CC BY
9DOI: https://doi.org/10.24412/cl-36892-2024-7-46-53
Pages: 46-53
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT: INITIATIVES OF WOMEN IN SCIENCE AND BUSINESS
4th INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE
SULTONANING ORZUSI: BIRINCHI FEMINISTIK ILMIY FANTASTIKA: ROKEYA SAXAVATNING ILMIY QARASHLARINI QAYTA KO'RIB CHIQISH
Nandini Bhattacharya
Tarix fanlari bo'yicha dotsent Kalkutta qizlar kolleji Kolkata, Hindiston
MAQOLA HAQIDA_
Annotatsiya: Rokeya Saxawat Xossain 19-asr Bengalining taniqli ta'lim va ijtimoiy islohotchisi bo'lib, uning fikrlari va g'oyalari o'z davridan ancha oldinda edi va bu uni bugungi kunda ham dolzarbligini saqlab qoldi. "Sultonaning orzusi" uning debyutant fantastik asari bo'lib, jahon adabiyotida birinchi feministik ilmiy fantastika sifatida tan olingan. Eng muhimi, Rokeyaning ushbu asardagi ko'plab ilmiy tasavvurlari haqiqiy hayotiy tajribalarda ro'yobga chiqdi. Fantastik ertak ramkasiga qaramay, u ta'limni imkoniyatlarni kengaytirishning asosiy vositasi sifatida qabul qildi va bu erda fanning kashshof roli patriarxal doirada tasvirlangan stereotipli tasvirdan ajralib turadigan ayol xarakterining qiyofasini o'zgartirishga ajoyib ta'sir ko'rsatdi.
SULTANA'S DREAM: THE FIRST FEMINIST SCIENCE FICTION: REVISITING THE SCIENTIFIC VISION OF ROKEYA SAKHAWAT
Nandini Bhattacharya
Associate Professor in History Calcutta Girls' College Kolkata, India
ABOUT ATRICLE_
Key words: Rokeya, Abstract: Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain was a renowned
feminist, fantasy, scientific, educationist and a social reformer of the 19th Century Bengal aviation, utopia. whose thoughts and ideas were far ahead of her time and that
kept her relevant even today. Sultana's Dream was her debutant fictional work that received acknowledgement in world literature as the first feminist science fiction. Most significantly, many of the scientific imaginations of Rokeya in this work came true in real life experiences. In spite of a _frame of a fantasy fable, she took education as the major
Kalit so'zlar: Rokeya, feministik, fantaziya, ilmiy, aviatsiya, utopiya.
medium towards empowerment and there the pioneering role of science had a striking impact to transform the image of feminine character distinct from their stereo-typical image _portrayed in the patriarchal framework._
МЕЧТА СУЛТАНЫ: ПЕРВАЯ ФЕМИНИСТСКАЯ НАУЧНАЯ ФАНТАСТИКА: НОВЫЙ ВЗГЛЯД НА НАУЧНОЕ ВИДЕНИЕ РОКЕЙИ САХАВАТ
Нандини Бхаттачарья
доцент истории Калькуттский женский колледж Калькутта, Индия
_О СТАТЬЕ_
Ключевые слова: Аннотация: Рокейя Сахават Хоссейн была
Рокейя, феминистка, фэнтези, известным педагогом и социальным реформатором наука, авиация, утопия. Бенгалии XIX века, чьи мысли и идеи намного
опережали ее время и это сохраняло ее актуальность даже сегодня. «Мечта Султаны» стала ее дебютным художественным произведением, получившим признание в мировой литературе как первая феминистская научная фантастика. Самое главное, что многие из научных фантазий Рокейи, изложенных в этой работе, сбылись в реальной жизни. Несмотря на рамки фантастической басни, она рассматривала образование как основное средство расширения прав и возможностей, и здесь новаторская роль науки оказала поразительное влияние на трансформацию образа женского характера, отличного от его стереотипного _образа, изображаемого в патриархальных рамках._
Introduction:
Rokeya Sakhawat is well known as a path breaking educationist who is equally acknowledged for her service and contribution in both the Bengals - East (now Bangladesh) and West. However, her thoughts and ideas were much ahead of her time and that kept the assessment of Rokeya yet to be explored. In this paper, her first novella, Sultana's Dream will be discussed for its extremely powerful scientific thoughts and imagination in favour of women's progression and empowerment. This small piece, written in the form of a fantasy is relevant and meaningful even after hundred years of its composition in 1905. It was originally written in English by the author at the age of 25, when India was under the colonial rule and women hardly had much scope for education and employment. Rokeya's bold and powerful imagination found women as airplane pilots, scientists working in the laboratories and strategists who could use solar power and rain water to stop warfare. Also, her imagination brought revolution in the cooking fuel which seemed unthinkable at that time and yet
immensely relevant and environment friendly today! "Sultana's Dream," written in 1905, is celebrated as one of the earliest examples of feminist science fict ion"[1]
Science and Women's Empowerment: Within the Frame of a Fantasy
In her path breaking fantasy fiction Rokeya created an imaginary world led by women named as Ladyland and supported by significant scientific devices and formulas. Of all the scientific methods and technologies narrated in this work, the closest to reality at that time was the aircraft. Although Rokeya did not see any airplane in reality in the sky above her home, yet, that was a well-known technological breakthrough that brought revolution in the transport and communication of human kind.
