Posted at 5:00 a.m.
“I felt like I was in a nightmare,” Verushka Lieutenant-Duval testified on Wednesday.
The lecturer, whose suspension had sparked a media outcry in the fall of 2020, delivered her version of the facts during a second arbitration session against her ex-employer, the University of Ottawa.
Nervous and emotional, Mme Lieutenant-Duval reflected on the early days of the controversy, after she said the “word starting with an N” in class.
It should be noted that the University of Ottawa is the subject of two grievances filed by the Association of Part-Time Professors of the University of Ottawa, which represents Ms.me Lieutenant Duval.
Arbitrator Michelle Flaherty will have to decide on the establishment’s decision to temporarily suspend her ex-employee, even before hearing her. For Verushka Lieutenant-Duval, the answer is unequivocal: her rights have been “completely violated”.
I could not believe my eyes. I didn’t feel like I was in Canada. The minimum, in a rule of law, is at least to check with the person: is it true?
Verushka Lieutenant Duval
Two years after the controversy, the incident still upsets her. The position of professor at the university to which she had aspired for 20 years, she no longer dreams of it.
“I don’t know what my goal is anymore. I don’t have a plan B, ”she breathed.
“Surprised and shocked”
Verushka Lieutenant-Duval said the “word starting with an N” in September 2020, while giving her course Art and Gender on the representation of gender identities in the visual arts.
According to the complainant’s version, she was explaining to her class the concept of “subversive resignification”. She gave the example of the word queer, which was originally a slur, as was the “word starting with an N”, which has been reappropriated by the black community. A word she had heard “several times” from the mouths of white professors during her university career. A word she had read in scholarly books. And that she pronounced in its entirety, that day.
“These examples, I take them from scholarly literature. I did not take them out of my imagination, ”she said.
Hence her “shock” when a student from the group contacted her after the lesson to ask her not to pronounce the word in full. Immediately, M.me Lieutenant-Duval apologized to the whole class.
I was surprised and upset. I was sorry, because my mention of the word really wasn’t meant to upset anyone or hurt anyone.
Verushka Lieutenant Duval
“If I had known that this word was again so sensitive for students, I would never have used it”, pleaded Mme Lieutenant-Duval, Wednesday.
Their personal information published online
The following lesson, Verushka Lieutenant-Duval invites her students to express themselves on the use of the word charged in a university context. A purely “academic” debate, she stressed. In his eyes, the exercise, which had been recorded and which was presented during the hearing, “went well”.
For her, the file was closed. Then the story took a turn.
The same student who criticized her for saying the word charged posts an excerpt from the lecturer’s apology email on Twitter. His personal information, including his address, is published online. Verushka Lieutenant-Duval panics.
“It’s getting really, really serious. I understand that I am in danger, ”testified the 45-year-old woman, still shaken.
1er October, she wrote to several officials in her department. She doesn’t know what to do. She needs help. But his calls go unanswered.
The next day, the Dean of the Faculty of Arts tells her that she is temporarily relieved of her duties. Before we even heard it.
The day before, the University of Ottawa had reacted to the incident in the student newspaper The Fulcrumcondemning the use of the “word beginning with an N” on its campus.
“I was completely flabbergasted. They didn’t even call me, and publicly say what I said in class was offensive “, lamented M.me Lieutenant Duval.
The next hearing will be held on 1er december.
Only one official complaint
During its opening argument, the University of Ottawa had argued “exceptional circumstances” to justify the expeditious withdrawal of its ex-employee. In particular the media attention and the tense social climate.
On Wednesday morning, the University of Ottawa clarified that only one student had finally filed a formal complaint with the faculty of arts before the suspension of the teacher, and not two students.
“It’s something I just want to clarify, because I think it wasn’t clear either when I mentioned it on Monday,” Ms.e Céline Delorme, representing the University of Ottawa.
Later in October, six students wrote to the Dean of the Faculty of Arts to challenge a possible return to class of Mme Lieutenant Duval