Rukshana Shroff : The Story of a Beloved Professor
In 1992, I fell ill with a slipped disk and was put on bed rest for weeks. My students started panicking, “If RS doesn’t come and teach us Shakespeare, it’ll be the end of the world!” I had a student named Mitali: she was an earnest and constant, you know, student, she was always there and wouldn’t allow anyone else to sit on the first bench in front of the teacher. So Mitali and her group started panicking. So they decided they needed to do something as they couldn’t just sit back and wait for the time whenever my back decided to heal itself. I don’t live far from college, and they knew it. So, they set up this meeting one fine afternoon and that group landed up in my room where I was lying with my leg in traction. They asked me if I’d be comfortable teaching them at the house. And because I was eager to teach, we started our small Shakespeare classroom there in my bedroom!
I look back and think, “God, what happened to us at that stage!” We forgot there was any concept of privacy of any sort, obviously! We all thought it was absolutely the most normal thing to do, to sit in a bedroom with a person’s leg in traction and have a regular Shakespeare class. Even Mitali says that she looks back on it and feels most zapped at herself, “How could I have done this! Why did you tolerate it?”, while I say, “Well I didn’t think anything of it at that point of time.” I think it was because we really were fed this whole myth that we were the great ones who gave information to students.
I hope I have changed a little bit from that and realised that we are not the superior ones who can only give students information, as students can get information from anywhere: we are here to learn and give. Back then, we had comparatively smaller classes with 30 to 35 students in a section. It used to happen in an annual mode, which meant that we got to learn about each other throughout the whole year. We got to know each one’s flaws, faults and good points. I remember students would actually come and sit at the teacher’s table with us: they’d pull their chair up and come and sit there, saying, “Ma’am we can concentrate better if we’re sitting right there.” So literally you’re breathing down each other’s throats! They would sit there, taking down their notes religiously when you’re talking from just across that table.
I remember another student, who also became a colleague at a later stage. She was this student who was known for asking the teachers for their pens, as she would only write with a teacher’s pen in each class. Each class we’d start off, and the moment the attendance would finish, she'd say “Ma’am, your pen?” In fact, she did that with everybody, not just with me. So, this thing went on:
“Ma’am, your pen? I need your pen.”
And then one would have to remember “Megha please give me back my pen, next class I need to mark attendance.”
The others would all say, “Ma’am she’s actually trying to whack your pen.”
So, you know, we’d have this little tussle going on. We would have this sort of close friendship with our students. Believe me or not, but she would actually turn around and say, “Today I don’t like your pen, that day’s pen was better.” I could never get a pen according to her liking and disliking.
One of the dogs on campus used to love Shakespeare. He used to walk into my Shakespeare classes regularly. Some of the girls would start yelping and saying, “Ah! Dog! Dog! Dog!” and I’d say, “Just leave the dog. The dog is attending class, and so should you. He’s better behaved than you are most of the time: he just sits quietly, listens and when he’s bored he walks out. You can do the same if you like!”
I remember one incident which is linked with Shakespeare again, which happened in the English corridor. Shakespeare was usually shared between me and a very close friend and colleague of mine, Mrs Kanthan. She and I were both equally involved with teaching Shakespeare that we were like Shakespearen nemesis! We had this rivalry going on as to who was ahead with the syllabus. We’d come out of the classes and say, “How did you manage to go ahead of me!” On that particular afternoon, the classes, as often happened, were happening in adjoining rooms. It was late afternoon, and was fairly quiet all over. Both of us were dealing with the last part of Othello, the murder scene of Desdemona’s. We both have always had this tendency of reading out and enacting Shakespeare whatever we can; as we love dramatising Shakespeare. We were looking at that particular scene where Desdemona is murdered and as she’s murdered she says, “My Lord, my Lord,”, while Emilia outside is banging away at the door saying, “My Lord! Open the door, my Lord!”. An echo scene, where Emilia is echoing outside, and Desdemona dying, gasping, “My Lord, my Lord,”. So this word ‘my Lord’ is echoing. Suddenly, as I read out this very dramatic scene, I felt a very eerie silence in my class, the silence that makes you feel uncomfortable. So, I stopped and thought, “What’s wrong with the girls? It’s such a dramatic scene: why are they responding in this peculiar way?” And then as I stopped, I could hear my voice almost echoing from the next room! So I was reading out a line and getting an echo from the next room. \It was Mrs Kanthan who was echoing it in her own dramatic way! The poor class was listening to both these teachers going on and rivalling each other in trying to dramatise that scene. And hence we were getting an amplified version of the echoing scene. We automatically barged out of our classes into the corridor and said, “What the hell are you doing!” and the two classes collapsed in laughter. So this was one of those times which became legendary at that time. As to this particular class, I don’t think they will ever forget that scene.
