Right! The proposal has been emailed. I feel pretty good about it, especially since my annotated bibliography is shaping up rather nicely with between eleven and thirteen sources from which to start from. I talked to some of the other students in my Bronte seminar today, and people seemed to like the sound of my topic as well, which was definitely good to hear. So now it's legit: I'm writing about machinery and the Gothic. It couldn't be more like me if I tried. I feel good about it too, better than I did about Middlemarch last year, which in retrospect was mostly me trying too hard. This topic feels less forced, more aligned with my interests and my mind.
I've begun getting lunch with some of the girls from the Bronte seminar after our class, which has been quite nice. One of them works for the English department in administration as well, so we get faculty gossip, which is very entertaining. It's a nice cap to the afternoon, and I think we're probably going to try to absorb the whole class into it some time or another.
We also got our unassessed essays back, and to my relief the reception of mine was fairly positive. My professor's main critique was a request for greater specificity, which is exactly what I wanted to do with it but didn't have sufficient room for this time around, so I think that's a good sign. Overall, she said she liked my prose style and thought it conveyed my ideas well, and pointed out some places where I needed to clarify my points. So all in all, feedback that I can definitely work with.
The only thing I'm really not looking forward to will be switching citation schemes--MLA is popular in the States, but not over here, and since I was never really taught MLA properly in the first place and as a consequence developed some bad habits about it, I'm just scrapping it completely and starting over with MHRA style, hopefully done properly. I can already tell that it is going to drive me nuts, but it's an improvement over getting accused of plagiarism or something. Also, I hear that Harvard system is way more annoying, so I'm avoiding it.
Other small and/or random observations:
-Taps here are extremely finicky. It takes a while to actually get steady water pressure in most sinks, and cold water takes a while to appear, which is totally backwards from what I'm used to.
-I'm pretty sure wellies are used even less here than in the States despite there being more rain. Maybe it's just because I'm in a city, but I think since the rain tends to come and go more often but also more quickly, people don't bother and just carry umbrellas all the time instead. Luckily, with my giant purse I can do the same.
-It is 4:00 PM and the sun has set. It is taking me a while to get used to this.
-The Dewey Decimal System is not in effect! I don't even know what library organization style is used here, but it's definitely different. I honestly don't have a preference, but it was a little odd at first.
-Of all the little cultural differences floating around, I am having the hardest time getting over how the first floor is not the ground floor. Don't know why, that's just the one thing I can't reconcile my brain with.
-I've started watching a BBC drama called 'Garrow's Law' which has just begun broadcasting. It's concerned with William Garrow, who apparently had a large hand in reforming the justice system in the 18th century by actually giving a proper defense to the prosecuted and addressing the jury directly. Pretty enjoyable so far.
Okay, I think that's it. I have to give a presentation on Bronte poetry for next week, so that's the project for this coming weekend.
No comments:
Post a Comment