Graveyard shift girls — Gross National Distress

Graveyard shift girls

This project is yet to be realised but hopefully in collaboration with Teater Ekamatra, it will take the form of a performance or expanded cinema piece. It might also result in a television show. Below is a written proposal for the project.

In a letter to the local Singapore newspaper, The Straits Times, a group of factory workers, who signed off as “Graveyard shift Girls” speak about hardships they face in the factories where they work from 11pm to 7am. This letter dated 1972, proclaimed that “working night hours affects our health very much” and that “conditions and the effects of night work were worse than we had expected”¹⁸⁹. This letter provides insight into the frustrations and anxieties the workers encounter. Similar to the act of sending a letter to The Straits Times, this piece hopes to engage with the wider public about the overlooked individuals whose lives have been engulfed by the much celebrated industrial history of Singapore.

Amendments made to the labour act of Singapore in 1967 allowed women to work after 11pm¹⁹⁰ meaning that the push for the graveyard shift to be normalised was a priority. Initially not many were keen as the odd hours would take a toll on their physical and mental health and this in turn, might affect their home life and/or domestic duties. Crucial to the findings of this project is the dichotomy between home and work life which shows how workers are constantly being scrutinised by communities of their own in addition to authorities of the factory. The gaze of surveillance does not end when the worker punches out of work. Most female factory workers who belong to the Malay-Muslim community are also often held to higher standards of morality through their gendered roles such as mother, housewife or daughter. In her article, The Malay Problem poses a Double Burden on a Malay Women, Aishah Alhahad states that “where Malay women have to situate themselves in the context of their Malayness in the national community, they have to situate themselves in the context of patriarchy when in their own spaces, like their families and homes”¹⁹¹.

Aihwa Ong claims in her article, Production of Possession, that “as factory workers, Malay women became alienated not only from the products of their labour but also experienced new forms of psychic alienation. Their intrusion into economic spaces outside the home and village was experienced as a moral disorder”¹⁹². In these economic spaces such as the factory, workers are mostly discouraged from any activity that detracts from work; this includes banter between workers that initially builds camaraderie. Alienation is bred through disciplined silence which is symbolic of control exerted by authorities of the factory.

“Graveyard shift girls” adopts and questions techniques of documentary filmmaking. Does the camera behave in a similar fashion to the gaze of authority? Development of the project will be in 3 stages. Firstly, research will be conducted to aid the construction of a script/form. Text and other “materials” will be inspired by interviews with graveyard shift factory workers and the methodology of research will also be addressed in the piece to interrogate intentions of the creators. The second phase will see collaborators brought in to work with the script. The final phase will result in the presentation of this project. In hopes of better understanding factory labour, this project will also serve as a letter in conversation with past and present from the “Graveyard shift girls”.

_{1. Loh Kah Seng, et al. Theatres of Memory: Industrial Heritage of 20th Century Singapore. Ethos Books, 2022.
2. Ministry of Labour Annual Report, 1967.
3. Imran, Mohamed, and Nurul Fadiah Johari. Budi Kritik. 2018.
4. Ong, Aihwa. “The Production of Possession: Spirits and the Multinational Corporation in Malaysia.” American Ethnologist, vol. 15, no. 1, Feb. 1988.}