Sultana's Dream was a fiction that received acknowledgement in world literature as the first feminist science fiction. Set in a frame of a simple fantasy, this amazing fiction is a brilliant composition that remains not only relevant and meaningful even after more than hundred years, but it further can act as a manifesto for a utopia suiting environmentalism, world peace and non-violence. The dream world created in this fiction promises as land of women where saddle of power was surrendered by the men to the women as a whole- men were pushed behind the curtain, called ' mardana' (derived from mard- meaning men) which juxtaposed zenana(women's enclave) a real life experience of her own time.
Sultana was brought to this fantasy land in an ace aircraft run by a woman who as a guide had shown her all the wonders of the land around and explaining how the women took up the control of the land in a peaceful revolution and began to experiment out in a number of areas starting from cooking to warfare. The author was not only aware of the blessings of scientific know how and their applications, but also conscious of the environmental damages these high technology might bring. The science fiction distinctly addressed the issues of air pollution while depicting the innovations practiced in this wonderland.
In fact, most of Rokeya's imagination for scientific breakthrough had been materialised at different stages of history and seem meaningful even in today's world. For instance her innovation of thought towards the utilization of solar energy was a path breaking concept at that period of time and a concept that showed a policy towards energy drive in the 21st century world across the economic status of the states. Use of solar energy for cooking to warfare (in peaceful and non-violent means) had been the amazing range of Rokeya's dream in the name of Sultana. However, the use of smokeless cooking, something unthinkable in that time's India, was one of her very pragmatic thinking in favour of women's work condition which could be derived only from the experienced empathy. Rokeya's feminist thought had its own Asiatic framework, where even when she proposed a complete role reversal for men and women - men
pushed behind the curtains or parda (mardana), with the task of cooking and managing babies, yet it was shown that women are perfectly capable of cooking. Rokeya in her dream-walk in the Ladyland along with her newly acquired company Sarah expressed her delight to see the simplification in the sphere of cooking. 'How my friends at home will be amused and amazed, when I go back and tell them that in the far-off Ladyland, ladies rule over the country and control all social matters, while gentlemen are kept in the Mardanas to mind babies, to cook and to do all sorts of domestic work; and that cooking is so easy a thing that it is simply a pleasure to cook!'
Solar Power: The Pragmatic Futuristic Utility Imagined by Rokeya And it is here, that she found the scope of solar power to bring a revolution in the method of performing the task. This land saw women at work at all walks of life professional and private, starting form education, scientific discoveries, driving crafts and managing home. Sultana's Dream was written in English and later translated in Bengali and many other languages. It received world - wide appreciation for its immense potential as a feminist manifesto in a garb of a satire. Rokeya could have been taken the revolutionary angel who could dream of a complete subversion of the society in favour of women.
