"A Study Guide for Begum Rokeya's ""Sultana's Dream"", excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Short Stories for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Short Stories for Students for all of your research needs."
Sultana's Dream is a classic work of Bengali science fiction and one of the first examples of feminist science fiction. This short story was written in 1905 by Rokeya Sakhawat Hussain, a Muslim feminist, writer and social reformer who lived in British India, in what is now Bangladesh. The word sultana here means a female sultan, a Muslim ruler.
‘Sultana’s Dream’ is an extraordinarily prescient story set in fictional Ladyland. The narrator, Sultana, falls asleep and is greeted by Sister Sara, who introduces her to the futuristic society she has apparently awakened in. In this alternate reality, men are shy and timid creatures, while women pioneer scientific breakthroughs, such as solar power and weather control. A fascinating and thought-provoking tale that leaves the reader to decide whether this is, in fact, a dream or a visit from an unseen future. Born in Rangpur, Begum Rokeya (1880 – 1932) was an author, political activist, and pioneer of women’s rights in South Asia. While her parents were wealthy, their religious beliefs meant that Rokeya and her sister were deprived of education. However, her brothers, who were both attending school, educated them by night. Rokeya’s literary career began when she was 22, with the publication of an essay, ‘Thirst’. This was followed up by two books, ‘Matichur’ and ‘Sultana’s Dream’. The latter took the bold step of reversing the roles of the sexes, in order to demonstrate what women are capable of contributing, given the chance. Her other works follow a similar thread, and Rokeya reinforced her beliefs by setting up the first school for Muslim girls. During her lifetime, she wrote 16 novels, including ‘The Fruit of Emancipation’ and ‘Education Ideals for the Modern Indian Girl’.
Sultanas Dream, first published in 1905 in a Madras English newspaper, is a witty feminist utopiaa tale of reverse purdah that posits a world in which men are confined indoors and women have taken over the public sphere, ending a war nonviolently and restoring health and beauty to the world."The Secluded Ones" is a selection of short sketches, first published in Bengali newspapers, illuminating the cruel and comic realities of life in purdah.
This book traces the genealogy of ‘women’s fiction’ in South Asia and looks at the interesting and fascinating world of fiction by Muslim women. It explores how Muslim women have contributed to the growth and development of genre fiction in South Asia and brings into focus diverse genres, including speculative, horror, campus fiction, romance, graphic, dystopian amongst others, from the early 20th century to the present. The book debunks myths about stereotypical representations of South Asian Muslim women and critically explores how they have located their sensibilities, body, religious/secular identities, emotions, and history, and have created a space of their own. It discusses works by authors such as Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain, Hijab Imtiaz Ali, Mrs. Abdul Qadir, Muhammadi Begum, Abbasi Begum, Khadija Mastur, Qurratulain Hyder, Wajida Tabbasum, Attia Hosain, Mumtaz Shah Nawaz, Selina Hossain, Shaheen Akhtar, Bilquis Sheikh, Gulshan Esther, Maha Khan Phillips, Zahida Zaidi, Bina Shah, Andaleeb Wajid, and Ayesha Tariq. A volume full of remarkable discoveries for the field of genre fiction, both in South Asia and for the wider world, this book, in the Studies in Global Genre Fiction series, will be useful for scholars and researchers of English literary studies, South Asian literature, cultural studies, history, Islamic feminism, religious studies, gender and sexuality, sociology, translation studies, and comparative literatures.
In this major book Martha Nussbaum, one of the most innovative and influential philosophical voices of our time, proposes a kind of feminism that is genuinely international, argues for an ethical underpinning to all thought about development planning and public policy, and dramatically moves beyond the abstractions of economists and philosophers to embed thought about justice in the concrete reality of the struggles of poor women. Nussbaum argues that international political and economic thought must be sensitive to gender difference as a problem of justice, and that feminist thought must begin to focus on the problems of women in the third world. Taking as her point of departure the predicament of poor women in India, she shows how philosophy should undergird basic constitutional principles that should be respected and implemented by all governments, and used as a comparative measure of quality of life across nations.
This new edition of the Routledge Handbook of Gender in South Asia provides a comprehensive overview of the study of gender in South Asia. The Handbook covers the central contributions that have defi ned this area and captures innovative and emerging paradigms that are shaping the future of the field. It offers a wide range of disciplinary and interdisciplinary perspectives spanning both the humanities and social sciences, focusing on India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. This revised edition has been thoroughly updated and includes new chapters, thus adding new areas of scholarship. The Handbook is organized thematically into five major parts: • Historical formations and theoretical framings • Law, citizenship and the nation • Representations of culture, place, identity • Labor and the economy • Inequality, activism and the state The Handbook illustrates the ways in which scholarship on gender has contributed to a rethink of theoretical concepts and empirical understandings of contemporary South Asia. Finally, it focuses on new areas of inquiry that have been opened up through a focus on gender and the intersections between gender and categories, such as caste, ethnicity, sexuality, and religion. This timely study is essential reading for scholars who research and teach on South Asia as well as for scholars in related interdisciplinary fields that focus on women and gender from comparative and transnational perspectives.
