On occasion of his first lecture tour of India in 2010, Žižek sparked off a debate with Nivedita Menon, a leading postcolonial feminist scholar. The debate revolves around Menon\u27s contention that Žižek\u27s emphasis on European, Christian Universalism as the most proactive model for countering capitalism is ignorant of the heteroglossiac postcolonial histories of South Asia. Menon\u27s response (“The Two Žižeks”) suggests that what Žižek appears to be missing is knowledge of the fallibility of Eurocentric discourses in negotiating the colonial and postcolonial situations particular to the subcontinent. Though Žižek\u27s debates with Badiou and Butler are well known, few outside India are aware of the Menon-Žižek debate. This paper will occasion this little known debate to consider some of the major points raised by Menon against the applicability of Žižek\u27s theoretical arguments toward reading and understanding postcolonial politics and culture
