Reflections on the Spivak-Kumar Fracas By Ajeesh T Vijayan

LONDON June 8: Gayatri Spivak’s lecture on 21st May 2024 at the JNU sparked controversy, and many academics and public intellectuals were quick to judge and criticise Spivak for her behaviour. Gayatri Spivak is an Indian scholar, literary theorist, and feminist critic.

She tried to correct Mr. Anshul Kumar’s pronunciation of the name of prominent civil rights activist W.E.B. Du Bois. Many took Anshul’s side and criticised Spivak for this. Were these people right to criticise Spivak for correcting the pronunciation of a name?

We must analyse the verbal exchange between Spivak and Anshul to understand the whole issue behind the controversy. Below is a snapshot of the conversation.
(Ref: https://x.com/notsomeritorios/status/1792888907962413413)
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Anshul: My question is…
Spivak: Who are you?
Anshul: I am Ansul kumar.
Spivak: What do you do?
Anshul: I am founding professor of centre for brahmin studies.
Spivak: Brahmin studies?
Anshul: Centre for brahmin studies.
Spivak: Very good.
Anshul: My question is Du-ba-wa becomes an elite upper class and you, despite being…
Spivak: Du-bo-is. Would you please learn his name? Brahmin studies you know the brahmin names. If you are going to talk about the man who is, perhaps best historian and sociologist of the last century, this is supposed to be an elite university, and please take the trouble to learn how to pronounce his name. <explains how to pronounce the name again > DU-BO-IS
Spivak: If you are done with the trivialities, I will proceed.
Spivak: Sorry?
Spivak: If you are done with the trivialities, I will proceed.
Spivak: I didn’t understand it.
Organizer: Please keep your question short and crisp. Don’t be rude.
Anshul: If you are done with the trivialities, I will proceed.
Spivak: Don’t you do Brahmin studies? Don’t be rude, I am an 82-year-old woman in public in your institution with a youth wing…
Anshul: My question is, Du-ba-wa becomes an elite…
Spivak: NOT Du-ba-wa. I don’t get it…
Anshul: …you are one.
Spivak: No.
Spivak: Great-granddaughter of Bihali Lal Badhuri.
Organizer: Can you have other questions?
Spivak: I don’t want to answer.
Anshul left the auditorium.
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Anshul started asking the question without introducing himself, which is a basic courtesy. Hence, Spivak asked him who he was. Anshul said his name and continued with the question. Spivak interrupted him and asked what he was doing. He could have said,

“I am Anshul, a sociology student at JNU.”

Instead, Anshul got irritated and sarcastically introduced himself as a Founding Processor for the Brahmin Studies Center. Anshul then asked his question but mispronounced the name W.E.B. Du Bois. Spivak interrupted him and corrected the pronunciation. Anshul could have thanked her and proceeded, but he replied, “If you are done with the trivialities, I will proceed with my question.”

How could a Sociology student claim that correctly pronouncing a prominent civil rights activist’s name is a triviality? For the sake of argument, let’s agree that it’s his prerogative. However, we cannot argue that Spivak should agree with him. After all, she came there to speak about the vision of W.E.B Du Bois on democracy.

Do we allow someone to distort or mispronounce our name purposefully? Do we allow someone to distort Babasaheb Dr B. R Amberdkar’s name? We all should ask ourselves this question before judging Spivak. It’s not a crime to not know the correct pronunciation of someone living on a different continent. But don’t let your ego does not acknowledge the mistake and try to correct it.

Maybe Spivak could have waited for him to finish his question. But has anybody seen his Twitter rants about what he wanted to ask? He wanted to question Spivak’s claim that she was from a middle-class background. (I don’t know when Spivak made this claim; I believe she said it during the speech). I guess he came there to humiliate Spivak and asked someone to shoot while he did that, but Spivak interrupting him during his question ruined all his plans. We all should learn to question someone without personal attacks.

Spivak’s later statement shows that She didn’t recognise the sarcasm⁠ when he said he was the founding professor of Brahmin studies. Sarcasm is passive aggressiveness, and many do not understand it all. Anshul posed as a Brahminist and abused Spivak in front of everyone. Regardless of the organiser’s request to avoid being rude, Anshul did. When Spivak declined to answer, Anshul left the auditorium and hurled abuse at her on Twitter. Spivak took a dignified stance and did not respond, which is her maturity, and many intellectuals supporting Anshul take that for granted.

Now, let’s dissect some of the claims made by those who support Anshul in this misogynistic, abusive behaviour. I am basing my arguments on three premises:
1. Correctly pronouncing names is a basic courtesy; mispronouncing them is not trivial.
2. If someone has the time to research the lecturer’s family background, he also has some time to study the topic of discussion, at least correctly pronouncing the name of a civil rights activist.
3. A sociology student should have learned the correct pronunciation of the name of a prominent historian or sociologist. This premise is a direct consequence of the second premise.

