So the big one.....! Dissertation and more (updated)
So now the big one! 🎺 The dissertation!
Dissertation, a compulsory module which should be a student's opportunity to research an area of Philosophy that they are interested in as long as there is a relevant lecturer who can supervise it. 👍 🙂Or so everyone believes.
My first choice for my dissertation was Spinoza 🙂👍 but there was a general negative attitude towards Spinoza 😥😢😪 which even the UG students started to pick up at the end of the first year and even more so by the 3rd year (not sure how and why because they were perfectly positive at the start). So I didn't think a dissertation on Spinoza would be welcome, and I wasn't wrong. My essay on Spinoza (Spring term 2012) went missing, along with the tutorial tutor. I emailed the tutor my Spinoza essay so he only needed to email back the comments/feedback/mark but he never did. He also did a no-show 😮 for the tutorial on that essay topic. After wasting our time hanging around an empty tutorial room slowly realising he wasn't ever going to show up, we went our separate ways to find something better to do with our time, especially since, as part-time mature students, we'd now unnecessarily 😠 spent time and money commuting to uni. I attended a lecture so that I received some replacement input. 🙂 The tutorial was never made up belatedly either 😪. I raised my concerns with the UG admin but she never located him 🔭for the rest of the term since he was a jurisprudence postgraduate student at Oxford University so harder to chase up. The wider college didn't address the problem either when I informed them by email later. So my one and only essay and tutorial on Spinoza went presumably unrecorded. (Other essays had gone unmarked previously but at least all tutorials were conducted at some point in time and sometimes I eventually had a missing essay marked belatedly. So the Spinoza essay/tutorial suffered the most.) So by summer 2012 when it was time to email my dissertation title and subject areas to the department, I decided I certainly shouldn't put forward a Spinoza dissertation idea in case my dissertation went the same way as my Spinoza essay! 😢
However, the dissertation title and subject area I did email should have come as no surprise. By the end of my 2nd year, I'd realised that feminist philosophy and women philosophers in the History of Philosophy were never going to be covered on the course 😥 so started to think I should perhaps compensate for this by doing feminist history of philosophy for my dissertation by choosing to research a woman philosopher in the 17th or 18th century.👍 So when suddenly there was a personal tutor substitution for the summer term 2011 (although not the personal tutor I had asked for earlier that academic year), I mentioned that I was interested in discovering past women philosophers in the Early Modern period in my email reply. However, I received no response. So I had a temporary personal tutor I didn't know, hadn't met and one who even when in the same conference room with me didn't bother to come near me. This temporary personal tutor in the summer then became head of department in the autumn.
Had she bothered to respond to my email or approach me, any confusion over finding a supervisor for my dissertation could have been raised or resolved up to a year in advance. Hence, when I emailed my title/topic/subject area for my dissertation on Margaret Cavendish the following year I expected it to go smoothly 👍.
My title (June 8th 2012) was: ‘Feminist Interpretations of Margaret Cavendish's Political Philosophy, Subtitle: Power Relations: War, The Army and Gender’.
While waiting for the supervisor allocation confirmation email reply, I spent my time researching Cavendish's philosophy texts 📚and any possibly relevant or interesting secondary literature 📚 on her as well as beginning to write the first section 🖋 in preparation for the initial dissertation consultation with my appointed supervisor. I started to get suspicious 😟and wonder 🤔what was going on when it was taking far too long to receive the confirmation email, which I think I assumed would be written by Garnett since he was in charge of allocating supervisors. When I did eventually receive the email, to my surprise😮it was not from Garnett but the head of department. It was nevertheless to decline my dissertation title/topic/area of philosophy, on some feeble excuse 😠😠😠😠 that it was because Susan James was the only one who could supervise it. There was no explanation why exactly this was a problem or whose idea it was to reject my dissertation. I was baffled and disconcerted😵.
For a start, Susan James had in fact been recommended to me as a suitable supervisor 🙂👍 for my dissertation by a male lecturer I'd met at the 2011 International Hume Conference, which led me to believe that philosophers would be supportive of me doing a dissertation with her on one of her research areas.
