Ninotchka Rosca (born in the Philippines in 1946) is a Filipina feminist, author, journalist and human rights activist who is active in GABRIELA Network USA, a member of the MARIPOSA ALLIANCE (Ma-Al), a multi-racial, multi-ethnic women's activist center for understanding the intersectionality of class, race and gender oppressions, toward a more comprehensive practice of women's liberation.

Biography

Canadian fans call Rosca "The First Lady of Philippine Literature." She has two short story volumes (Bitter Country and The Monsoon Collection), two novels (State of War and Twice Blessed), and two non-fiction books (Endgame: The Fall of Marcos and JMS: At Home In The World). One of her stories was listed by Raymond Carver in the 1986 Best 100 Short Stories in the United States; another in the Missouri Review collection of their Best Published Stories in 25 Years while a third was included in the Ms Magazine's Best Fiction in 30 Years. Twice Blessed, the second novel, won her the 1993 American Book Award for excellence in literature. Her book JMS: At Home In The World was co-written with the controversial Jose Maria Sison, who has been included in the U.S. list of "terrorists".

Rosca was a political prisoner under the dictatorial government of Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines (1965-1986). She was forced into exile in the US when threatened with a second arrest for her human rights activism. Rosca has been designated as one of the 12 Asian-American Women of Hope by the Bread and Roses Cultural Project. She worked with Amnesty International and the PEN American Center. Rosca was also a founder and the first national chair of the GABNet, the largest and only US-Philippines women's solidarity mass organization. She is the international spokesperson of GABNet's Purple Rose Campaign against the trafficking of women, with an emphasis on Filipinas.

She was at the UN Fourth World Conference on Women which took place in Beijing, China, and at the UN World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna, Austria. At the latter, she drafted the Survivors Statement, signed by four Nobel Prize winners and hundreds of former prisoners of conscience. This statement first applied the phrase "modern day slavery" to the traffic of women. It was in Vienna as well where the slogan "women's rights are human rights" gained international prominence; Rosca had brought it from the Philippines women's movement and helped launch it internationally.

Rosca was press secretary of the The Hague International Women's Tribunal on Japan's WWII Military Sex Slavery which convicted Japan's wartime era leadership for creating and using the Comfort Women.

Rosca is particularly concerned with the origins of women's oppression and the interface between class, race and gender exploitation, so that women can move toward greater theory building and practice of a comprehensive genuine women's liberation. She often speaks on such issues as sex tourism, trafficking, the mail-order bride industry, and violence against women, and the labor export component of globalization under imperialism.

For her achievements, Rosca was designated one of the 12 Asian American Women of Hope by the Bread and Roses Cultural Project. These women were chosen by scholars and community leaders for their courage, compassion and commitment in helping to shape society. They are considered role models for young people of color, who, in the words of Gloria Steinem, "have been denied the knowledge that greatness looks like them."She attended the University of the Philippines and lives in New York City. Her lecture schedules are managed by Speak Out Now. A huge fan of science fiction, Rosca reads four books a week (three "light," one "heavy"). She is currently a correspondent for the Philippine Daily Inquirer, the most widely-read broadsheet in the Philippines.

Works

Books

• Sugar & Salt (2006)
• Jose Maria Sison: At Home in the World--Portrait of a Revolutionary by Jose Maria Sison and Ninotchka Rosca (2004)
• Twice Blessed: A Novel (1992)
• State of War (1988)
• Endgame: The Fall of Marcos non-fiction (1987)
• The Monsoon Collection (Asian and Pacific Writing) (1983)

Women's Review of Books articles

• "Innocent Bystanders" (2002)
• "The Idea of Prostitution" (1998)
• "Global Sex Workers: Rights, Resistance, and Redefinition" (1998)
• "The Comfort Women: Japan's Brutal Regime of Enforced Prostitution in the Second World War" (1995)
• "Patpong Sisters" (1995)

References

Specific

General

1. "Lily Pad" Unconventional Thoughts from an Unconventional Filipina, a personal blogsite by Ninotchka Rosca
2. "Ninotchka Rosca on Global War on Terror, Subic Rape Case, Political Killings", Bulatlat Vol. VI, No. 18, June 11-17, 2006, Gabriela Network USA
3. Books by Ninotchka Rosca, Amazon.com
4. "Ninotchka Rosca: I'm Still Very Filipino" by Alfred A. Yuson, Literature & Culture, Philippine Post Magazine
5. An Interview with Ninotchka Rosca in Seattle by Bughaw.com, date retrieved: 27 May 2007

See also

• Cecilia Manguerra Brainard
• Maria Rosa Luna Henson
• Angela Manalang-Gloria
• PAWWA
• Paz Márquez-Benítez
• Sophia G. Romero
• Women in the Philippines