Dr. Anitha Devi Pillai teaches and researches on related multi-disciplinary areas of English language pedagogy (writing component), literacy studies, academic writing, creative writing and communication skills at the National Institute of Education (NIE), Nanyang Technological University. Before joining NIE in Jan 2006, she taught General Paper (Cambridge University GCE 'A' level examination) and Project Work at a junior college in Singapore for five years. Dr Pillai is the recipient of three Teaching Awards. She received the Excellence in Teaching Commendation 2018 from NIE and two Teaching Merit Awards from the Singapore University of Social Sciences in 2013 and 2014. In 2017, she received the Research Excellence Award from Pravasi Express for her research on the Singapore Malayalee community. Her doctoral thesis focused on the discourse structures of student research papers and the acculturation practices of students to academic writing. Her translated novel, Sembawang: A Novel, has been shortlisted for the Best Literary Work 2021 by Singapore Book Publishers’ Association’s Book Awards and for the Singapore History Prize by National University of Singapore. She continues to hone her skills in her field of expertise and has completed two three-week professional programs. In 2013, she was selected to attend the Summer Writing Research Seminar at Dartmouth College, USA. In 2017, she was invited to attend the Singapore Writing Project, which is an international associated site of the National Writing Project, USA. Between 2014 and 2016, the Ministry of Education (Singapore) appointed Dr Pillai as the Consultant (for the Writing component) on the General Paper Syllabus Review Committee to advice on the development of the national curriculum for the writing component.

Dr Pillai serves as the President of the Singapore Association for Applied Linguistics (SAAL), on the board of a School Advisory Committee in Singapore, as the Chair of ELL's Talks & Seminars Committee and on NIE's National Education Committee. She was a Cambridge-certified International English Testing System (IELTS) examiner for IDP Education (Australia) for 13 years and the Chief Examiner for English Proficiency Test (Writing component) (REEPT). She had also developed tests to assess the written language proficiency of teachers from China seeking entry into NIE's Postgraduate Diploma in English Language Teaching program.

She is bilingual in English and Tamil, and speaks Malayalam. She has been an examiner for dissertations written in Tamil and has also translated a Tamil historical novel, Sembawang (2020) into English. She has a keen interest in heritage and language. She sits on the board of the Indian Community, Oral History Committee (ICOHC) headed by the Senior Minister of Communications and Information to develop Singapore's oral history collection of the Indian community in Singapore. She is especially interested in exploring how these heritage resources can be incorporated into the English language writing classroom as well as how heritage languages are preserved by members of the community.

Dr Pillai has published academic papers on writing pedagogy, teacher education, academic writing and community literacy practices as well as delivered keynote addresses at international conferences. Her publications include books such as 'From Kerala to Singapore: Voices from the Singapore Malayalee Community' (2017), 'From Estate to Embassy: Memories of an Ambassador' (2019), 'A View of Stars' (2020), 'The Story of Onam' (2021) and 'A Tapestry of Colours 1 & 2: Stories from Asia' (2021).

Some of her other creative writing publications in 2019-2020 include Monsoon in Kolkata (poem) in 'Wanderlust: The Best of 2019 Anthology', That Kiss on your Forehead (poem) in 'Poetry Moves: An Anthology of Poetry', Home is a Three Syllable Word's (poem) in 'Southeast Asian Review of English Journal', Mother Tongue (poem) in 'Asiatic: IIUM Journal of English Language and Literature' and Voices (short story) in 'The Best Asian Stories 2019'. She serves as the editor for the fiction and translated work sections of the Practice, Research and Tangential Activities (PR&TA) Journal.

In 2019, Dr Pillai conceptualized the Writers @NIE, a series of talks that brings local and international authors to meet the faculty and students on campus. She believes strongly that writing teachers need to be readers and writers themselves, and this belief guides her in everything she does.