I hate being in a grad school

This is an invented survey by one of us. It makes sense since I got 9 out of 10.

Take a Moment to Complete this Brief Survey:


1. I've lost interest in and/or stopped activities I used to enjoy.
oYes
oNo
2. I feel stressed and/or ‘down’ much of the time.
oYes
oNo
3. I feel tired almost every day.
oYes
oNo
4. I have problems sleeping. I'm either sleeping too much or staying awake at night.
oYes
oNo
5. My appetite has changed. I'm not eating enough, or I'm eating too much.
oYes
oNo
6. I have trouble concentrating.
oYes
oNo
7. I isolate myself from others and this affects my social and/or significant relationships.
o Yes
o No
8. I feel that my self-esteem has gone down.
o Yes
o No
9. I'm having frequent headaches, stomach problems, or muscle pain.
o Yes
o No
10. I find myself thinking about having a completely different life.
o Yes
o No

If you answered yes to 5 or more of the above questions, you may be either A) depressed or B) in graduate school.

I Feel Like an Outsider

I feel like an outsider in a socio-method class.

We talked about our field work experiences in class. Last week, three of them talked about these Hispanic kids whose dress code was black. They walked around together and got a cookie from a smaller boy. All linguists expressed their concern, and I could even feel a little anger toward to them. Mary said, 'So did you act on it with your ethics over your research interest? Did you report them, stopped them?' One got worried because her kid would go to the school. The other pointed out that the teachers or security didn't do a damn thing about it. None of my classmates took the incident light.

I realized that I was the only one with big smile. Frankly, I thought it was funny. Teenagers do all crazy shit. Come on, it was only a cookie. Nobody was actually hurt. I came to think they might be one of those kids whose cookie was taken. Obviously, they were not one of those kids who took cookies.

The thing is I was one of those kids in black in junior high. I didn't actually take cookies-Koreans don't carry cookies to school. We bring a lunch box with rice, side dishes, etc. I hung out with problem kids. They were so into who could fight well, who could get a boyfriend (we were supposed to be on probation if we had a boyfriend), who lost virginity first, etc. I wasn't a "hard core" member because they sometimes placed me outside of the circle to "protect" me from further corruption of me; I kept good grades and had both parents unlike them. When they talked about their family problem or how they lost their virginity, they told me it was the stuff that I didn't have to know. But I skipped the class, looked out for a policewhen the others took small money from kids on street, ran away with them without paying for dishes we ate, and stole stationary or other school supplies. We used all these slang terms that other "good" kids didn't know. It was so much fun.

I stopped doing it after I got beaten like hell from three girls on the street near my place. They wanted my new Nike sneakers and designer's brand jacket. I should've let them take them, but I was too proud. My father was so pissed off. Unfortunately, my father was a head of the committee to lead teenagers or something. He always likes to be involved in those stuff, you know making justice come true. No wonder I was involved in activism from an early age. I totally blame my father for that. Anyway, I called my friend to find out who they were. Come on, I had connect to that world. Policemen got all three of them in the police station next morning. I stayed home for two weeks until all bruises were gone. After that, I stopped my little illegal action. My friends either didn't make it to a prep high school or dropped out anyway. High school was boring compared with my junior high. Kids seemed all "good" studying hard to make it to college.

The kids seemed too good aspiring to do better are now my classmates in grad school. I feel so alienated. Where the hell are my "cool" friends now?

Who's Carlos?

I wanted to put a title as 'Things I Hate about Carlos.' I always hate those b*tches who can do everything such as Martha Stewart. Thank God she served her time. Well, I owe Carlos too much to say I hate him, so here it goes. As a sociocultural linguist who dig identity issues, I'll try this: Who's Carlos?

1. He's a Texan who speaks British English.
-When he said, 'azz' (a fake term for 'ass') in soci-method class, I was thinking of 'The Wizard of Oz.' It took me some time to finally figure out what he meant. Darn. I forgot that his 'a' is 'o' in American English. BTW, ask him to pronounce 'laboratory.' You'll see what I meant, and then ask Nobu to say 'laboratory.' Those two phonologiests are ruining American English.

