Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak: Translation! Ever New, Ever Elusive

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak is University Professor at Columbia University.  Her first job was at Iowa (1965-77), where she went through the ranks, and profited greatly by the absolute support of colleagues among whom she would mention President Sandy Boyd, Vice President May Brodbeck, Chairs John Gerber and David Hayman, and many many others. She met Ngugi Wa Thiong’o, Okot p’Bitek, and Sankha Ghosh at the International Writing Program; worked with John Cheever and Anthony Burgess at the Writer’s Workshop, and was involved in the hiring of Maureen Robertson, Danny Weissbort, Steven Unger, Ruedi Kuenzli, Sheldon Pollock and others. Her special friends were Alexander Aspel, Cassia Tomasini, Dale Godwin. She has written a few books, received a few prizes and holds a few honorary degrees. For many years, she has been grappling with finishing a book on W.E.B. Du Bois and writing an Afterword on the first English translations of Gramsci’s conversation with Julia and Tatiana Schucht while imprisoned.  Humanities for social justice is her obsession. Translation is the medium of this work.