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What’s it like to study for a master’s in applied linguistics at the University of Melbourne?
Been A2A’d, but alas, I went through the general linguistics programme 20 years ago, and I haven’t stayed in touch.
Some generalities:
- Melbourne Uni has the Language Testing Research Centre, which means that Language Testing is one of the core strengths of the department.
- The department also has three ESL specialists.
- The department includes Tim Macnamara, who is a reasonably big name, and Paul Gruba and Carsten Roever, who I have found affable and clever.
- The applied linguists and the theoretical linguists got yoked together 20 years ago, while I was there. The two halves didn’t have much to talk to each other about back then, and I doubt they do now either.
- Alastair Pennycook was in the applied program during my time. Alastair is a huge name in the politics of World Englishes. As far as I was concerned though, he was this odd Scotsman who would debate with me whether my teal jacket was blue or green.
- Melbourne Uni in general is a great place to study…
- … but it can be complacent on its laurels; do talk to people from other universities if you can.
- The MA in Applied Linguistics is coursework and minor thesis, and always has been. From the perspective of a PhD student in general linguistics, there were gajillions of you, you did a lot of coursework, and you weren’t as hippy and eccentric as we liked to think we were. Large overseas student representation among them.
- I’m saying that to indicate that I’m not really the right person to A2A. 🙂
Do you think “homo prospectus” would be a more accurate title for humans than “Homo sapiens”?
The claim, Googling tells me, comes from Homo Prospectus (2016), by Martin Seligman et al. Its programmatic claim is that:
Our species is misnamed. Though sapiens defines human beings as “wise” what humans do especially well is to prospect the future. We are homo prospectus.
If the title is to be more accurate, then we would need to concede that (a) humans are not necessarily more ‘wise’ than chimps or dolphins or crows, and more importantly (b) that what is distinctive about human intelligence is the ability to envision a future, a mental model of time.
The attribute that usually gets brought up as unique to human intelligence is self-awareness. Googling tells me that George Herbert Mead, at least, made much of awareness of the future as part of the human mind’s ability to reflect on its self, as a defining attribute of human intelligence. (https://books.google.com.au/book…)
So, maybe? At least one psychologist seems to have thought so. Animals do plan for the future; I gather it’s still controversial to what extent they have a mental model of the future.
And thanks for the vote of confidence in A2A’ing me, Rynnah. That was a lot of googling and guesswork. 🙂
How would you describe your grandparents?
I didn’t get to know my paternal grandparents well; I met my grandfather only once, my grandmother twice. My grandmother was somewhat vague by the time I met her, and I had real trouble with her dialect. My grandfather was vaguely feared, but I couldn’t particularly see why at eight years of age; I hadn’t been brought up in his hardscrabble household, after all.
My maternal grandparents, I got to know well. My grandfather was proud, unsmiling, stern. He was the village beadle, and a denizen of good standing in the community. He was descended from Sfakia, the southwest of the island, where people pursue vendettas and dress in permanent black, and think dancing beneath them. He was slightly out of place in the village in easternmost Crete, where people are relaxed and docile, and do not shoot firearms into the air at weddings. He ran a cafe in the upper village, before my time; I could not understand how—the kafedzis is supposed to be the life of the party.
He wasn’t cold, as such, although perhaps more affectionate to infants than to children. But critical, and very concerned with public perception. When I’d goof off as a teenager, he’d scowl Λίγη σοβαρότης δε βλάφτει. “A bit of seriousness wouldn’t do you any harm.”
He often said that if he was ever debilitated, they should give him rat poison: he was too proud a man to want to go without command of his faculties. He was felled by two strokes, and lived out his final days with no faculties, and no rat poison. He deserved a better end than that.
My grandmother was—is—as cheerful as my grandfather was stern, and as kindly as he was critical. She’d laugh a lot, with a gentle chuckle, and often without much obvious cause. She’d still get annoyed about things, often including me goofing off. But her annoyance never lasted long.
She’s still going at 94, although not quite there as much as she was. Then again, she’s more there than her children allow. When my wife and I visited her, she asked my wife’s name, and when she was trying to pronounce “Tamar”, my uncle jumped in and hollered “Maria! Her name’s Maria!” (A generation of Albanian migrants can testify to Greeks refusing to learn foreign names.) My grandmother chuckled, “Well, I guess I’ll call you Maria then.” In fact, here’s the footage:
What are your results on the new 8values political ideology test?
You know, for someone who has said publicly that they have made their peace with the market, I’m still scoring pretty socialist. For someone who despairs of the morass of modern Western democracy, I’m still scoring pretty democratic. For someone who thinks globalisation is proving a mistake, I’m still scoring pretty internationalist. And for someone who thinks there is more to tradition than the (non-American) Western consensus admits, I’m still scoring pretty progressive.
I don’t think the problem is the test (although I did put in some “neutral” answers). I think the problem is that I keep thinking I really am supposed to be Ché Guevara, and I’m a disappointment when I turn out to be a mere Fabian…
What are the most romantic restaurants in Melbourne?
We truly are spoiled for choice in this town, Miguel Paraz.
I did take my future wife for Valentine’s Day to Grossi Florentino our first year of dating. It truly is a high temple of dining. It would have to be, at $200 a person.
But the place that pops into my head is Scugnizzo. Tucked away in a laneway of the more downmarket side of the CBD, in a lovely old brick warehouse, with a courtyard. Featuring an expansive mad genius Italian chef with creativity to spare, and good ingredients. It’s a place that makes you smile just to walk in. And I think it is well suited to canoodling…
What do I need to know before I move to Bendigo, Australia?
Well, you need to know What’s Bendigo, Australia like to live in?