" In the capital, where our Queen lives, there are two universities. One of these invented a wonderful balloon, to which they attached a number of pipes. By means of this captive balloon which they managed to keep afloat above the cloud-land, they could draw as much water from the atmosphere as they pleased. As the water was incessantly being drawn by the university people no cloud gathered and the ingenious Lady Principal stopped rain and storms thereby.'[2] 'Really! Now I understand why there is no mud here!' said I. But I could not understand how it was possible to accumulate water in the pipes. She explained to me how it was done, but I was unable to understand her, as my scientific knowledge was very limited. However, she went on, 'When the other university came to know of this, they became exceedingly jealous and tried to do something more extraordinary still. They invented an instrument by which they could collect as much sun-heat as they wanted. And they kept the heat stored up to be distributed among others as required."[3]
Critical Appreciation of Sultana's Dream by Experts from Diverse Fields The fantasy fiction of Sultana is so well knit along the course of logical framing, that one can hardly find any loophole in the thought process of the debutant author at her mid- twenties. All these scientific experimentations were nurtured in the laboratories of the universities, sponsored by the queen of the fantasy land. Obviously, the teachers and students of the universities are all women who are motivated towards scientific research and experimentation
that can bring progress and development for their state and at the same time help them to win against the enemies looming large at the frontiers. It was Rokeya's utmost imagination to utilise the two basic natural energies in such a perfect balance, solar power and rain water, that would create an unbearable situation for the army of the enemy camp and force them to finally give up and retreat. Rokeya's imagination was non-violent, non-invasive yet effective and powerful, if seen from a scientific perspectives even today. To a world so used to engaged in the creation of endless variants of weapons of mass destruction, horrible and damaging to both nature and humanity, Rokeya's imagination could have acted as a meaningful force towards sustainable peace for the world order. In Fayeza Hasanat's view "Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain's Sultana's Dream can be read as a utopian science fiction that shows a strong adherence to a feminist ecocritical narrative long before utopian fiction, science fiction or ecocriticism offered to establish any links with gender politics, especially in context of the Indian subcontinent." [4]
However, while working on the image of the aircraft, Rokeya actually made quite a few breakthrough in the conventional approach to life. Till that historical moment it was not accepted in the regular social norms to find women in the driving seat of any vehicle, anywhere in the world. Driving airplane was a rare affair at that time. "A propeller - driven air car fitted with speroids of hydrogen is the typical mode of transportation in Lady Land. Written barely a year after the Wright brothers' first successful flight in December 1903 Hussain's narrative imagines a society where women adeptly assemble and operate machines for air travel." [5] Given that material context, the story of Rokeya shows the power of her scientific imagination. It was the highest possible escalation for women in the arena of transport technology. It was unthinkable in an era when women, especially women in South Asia hardly came to the streets without covered carriage, that Rokeya is imagining her to be flying, not only flying in a passive mode of a passenger, but even the flying the craft itself by woman power. This was a great leap forward, both from the perspectives of science fiction as well as feminism. A retrospective assessment of the novella after a century's gap shows how pragmatic and logical was Rokeya's imagination.
One significant anecdote of Rokeya in her mature age actually testifies the experience and thrill involved in the travel up in the air. Interestingly, at a mature stage of her life, this educationist and social reformer received a rare opportunity to take a ride in an aeroplane and fly around the sky of Kolkata - the city where she had spent most of her life. This ride was made possible by her nephew who was the first Muslim pilot of South Asia. He got a special permit to take his aunt in his aircraft and fly about an hour above the sky of the city. Rokeya
was, in that respect, the first Muslim lady to get an opportunity to ride in an air plane in the South Asian sky. This is how, a part of her Sultana's Dream came true for her.
In hindsight, after almost a hundred and twenty years, one can see Rokeya's dream has spread all over the world where aviation industry is largely controlled by women power. It is no longer a scenario where in-flight hospitality remains the forte of women while men do the flying. Women have proved themselves capable and successful as pilots, leading flights across the sky and connecting countries from one end of the globe to another. However, do these brave and competent women pilots know about Rokeya's imagination which she dreamt more than a century ago?
Scholars from her paternal homeland, todays' Bangladesh had found the power and strength of Rokeya in her ability to create the utopia- a utopia which she later, in her career of an educationist and a social reformer had tried to address and realise. It was through the power of knowledge that she evoked the self-reliance in women to bring the magic solution. "Ladyland is a utopia where science technology and humanism work in unison to make women self-reliant. Patriarchal operation becomes meaningless in this utopia. Like most feminist utopias Sultana's Dream is a direct exploration of a gendered pivotal society. Ladyland is a utopian space since it represents an ideal feminist space. Sultana's Dream employs utopia to inspire those women who suffer within patriarchal societies. The story can be seen as a representing a satirical utopian society as power of males is taken away and given to females."[6] (Alam and Sanjida, Page 109)
Rokeya's Dream and Reality in Aviation Industry
In reality, however, as obviously, the utopia did not take place, the complete role reversal did not occur. Yet, even within patriarchy, the stereotypical image of women as an inferior specie, unable to deal with science, or weaker sex unable to pilot air crafts could be transcended - seen from hindsight, they emerge as a silent revolution.
