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I respect and appreciate my PhD advisor very much and she is infinitely better than many of the horror stories I've heard about PhD advisors, but there is simply no way she or anyone else can persuade me that qualifying exams are anything other than a hazing ritual
@ingrid how many do you have and what’s their structure? (Penn Comp Lit famously had three BEFORE the dissertation proposal, which always seemed excessive)
@ingrid a lot of academia is a hazing ritual imo. Academics don't seem to really know or do a good job of helping people learn, collectively with some bright exceptions, more like they sit atop the ivory tower of approved knowledge and dispense it to a limited number of those deemed worthy, and anyone who can't grasp it is kicked out