Graduate Student Life

"Let's meet up tomorrow evening," suggested a friend to the group as we were on our way out of Soul Night (the MCR's funktastic 70s party).

"Great!" chirped another friend, "Why don't we meet up after dinner and study together?"

Cue complete and utter shocked silence from the rest of us. Then:

"You're joking."

"On Sunday evening?"

"That's so dorky!"

"Hell, no!" I chimed in, "Let's go to the pub!"

That got general approval. Us graduate students have our priorities right.

You see, we're not studying. We're researching. We're not trying to learn things which have already been discovered; we're trying to learn things which have yet to be discovered. That's the difference: when you research, it is vitally important to take a step back and reflect and review all the material you've dug up and analysed, and to discuss this with your friends and colleagues to give you fresh perspective. It just so happens that around here the most convenient place to do that is in the pub, over a pint of bitter. That's why doctoral research takes so long. You need to devote time to introspection and reflection, and also to discussion and exchange.

After all, we're paying for the University for the right to hang out and research here. Unlike in the USA, we don't get stipends. Us humanities researchers don't get classes, tutorials, officies or facilities. We get a) access to the library (which many of us could easily get anyway- for example, if you have a BA from Oxford you can get access); b) seminars (most of which are in unrelated areas, since all our individual areas of research are so specific); and c) a meeting once a week with your supervisor (if you are lucky; some of them disappear for ages and you never meet them). So I'll be damned if anyone is going to pressure me into studying on my day off! I am beholden to no one here. I am a paying customer and not an employee.

I guess in my friend's defence, she's on a one year taught Master's and she left behind a professional music career in New York to come do this, so she feels the pinch and the pressure to learn her stuff quickly and go back to making a living.

Today's moment in the life of a graduate student brought to you by PhD Comics, one of my favourite comics, not least because it is so painfully true to life.