However, one needs to reckon with the fact that Rokeya's dream or utopia could be largely realised within the changing /evolving frame of patriarchy as time moved on. One of the leading Indian aviation company Indigo have a proud catchphrase - 33,000 feet above patriarchy- Girl Power.[7] The same aviation company has created a number of similar templates and slogans like those of, " Most women pilots in an airlines anywhere in the world," and one very close to Rokeya's thoughts as reflected in the fantasy world, this is an extension of a national slogan in Hindi, "Beti parao, Beti bachao, Beti ko pilot banao." (provide education for your daughters, let them live and make them pilots). Along with the two liner slogan of the India Government, Indigo had added the tailpiece of making the daughters pilots. This approach
is strangely falling in tune with the ideas nurtured by Rokeya at her mid -youth days. She too was insistent on education as every success in the Ladyland was taken as a successful outcome of proper education for women. The propaganda of the Indigo Airways implies two things at the same time - one, the drive for education did not become obsolete and the linking of education with aviation had brought a conventional sense of empowerment by education in dialogue with an unconventional method of empowerment,namely, aviation. As Rokeya had initiated to break the stereo-type right after the Wright brothers' experimentation took a full century to sip into the social sphere of acceptance. However, while dealing against patriarchy and moving each step towards women's progression, the role of science is extremely significant as it provides material strength and technological know-how which was traditionally considered a man's domain for long. While projecting the girl power in their image making and propaganda for social justice, this airlines receives criticism from the bastions of conventional patriarchy and malevolent male chauvinism. Anyway, the projection of girl power as a benchmark of progress on the one hand and its caustic critic on part of the patriarchal stronghold on the other, implied the significance of Rokeya, even in today's world. The need for the changing mind-set, set forth by her a century ago still needs to traverse through further experiences to get used to the bottom line. However, none of these slogans ever mention Rokeya or acknowledge the due respect she truly in this field.
Rokeya Sakhawat deserves to be part of the icons or templates for the aviation industry and everyone linked with the world of aviation, across gender, ought to be made aware of her dream which they are realizing along with the progress of science and technology in each day of their professional venture.
Concluding Remarks:
However, a woman like Rokeya, a path breaker in this context, deserves to be acknowledged for her brave contribution to the very idea of challenging the patriarchal domain and creating the scope for women to think beyond the box. The most amazing part of Sultana's Dream is that the fantasy, the utopia and the science fiction of that day has been materialised in bits and pieces in today's world and made Rokeya an immortal spirit for fighting against the inequality, ignorance and dominance of lop-sided gender hierarchy still looming large in dark corners of this globe. The fighting spirit of Rokeya, illuminated with the light of scientific knowledge, conscious of the nature's balance and basic human needs is therefore, even more relevant and meaningful to the contemporary world.
References
1. Michelle Murphy, Sultana's Dream, Page 1, URL http://histscifi.com/essays/murph-y/sultanas-dream, Last visited, 3rd February, 2024
2. Rokeya Sakhwat, Sultana's Dream, Rokeya Sakhawat Hussain, Sultana's Dream) Originally published in English in Madras: The Indian Ladies' Magazine, 1905. Reprinted in "Sultana's dream; and Padmarag: two feminist utopias by Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain". New Delhi (India): Penguin2005. URL: https://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/sultana/dream/dre-am.html) Last visited, 1st February, 2024
3. Sakhawat, Sultana's Dream, (above URL)
4. Fayeza Hasanat, Sultana's Utopian Awakening: An Ecocritical Reading of Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain's Sultana's Dream, Asiatic: IIUM Journal of English Language and Literature, Volume 7, Number 2, December 2013, p-115, DOI: https://doi.org/10.31436/asi-atic.v7i2.321)
5. Debali Mookerjea-Leonard, Feminist Review, No. 116, dystopias and utopias (2017), p-147 URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/44987318
6. Jahidul Alam Sania Sanjida, Reversal of Tradition: A Feminist Study of Rokeya's Sultana's Dream, The Comilla University Journal of Arts, no. 2, June 2017, p-109.
7. Indigo official Facebook page, 8th March, 2023 post, URL: https://images.app.goo.gl/o94N2B8qFELSkbzPA, Last visited 4th February, 2024
