[INDOLOGY] Sexism and Bias on INDOLOGY governing committee

Wed Apr 3 23:22:22 UTC 2019

Dear Jonathan,

I'm not dead wrong, nor am I right, for what it's worth, because being right was never my intention when I wrote my last message. I simply wanted to raise an issue and I managed to do it, judging from the replies I received.

Your reply does not take into account the fact that we are all human beings. In the haste of stressing the obvious, namely that it is a matter of power, you obliterate another obvious matter, namely that professors -- or shall we perhaps say all educators -- are not only entitled to have feelings towards their students, but also that more often than not this is something out of their control.

Moreover, I find very funny that you raise the issue of power relations, because in this discussion you are in a position of power, if compared to other younger colleagues, who don't have a permanent position (like myself) and probably don't feel at all comfortable in entering the lion's den. The reluctance of younger colleagues to express their opinions about matters of sexism and bias on the Indology committe as been already pointed out by Dr Sauthoff and rightly so, but I'd like to highlight again that in this list the power relation is obviously tilted in favour of professors and senior colleagues (who are overwhelmingly male, by the way). I'm writing all this because I would never dare to write on this list that you are dead wrong about anything, and for two simple reasons.

First of all, because I never start a discussion to prove that I'm right. I truly believe that a fruitful discussion is never about being right or wrong, but about gaining a better understanding of the issue. Moreover, I think that even the most outlandish ideas might be interesting and deserve to be at least seriously considered, instead of being dismissed immediately.

Secondly, in this discussion you are a powerful professor, while I'm only a younger colleague on a fixed-term position. The power relation here is clear. At some point in the near future you might be in the position of having the power to decide about the future of my own career and it's certainly not advisable for me to risk to upset you. Now, you are certainly thinking that you judge applicants only for the scholarly value, but this doesn't eliminate the issue of power, does it? Even the simple fact that I've addressed this issue directly and publicly on the list has already changed everybody's perception of me as a person and hence as a scholar, like it or not. It's not something positive or negative, it just is. Power relations are and always will be there in all aspects of life. So yes, I completely agree with you: it is always an issue of power, even when we discuss supposedly neutral scholarly topics.

As to the political correctness, believe me, I hesitated to write that last remark, precisely because of the implicit power relations you referred to.

A couple of other considerations. I am one of the very few men who didn't even doubt for a second about the misogyny in academia at large. I even went so far as to write immediately and without any reservation that I find the atmosphere in this mailing list misogynist. Also, I'd like to point out that Prof. Madhav Deshpande is an Emeritus professor, Malcom Keating is an assistant professor, Aleksandar Uskokov a Lecturer, Georges Pinault is a professor. I'm a librarian on a fixed-term contract. How is the power relationship in this discussion again? I'm hammering on this point because of a very simple reason: nobody in this list had the courage to reply to my first email, in which I wrote a comment about the right-winged, misogynistic and nationalistic Hindu propaganda spewed on this very list. Why is that? Why did I get a lot of instant replies to my last email, but none to the former? I do have an idea, but at this point I'm truly scared at the prospect of expressing any kind of opinion on this list.

If we want to talk about power, I'm all for it, but then we should go for the full ride. I'm totally for it.

Best wishes,

Camillo

________________________________
From: Madhav Deshpande <mmdesh at umich.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, April 3, 2019 7:30:48 PM
To: Uskokov, Aleksandar
Cc: Camillo Formigatti; Jonathan Silk; indology at list.indology.info
Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] Sexism and Bias on INDOLOGY governing committee

In a similar situation at the University of Michigan many years ago, a tenured professor was fired, and there were departmental faculty meetings on how such issues should be addressed, and some guidelines were developed.

Madhav M. Deshpande
Professor Emeritus
Sanskrit and Linguistics
University of Michigan
[Residence: Campbell, California]

On Wed, Apr 3, 2019 at 11:24 AM Uskokov, Aleksandar via INDOLOGY <indology at list.indology.info<mailto:indology at list.indology.info>> wrote:
I'd like to side with Jonathan on this, if I may. As long as the teacher is a teacher, s/he should assume the virtues that Sankara required from the student (shama, dama, etc.) upon himself/herself. Self-control must be the norm in a relationship of power imbalance.