2. He loves music... I meant, he loves strange music.
-He likes country music. Well, that makes him a Texan, but he's in California now where country doesn't rule. The thing is I HATE country music. If you end up living where people do line dancing and listen to depressive country music all the time, you'll soon to be like me. The lyrics in country songs are something like, my car broke down, my girlfriend left me, my dog bit me, etc.

-He plays songs from old musical in lab also. Fair enough. Many love musicals, and I do too, but you don't usually play them loud in lab.

3. He lap dances on me in lab.

-Not that I don't like it. I love it when guys do lap dance on me, but not in a lab. My social identity is so much at stake. As far as I know you're one of only few linguists who dance, who dance hot.

4. He can do almost every thing.

-I meant it. When you have a problem with sound forge, call him. When you have a problem with any sound soft ware or data, call him. When you have a problem with mathematics, graphs, figures, diagram, call him. When you have any problem with machinary, call him. When your car doesn't start, call him. I hate those people who can do almost everthing, but then again, I can't live without them. Damn it.

5. He knows people.

-He knows people, or at least people know him for some reasons. He gets along with everybody, and people think they are special for him. There is even rumor that he has connection to mafia. If your boyfriend dumps you, tell him about it. Who knows? He might have Mafia beat the hell out of your ex-boyfriend.

6. He knows things.

-He knows what's going on behind the scene. As far as I can tell, his information is pretty accurate.

7. He is late for class.

-It's not that he isn't on campus. He's either gone to have a cup of tea, tutle, or cigarette. When I yelled at him either stop smoking or drinking tea, he drew a piramid diagram explaining the hierarchy of sugar, smoking, and tea. Well, Carlos, you've been in school too long. Normal people outside of academia don't make a diagram out of it. Is it phonologiests thing to draw a diagram to be able to explain something? Gotta ask Nobu about it.

8. He kisses.

-When he greets people, he kisses on your cheek. I love it, but I just have to question his identity. In my experiences, Latinoes and Europeans kiss on your cheek. Americans shake hands. Well, old ladies and family is exception though. Is it a Texan thing or are you just being British?

9. He talks explicit stuff.

-I learned so many of those terms that I can never find in dictionary. Thanks, Carlos for expanding my knowledge.

10. He doesn't speak AAVE.

-How funny it will be if he speaks AAVE and listens to hip-hop. He even can't flip (I got this term from Alim's article and just love it. It sounds so much better than code-switching) to AAVE. You just can't imagine him doing it based on his current identity displaying.

11. He's a phonologist who takes sociolinguistics classes.

-I see him everywhere. I'm haunted. I see him in all my sociolinguistics classes, lab, ling library... I used to see him at GSA meetings, GSA happy hour, James Joyce, Anderson... You also see him in phonetics classes, field method and maybe more. I even see him at my field work. On the first day of field work, I saw someone on the play ground among kids on lunch break. I thought, 'hmm, he's just like Carlos, wait a minute, he IS Carlos.' I mean who would wear long blue sleeve shirt on hot summer day but Carlos?

12. He knows how to dress.

-I don't mean to blame you linguists. I'm just being honest. Let me remind you what or how linguists wear things. Kira wears her red jacket for all four seasons. Do you remember Kobe's rainbow color hat? You jing wears pinkish things (take a close look on her cardigan, shoes...). Janie's brown sneakers, Mara's red hair (not that I like it), Susanna's earings (they sometimes don't match), Joy's green color clothes, Pat's out-of-date dress code (she's still in 60s)... Come on, Matt tucks his shirt in. Nobu wears pants with elastic rubber waist band (not to mention he also tucks his shirt in, did you get it fromMatt, your advisor?). Do you get it?

Mary Rae and Carlos are the only ones who care what to wear. The color matches. You know what I mean? Can you please get it? It's not that I don't love you guys. It's just that, please do something about it.


Pretending to be a good grad student, let me summarize who Carlos is.
Carlos is 1) a texan who speaks British English, 2) a half Afro-American who doesn't speak AAVE, 3) a music lover especially country, 4) a gadget and computer genius, 5) a possible lap dancer if he can't make it as a linguist, 6) a dirty mouth who kisses on your cheek, 7) a linguist who doesn't act like one by being social and dressing well. Period.