You need to know that Bendigo is a two hour train ride from Melbourne, and a smidgeon longer as a car ride.
You need to know that there are good foodie options to be had in Bendigo, that real estate is affordable, that the town has a visible history (it was its Victorian architecture that made me fall in love with it), and that it is large enough for life to be pleasant with all the expected modcons.
You need to also know that it is still a country town (population 100k), and that there are things you can get or experience in Melbourne that you can’t in Bendigo. But again, Melbourne is two hours away. Not six, like Mildura is.
You probably need to know that Bendigo was a flashpoint recently of conflict about whether a mosque should be built there. There were Bendigonians who were passionately against; there were also Bendigonians who were passionately for. Country Australia is relatively whitebread compared to the cities; but Bendigo does have a significant presence of overseas born residents, including refugees: a large number of Karen refugees, for example.
What are the uncivilised things about Australia? E.g. casual swearing (cursing), excessive drinking, informal culture, disrespect toward or suspicious of authority figures, sports obsessed, arrogant, and the list goes on. Am I wrong?
Oh, we Aussies, we’re a defensive lot. Not the first time I’ve seen this on Quora. And I did appreciate Alap Arslan’s answer.
Lemme have a go.
casual swearing (cursing)
Yes. I don’t think it’s uniquely Australian, but we certainly pride ourselves in swearing; the subreddit Straya • r/straya seems to use cunt as every third word. We have defined ourselves (mythologically) in opposition to British moralising, and we find American avoidance of profanity ridiculous. (I was astonished, living in California, when two delivery guys said they were looking for a restroom. No delivery guy in Australia would say anything more genteel than toilet.)
Is this uncivilised? Well, it certainly is not genteel, and it prioritises egalitarianism over respect (positive over negative politeness—in this regard; compared to Southern Mediterraneans, Aussies are still a bunch of emotionally unforthcoming Poms). And there is a special boorishness in the business elite, with none of the noblesse oblige you might see elsewhere. But as others have said on this thread, we find scepticism about deference a healthy thing. Just like Israelis do.
excessive drinking
Yes, one of our less helpful inheritances from the UK. An outbreak of drunken violence in Sydney has led to an early curfew there—and to Melbourne gloating about it.
informal culture
Much more so now than thirty years ago. People used to dress up for classical concerts or dinner; they rock up to both in jeans now. Can be seen, again, as egalitarian rather than uncivilised, but it does mean that there is less of a sense of occasion or solemnity. Australians don’t do solemnity. In fact, when I tried to solemnly launch my departmental working papers as a postgrad, I was heckled.
… Well, rephrase that. They don’t do solemnity, unless it’s one of their sacred cows. A Muslim activist raised the plight of detained refugees during Anzac Day, and got attacked for it universally.
disrespect toward or suspicious of authority figures and authority generally
Overstated. Yes, people are contemptuous of politicians, and routinely vote informal. Yes, people are suspicious of ceremony, and are reluctant to offer deference. Something they again are quite proud of, as you’ll have seen here.
On the other hand, their obedience of laws and norms is distressingly reflexive. I had a friend from Eastern Germany, who was aghast at how unquestioningly Australians obey the law; “social consensus” happens very quickly here, and the nanny state finds fertile ground among the citizenry.
sports obsessed
Yes, there is a big sports culture, and sports chews up a disproportionate amount of public discourse. Australia isn’t really unique in that; and Australia does at least have a culture of public participation in sport, which is rather healthier than just collecting stats about it on the couch.
arrogant
Well, yes. Australia is compensating now for generations of cultural inferiority complex and tugging the forelock to The Mother Country, by truly believing they are the best country on earth, and deflecting criticism. (As again you will have noted in this thread.) The post-Howard brand of nationalism is much more po-faced and prickly than the understated wisecracking about God’s Own Country that went on before Howard. And I don’t think most Australians really believe that they have anything to learn from any other countries.
What are the pros and cons of living in Australia specifically in Melbourne?
Vote #1 Kim Huynh’s answer to What are the pros and cons of living in Australia specifically in Melbourne? This will be rather more superficial.
Pro Melbourne:
- Lots of parkland.
- Good public transport system (so long as you’re commuting to and from the CBD)
- Critical mass of culture in general
- Excellent foodie culture
- Excellent sporting culture
- Low crime rate
- Peaceable population, for the most part
- Pleasant surrounding countryside
- I live here. And really, what more do you need.
Contra Melbourne:
- The weather. Way too volatile, and searing hot or raining (or both within hours).
- Far away from anywhere (except Geelong, I guess). Even Sydney is an hour flight away.
- Cost of living is high
- Real estate is unaffordable
- Infrastructure is starting not to keep pace with the population
- Allied with both: emerging have and have-not geographical divide; it’s not as bad as Sydney yet, but it will be
- Not as many high-powered jobs going as in Sydney
- Like most coastal cities, a lot of it is going to be underwater in a few decades
How similar is Australian culture and Californian culture?
It’s a comparison you hear often (“Australia: a combination of the best parts of California and England”), and it’s not unfounded:
- Both are warmish—by Anglosphere standards
- Both are informal—by Anglosphere standards (insert “by Anglosphere standards” in all the following)
- Both are outgoing and friendly according to their own self-perception
- Both prioritise a relaxed lifestyle
- Both promote a beach culture
- Both have discovered winemaking
- Both have had (at least historically) a sense of optimism about the future
- Both got established through gold rushes
Having lived in both, California is still much closer to the American norm than anything in Australia, and I think the similarities are on the superficial side. For example, both are outgoing and friendly, but I still found Californians to be too in-your-face for me.