For those of you who have yet to take a course from Dr. Anne Furlong – run, don’t walk! I will allay the rumors now: She is a tough marker, she expects that students actually do their work, she is high-energy, and she is a complete riot! I have, since taking Research Methods with Ann, highly esteemed her, and spend a good many hours hanging out in her office, much to the dismay of my papers and assignments.
Anne grew up in Newfoundland, which you will soon discover if you are witness to her fabulous story-telling. She is absolutely brilliant at Newfoundlander accents (as well as various others which are just as amusing). However, Anne has had many excursions off The Rock, which have lead her to the position she is in now. First, in 1976, Anne went to Boston for a year to attend the school of fine arts at Boston University, after which she returned to St. John’s for two years, then off to Sackville (more Arts school), then to Toronto, where she spent three years working at Mark’s and Spencer’s (I must admit, I could definitely be convinced by Anne to buy an expensive pair of pants). When she returned to Newfoundland, Anne began her M.A. at MUN, during which she applied for the Rothermere Fellowship, which she received. The Rothermere allowed her to attend The University College London, and begin her PhD research in Linguistics, all expenses paid. Nice deal, I say!
Interestingly, Anne had only ever taken three undergraduate Linguistics courses. Therefore, it is easy to see why her PhD took her from 1986 to 1995. It was also difficult for Anne because there was no one in North America who studied the same thing as she did. “Still”, she says, “there are very few people in North America who do what I do”.
I asked Anne why she likes being a Professor. She laughs, “it’s particularly because, as Mark Twain says ‘my tongue is hinged in the middle and swings both ways’”. But really it’s because, like many of us life-long university goers, the “interpretive impulse is satisfied through talking – it is how we discover meaning and significance”. “The challenge of teaching” she’d argue, is “you’re constantly discerning how others see and discover texts – it’s fun!”. Also, “most people who like teaching, like performing, but I’m a bit different because I like to have the audience up on stage with me – to play with, and to play back to me”
I am about to embark out into the wonderful world of grad school, and Anne’s thoughts about teaching, learning and being an academic have made me even more excited to do that (if that were possible – holy crap!). She says “I love being a prof because I spend my life with the best minds going – alive or dead. Like Socrates says, “True knowledge exists in knowing you know nothing”. However, she does admit that there are things she does not like: “I don’t like marking [...] I don’t deal well with apprentice writing”. I am sure we all cringe at this comment, because I think back to my first-year papers, and I feel awful for the Profs who just shook their heads at my abominable use of commas and semi-colons.
When speaking about the students in class that don’t really want to be there, Anne says; “you don’t realize how painful and difficulty it is to deal with disrespect for your life and passion”. So, I asked what advice Anne had for first-year students; “If you’re not having a really good time here, you’re in the wrong place – and it’s ok not to be here [...] If it’s fun, it always sustains you”.
Favorite Book: Middlemarch by George Eliot. “It’s the most important book in my life. It has beautifully well-developed characters in Nineteenth-Century literature [...] It’s why I’m a prof [...] It taught me how to read”.
Favorite Movie: Babette’s Feast, because it’s about love and art. And also, it’s funny and touching.
Favorite Music: “At the moment, Spem in Alium. It’s a forty voice motet. I like Baroque music, choral music – renaissance. I like lots of other things as well, but that’s the stuff I always come back to”.
What would you do if you had Stephen Harper’s job right now?: “I’d probably hang myself”, she laughs. “I would do something no politician would do – I’d put governance ahead of politics. I’d put the money where it belongs; education, improving the social fabric, health and infrastructure. I’d build a best process where the best people in the political structure were running the country. In short, I want to make want to make the goal of governance to let people live with the dignity that befits a human being”.
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