almost there!

[fox]

and already armed with a reading list for the break, and a list of proposed tutorial topics -- with the note "You might like to do the first of them for the first tutorial." is that just the cutest thing? here's a list of assignments. you might find it to your benefit to do the first one by this date. yes, i suppose i might. hee. ah, britain.

Comments

[shezan.livejournal.com]

The first day I met the editor of the Sunday Times, as a lowly stringer at the time, he said something along the lines of "D'you think you could perhaps look into this for us?" and I melted.

[sowilo.livejournal.com]

Britain -- the most passive aggressive nation on the planet.

[reginagiraffe]

In the lab I used to run I almost always prefaced my requests with "You might want to..." meaning, of course, "do this or I'll get pissed". I also used "Could you do me a favor and...?" meaning "do this or I'll get pissed". But the lab ran really really efficiently. *g*

[ellen-fremedon.livejournal.com]

*g* When I was a passive-agressive teenager, I used to interpret all my mother's commands of this type as requests for information.

"Do you want to take those canteloupe rinds out to the compost heap?"
"No, actually, I'd rather sit here and read."

[darthfox.livejournal.com]

see, especially around here, it seems to be more trouble than it's worth to phrase their questions that way. there was just a mild-to-moderate kerfuffle in the department about whether MSt students -- a single-year program -- would have to take one of the "core" exams as one of their options this summer. they need the basic exam and three options, but the structure of the basic exam is such that you choose from various sections, so without requiring a core as one of the options, it'd theoretically be possible to graduate a student with a master's degree who knew nothing of phonetics OR syntax OR semantics, and wouldn't that be embarrassing.

okay, sure. the reasoning is sound. but this requirement wasn't clear to most of the MSt crowd -- mainly british, by the way, so it wasn't a dialect issue -- and despite the department's saying the information was there for them if they'd only read it; but the notes from the committee meeting say "Regarding MSt options, it was noted that students really should refer to information provided in the handbook which does state that it is usual to include at least one core subject."

it is usual. native speakers of british english didn't make the leap from "usual" to "compulsory" (or even "required, although occasional exceptions are made"). i mean, dudes.