Words/phrases that should be banned from tutorials...

[rubbermuffin]

"whatever"
"like"
"sort of"

Anyone else got any?

[hr]'I said I wasn't blaming Jesus or anything. It wasn't His fault that He didn't have any time.'

[exnihilo]

Ah! Many years ago, when I was an undergrad, a group of us coined the expression "verbal static" to cover such words as "like", "basically" and so on and so forth. And it became something of a game to play verbal static bingo in tutorials. My favourite is still a line from one of my co-tutees when describing a poem by Catullus "it's um, like, basically, sort of about love, innit?"

Euqally, there was on occasion where a friend came into my room and started a question "do you, like, have..." and before he could finish another friend butted in with "No. We all thoroughly dislike 'have'." As you can tell, like is my own least favourite.

[Buzzboy]

'in a kind of way'
'arguably'
'technically speaking'

[hr]On the Seventh Day God said to Adam:

"Can I leave it with you?"

[Sleigh]

What's the answer?

I can't stand being asked that.

[exnihilo]

And from the other side of the fence:

"Can I have an extension?"

I hate being asked that.

[Tipperary]

the phrase 'type thing' should never be used, let alone in tutorials. unfortunately it has been used, when the head of department was giving the tutorial too. and on more than one occasion.

[Eliot Wilson]

I haven't been asked for an extension yet. Do you think my students are all hard-working, or am I perceived as unsympathetic? Hard to say.

[hr]Bill and Ted beat the Grim Reaper at Twister

Bill: "You played very well, Death, especially with your totally heavy Death robes."

Death: "Don't patronise me."

[exnihilo]

I can hardly imagine that I am perceived as sympathetic! Perhaps I just got a collection of shiftless wasters?

[Buzzboy]

More than likely - these undergrads, eh? Don't know they're born.

[hr]On the Seventh Day God said to Adam:

"Can I leave it with you?"

[exnihilo]

Amen!

In the sense of "amen to that", not in the sense of banning it from tutorials.

[highway_to_hell1982]

I cringe everytime I get given a why question - just cannot stand the bloody word, I wish it wasn't even in the english language!

[Homer]

'Pro-active'

Should it have a hyphen, is it even a recognisable word? Anyhoo, it just shouldn't be used in tutorials, lectures etcetera.

[Buzzboy]

any word I don't understand.

[hr]On the Seventh Day God said to Adam:

"Can I leave it with you?"

[Guided By Vices]

In seminars where we get paper from a visiting speaker, the members of staff who chair the seminars often end up describing the paper as "rich and dense". This phrase makes me want to scream, although I sometimes think that "dense" has an amusing double meaning.

[exnihilo]

Rich and dense? Is that not how many would describe St Andrews students in general?

[mossop]

[s]exnihilo wrote on 19:24, 18th Dec 2003:
Rich and dense? Is that not how many would describe St Andrews students in general?


Tee hee!

[hr]
http://www.geocities.com/stauwfc

[Bryn]

[s]exnihilo wrote on 13:49, 18th Dec 2003:
And from the other side of the fence:

"Can I have an extension?"

I hate being asked that.


You should be more sensitive to people asking for extensions. Sometimes people have a genuine reason to need one, and it's actually really embarassing to ask for them. I know this from personal experience having asked twice and not because of laziness. Although the first time I managed to get the work in on time anyway by slogging for a day.

I could explain what my genuine reasons were, but you'd just think I was a moaning wretch. Either that or you'd consider me more crazy than you already do.

[hr]
http://bryn.ipfox.com

[exnihilo]

Oy vey! Can I say anything on here that isn't taken to be deadly serious? Of course I'm sympathetic to people who ask for extensions. I'm not sympathetic to people who try to play the system however - and a lot of people seem to think that their tutor won't know when they are. I'm far more likely to grant an extension on a Monday or a Tuesday, say, than the Friday it is due. Or worse, after its due. And I don't consider you crazy, merely precipitate.

[Homer]

[s]exnihilo wrote on 00:27, 19th Dec 2003:
And I don't consider you crazy, merely precipitate.


Yeah, I hate it when people turn into rainfall myself...

[Prophet Tenebrae]

I think phrases I'd like to see banned are...

"Who'd like to do a presentation?"

Especially when it's painfully obvious that one might expect more interest from a decaying squid than the class.