May, 19, 2011
To John Treat and the members of the Brudner Prize committee at Yale
Dear John Treat
With great regret, I am writing to you in order to ask you to withdraw my name from the list of the recipients of the Brudner Prize.
I was greatly honored to be awarded the Brudner Prize in 2008, and proud to see my name included on this highly prestigious list of prominent scholars and activists.
But I’ve just learned that this year’s prize has been given to someone whose last book (David Halperin, What Do Gay Men Want?) shamefully plagiarized my work (a fact that I made public in 2009, and that many reviews of the French translation of the book in question have also made clear).
I wish to register my protest against this choice of yours, which is an offence not only to me, but also to academic, intellectual, political and ethical standards.
I cannot believe your committee finds plagiarism an acceptable form of behavior, nor that you consider that such a behavior should be rewarded with such a distinguished prize. To my mind, such an award damages the credibility of the Brudner Prize, and I do not wish my name to be included in a list with somebody who has stolen my work , my intellectual framework, and my way of thinking.
I have therefore decided to return the prize and to ask you to remove my name from any documents related to it. I no longer wish to be considered the 2008 recipient.
In the near future, I will issue a public statement demonstrating the extent of the plagiarism I have mentioned and explaining why I have returned the prize.
Sincerely yours
Didier Eribon
- My 2009 statement : http://didiereribon.blogspot.com/2009/02/plagiarism-and-linguistic-imperialism.html
- Pour une mise au point plus détaillée, on peut se reporter à mon entretien paru le 26 mai 2011 sur le site du magazine français en ligne YAGG : http://yagg.com/2011/05/26/affaire-de-plagiat-didier-eribon-rend-son-brudner-prize-de-luniversite-de-yale/
