(((i'm livid.)))
a rant by knk
currently i'm on the verge of tears due to a current situation with a professor's grading of a paper of mine...
let me backtrack and also apologize to all of you who have been subjected to reading my shaky writings, as i never liked writing (or my writing skills) for a good portion of my life. if and what i write is more because i feel like i have something to say, and i have always highly disliked the idea of being a silent passive 'girl.' thus my reasonings for writing in general.
i would consider myself a good student, i show up to my classes (as difficult as that may be early in the morning on a freezing cold minnesota day), i actually make the effort of participating in my classes, i do my work, and even tho i might procrastinate a tad (but who doesn't).... i get good grades, even tho i somewhat question the idea of being graded (and would much rather learn without the trappings of being graded)... i dream of going off to grad school and being completely/continually immersed in the search/discussion of knowledge.....
it is my last semester of college. and i'm fulfilling those last requirements that over the years i either forgot about or they didn't fit into my schedule.... generally, i take classes on the basis of if it looks like it would be of interest to me, so i signed up for a class on scandinavian literary fairytales. (which seemed, at the time, would appease my interest in the form of fairy tale writing and also might be something outside of the realm of the theory which is the bulk of my major. the class actually looked like it would be good.) yet, i find myself in a class where i continually find moments where i would want to conflict with the professor (but because i've learned, conflicting with the profs generally isn't a good idea)... i'll grimace as he boils down all of freud, or all of marx into these bite sized pieces to manipulate in ways in which he can use against the stories we read. (i come from the line of thinking that if one is going to use a philosopher person to back up an argument, that you should be exposed and also expose the class to that writing. None of this has been done. Feminist theory is glossed over in a few words to a class full of neophytes to theories in general.) i have on several occasions objected to his screwing foucault into something completely unrecognizable.. but at that time, i only explained instead of attacking him. (thank you f.s., years ago to learning about the importance of 'i' vs 'you' statements.) so i write my paper for the class, on a topic which is quite close to my own heart and interests... i was extremely excited about the paper, and even sent copies of it to other people...
yet i wasn't excited to see it returned to me... completely marked up in red ink... for trivial reasons.
(did i mention yet that he isn't a native english speaker? perhaps this factors in a tad.)
i was completely livid when i first looked at the markings. i actually did cry... because not a single one had anything to do with the actual content or my progression of thoughts, but it was extremely critical about my usage of my mother tongue, english.
i will never claim to being an expert on the english language. as i hated english when i should've been learning grammar... there were other subjects of more importance.
and also, the writing skills that i have developed are completely as a result of spending a good portion of my life online... (and only because of online did i ever develop a taste for even writing a word.)
my major is writing intensive. it is what we do. and i enjoy it. (i'm even willing to stand up for the ancient idea of a senior thesis, because it seems to be an essential crowning moment of a major: cultural studies and comparative literature, which is focused on writing theory about theory.) but i don't write about fluffy literary texts in the way which the paper for this class required.
i went in and talked with the professor after class today. (after i had a bit of time to calm down... and thus think about it all.) i told him how i'm not an english major, i'm might not be the best at grammar... but the syllabus said nothing about being harshly graded on the grammar, it only mentioned that the content was of high importance.
and i told him that i didn't think he was justified in writing "Quite a good string of observations, but somewhat marred by 'unpolished' language." as the only damn thing he wrote about my actual content.
he railed on me for 45 minutes.
as being overheard (by my other class which is 30 minutes after the end of this prof's class) by others, they couldn't believe his tone of voice and the dumb things he was saying.
he spent a good portion of the time critiquing my usage of the 'meaning' instead of what he would rather 'means.' i told him that this is just semantics, and shouldn't affect my grade. but he thought it made the paper unreadable. we also had an argument over my usage of the word 'risk' instead of what he wanted the word 'sacrifice'.. because he didn't believe that the character saw the it as a risk, and i said that it isn't from her standpoint that i wrote my paper.. it is how i read the story, and it is from the reader's view that she (the character) took a 'risk'. then he said that i should say 'as a reader of this story....' instead of just writing the word 'risk' without being attached to saying it was from me. But the whole damn paper is from me, so i don't really see the need in justifying every line by taking up words saying "I believe" or "My understanding" or anything in the damn 1st person in general. saying the word "i" doesn't help add to my argument, i only see it as weakening.
we're studying hans christan andersen, a poor undereducated man, who had brilliant stories to tell but was always critiqued by his contemporaries on his grammar skills instead of the content of his stories.
3/22/2001
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