Venkatesan’s Thesis: Sound and Fury
By Weston R. Sager | Monday, May 19, 2008
Professor Priya Venkatesan, tucked away in her research position at Northwestern, is now, quite infamously, suing students at Dartmouth College on vague personal harassment charges. If you have not read her rambling interview that was published in the last issue of The Dartmouth Review, I highly recommend referring to it before reading this article.
Over a decade before she taught at Dartmouth, Priya Venkatesan was an undergraduate at this beloved institution; Ms. Venkatesan graduated from the College in 1990 as a comparative literature major. It was only a matter of time before one of the self-proclaimed “post-modern” feminists sowed during the Freedman/McLaughlin years was finally hired by Dartmouth College. Though the Review is always wary of the potential damages these liberal fanatics can cause the College, it seems the administration was blissfully unaware until this recent debacle.
If only someone in the College had had the presence of mind to read Ms. Venkatesan’s thesis, he might have been able to bypass the hiring of this unstable Writing 5 teacher. In her senior year of 1989-1990, Ms. Venkatesan wrote an Honors Thesis entitled “Montaigne and Macbeth: Rebellion, Gender and Patriarchy in the Renaissance.” After reading this document, it comes as no surprise that this alumna is causing so much trouble almost two decades later.
It is a feat unto itself that she was able to get her thesis proposal past professors, as its very content is of seriously questionable academic value. In her undergraduate literary opus she attempts to prove that Montaigne and Shakespeare were attempting to disparage the “tyrannical” structure of the patriarchy, but in doing so, she ended up reinforcing existing misogynistic stereotypes. Though it is well known that theses often discuss inane or insignificant topics, particularly in such a well-trodden field as comparative literature, the question that kept arising for me was simply, “Why?” Why was the thesis created? Why was it approved by the comparative literature department? Why was Ms. Vankatesan able to pursue a Ph.D. in literature? The thesis does not tread new ground, nor really any ground for that matter.
Ms. Venkatesan simply offers seventy-odd pages of angry academic rigmarole that accomplishes next to nothing. Over and over again she attempts to cover the stench of a bad idea with a heaping of flowery, self-defeating diction. Her very first line exemplifies the problems with her thesis, “The Renaissance is a period characterized by many scholars as a critique of medieval and religious scholaticism [sic] that concerned itself with the study and revision of certain aspects of ancient civilization in the realm of art, literature, law, historiography, and political theory.” Phew. Despite her obvious attempt to create a florid opening line in academia-speak to “wow” the reader with her erudition, she ends up faltering with a grave typographical error in “scholaticism.” Alas, this type of flaw runs rampant throughout her thesis.
Much of Ms. Venkatesan’s writing focuses ad nauseam on the “rhetoric of the son,” a phrase of her creation which she upholds encompasses both the anti-patriarch and the anti-woman. The “son” in both Montaigne’s essays and Shakespeare’s play Macbeth is trying to do away with the father by way of the female. To further her point, she conveniently uses another term, “fraternity,” to describe the process by which young men “demystify” the patriarchy while undermining femininity and feminine sexuality. After all, what’s a good hard-line feminist thesis without a little frat-bashing?
Yet, it is apparent that Ms. Venkatesan is confronted with a moral paradox throughout her thesis. She is no doubt in favor of the downfall of the ever-evil patriarchy, but strongly against the promulgation of degrading stereotypes towards women. The result is an angry thesis, where it is apparent that Ms. Venkatesan is never satisfied with either Montaigne or Shakespeare for what they write in their respective works. She makes sure to point out that there was “no renaissance for women” and ends her thesis in a state of loathing for all things masculine.
What, if anything, can be garnered from her thesis? Though the text contains very little in the way of groundbreaking literary theory, the thesis itself should be used as a forewarning to colleges across the country. After reading this thesis, it is quite obvious that Ms. Venkatesan is not the type of teacher one wants in a hallowed college like Dartmouth.
Even though she padded her educational qualifications over the years (as she lets everyone know), the person she is now is not too different from the person who penned this thesis eighteen years ago. This is a confused, insecure, and angry thesis, one that accomplishes little and speaks volumes about her state of mind. To those in the Dartmouth administration: make sure to read up on the people you’re hiring, particularly when the material is right at your doorstep.
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