Typical Day
Sam-Anne snores peacefully at her desk, a glistening stream of drool trickling out of her open mouth. She had been up all night chasing a hunch and didn't quite make it to bed. Suddenly, her cell phone rings. Her head shoots up and her eyes slowly blink open. It takes a few moments for her to realize that her view is partially blocked by a piece of paper glued to her cheek—the IPA chart she had scrawled all over last night.
Sam-Anne groggily chuckles to herself as she fumbles for her phone. Her phone screen says the person calling her is Lexi Connors, her colleague at MIT. Also, it's 6:00AM on a Sunday. Oh, Lexi.
Samantha-Anne Tick is the name her parents gave her. It's a good name, but she's a linguist and she specialized in Optimality Theory for her undergrad. Samantha-Anne. Now that's a marked name: a syllable with no onset, adjacent vowels with similar backness...in separate syllables? No. Not in her name.
And so, she unfaithfully left her past behind and became Sam-Anne.
Sam-Anne Tick.
Lexi is the chair of the Linguistics Department, and the leader of her research group. A call from Lexi at this hour is normal. She pretty much never sleeps.
"Hello?" Sam-Anne answers, eager but groggy.
"Sam, it's Lexi. Did I wake you?" Lexi replies.
"No, no, of course not. Just got back from my morning jog."
Lexi laughs a little harder than Sam would have liked. It's not that ridiculous, is it?
Lexi finally finishes laughing. "Anyway. I just had a breakthrough on the sound patterns of Chamorro..." Lex begins. She talks Sam-Anne's ear off for about thirty minutes. Sam-Anne listens respectfully, even though she knows there's no way she can follow along. She's a visual learner, and Lexi knows this, but they both know how important it is to say things out loud.
As Lexi's argument draws to a close, Sam-Anne promises to come up to campus to help flesh it all out—with coffee and bagels. They say goodbye and Sam-Anne examines her Sunday schedule. First on the list: grading research papers. As an assistant professor at MIT, Sam-Anne needs to balance research with teaching—even if her boss has a breakthrough. Luckily, they were just awarded a hefty NSF research grant, so they'll soon be able to hire some bright-eyed underlings to help with the grunt work.
Sam-Anne stands up, stretches her back, and walks to the bathroom to wash up. Then, coffee. Then, grading.
This quarter is the first time she's teaching a class all by herself: Phonology II. She has three TAs and one underling tutor to help her with grading and office hours, but preparing class materials has taken up most of her time. Sam-Anne examines the intimidating stack of research papers she has to get through before tomorrow.
After splitting the stack with her helpers, it's really only one-fifth of the class—not too bad. The writing itself is what takes forever to get through. She's pretty sure many of her students were just as tired as she is while writing them; most of them are concurrently taking Syntax I, also known as linguistics boot camp. How did she, a diehard phonologist, get hired at a syntax-heavy research university?
Sam-Anne wades through the misplaced modifiers, unspecified referents, and syntactically mangled sentences for evidence of an understanding of linguistic theory. It's a tough job. She manages to get through three papers in four hours—only four papers left to go. It's around lunchtime, so she makes her way to campus to help Lexi out.
On her way up the steps to the linguistics department, Sam-Anne bumps into the tutor for the class she's teaching. "Oh! Hey, Elaine," she says.
"Hey, professor! Glad I caught you. I have an issue with these papers I'm grading," Elaine says. Sam-Anne tries to hide her displeasure; student graders tend to be way more careful in grading papers than they need to be. Sam-Anne hopes her question is quick.
"Sure thing. Why don't you come to my office so we can discuss it?" says Sam-Anne. Elaine nods and follows Sam-Anne up the steps to her office.
When they arrive, Sam-Anne places the bagels, her coffee, and stack of research papers carefully on her desk. Elaine begins, "So...it's really just that I don't know how many points should be docked off for horrible writing."
"Hmm. Yeah, it's hard to gauge that, but here's what I do: Grade it based on information first. Then, rate how hard or painful it was to read on a scale of one to ten. Anywhere between five and ten deserves half a letter grade down. It's arbitrary, sure, but this isn't a writing class."
Elaine nods in agreement, but Sam-Anne can tell she's not completely sold on that idea. Nonetheless, Elaine thanks her and leaves. As Elaine exits, Lexi glides in and hands her a few sheets of paper.
"Hey, Sam. Check out this OT analysis when you get the chance and tell me if you can find anything wrong with it. You have red IPA symbols smeared on your cheek, by the way. Thanks for the bagels. I'll be in my office—I have a student waiting, 'kay thanks."
Sam-Anne mindlessly rubs her cheek as she examines Lexi's OT analysis on the syllable structure of Chamorro. Lexi's a great phonologist, but Sam-Anne's a pro at Optimality Theory. She makes a few notes for Lexi and then knocks out the rest of the research papers. Then, she reviews her lesson plan for tomorrow while munching on a second bagel. Finally, she looks at the clock. It's 6:00PM and time to head home.
In her bathroom mirror, Sam-Anne examines her red IPA face. As she reflects on her research findings of the day, she washes off the remaining red ink, knowing full well that she'll be doing the same thing tomorrow night.