Science Fiction and Indian Women Writers Exploring Radical Potentials

Science fiction, as a literature of fantasy, goes beyond the mundane to ask the question: what if the world were different from the way it is? It often challenges the real, builds on imagination, places no limits on human capacities, and encourages readers to think outside their social and cultural conditioning. This book presents a systematic study of Indian women’s science fiction. It offers a critical analysis of the works of four female Indian writers of science fiction: Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain, Manjula Padmanabhan, Priya Sarukkai Chabria and Vandana Singh. The author considers not only the evolution of science fiction writing in India, but alsodiscusses theuse of innovations and unique themes includingscience fiction in different Indian languages; the literary, political, and educational activism of the women writers; and eco-feminism and the idea of cloning in writing, to argue that this genre could be viewed as a vibrant representation of freedom of expression and radical literature. This ground-breaking volume will be useful for scholars and researchers of English literature. It will also prove a very useful source for further studies into Indian literature, science and technology studies, women’s and gender studies, comparative literature and cultural studies.

1. Introduction: Science Fiction as a Genre 2. Indian Science Fiction 3. Contemporary Indian Science Fiction Writers and their Works 4. Radical Elements and the use of Conjunctions 5. Contradictions through Disjunctions. Conclusion                 

Urvashi Kuhad is Assistant Professor in the Department of English at Ram Lal Anand College, University of Delhi, India. She was awarded a Fulbright Foreign Language Teaching Assistant Fellowship (2010–11) to visit the University of Texas at Austin, USA, where she served as a young ambassador to the host country. She was also invited for a graduate teaching assistantship to the University of Western Ontario, Canada in 2011–12. Dr Kuhad’s work has been published in several national and international publications on the intersections of identity and imagination. Her research taps into the latest developments in Indian science fiction to investigate its radical potential.