Best,
Aleksandar

Get Outlook for Android<https://aka.ms/ghei36>

________________________________
From: INDOLOGY <indology-bounces at list.indology.info<mailto:indology-bounces at list.indology.info>> on behalf of Jonathan Silk via INDOLOGY <indology at list.indology.info<mailto:indology at list.indology.info>>
Sent: Wednesday, April 3, 2019 2:08:44 PM
To: Camillo Formigatti
Cc: indology at list.indology.info<mailto:indology at list.indology.info>
Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] Sexism and Bias on INDOLOGY governing committee

I know I'm throwing myself into the lion's den, but I say this because I am someone in a position of (relative) power and it makes sense for me to say it: Camillo is dead wrong. The problem is one of power, and power between a teacher and student is always and inherently unequal. It's just a simple as that. What the teacher may think or feel (or think he/she feels) is something he/she has to deal with privately (or with a therapist or friend): there is never any possible way that that can ever under any circumstances be correctly conveyed to the student. This is gender neutral: male-female, female-male, f-f, m-m, it does not matter. It is not the gender that is the issue, it is the power. This is not the same as between colleagues, although even there I would say one must be extremely careful, because there is likely also there to be an imbalance of power. I am sure that there are grey areas; students become ex-students, etc., and I'm sure all of us know or know of a teacher who married an ex-student and had a long and happy life together. I do not dispute that. What I would say is that the circumstance of ignoring the imbalance of power is absolutely fatal*; there is no way this comes out well as long as this imbalance exists, and I dare say (here I may be going too far, I don't know) --here I dare to say, if you don't understand this, then just trust me on it without understanding it, and just keep your thoughts to yourself.
Jonathan Silk

PS: I've taught both in North America and in Europe, and this is not an issue that applies more in the former than the latter; it's a question of social tolerance, but that is changing everywhere (I hope), and I certainly don't mean to suggest that there are no excesses in political correctness in any domain, but this (discussed above) is not an example of that.
*I see that this may be unclear: what I mean is that once the relationship no longer exists of teacher-student, in theory two persons could discuss openly their mutual attraction, but while the educational (etc) unequal relationship exists, this is almost certainly not possible.

On Wed, Apr 3, 2019 at 7:19 PM Camillo Formigatti via INDOLOGY <indology at list.indology.info<mailto:indology at list.indology.info>> wrote:

Dear colleagues,

Sorry for intervening again in this discussion, but I’d like to comment on a point raised by Dr Sauthoff and taken up again by Prof. Keating. I refer to this episode:

Just last week a student came to me after her professor unburdened himself by professing his feelings to her -- two weeks before the end of class and placing her in a position where she was not sure if she would graduate because she rebuffed his (totally inappropriate) advances.

I wonder whether is a cultural difference between North Americans and Europeans regarding what is considered inappropriate behaviour bordering or being sexual harassment. I hope I can explain what I mean in a clear way. I personally believe that this professor’s advances where not totally inappropriate, only the timing was inappropriate. His feelings towards this student were there anyway, regardless of the fact that he expressed them or not. He should only have waited the end of the classes, that’s it. Or maybe not even, because even if he had waited, he might have unconsciously favoured this student, in the hope that she would have returned his advances afterwards. Either way, he was trapped, in the sense that it wouldn’t have mattered whether he’d had chosen to express his feelings or not, by the moment he started to have feelings towards his student, his judgment as a mentor was clouded anyway. Now, I don’t see why having feelings towards another adult human being should be considered totally inappropriate. Obviously, all these considerations are moot if the advance was done in a pushing way with overt sexual behaviour, but since Dr Sauthoff did not describe the advance in detail, I don’t have any means to know. I’m making a general point here and I hope it is clear.

Believe, I’m not kidding when I say that now I feel I can’t even make a compliment to a colleague about a new haircut or a nice dress—and I mean both a male or a female colleague—without the fear that he or she would feel harassed. This is how far political correctness has gone.

Best wishes,

Camillo

From: Malcolm Keating <c.malcolm.keating at gmail.com<mailto:c.malcolm.keating at gmail.com>>
Sent: 03 April 2019 07:08
To: indology at list.indology.info<mailto:indology at list.indology.info>
Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] Sexism and Bias on INDOLOGY governing committee

Dear all,

1. Regarding Dr. Truschke's concerns about gender parity, I would draw attention to an analogous effort being made in philosophy, which is a field that is also heavily male-dominated and has its share of problems with sexism, from egregious cases of harassment to pernicious and persistent cases of stereotyping. The idea of aiming toward gender parity in conferences has been present there for a decade now (see the "Gendered Conference Campaign" post at the Feminist Philosophers Blog: https://feministphilosophers.wordpress.com/gendered-conference-campaign/). This post includes links to some discussion about implicit bias, stereotype threat, etc. I raise the question of whether analogous efforts within Indology more broadly might not also have salutary effects.

