Teaching

Our lecturer for Introduction to Economics is back! She had a back injury and was out of action for two weeks, during which we had several substitutes, all worse than each other. It almost made me want to switch over to Modern Economic Thought, but there's only 3 weeks left before the exams, and I can just read the textbook - there isn't anything new in the lectures.

Having to bear with questions during lectures are also getting frustrating. Firstly, I don't know if it's an European thing, but there's this complete lack of respect for the professor as a teacher. Sometimes people don't even let him/her finish speaking before jumping in with their questions. Worse, many questions are also irrelevant. At least for the introductory courses, which is what most of us are doing in this foundation term. They want to criticise the orthodox view, but there really isn't time to debate on how the accuracy of the textbook and how there are other kinds of 'nation-state' before the Treaty of Westphalia 1648. If you want to criticise orthodoxy, you have to know it in the first place.

In the 1.5 hours of lecture, the professor is already trying to explain the common (or hegemonic, if you like) concept of a nation-state. Also, it would be nice to not monopolise Q&A time by arguing with the professor on the abovementioned issues.

Respect, y'all.