Mr Anilkumar Payyappilly Vijayan wrote an article in The Wire questioning Prof. Spivak’s behaviour. I find his arguments completely flawed. Anilkumar claims that Spivak asking Anshul to introduce himself and declining to answer his question is an example of structural violence in academia. The structural violence mentioned here is caste-based. Castiestic acts of violence will happen only after identifying the caste. Our society uses many mechanisms to determine a person’s caste. I am not getting into the details of it, but identification of the caste is the first step in caste-based violence. Spivak didn’t try to identify Mr. Anshul’s caste. He posed himself as a Founding Professor for the Center for Brahmin Studies. Hence, it’s natural to assume that Anshul must be a Brahminist. The current political context, too, is critical here. There has been wide criticism that Hindutva ideologists are infiltrating the campuses, and one must be surprised if Spivak, or anyone else for that matter, didn’t believe Anshul was a Brahmanist when he posed as one.

Anilkumar also claims Anshul can be written off as yet another misogynist in a sea of misogynists who routinely abuse women. The author here conveniently forgets the fact that misogyny is one of the foundational pillars of the caste system. Misogyny permeates through the walls of the caste system, and it’s bi-directional. The author thinks of a casteless world where misogyny will routinely happen. In other words, women are here to serve men’s interests. If the caste system disappears, the current upper-caste and lower-caste men will work together to support routine misogynists. As my spouse, who herself is a Dalit Pulaya, states, misogyny/gender discrimination starts inside the house/community, and caste discrimination only begins when she steps out of the house/community.

Anilkumar’s other argument is that while this incident may slightly tarnish the reputation of the esteemed professor, it will not end her career. In contrast, overshadowed by this misogynistic excess, the student has all the possibility of facing a bleak future in an Indian academic system controlled by Savarna academic networking. The author is a confused individual on many levels. The author thinks misogyny can be accommodated when fighting caste oppression. He claimed before that Anshul was using Frantz Fanon’s method of violence against oppression. Did Frantz Fanon suggest verbally abusing women as a fight? Anshul went to Twitter and hurled abuses at Spivak. If you go through his Twitter handle, you can immediately recognise a serial abuser. Anshul is Islamophobic, Mysogynist and Casteist – a pathetic excuse of a human being.

Throughout the article, Mr Anilkumar treats the entire issue as the English pronunciation of underprivileged people, while Spivak only corrected the pronunciation of a name. Nearly half of the article is about English language and pronunciation. Mr Anil must do some research on the “Say My Name” campaign. Correctly saying names is essential in a country where people are addressed based on their caste and race. The author first made it an English pronunciation issue. Now, it’s easy for him to attack Spivak in the name of elitism.
In her response to The Hindu, Spivak said, “Anshul Kumar had not identified himself as a Dalit. Therefore I thought he was a Brahminist, since he was saying that he was the founder of a Brahmin Studies Institute.” Anilkumar, when quoted Spivak, conveniently disregards the “therefore” part of Spivak’s statement. I feel that Anilkumar just used this opportunity to boast about his command over the English language.

I read another article by Dr. Jaime Chithra on Media One (https://www.mediaoneonline.com/mediaone-shelf/analysis/spivaks-academic-philosophy-and-brahminical-values-rejected-representation-255761). This article contains blatant lies to support the misogynist. It demonstrates how someone can twist a situation out of proportion to benefit them. In this article, she has highlighted four points below:
1. Spivak interrupted the student from asking a question
2. Spivak asked, “Who are you” and “What you do” at Anshul
3. Spivak corrected the pronunciation of Du Bois
4. Spivak asked him not to be rude to an old woman
If you closely examine the snippet of the verbal exchange between Spivak and Anshul, you will understand that Spivak’s intention was genuine. She interrupted the student at the very beginning, not after the question, asking him to introduce himself. Her request is reasonable, and “Who are you?” is not a big philosophical question. It loosely translates to “What’s your name, and what do you do?”. The organiser and Prof. Spivak asked Anshul not to be rude. When Anshul rudely reacted that correctly pronouncing a name was trivial, she asked is this the way someone doing Brahmin studies behaves publicly to an 82-year-old woman? Her remark is entirely different from what Dr. Jaime is appropriating. Jaime forgets that natural language is not just words; it involves tone of voice, facial expressions and hand gestures.

This incident reminds me of how the Kerala society gaslighted the women who faced verbal abuse from actor Vinayakan. They have rallied behind the actor and supported Vinayakan, saying his childhood days were brutal and he grew up in a Dalit colony. Well, my wife was born and raised in a similar Dalit colony, and she doesn’t use such words; most women don’t use such words, but many men do. Hence, my reading is that the attitude of these supporters is that it’s okay for men to say abusive words and women, for the sake of bigger wins, have to swallow their pride and live with it. There is only one name for this attitude. It’s called covert misogyny. Weaponising trauma won’t bring any progress; it’s only an eye-for-eye attitude. If you can’t call a spade a spade, you are not doing justice; you are being fake.

In hindsight, it’s good that Spivak interrupted Anshul during his question. If she had attempted to correct the spelling after he completed his question, people might have argued that she had humiliated him as a tit-for-tat because he asked a tricky question. (Many are already doing it. For reference, see Dr Jaime Chithra’s article on Media One. She created a lie that Spivak interrupted him only after Anshul completed his question). Spivak taught us the importance of correctly pronouncing someone’s name by correcting him straightaway. She taught us the politics of correctly pronouncing someone’s name. Someone’s name is their identity. Do not distort it to disrespect people.

The views expressed in the above column is solely that of the author and does not necessarily reflect the views of this website or its editor.