Kavita Daiya is currently Assistant Professor of Postcolonial Theory in the Department of English, and affiliated faculty in the Women’s Studies Program at George Washington University. Her research and teaching interests include Postcolonial Literature and Cinema, Colonial History, Transnational Feminisms, South Asian American Literature, Race and Ethnicity, and Visual Culture. Dr. Daiya holds a PhD from the English department at the University of Chicago, and is currently working on her book Violent Belongings: Gender and Nation in the Postcolonial Public Sphere.
On What Happened…
I’ve seen the passages in Viswanathan’s novel that are similar to those in Megan McCafferty’s works, and I would ascribe those similarities to both carelessness and to genre. While I think Viswanathan was careless in not being attentive to the question of plagiarism and originality before releasing the text to Alloy, it seems far fetched to argue that Viswanathan deliberately, maliciously and intentionally plagiarized phrases (like “sweet and woodsy”) from these specific works!
On Plagiarism In The Chick-Lit Genre…
I am inclined to agree with those who have also pointed out that many of these similarities emerge from the generic conventions within which both writers work: there are certain tropes, archetypal plots, linguistic features, stock characters, etc. that most if not all of the novels in the young adult genre share. In a way, that is the difference between a literary novel written by a Kazuo Ishiguro, Arundhati Roy or Toni Morrison, and the works written for and as a part of a particular genre by McCafferty and Viswanathan.
On Other Upcoming Young Adult Writers Being Affected…
I think young adult writers in the future might be more careful, might think a little more self-consciously about this potential charge of plagiarism when they write. But I do think the fact of the genre and its conventions do constitute a limit and frame for the creative possibilities: and add to that the reality of a certain type of novel becoming commercially successful like Sophie Kinsella’s novels, and publishers therefore following suit trying to find the next Kinsella.
On Packaging…
It is unfortunate that a “packaging” company like Alloy has now emerged to mediate between a writer and a publisher, and to essentially transform an author’s creative output into a “product” that will produce sales for a publisher. Because this has now started involving not only producing the cover design but also altering the text, the story and its language to fit a particular saleable dominant, personally I find this very troubling. It takes the commercialization of literature to a new level. Because this kind of novel is not only about creative literary production, but more about producing a popular product for consumption. So all this raises important questions about how we think of originality, newness and authorship in the modern world…in a way, it deconstructs our myths about the lonely struggling writer working away at his craft in the garret to produce a unique and original work: showing that often it is just that, a myth, an idealization. Originality and authenticity are, after all, constructs and artifacts of modernity.
On The Media Overexposing The Case…
I think the media has definitely overexposed the case, giving it more salience than necessary, in part probably because of the high financial stakes for Viswanathan, and the Harvard connection: the prestige and status of Harvard as the leading educational institution not only in the US but also globally, has unfortunately given a greater visibility than warranted to this book and its young author studying at Harvard.
On Viswanathan Writing And Being Published Again…
Yes of course she should write again, and if she writes well, should be published again. Let me clarify that academic honesty is a very serious issue that I take up regularly in my classes: one has to both educate students on what constitutes plagiarism and its seriousness, and to critique the instances of plagiarism that one encounters in higher education. But I believe that with respect to the Viswanathan controversy, it is less interesting to ask ‘Did she plagiarize or not?’ or ‘Did she intend to copy McCafferty?’ Instead, I think it is more important to look at the discourse generated around her and ask: Viswanathan seems to have become an icon in the public sphere upon whom a cultural crisis about authorship and authenticity have coalesced, given the increasing corporatization in the US of ‘literature.’
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