‘What’s your name? Don’t tell me you are Shakespeare’ ❤️

International Confy @ MCC

A Report

21st July 2025

The first day of the Two-Day International Conference hosted by the Research Department of English, MCC, got off to a grand start today in the Anderson Hall.

Dr. Franklin Daniel, our vibrant Head of the Department, set the tone and the tenor for the Conference with his lovely words of introduction.

“This conference is the result of meticulous planning. On March 5th we had Dr. Greg hosted by the Dept of English on ‘Heidegger’s Typewriter’, which in fact set the spark for this great event today”.

“Truth emerges in conversation, and understanding is a process of becoming. Literature is a dialogue across time between the author, the text and the reader. Let us keep listening, interpreting, reading”, he noted.

Speaking at the Conference, our Principal Dr. Paul Wilson reiterated on reimagining hermeneutics for the 21st Century.

We need to keep decoding traditions. Sometimes the traditions are real legends. So we need to differentiate between tradition and legend. Try to use value as a keyword to authenticate and curate traditions.

When you say ‘traditions’, they are always value-based. I keep reading the Life and Legacy of MCC book, to see how these traditions always had some value and objective to bring uniformity.

Anderson, wanted to educate people, but when Miller came, he saw education as the importance of ‘teaching the minds of the learners to grow’.  So truth is not dumping, but exercising the mind / training the mind to know knowledge / truth / reality for themselves.

Truth is not objective but is a formation of various social structures, that makes truth possible.

Today, India is in the 39th Position in the global Innovation Index, starting from 80th position, seven years ago. Is it because of the policies we have, or the innate tendencies in us to innovate?

In the next five years, we might even touch the top ten in the Innovation Index, 

he opined.

Speaking next, Dr. V. Rajagopalan, the former Head of our Department, and presently, Dean with SSN University, Chennai, gave an inspiring talk that foregrounded the theme of the Conference.

Prof. Monsingh Daniel, President of ELF introduced Dr. V. Rajagopalan.

Excerpts from his talk –

I hope you must have read the famous essay titled, ‘The Unexpected’ by Robert Lynd. It is an essay that explores the theme of how nature often surprises us with its unexpected beauty and pleasures, particularly when we approach it without fixed expectations.

Translation is interpretation. Translation is understanding. There is a big difference betwen literary hermeneutics and biblical hermeneutics.

In 1989 I attended a Refresher Course spanning 28 days in Hyderabad. We had a grammarian, a very great scholar by name Prof. Thirumalesh who was our Resource person. This was his second class with us.

A small group of people always had the habit of coming late to class.

A gentleman walked in late, and Prof. Thirumalesh asked him,

‘What’s your name?’

‘Bernard Shaw’ he replied.

He went and sat.

After sometime another gentleman came in late.

Prof. Thirumalesh asked him,

‘What’s your name? Don’t tell me you are Shakespeare.’

Now everybody laughed.

So what really happened there?

The first person who came in, his name was really Bernard Shaw. Prof. Thirumalesh thought that he was joking.

Somewhere communication was lost. So we are always in the midst of understanding. We are always in the midst of interpreting…

To be continued…

Dr. Greg Emery then gave an insightful key-note address.

(updates follow).

The first Technical session followed at 11.15 am in the Anderson Hall.

So happy to note that, each technical session spread over various venues, had just five paper presenters, and so everyone of them could speak for at least ten minutes. Many from among the participants asked very insightful questions to the paper presenters, which led to a lot of valuable takeaways and enriching insights.

I was so delighted to chair one such paper presentation session, where the presenters presented on postcolonial hermeneutics, folklore and hermeneutics, psychoanalytic hermeneutics, feminist hermeneutics, Dalit hermeneutics, etc.

Hearty congratulations to Ms. Gopikarani, a student at University of Hyderabad, pursuing Masters in Sociology for presenting a paper on “From Fat to Fit: A Feminist Hermeneutic Reading of Bodily Transformation in Hollywood Films’’.

Hearty congratulations to Prof. Pavithra Mahendran, on presenting an insightful paper titled, “Subalternity and Ambivalence in select poems of Jacinta Kerketta”.

Hearty congratulations to Ms. Lara Violet, II MA English, on presenting a lovely paper titled, “INTERPRETING FOLKLORE IN AFRICAN AND INDIAN LITERATURE”.

Hearty congratulations to Ms. S. V. Nivedhaa on presenting a paper titled, “Dalit Women’s Testimonies: Reading Resistance in Bama’s Sangati”.

Hearty congratulations to Ms. Nandini Sukumar, on presenting a paper titled, “Echoes of Womanhood: Confronting Trauma, Tradition, and Transformation in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s The Dream Count”.

On an added note of appreciation, haven’t seen a conference of this calibre and import anytime in the recent past.

Everything went like clockwork.

All the events happened on time (on the dot), and the organising team – our vibrant research scholars left no stone unturned in the process.

This Conference I’m sure would be a benchmark in the annals of the Dept of English, MCC.

Up Up MCC!

On an added note, our hearty congratulations to Ms. Pearlina and Ms. Keerthana from III BA English, on having presented their papers in the International Conference at St. Xavier’s College, Palayamcottai. We are so proud of you our dear students. Keep it up.