarity.

From tales of migration and exile to intimate family dramas, from rediscovered histories to imagined futures, Ways of Belonging offers readers a mosaic of experiences shaped by the region’s unique cultural and linguistic intersections. Whether set in the tiny lanes of Panarim (where's that, you might ask!), the hinterlands of Salcete, or the immigrant suburbs of distant cities, these stories resonate with a deep sense of place and the complex ways in which we come to inhabit it. There is even a love story from a nonagenarian.

This volume stands as a literary landmark — the second fiction-and-non fiction anthology to emerge from the Goa Writers collective — and affirms the vibrancy of Goa’s evolving English-language writing. As much a celebration as a reflection, Ways of Belonging invites readers into a world where belonging is not a given, but a journey.

Writes Sheela Jaywant, in the foreword: “I knew none of them when I joined. I met a few at the Goa Art and Literature Festival (or GALF, which began in 2010) and fell in like with the banter, the camaraderie, the feeling that this was a safe place to voice one’s opinion, however unsuited it was to popular contemporary thinking.

“Most of the members were published writers, some did it for a living, some for a lark; there were others who worshipped the written word in private domestic corners, whose feelings remained well-expressed in hard or soft copy, but unshared by those outside their world of family and friends.”

She goes on to tell us that the group’s first anthology, Inside/Out: New Writing from Goa, was launched by cutting open a loaf of bread! That was at Literati, a bookshop-cum-café, in 2011.

Later, some of its members also published From Mind to Keyboard. This tells us the stories of how writers became writers.

Stories and essays in this volume look at the changing real estate scene in Goa, life in Goa, working in advertising, the Africa-expat Goan experience, shifting down to Goa, language politics here, and much more.

Check out the sketches by artist Bina Nayak.

Contributors to this volume include: Aniruddha Sen Gupta, Ashlesha Athavale, Ben Antão, Bina Datwani, Bina Nayak, Brian de Souza, Deepa George, Edith Noronha Melo Furtado, Ermelinda Makkimane, Frederick Noronha, Gail Pinto, Gouthami, Heta Pandit, Hune Margulies, Isabel de Santa Rita Vás, Jeanne Hromnik, Joanna Lobo, Mehru Jaffer, Michelle Mendonça Bambawale, Pamela D’Mello, Pantaleão Fernandes, Pragya Bhagat, Rachana Patni, Salil Chaturvedi, Sheela Jaywant, Sonia do Rosario Gomes, Tino de Sa, Veena Gomes-Patwardhan, Victor Rangel-Ribeiro, Yvonne Vaz.