Furthermore, I already knew it was against college policy for any two people not to be able to work together, no matter what the circumstances or what the history of the problem was 👍. I'd read all the college small print and knew that this even applied after a formal complaint - the system in place was that people could always meet, talk to each other and work together. 👍🙂
(This is something President Macron brought up the other day when talking to students. He stated that you have the right to access and meet your professors in person.)👍
To continue, if both parties wished, a person in Human Resources could help them repair any friction to assist contact and communication between them. This only applies during the period of time that both people belong to the same university, not subsequently so:
If you are a student/staff, no rules, restrictions or systems can apply after you finish your course. 👍🙂
My understanding of this was also confirmed, by email, that, of course, every student was allowed to work with any and every lecturer in the department - no exceptions! This included Professor Susan James and even, say, Keith Hossack! No exceptions means no exceptions!
So the department throwing my dissertation in the bin 🗑 was not a situation I could anticipate - it is completely unjust that two people at the university can meet freely any time even after a formal complaint between them but I can't so much as meet someone 😭😠I have never even had a formal complaint with, ie Susan James, for a total of 3 hours over the course of a whole academic year (1x a term for 3 terms: summer term consultation; 1x in the autumn term, 1x in the spring term) purely for educational and academic purposes directly related to my UG degree course and research development! Susan James and I had never discussed Cavendish together (or Spinoza for that matter, other than Q&A at lecture/conferences and contact with lecturers at conferences was also explicitly allowed by the university although I had very little contact with her at conferences), so there could not be any excuses that I'd somehow had any unfair extra input from her, so that couldn't be the reason. Susan James taught on my compulsory History of Philosophy module spring 2012 so I hadn't even seen Susan James in months! The last time I saw her was the last week of the spring term 2012 (and hadn't even emailed her since June 2011).
I was also receiving government funding for my UG philosophy BA, which they do not pay out for the university to go on to negatively impact on my education or opportunities, both while a student at university and after graduating!😭😠
The nonsensical reply to my Cavendish dissertation research idea also wasted my time because I had been doing hours of independent study e.g. reading Cavendish and secondary literature, thinking up various research ideas on her in the months leading up to submitting my dissertation title. I also went to a conference Feb 2012 on Cavendish to make sure I was happy with my choice 🙂. Susan James gave a paper on Cavendish 👍there, although not all the speakers were philosophers because it was interdisciplinary. The conference gave me a good perspective on Cavendish and inspired me to do more reading of her texts.📚📚📚📚📚📚
Susan James is a specialist on Margaret Cavendish, 👍 the one and only specialist in the department on Cavendish, so my dissertation choice should go through purely on the strength of that. Indeed, when I told a male lecturer years later about what had happened with my Cavendish dissertation idea, he was also baffled 🤷 and said the supervisor allocation should be conducted purely on the basis of whether there is a specialist in the department to supervise it, nothing else.👍 So not only was I emailed some complete nonsense by the Head of Department, worse still, in that same email, I was directed to do Politics with Garnett as supervisor. What happened to own choice! 🤔
So, let's get this straight, an out-lesbian feminist student 🌈 (sometimes gender non-conforming because I immediately received harassment at uni about any choice of more masculine clothes, despite them being e.g. a womenswear trouser suit) can't do her dissertation with a feminist lecturer (I'm respecting her privacy so only giving her a label that is already in the public domain) about a 17th century 🌈lesbian/gender non-conforming feminist philosopher and one that few philosophers research.🌈 And then as a lesbian feminist having to research a typical, white privileged male philosopher with an Oxford-educated male lecturer.🙄😕 No diversity happening then! 😦 How does this SWIP badge work again?🤔😞😲 Surely, they are all about encouraging women lecturers to undertake teaching past women philosophers, such as Margaret Cavendish. And surely diversity is also key so it's important to include philosophers of a different faith. Spinoza was a Jew.
I also had a highly original title and idea for Cavendish 💡. I emailed the the Master of the whole college, and included the college head of student satisfaction in it, but even this didn't resolve the situation😭, both he and student satisfaction ignored my email.😢This surprised me because I received a letter circular from the Master encouraging me to accept the unconditional offer of a place to start 2009 that I'd been given earlier in the acceptance letter. (I never filled in a student satisfaction survey so my experiences were probably never recorded in their stats etc. So don't get me started on OBE's for services to Higher Education. 🙄) I was left with having to not only instantly think up a second original dissertation idea/title/topic 😟, but also make a great deal of effort 😤 to ensure I would be given my dissertation consultation that summer term (2012) by whoever the replacement supervisor would be, before term ended, which was an imminent deadline.