2. I would like to echo Dr. Sauthoff's concerns about the experiences of women in academia. As another junior academic, I post to this list with trepidation, aware of its public nature and wide reach. At the same time, I have enough evidence, testimonial, perceptual, and inferential, to believe that there persist widespread problems in academia more generally, and Indian philosophy (my own subfield) more specifically. I also agree that the problems are more entrenched than what might be visible from the vantage point of most men, myself included. Perhaps these may be mostly structural, and not a matter of individual bad intentions. That possibility does not mean those of us within these structures aren't responsible for seeking solutions. And finally, if my female colleagues are speaking out at the risk of their reputations--at least in the sense of reputations for not stirring things up--I cannot simply watch. What the implications are for this list, I am in no position to say. However, I would like to add my voice to those who would like to see more discussion of how to create a more humane and equitable environment for scholars.

Best,

Malcolm

--
Malcolm Keating
Yale-NUS College | Assistant Professor | Humanities Division (Philosophy) | malcolm.keating at yale-nus.edu.sg<mailto:malcolm.keating at yale-nus.edu.sg>

Office hours may be scheduled here: https://malcolmkeating.youcanbook.me
Academic website: http://www.malcolmkeating.com/

Subject:

Re: [INDOLOGY] Sexism and Bias on INDOLOGY governing committee

From:

Audrey Truschke <audrey.truschke at gmail.com><mailto:audrey.truschke at gmail.com>

Date:

2/4/19, 8:11 pm

CC:

"Indology List (indology at list.indology.info<mailto:indology at list.indology.info>)" <indology at list.indology.info><mailto:indology at list.indology.info>

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

Dr. Silk raises a valid point, which is that I am slightly vague in my account of what has happened. I would encourage everyone to be sensitive to the fact that other committee members have repeatedly told me, often angrily, to not share their emails and to not discuss any of this with the list at large. There are real risks for women who choose to come forward with these sorts of concerns.

That said, I do point to some specific things, such as an attempt to encourage me to resign when I pointed out bias (March 2019; in an e-mail), refusals to talk about possible bias (numerous e-mails; fall 2018), and persistent demands that I keep silent about what I experience as abuse and intimidation (repeated over the past year or so). To add another specific case, last week a committee member wrote to Dr. Paturi and chastised him for writing 'thank you' to the entire list regarding the post I sent around sharing Anand Venkatkrishnan's excellent blog post on female Sanskritists and sexism. Indology members say thank you to the list all the time without complaint, and so this was a targeted silencing of a discussion about discrimination against women in our profession (and it worked). I think this is a fair amount of precision and several discrete instances. I do not know whether the intent was sexist or biased in any specific case, but the effects were.

So far as how to move forward, I recommend a few concrete steps. All are aimed to redirecting the committee's energy toward making both the committee and the list a more equitable, welcoming place. (1) I want gender parity, or at least approaching gender parity, on the INDOLOGY governing committee by adding female members. I think everyone on this list should value and want gender parity. (2) I want the committee to take further steps to address bias issues, whether that is bias training, a system for adjudicating complaints, shaking up committee membership, or something else. Whatever we decide, I would like those steps announced to the list at large. (3) Personally, I think that the individual who suggested that I resign after pointing out bias should instead, himself, consider stepping down. But I will not press this particular point.

Another thing that I wish to achieve here is awareness and space for conversation. Indology as a discipline may be focused on classical India, but we exist in the modern world, and modern issues of bias are a legitimate topic for scholars to discuss on INDOLOGY (preferably without declarations by list members that a given discussion of bias and discrimination is inappropriate on INDOLOGY). I would like issues of bias and discrimination treated seriously on this list and on the governing committee going forward.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

All the Best,

Audrey Truschke

Assistant Professor

Department of History
Rutgers University-Newark

Audrey Truschke

Assistant Professor

Department of History
Rutgers University-Newark

Subject:

Re: [INDOLOGY] Sexism and Bias on INDOLOGY governing committee

From:

Audrey Truschke <audrey.truschke at gmail.com><mailto:audrey.truschke at gmail.com>

Date:

2/4/19, 8:11 pm

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