Category: You and your supervisor

Interestingly, the word ‘whingeing’ is derived from the Old English ‘hwinan’ : “the sound of arrows whizzing through the air” and ‘hwinsian’: “to whine like a dog”. This derivation implies whingeing is a form of passive warfare, or social irritant, which is perhaps best ignored. However, when someone tells a trouble to another, the opposite is more likely to be true – telling troubles can bind us together. In fact, sites like PhD Comics or this blog wouldn’t be nearly as popular if they weren’t full of troubles talk!

I was lucky enough to get a Masters degree and PhD by research on the public purse – the University of Melbourne even paid me a living stipend while I was doing my PhD (ok, technically it was an amount below the poverty line, but better than nothing at all). Australia is relatively generous – at least to local students; in other countries, all students have to pay to do their PhD. When you pay fees are you a student or a customer? How much can you demand of your supervisor? Dr Sarah Louise Quinell from Kings College in London ponders these issues in this guest post.

Have you presented at a conference and suddenly heard a snide remark from the back only to find it’s your supervisor? Believe me this happens, I’ve seen it and I’ve seen the poor students try to defend themselves and been totally lost. This is not best practice, have a word. Better still, show them the door.

In previous posts I have discussed how to ask your supervisor for a divorce and how to maintain a good supervisory relationship. But what happens if your relationship with your supervisor bounces up on down on the sea-saw: sometimes fine, and other times not? What should you do?

Who cares about authority? We all should – but differently.

Jess Drake offers some helpful advice when you find yourself evicted from the nest…

Having two supervisors is becoming increasingly common. If, like me, you did your PhD within a college of the University Of London, UK you will automatically get two supervisors. This is done for a range of reasons including; supervisor commitments, breadth of knowledge / experience, pastoral reasons (so you don’t end up needing my much …continue reading.

In my last post I wrote about what to do if you need an academic divorce during your PhD. This time I am considering the flip side of the argument: maintaining a successful student / supervisor relationship. After my ‘divorce’ was finalised my secondary supervisor took over and we began the process of rebuilding and …continue reading.

This week’s guest post comes from Dr Sarah-Louise Quinnell, who gained her PhD from the Geography Department at King’s College London in 2010. Here Sarah talks about the delicate matter of ‘supervisory divorce’.

In which I argue that your inner scholar is a bit like Yoda. Yes, really.