Mrs Kanthan and I share this passion for Shakespeare. We still get together and discuss all these things and the great times we had. We used to do jugalbandis too! After finishing a play, we would ask both sections to pile in together, take a larger room, and then discuss the play together. In a way, it gave both classes insight into what the other class had learnt or not learnt and it was a good space to discuss. So, our jugalbandis became quite famous, which we used to do regularly!
Over the years, I’ve realized that one needs to change and one needs to keep reinventing oneself. This is something we as teachers have tried to do with newer generations. When we started teaching, it was really about giving information. You collected stuff and then you gave it to students. But today, it’s not that anymore: it’s much more about facilitating. The problem we all face is that there’s an information overload. So the question remains: how do we deal with that information? And this is what we try to conduct to our students. So we’re a facilitator rather than a giver of information. I think that has been an important change.
The other thing is that at one level, students today have so much more knowledge available and they know so much more about the world. But at the same time, there are many more anxieties and we see them being reflected. Earlier one tended to find that students were more comfortable in their own skins as it were, and wouldn’t face so much of an identity crisis. But then it’s both good and bad: maybe they were naive at that point of time and students these days are more aware. But students today are dealing with many more anxieties and that is something one is very conscious of all the time. One is really concerned about if I say something, is it going to hurt somebody? Is it going to disturb somebody? So I think, as teachers, that is something that at least I have consciously had to keep dealing with. I’m still trying to fight myself using the word ‘girls’: I know every time I use it I’m using it wrongly, and shouldn’t say it. I’m still fighting that. And I do make that mistake occasionally and bite my tongue and realise that I shouldn’t have said it. So that’s just a small thing but, somehow, one has to adapt to these changes and adjust to it because we are dealing with a much more diverse crowd today. At the same time, we are dealing with students who are coping with so many different issues and stresses. At each stage, we as professors are more conscious of this aspect too. We keep worrying about, if I’ve said something, in the sense is it appropriate for everybody, is it not appropriate for everybody. So how do you manage to keep that balance? I think that is something that I have had to learn to deal with. And this is apart from having to learn to deal with technology. Earlier, when we didn’t have this platform and we had to move online, that adjustment was quite hard for us. But now I think I’ve learnt to manage my classes. Earlier when people said, “Give me your mail address,” one thought that they wanted your postal address. I remember someone saying, “No ma’am, not that address, I meant your email address”. I found myself in a world where people had started thinking about emailing, And I would apologize for that! So when these changes happened, I found myself thinking: isn’t it time to quit? But I took all this up as a challenge: I said to myself that I’ve got to take it up, I’ve got to handle this properly, and I’m going to do it entirely on my own. Because evolving and challenging yourself is a part of the journey of being a teacher.
I look back and think, “God, what happened to us at that stage!” We forgot there was any concept of privacy of any sort, obviously! We all thought it was absolutely the most normal thing to do, to sit in a bedroom with a person’s leg in traction and have a regular Shakespeare class. Even Mitali says that she looks back on it and feels most zapped at herself, “How could I have done this! Why did you tolerate it?”, while I say, “Well I didn’t think anything of it at that point of time.” I think it was because we really were fed this whole myth that we were the great ones who gave information to students.
I hope I have changed a little bit from that and realised that we are not the superior ones who can only give students information, as students can get information from anywhere: we are here to learn and give. Back then, we had comparatively smaller classes with 30 to 35 students in a section. It used to happen in an annual mode, which meant that we got to learn about each other throughout the whole year. We got to know each one’s flaws, faults and good points. I remember students would actually come and sit at the teacher’s table with us: they’d pull their chair up and come and sit there, saying, “Ma’am we can concentrate better if we’re sitting right there.” So literally you’re breathing down each other’s throats! They would sit there, taking down their notes religiously when you’re talking from just across that table.
I remember another student, who also became a colleague at a later stage. She was this student who was known for asking the teachers for their pens, as she would only write with a teacher’s pen in each class. Each class we’d start off, and the moment the attendance would finish, she'd say “Ma’am, your pen?” In fact, she did that with everybody, not just with me. So, this thing went on:
“Ma’am, your pen? I need your pen.”
And then one would have to remember “Megha please give me back my pen, next class I need to mark attendance.”
The others would all say, “Ma’am she’s actually trying to whack your pen.”
So, you know, we’d have this little tussle going on. We would have this sort of close friendship with our students. Believe me or not, but she would actually turn around and say, “Today I don’t like your pen, that day’s pen was better.” I could never get a pen according to her liking and disliking.
One of the dogs on campus used to love Shakespeare. He used to walk into my Shakespeare classes regularly. Some of the girls would start yelping and saying, “Ah! Dog! Dog! Dog!” and I’d say, “Just leave the dog. The dog is attending class, and so should you. He’s better behaved than you are most of the time: he just sits quietly, listens and when he’s bored he walks out. You can do the same if you like!”
