Perception of Technology in Marathi Literature
Human - Technology relationship is dealt with in novels by Jayant Naralikar.
We have tried to explore how technology is perceived and written about in regional literature, specifically marathi novels by Jayant Naralikar. We try to look for answers to these questions.
How are humans, computing tech, and their relationship conceptualised and talked about?
Speculate on the role of the regional language in shaping this conceptualisation.
Writing science fiction would or should add another layer of purpose — that of getting people to think about science. After all, stories are one of the primary ways humans learn. That was one of the main objectives Jayant Naralikar writes marathi sci-fi novels for.
Science via science fiction. Entertainment intermingled with education. Tales of imagination told well while being rooted in scientific principles and technological possibilities.
Jayant Vishnu Narlikar is an Indian astrophysicist. He is one of the popular Sci-fi writers in Marathi literature and has written a lot of science fiction novels.
He uses his writing with the aim of the proliferation of science in the simplest language. He says:
“The main objective behind all this writing is to impart the interesting facts to the common masses about the recent developments in the field of science. I used the science fiction stories for the same purpose. But here I wish to coordinate between science and society. The society can’t digest the great speed with which the inventions are taking place in the field of science. So there is a mystic fear for science and so the question of its use remains resulting into the symptoms like the misuse of the boons of science. It is necessary to make the people aware of the proper use of science. The stories written with this background are the real science fiction stories, I think. Of course, this picture is quite different from that shown in the movies like Star Trek ̧ Star Wars, etc. Therefore, I don’t use such popular literature for my stories “
Our observations of his writings are two-fold, one of the langauge he uses to talk about technology, the other being how he perceives usage of technology itself through the stories.
He first wrote and published Preshit in 1983. Around 35 years ago, in this novel, he was able to introduce ideas around human-computer interactions. He talks about alien life forms, life on other planets, super computers and also concept similar to artificial intelligence. Since he came from a science background we can see that he could speculate about our current technologies like, Internet, Computer, Voice recorders in watches, Space ships, space travel are some of these. We also read about devices like a television set which can connect to many other television sets on the earth at a time. If we compare all those technological concepts with current technology, we can find many similar technologies are working in current world. The name of the main character, Preshit (who happens to be an alien amongst humans) has encoded meaning, one who came with a message.
In his first novel Preshit, the author borrowed words from the English language for naming technologies. Critics were displeased due to this, hence, Naralikar had to switch to using words from Marathi in this second novel Vaman parat na ala (the Return of Vaman). But he maintains his stance on the usage of English, which is not to be considered as the language of the British who ruled over India but the language of science and technology. He believes that if scientific concepts and words are to reach everyone, we have to accept scientific English terms as part of our regional language. As such he has not ‘invented’ any new technology, but has thought over the existing data with a different perspective. So we don’t find any new terminology in any of these novels.
Vaman Parat na ala (the Return of Vaman) reads like a cautionary tale, warning us about the overuse of technology that destroyed the imaginary Monad culture, civilisation that devised it. The Monads achieved great materialistic progress in all fields. Their dependence on the robots and machines increased to such an extent that they became completely dependent on the machines for all their routine work. It increased laziness and brought stagnancy to their knowledge. Human culture and values turned to dust due to the rule of the robots in the world. There were no ethics in the machines, they became uncontrollable and destroyed their creators.
Use of language and vocabulary.
At time of writing the first book, the vocabulary for those technologies already existed in Marathi but the author chose not to use those terms. Since it might alienate the people further from the world of Technology. We can speculate that the authors objective of his writings was to act as a mediator between complex technologies and his readers.
The author also uses mythological references in Vaman. He used references like Urmila and Lakshman; mythical characters from the Ramayana. These references help contextualise the happenings. It becomes easy to understand the meaning behind role of human and technology in this world. These help to explain his opinion easily. The author is a scientist, so he is not against the use of science and technology for the betterment of human life.We feel his approach towards the machines in particular and advancement of science in general in these novels is not pessimistic, but rational and practical. The nomenclature for the supercomputer and the robot are also very suggestive. Bruhaspati was the mentor of the Gods and so was the wisest of all. This name is chosen for the supercomputer. The robot is named after the mythical character of ‘Vaman’ who was the incarnation of Lord Vishnu.
From what we can gather, the author does want the influence of language to interfere with the propagation of technology. The usage of overtly complicated terminology in marathi should not hinder new theories being introduced to marathi readers.
Naralikar uses science fiction as way to put forth fears, hopes and possibilities of the technological advancements. His themes give us guidelines for the future technologies. He sometimes paints a very hopeful and happy picture of the future. However, his dark colours make us aware of the dangers of future technologies.
Lexicon -
Computer: संगणक
Super computer : संगणकच, बृहस्पति
Robot : यंत्रमानव
Television set : दूरदर्शन संच
Links to the Novels by Jayant Naralikar :
The Return of Vaman — A Scientific Novel (Science and Fiction)
Authors — Ketaki Paranjape & Saili Gupte
