I have stopped working on a regular basis at St Joseph’s College as I am snowed under by work with Mount Carmel’s and Jyothi Nivas Colleges and Sophia School and St. Joseph’s School. But when it comes to being the external examiner for their PG Exams they always connect with me and I cannot say no. After all it’s Fr Ambrose’s memory and my Uncle Simon who was a Jesuit, which takes me back over and over again.
So, on the 24th of May we started on the vivas for St. Joseph’s PG section from 9am in the morning. Two weeks before that I was sent the dissertations by email and dunzoed the hard copy and I wallowed in reading them through and through.
Why?? Well this is a student's blood, sweat and tears and having just gone through my PhD with writing and rewriting it before submission, I read and make notes and the kids know -- they wont get their Masters certificates if they are not up to scratch. I will make them rewrite and I will check for plagiarism. That is a HUGE no, no in my book. Outright fail if they plagiarize.
Student, guide, chair and me
This year the dissertations were on more modern subjects and for a change I did not have to kill myself reading boring old topics. Instead there was one on fake news which was attributed to becoming famous by the most infamous US President of them all -- Donald Trump.
“Using Multimodality to Counteract Fake News during COVID-19 Pandemic in India: A Social Semiotic study of Instagram News Explainer Videos” -- well argued but I was disappointed as she found ITV News the safest platform to believe and they are funded and are part of the Times of India Group. But then I am a journalist and she is still a student with rosy spectacles!!
Another interesting dissertation called us older people “ digital immigrants” and younger than 35 “ digital Natives” Made me laugh at the terminology and as the student said, she wrote on the topic because of the older family members who believed everything and anything on whatsapp or social media. The name of her 44 page thesis -- “Using Multimodality to Counteract Fake News during COVID-19 Pandemic in India: A Social Semiotic study of Instagram News Explainer Videos. How multimodal videos were helping to explain concepts clearly and truthfully, rather than falling for fake news. She seemed disappointed that many of her older family members believed all whatsapp messages.
One dissertation was about Kannada film producer Prashanth Neel’s films and it was intriguing ly called -- “The High-Octane Man and an Enticing Female Body: Emphasizing Gender Stereotypes and the Representation of Women in the Films of Prashanth Neel”. Very sad even though she tried hard, but the whole thesis was just a textual personal analysis of the films with no rigorous scholarship or research. But thats her guides fault, not guiding her correctly.
And then my Heidi Thomas who has taken four years to submit her thesis!! She did a regular, old fashioned ---Gender influence in the context of journalism practice in Bangalore. Good old fashioned ranting about gender in the media room. After all the years and the mentoring she got from all over, she produces a thesis with SIX in her sampling for interviews.Heidi is street smart and will do very well in our media arena. Academics are not her forte and so as we laughed together the HOD and me -- she will fall on her feet and bring laurels to the college anyway-- weak thesis or not!
The other thesis ‘s were on anime’s and Tamil movies and oh yes! Vlogging about food. Called “ Representation of Culture through Food: A Textual Analysis of YouTube Food Vlogs “ she had analysed three of the worlds top vloggers and ofcourse I ticked her off for not adding my favourite vlogger -- Anthony Bourdain. How could she talk about food vlogging without the amazing Bourdain, who even though he is dead is beloved by all of us his fans..