I remember one incident which is linked with Shakespeare again, which happened in the English corridor. Shakespeare was usually shared between me and a very close friend and colleague of mine, Mrs Kanthan. She and I were both equally involved with teaching Shakespeare that we were like Shakespearen nemesis! We had this rivalry going on as to who was ahead with the syllabus. We’d come out of the classes and say, “How did you manage to go ahead of me!” On that particular afternoon, the classes, as often happened, were happening in adjoining rooms. It was late afternoon, and was fairly quiet all over. Both of us were dealing with the last part of Othello, the murder scene of Desdemona’s. We both have always had this tendency of reading out and enacting Shakespeare whatever we can; as we love dramatising Shakespeare. We were looking at that particular scene where Desdemona is murdered and as she’s murdered she says, “My Lord, my Lord,”, while Emilia outside is banging away at the door saying, “My Lord! Open the door, my Lord!”. An echo scene, where Emilia is echoing outside, and Desdemona dying, gasping, “My Lord, my Lord,”. So this word ‘my Lord’ is echoing. Suddenly, as I read out this very dramatic scene, I felt a very eerie silence in my class, the silence that makes you feel uncomfortable. So, I stopped and thought, “What’s wrong with the girls? It’s such a dramatic scene: why are they responding in this peculiar way?” And then as I stopped, I could hear my voice almost echoing from the next room! So I was reading out a line and getting an echo from the next room. \It was Mrs Kanthan who was echoing it in her own dramatic way! The poor class was listening to both these teachers going on and rivalling each other in trying to dramatise that scene. And hence we were getting an amplified version of the echoing scene. We automatically barged out of our classes into the corridor and said, “What the hell are you doing!” and the two classes collapsed in laughter. So this was one of those times which became legendary at that time. As to this particular class, I don’t think they will ever forget that scene.
Mrs Kanthan and I share this passion for Shakespeare. We still get together and discuss all these things and the great times we had. We used to do jugalbandis too! After finishing a play, we would ask both sections to pile in together, take a larger room, and then discuss the play together. In a way, it gave both classes insight into what the other class had learnt or not learnt and it was a good space to discuss. So, our jugalbandis became quite famous, which we used to do regularly!
Over the years, I’ve realized that one needs to change and one needs to keep reinventing oneself. This is something we as teachers have tried to do with newer generations. When we started teaching, it was really about giving information. You collected stuff and then you gave it to students. But today, it’s not that anymore: it’s much more about facilitating. The problem we all face is that there’s an information overload. So the question remains: how do we deal with that information? And this is what we try to conduct to our students. So we’re a facilitator rather than a giver of information. I think that has been an important change.
The other thing is that at one level, students today have so much more knowledge available and they know so much more about the world. But at the same time, there are many more anxieties and we see them being reflected. Earlier one tended to find that students were more comfortable in their own skins as it were, and wouldn’t face so much of an identity crisis. But then it’s both good and bad: maybe they were naive at that point of time and students these days are more aware. But students today are dealing with many more anxieties and that is something one is very conscious of all the time. One is really concerned about if I say something, is it going to hurt somebody? Is it going to disturb somebody? So I think, as teachers, that is something that at least I have consciously had to keep dealing with. I’m still trying to fight myself using the word ‘girls’: I know every time I use it I’m using it wrongly, and shouldn’t say it. I’m still fighting that. And I do make that mistake occasionally and bite my tongue and realise that I shouldn’t have said it. So that’s just a small thing but, somehow, one has to adapt to these changes and adjust to it because we are dealing with a much more diverse crowd today. At the same time, we are dealing with students who are coping with so many different issues and stresses. At each stage, we as professors are more conscious of this aspect too. We keep worrying about, if I’ve said something, in the sense is it appropriate for everybody, is it not appropriate for everybody. So how do you manage to keep that balance? I think that is something that I have had to learn to deal with. And this is apart from having to learn to deal with technology. Earlier, when we didn’t have this platform and we had to move online, that adjustment was quite hard for us. But now I think I’ve learnt to manage my classes. Earlier when people said, “Give me your mail address,” one thought that they wanted your postal address. I remember someone saying, “No ma’am, not that address, I meant your email address”. I found myself in a world where people had started thinking about emailing, And I would apologize for that! So when these changes happened, I found myself thinking: isn’t it time to quit? But I took all this up as a challenge: I said to myself that I’ve got to take it up, I’ve got to handle this properly, and I’m going to do it entirely on my own. Because evolving and challenging yourself is a part of the journey of being a teacher.
Interview and Transcript by Poloumi Deb, Shyla Sharma, and Aavani Gokul
Edited by Shikha Chandra
Edited by Shikha Chandra