In the end, I opted for a safe bet for my second dissertation idea: Hume. I left out any mention of feminism in the emailed title, topic and areas of philosophy in case this led to yet more unfair college processes. I finally got the confirmation email and I managed to get a consultation before the end of term. I emailed my research outline prior to the consultation. However, I was given a non-specialist 😢 in Hume - Anthony Price. Price's field of research was Plato 😲 and he immediately mentioned his displeasure at having to supervise me 😞 on top of being the next head of department (2012-13). He didn't want to discuss feminism 😮 and told me to take out my entire section on Sophie de Grouchy (who I was using as a criticism of Hume on sympathy). 😪 Nevertheless, I left de Grouchy in 🙂 as well as the Humean feminist secondary literature, despite Price considering this "injudicious" 🙃 - a comment and attitude I certainly wouldn't have had to put up with about feminism from Susan James! I'm sure including feminism lowered my dissertation mark 😢 (and possibly my overall degree with it, since my BA ended up only a couple of points off a 1st class😠) but I wanted to lay down my marker as a feminist philosopher before doing post-degree research.
The only valuable stuff I learnt from him were excellent research skills 👍 (including specific textual skills in the History of Philosophy) which I still continually draw upon.🙂 I also learnt how to cope with various types of contras 👍e.g. his vehement objection 😡 in the dissertation consultation that I'd referred to empathy as an emotion -even though other feminist philosophers do so in their Humean research -and was expected to defend my position (again, not an attitude I would have had to listen to if I'd had Susan James, a specialist on emotions in Early Modern philosophy having written a book on it). So, in terms of academic skills, I learnt a great dea from Price👍. However, I missed out on expertise on Cavendish 😪 and feminist philosophy 😥 which slowed up my subsequent research on her post degree😭.This is not what you expect from a college claiming to be feminist/female friendly. Or does that only apply to straight, cis women?! 😱The college always sells itself on the strength that you'll have an expert in your subject (which was realistic as it was a large philosophy department with a long staff list) which is why you have to match the dissertation to a lecturer's specialisation/research/books written or edited on them.
On the other side of the equation, it also deprives the lecturer in question of work which could affect their pay/salary. Besides, supervising a dissertation is coveted work for lecturers.
By now, it was hard not to claim that we were being treated differently in an unpleasant way!😪
A dissertation may not seem important but when you have had so many serious problems from the word go e.g. stalking and the present head is constantly restricting your freedoms as a student, 😭 it certainly is because everything adds up and ends up unmanageable😱. For instance, suddenly arbitrarily disallowing sitting in on certain extra lectures which you do to expand your knowledge in philosophy 😪 and later suggesting not attending a set of 5 compulsory final lectures on Metaphysics in person 😱 but instead listening to podcasts of the lectures. Who on earth thinks up such nonsense?! It's clearly wrong on many levels.
I was an internal student so it was expected that I turn up in person and have my attendance recorded. Attendance sheets were circulated every lecture and you ticked your name off to record ☑📝 you'd been there. So my name would possibly either be crossed off, be left out or show I've never ticked it for 5 weeks straight (ie a quarter of the lectures for the highest level ep/met module and would mean I'd look like I'd missed 50% of the metaphysics lectures) - she never addressed this issue and it was impossible to know how well this would work in practice because she was vague 🤔 to the extreme since she hadn't organised anything yet while she was pressuring a reply of yes or no from me e.g. repeated emails 📧📧📧📧📧📧, cc-ing an email to a college email address I didn't possess 📧 ❓(or shouldn't have possessed because I never set it up) and annoying me further by sending a letter 📬 to my home address (which I found intrusive and unacceptable) and repeating the same point until I respond. 🙄 So I had no choice but to email her a brief "no" to stop her.
Podcasts were a ridiculous suggestion 🙄🤦for many reasons.
One of the main reasons for me going to uni was to attend in person. I enjoyed my Latin degree module, which included attending lectures/seminars in person over the course of the module, all led by the lecturer, even though it was long-distance🙂. We convened at a London uni college, in London. I enjoyed that and it made me realise I'd prefer to attend uni in person 100% rather than do part long-distance/part evening attendance.
