Serious lack of funnies here, but anyway (and pre-emptive apologies for length)
OK, so having experienced a serious amount of luck with my secondary education, I wound up reading German at a frankly intimidating place down South. Grammar never having been my strong point, and also being the product of the state system, I was a little nervous and terrified by the thought of being a bit crap compared with everyone else.

The first few weeks did not do a lot to aid this, really (nor perhaps did my decision that bar sports were clearly just as important as my degree). Literature lectures and tutorials were fantastic, but the prose translation classes (English fiction texts into German) were at a level I'd never really dealt with before. These classes, along with twice weekly grammar sessions, were taught by a woman who frankly terrified me - and who I maintain had psychic powers to know whenever you were wavering on a conjugation, simile or general vocab. (Seriously, we tried everything - the confident and disdainful tap of the pen on the book, the concentrating hard face, the whispering of the 'correct' answer to a friend, the 'I'm screwed here' face... nothing worked.) On a weird tangent - grammar classes were also held in Room 101. Make of that what you will. And I became acquainted with the phrase, "Nein, das ist ganz falsch," rather quickly.

Praise was often understated, but sincere, and despite my remaining generally a little on the wonky side with my grasp of adjectival endings and other joys, I was really pleased when said tutor stated how she "admired my determination" in an end of term report, and also when I wrote an essay on the meaning of art (auf Deutsch) that she deemed "quite good".

Fast forward 8 years, and I got a decent degree from said institution, and am now working in Germany, something I am sure I would have never been able to do without a huge amount of teaching from this lady.

Now, I don't suppose many people will have paid a huge amount of attention to the articles in the paper last year, and I myself only found out due to my Dad spotting a side article and vaguely recognising the name, but if anyone saw the article about an Oxford lecturer suffering fatal head injuries after a fall down some college steps, then this is the woman I am currently rambling on about, Gudrun Loftus. An amazing, if slightly intimidating, teacher; and I am sure I am not alone in saying that I cannot imagine the German course at Oxford without her.

So this one is for a woman who deserves a huge amount of recognition for the effort she consistently put in to trying to open the eyes of many an undergrad to the many pleasures (hmmm) and complexities of German grammar.

Gudrun, thanks.
(Picotee, Fri 18 Mar 2011, 19:37, 2 replies)

And then you lezzed up, right?

( Dr. Shambolic je suis charlie, Fri 18 Mar 2011, 20:13, closed)

I started reading this...
...and thought "I know who this is talking about."

My all-time favourite memory involves me and my best friend struggling with an example of the rule about moving the verb when the sentence ends with three infinitives. Suddenly it clicked and we both shouted "HAETTE UMBAUEN LASSEN WOLLEN!" with far too much triumph. To be met by a look of utter seen-it-before world-weary disgust from Gudrun.

I don't know how she made German grammar seem exciting, but from time to time she did.

(And our classes were in Room 101 too...)
(miffytherabbit, Sun 20 Mar 2011, 19:05, closed)