Surviving Academic Life as a PhD Scholar
By: Sithara Puli Venkatesh
Tags: Academic, Mental Health, Victims, Harrassment, Survival

Today at around 9 am when I was scrolling through my WhatsApp, I mindlessly scrolled through few messages (which happens 40 times a day) in my PhD scholar’s group that included an image of the Kerala PhD student’s suicide news with her photo in the centre of the news. After few seconds of scrolling — after something hitting my mind I scrolled back to that post to read it in detail. Her face seemed so familiar and the content said that the PhD candidate who had worked hard for five solid years committed suicide because her PhD guide rejected her research paper. It took some time from within to get it processed. I do not know the girl — true! But I have been there in her position. I have got many of my proposals and abstracts rejected (not by my guide though). And every time I had faced rejections, my inferiority complex bloats up — surrounds me like a black smoky flame and never dissolves for a few days. I have often mentally banned myself from academics and have felt worthless. But suicide was never an option. Within the next few seconds of reading that news, I had a flush of confused guilt.

Dr. Krishnakumari

“Did I just scroll down the suicide news of a fellow PhD scholar? Have my senses numbed towards the sensitive issues happening around me?”

And am yet to process my stand here. Am I really shocked? Am I pretending to be shocked? Or should I even be bothered to be shocked?

Wait…

Did I just have a subtle mind-voice convincing myself with a micro sign of relief that ‘ it wasn’t my case and I have just safely completed my thesis submission process? And it’s really not for me to bother?’

For a moment, yes! Maybe I wouldn’t completely decline the self-interested mind-voice of mine.

I leaned back keeping my phone away and took a break to rethink what just happened. I confronted myself with the unsympathetic and unmindful ‘ME’.

Keeping my mindless — addictive mobile procrastination to another day, I would like to share my conscience as a PhD student.

My guide always used to say that ‘the relationship between the candidate and the supervisor is such as the relationship of a married couple’. You are destined to keep your wedding lock preserved for the good — The marriage cannot be undone or at least it is the supervisor’s responsibility to ensure safe marriage by somehow or the other protecting the candidate to safety borders. I have always felt lucky to have had such a guide who was just not my PhD supervisor and a well-wisher but a successful leading legendary professor in the field who spent minuscule bed-time to compensate all the time that he academically needed but still spent substantial time lecturing, correcting and guiding on his PhD student’s research areas.

This privilege of being a PhD candidate to the best humane professor triggers me more to think about those who are suffering from having a harassing, discrediting, humiliating, inhumane professor as their PhD guide. It is true that many failed tragic marriages end up disastrous to the victims and the news of it diffuses and disappears in the air in a short period of time and no one notices it or at least pretends to not have noticed. With the impact lasting forever among the victims and their closed knitted circle, this has become a seldom spoken topic in public.

THE ACADEMIC APOCALYPSE

When I recently encountered a brilliant academic intellectual (turned friend) on Facebook who had completed her PhD thesis in such a hot furnace situation filled with sexual harassment and dishonour, I felt helpless. Processing the depression, agony and anxiety that she had went through was such a disaster in my mind. As she is still struggling to pass through that phase, all that I could do was only imagine her situation that happened in the past.

Facing perverted invitation from the person whom she had respect for had put her mind on freeze. True, that our traditions haven’t equipped us to face these kinds of situations. But she has gathered her guts to reveal the incident to the other staff members expecting a minimum level of safety, security or the least — understanding.

But to her shock, the whole department worked together to disrepute her. The harassment from the powerful male (I intend not to call such a disgraceful person with any honorifics) was a shame to humanity — Yes! I agree. But the unsympathetic branding act of the other staff in the department is the root of THE ACADEMIC APOCALYPSE. I seriously doubt how these staffs who sided with the male authority by throwing repercussions on the victim go back to have a peaceful sleep at night. I wonder, won't the guilt choke them to death? (Do share your advice on how to teach these cold-blooded sheepish crime-supporters to be shamefaced?)

Let it be the case of the Kerala PhD candidate or the case of my friend, I could only come to one conclusion. The barbaric perverts utilised their power to sexually/ mentally harass just to prove their authority and intimidate, disempower, and discourage the growth of capable and efficient women using their comfortable traditional male-dominated space. I ask those cheap perverts: don’t you have a better way to compete with a woman?

“We are in solidarity with each other”

With a part of me wanting to rebel, protest and find justice against those heartless monsters in academia, the other realist part wants to enlighten my fellow students at the receiving end to develop a healthy community independent of the professors and management.

I raise the following questions and request every student to ask these to yourselves:

- Have I helped any student to recover from her own academic complexes by acknowledging her that she has done a great presentation/ write-up?

- Have I discussed my mental health with my supervisor and co-scholars?

- Have I witnessed mental health being discussed or debated among other department scholars or in the university’s public forums?

- Have I tried being the solution for a fellow PhD student’s anxiety or depression?

- Have I diffused positivity into the dark zones of my juniors who have struggled to speak during their DC meetings and proposal pitches?

- Have I expressed solidarity to those who haven’t received an acceptance email from the conference organisers or journal publishers who just accepted your abstract?

- Shouldn’t we be actively contributing towards building a healthy knowledge exchange environment instead of despising each other for their own growth in academics?

If your predominant answers were NO for the above questions, then you will seriously have to consider working on yourself to initiate a healthy academic environment for yourself and the others who are around you.

You would never believe what a little understanding and compassion could do to the mental strength of your co-scholars. All that you have to do is just show up to them and be there for them.

Once you find light from your entangled dark zones, do not put your victim phase into the black box. Use your experience to save your junior from a similar struggle. Make sure you torch the path of your co-scholar.