Berkley Center

Background: As part of the Education and Global Social Justice Project, in May 2011, undergraduate student Deven Comen interviewed Dr. Fleur D’Souza, vice principal of the arts and head of the History Department at St. Xavier’s College Mumbai, India. In this Interview, Dr. D’Souza discusses the interplay of social justice and engaged learning at St. Xavier’s, along with the history of St Xavier’s College, its programs, and its Jesuit foundation.

Can you tell me a bit about your background?

I am currently finishing off my term (six years) as vice principal in the arts faculty. I have been here for 27 years and at the Jesuit school next door for five, and I was a student here before that. I also did my teacher training in a Jesuit institution. So you can say I have been associated with Jesuit institutions since 1973.

How do you think that has impacted you?

I think it impacted me as a student as much as it did later on. As a student, I would put my experience with the All India Catholic University Federation as the formative factor. Xavier’s stood for excellence. Excellence in whatever you did, whether it was academic or co-curricular or extra-curricular.

As an essential requirement for academic advancement, I registered for a Ph.D. in history in the area of colonial studies. Since my research involved reading documents from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and several of these were written by Jesuits, I got an insight into Jesuit history. I started looking at Jesuit educational objectives and their changes over time, tracing educational policy from the colonial period to the present day. After 1973, because of the famous discussions ([General Congregation] 35 and [General Congregation] 36), the roles and positions of the Jesuits changed.

Did you see these changes reflected at St Xavier’s?

Certainly. Under the current principal, he has taken them very seriously. We see many changes, particularly in the admission policy. In the curriculum, we have not been able to change very much since we have only been independent from University of Mumbai for one year. Even so, we have individual teachers who have been involved in critical thinking about India’s complex social realities for a long time, exposing students and pushing them to think critically through outside programs, including summer school and the Honors program.

Can you tell me a little about the history of St. Xavier’s?

The institution was founded in 1869; the school and college were one. It was founded to educate the Catholic community of Bombay. It was very clear they felt the Catholic community was lagging behind in education, and the responsibility of higher education was given to the Jesuits. Very slowly, starting with a handful of students, we’ve grown immensely since then.

When were women admitted?

Women were first admitted in 1912. Here the universities do the examining and the degree granting, but the affiliated colleges carry out the teaching. This, history tells us, was the University of London model. The University of Mumbai was founded in 1857. For arts and sciences, we are the third oldest college in the university.

Can you talk about programs?

The SSL [Social Service League] was started in about 1950. The idea of “charity” and of helping out the unfortunate created the impetus. There was no element of compulsion since the SSL depends on student volunteers. I photocopied the annual reports of the SSL for 50 years. In the 1970s, there seems to be a change of heart in which the students were challenged to question, “What are the structures that are keeping people poor?” Still the students admit they can’t solve all of India’s problems, but they are more motivated to try. During the 1960s revolution period, students were very active and vocal on campus. Yet I believe St. Xavier’s College has always been very apolitical.

Often social issues have to engage the political. How do you do this?

Our policy has been to stay away from the political. In this country it means affiliating or attaching yourself to one political party, which is not always a good thing to do. When the first World War broke out the German Jesuits were considered a security risk to the British and were sent back. The Spanish Jesuits were brought in, but not being British, they had to maintain good relations with the British government. Even in the throes of the Indian Independence movement, the Jesuits were not as involved. I’m not talking about individuals here, though. There are definitely political individuals, but as an institution we try to stay neutral.

Can you tell me more about SIP [Social Immersion Program]?

It was not meant to be just social service; not going out and doing charity to feel happy about oneself. This program was meant to engage students. It requires them to think on paper, in the Ignatian pedagogical paradigm, which requires reflection, contextualization, and action. We have made it compulsory, and now it is a part of the curriculum. We have debated this: what is better, having students serve many organizations, or programs like adopt-a-village that make more concentrated change? There are pros and cons to each of these programs.

A few of us [professors] have done programs independently. In the Honors program, teachers are free to take up projects. Many years ago, I had a program to record the history of a tribal community in rural Maharashtra. Another program I organized involved studying the changing uses of space in Mumbai and in particular the transformation of the mill lands of central Mumbai. In the 1990s it was the world’s greatest development project. Like many cities in the world the gentrification process could be seen at work. As the students visited one of the still functioning mills, the security man made us promise not to talk to the workers there. History tells us that after a textile strike in 1982, thousands of workers lost their jobs as the mills shut down. These jobless workers fed the underworld, the mafia, out of desperation. Studying this history made the students think beyond the malls and chrome high rises that characterize the skyline of central Mumbai today.

How diverse is the student body?

Extremely and growing even more. Especially as we take in students under the reservation system. We also have a 50 percent reservation for Christians. The Christian population is not a very wealthy section of the city. Many of them are first-generation college students. They come from mill worker families or dockworker families, and this has contributed to socioeconomic diversity. However, most of the wealthier Catholics send their children abroad.

What core values do you instill?

Acceptance of people and different cultures. This is very much a value of the city. In the history of Mumbai, it was marshy islands that the British invited many people of different communities. We recently had a course on migrants and migration.

It is important to realize that the United States is facing many of the same problems India has. This is true in Europe also. We have a student who has a scholarship in the United Kingdom teaching refugees English. So many of the people she teaches from Eastern European countries are illiterate. Why haven’t the values of Western education percolated down?

We are still limited by some restrictions even though we are now independent. We cannot be so radically different, but we can give thought-provoking assignments. For example, I had my students present their assignment on the Industrial Revolution in the form of a newsletter focusing on women/child labor in industrial Europe of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and the current situation in India.

What involvement does St Xavier’s have in setting the tone for what education should be?

We believe in producing good citizens who are upright. We have alumni in various government posts. Now a lot of our alumni would not willing get into government because it is colored.

Some of our alumni say that the Xavier’s experience allowed them to change. Loads of our students go into Teach For India, founded by Xavierite Shaheen Mistri. We promote social commitment and social consciousness.

St. Xavier’s stands for excellence. It affords those coming here the chance to have access to excellence in undergraduate education in the arts and sciences. Very few students come here to extract from us without also giving back.

We have just concluded a program with [the Xavier Institute of Management & Research]. Sixty teachers from rural Maharashtra were housed here for a training program. They were given minimum training at St. Xavier’s in easy methods to teach math, Marathi, and English. Our students volunteer as one-on-one trainers for quicker dissemination of the new methods.