Grad Student Problems

I'm in a linguistics class that I really, really like.  It's called Language and Politics - so if you know me, you know that the class is kind of, well, a perfect fit.

It's pretty small - one of the best profs I've had at GU, plus only about 12 people - and one of those people is a linguistics graduate student.  He is intent on showing all the wee little baby undergrads who's boss.

I was in a group that presented a project a couple days ago.  Everything was going along swimmingly until the end of our presentation, when our professor asked if the class had any questions.  You can guess what happened next:

"So, um, I noticed in your presentation when you said politicians are now less likely to make religion a central point of their speeches than they were a few decades ago.  But don't you think that's totally not true because yadda yadda yadda reasons?"

"Well, I do think you have a point there.  But if we look at the data and see the two presidents talking openly about their faith - and recognize that society has become more diverse in the past few decades - I think it makes sense that the two modern first ladies we studied use less language about religion because they're speaking to an electorate with more diverse religious beliefs."

"Um, no.  Don't you think religion is even more important in politics today because yadda yadda yadda something else incoherent?"


"Sure!  I think religion is still very important, yes.  But going from the data we have here, we ---"

"NO. Garblegarble garble sputtering through his mustache garble garble"

His face is contorting at this point.  I guess he didn't expect me to be able to give him a solid answer?

"Please let me finish speaking.  I think that going from the texts we analyzed here, we see politicians speaking less and less about religion as time goes on.  So religion may be still very important - but it's not something that candidates think is advantageous to include in their nationally-televised speeches very often anymore, because religion in America has become so much more diverse since the first political era we included in our study."

He had been smirking and rolling his eyes the entire time I tried to answer him.
He facepalms and shakes his head.
He then gives me one of these:

And I'm sorry, but I don't think it's okay to purposefully attack another student's work in front of the entire class.  And when Southern women see someone being rude to them - oh, we don't let that rudeness go unrecognized.

Without even thinking about it - I lapsed into full-on Southern Twang and said jokingly:   " Oh don't you give me that eyebrow!"

He looks at me like I just sprouted a third arm or something.

The class starts laughing.  I'm laughing a little at myself, too.  So as not to seem angry (because I really wasn't!) I continued:  "Sorry, man. But I'm calling you out."

Class continues.  And no, I didn't scare off other students from asking questions.  The guy actually interjected a couple more times, but it was totally friendly - seems like he saw humor in the situation, too.

I know that end-of-year stress is starting to hit campus.
I know that the hardest final I ever took was for one of my econ classes.
You know what's one of the only things I remember from those econ classes?
That not everything is a zero-sum game.
Classes are one of those things.
So I just wanna put a word in for Hoya Love - let's share it. xo