I wasn't your typical home educated child/teenager - I had a broad education, studied all subjects taught in schools and more as well as attending many classes every week. Indeed, when I began uni, I'd already attended (over a period of 20 years) numerous educational, performing arts, music and tennis classes alongside my age group as well as adult education classes so I was used to an adult, mature student environment which is why I thought this uni would be a good fit. I mentioned this good fit at the interview with Susan James.
So I did not appreciate some so-called feminist I'd never even met (and still haven't met) creating fear, socially isolating me from my year group and silencing my voice during lecture time through physical absence. 😠
Neither did I appreciate😠 her turning my in-person degree into a make-shift partly long-distance one. If I'd wanted to do that for my undergraduate degree, I'd have continued doing more modules with the uni I was at before I arrived! Students now, in the UK and France, are complaining about being isolated at home staring at a screen for hours on end instead of being in lectures with others, chatting to each other, asking questions and generally having conversations and contact with their lecturers! And that's when it's during a global crisis and all students are in the same boat!
And again, her suggestion means I'm being treated differently. 🙄😠I would be the only student in my year group not to attend, which is socially awkward and excludes me from my year group's socialising around lecture time. It would also mean I'd be socially isolated from everyone, sitting at home unnecessarily for a third of the lectures for those 5 weeks.
So what kind of rubbish is this suggestion?! 😲🙄😠I had security/stalking problems so, in my first year, Gemes quickly and instinctively organised an all building access pass 🅿 for my mother to ensure that I could attend all lectures and tutorials safely and without missing any 👍🙂 That pass system carried on for all 4 years, was discreet in front of friends and worked well. It was the one and only idea that made a lot of difference in terms of the logistics of me actually being able to turn up therefore complete 💯% of the course 👍🙂💪. Indeed, when I emailed Sarah Patterson about my security problems around attending her lectures she was horrified and adamant nothing should affect my in-person attendance. 👍This shows how attendance was vital under all circumstances, even when my physical safety was at risk and nothing is more serious or important than that. So it would be beyond ridiculous for me to attend lectures previously under such conditions yet I wouldn't be there for just 5 weeks at the end of an important module for the whole course. This module included an extended essay (which is a topic which mustn't overlap with your exam essay topics) in addition to sitting the exams, both of which would be adversely affected if I missed vital information or teaching that other students had received by turning up in person. Being there in person also gives you a better feel of which topic you'd rather extend and which you'd rather do in the exam. At home, you are in a vacuum away from the uni environment so may make the wrong decisions about the course because you are not listening to everything that's being said in and around the lectures or chatting to fellow students about it.
Many questions were left unaddressed: Suppose, like zoom, there are technical difficulties meaning I miss information or teaching? Would questions be recorded? How do I ask the lecturer questions?
Of course, I did attend all 5 lectures in person because I didn't have issues with seeing the lecturer in person (or any other lecturer!) and I wanted to ensure my education would not be affected in any way by using a different, potentially misleading attendence system. However, it did affect my education because I was afraid to ask questions with that lecturer since she thought it best for me and him not to talk to one another. Why?🤔 There was no reason not to talk to one another, besides, that would be against college policy generally and against the college's specific wishes. She didn't have the right to, and exceeded her power to, suggest that.
Such ad hoc, inappropriate suggestions run the risk of lowering my compulsory attendance and affecting whether I could even sit the exams that year. 😱 It could result in my having to repeat a year which would not only mis-represent my academic abilities 😠 but also drag out my degree unnecessarily to 5 years instead of the usual 4 years 😡. It would also mean I could miss out on History of Philosophy level 6😢 (highest level) because by then it would be demoted from compulsory to optional which need not run. And if everything shifted a year, Susan James would be on leave during my final year which would mean the politics option she taught as part of the history of political philosophy would either not run 😥 or be solely taught by Garnett, a lecturer in contemporary political philosophy. I had focused on History of Philosophy not Contemporary. Again this would impact on my education, 😠and even more so, if I wasn't accepted back on the course 😱 which had happened to one of my friends who had to return to Africa (Congo, I think) on the death of his father. He eventually managed to return to uni (after a couple of attempts!) to repeat the second year when I was in my final year, the 4th year! QED
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