I’ve spent most of my life in The South (as I’ve mentioned before) and I haven’t really thought about what that implies in respect to my… personality. That’s not to say that I haven’t noticed differences in the behavior of people through out the country. I was shocked at how rude I perceived people to be the first time I traveled to New York City on my own. I’ve noticed the differences in greetings that Katie discussed. However, I’ve never really considered myself the typical demure Southern Belle (despite the occasional accent). While I still don’t think of myself as a Southern Belle, nor does anyone else, I have recently been told that my South is showing at Girl’s NightTM.
I was relating about how I’m trying to develop the courage (I’m not sure if that’s the right word, but I am horribly shy in real life) to ask questions of speakers. So, I’ve been practicing during General and Specialty Journal Club. I’m not too terribly obnoxious about it (as in I don’t ask questions just to ask them), but when I honestly have a question about the methodology presented or the interpretation of the results I’m trying to ask the question then. So far I’ve asked a grand total of three questions (out of the two Journal Clubs I attend each week).
Anyhow, I asked a question last week pertaining to the controls of one experiment that were obviously very off and that no one was questioning. This particular experiment was somewhat central to the paper’s thesis and I felt that I had put the student presenter in an awkward position. So, at Girl’s NightTM when we were talking about mean questions I pointed out that I had recently done so to another student thus breaking the graduate student code. This caused everyone in the room to burst out laughing. I was rather mystified and irked. I pointed out that I was rather bitchy in how I phrased the question and could have put the question much gentler.
“That was bitchy!” Northern Big City Friend replied and snorted. “She was so nice about it,” she explained to the rest of the room, “she said, ‘So, it seems that the loading controls are a bit off there. Did the authors explain that at all? It makes the interpretation of the data rather hard.’ The loading controls were more than a bit off. They were completely off! There were dark bands and non-existent ones.” She started laughing again.
“Well, what was he going to say to that? It wasn’t his experiment! He couldn’t help it. Besides if I hadn’t said anything maybe Dr. BigShot wouldn’t have said anything,” I defended myself.
“You are never rude,” Canadian Friend said, “For you to be rude, it would require lots of alcohol or just extreme provocation.”
This really did shock me. Apparently, I had a completely distorted view of the situation. I felt that I was being a huge… well, bitch about the whole thing and everyone else thought that I was completely justified. All I could see was that I made the student presenter rather uncomfortable, not that my question was justified. This has made me wonder about other times that I thought I behaved rather rudely in an academic situation. Maybe I wasn’t rude at all, but pointing out something?
Also, this may be indicative of my whole demeanor in academic situations. I have been told that in day-to-day conversation that I have strong opinions (which may be code for obnoxious), but that I do not express them during my presentations. Advisor has told me that my voice goes up at the end of my explanations of figures and that it makes me sound like I’m asking a question instead of giving an explanation. Dr. Nice BigWig has told me that when I answer questions I preface my statements with “I think” rather than just giving the answer. After reading Katie’s post about interviewing and PhysioProf’s response. I’m beginning to wonder if I’m just too afraid of publicly offending someone. But then again, what’s the line between being confident and being rude?
Northwestern Friend told me that, “You are really nice, but you need to start saying ‘no’ to people. Just because you know something about a particular technique does not mean that you need to teach someone a short course in it.”
Advisor has been telling me to be more selfish with my time. I think that I am selfish with my time. It’s not like I’m spending hours everyday on other people’s projects. And it’s only a fraction of the hours per week I spend at the lab. Besides it’s important to share the knowledge, right? Maybe it’s not me that needs to be selfish. Maybe other people need to be less selfish. Maybe we all should be more polite. Just because one is right or busy does not mean that one should be rude.
However, Midwestern Friend agreed with Northwestern Friend and said, “Consider this an intervention. Overcome your Southern-ness.”
Ha, I know this problem! My boss thinks I’m much too timid. I just see it as following my mother’s advice: “Pick your battles.” Problem is, the rest of the department doesn’t get to see how brilliant I am (I swear I am) and assumes the opposite. I also agree that everyone else should be a little less selfish and rude, but in my corned of science that doesn’t seem to be happening. So perhaps it would be good (for our careers and our conscience) if we got over our Southern-ness.
We TEAR apart papers at our journal club (which is why we never review papers by anyone at our university or by the speaker). My PI runs the journal club so he always calls on me for everything since he has no problem humiliating me, and loves it when I rip in to papers and tear them to shreds.
I guess his thought is if we learn to be extremely critical of papers, we will be more critical of our own data and write better papers. As long as I’m not offending anybody by being the journal club bitch, I don’t mind. Since the presenter is never doing their own paper, it’s never a problem — we tend to use the presenters more to just put the paper up there and do background, and it’s less their responsibility to critically judge the paper — that’s where I come in, week after week. I would probably feel pretty awful too, though, if I made the presenter feel uncomfortable in any way.
This problem occurs frequently with women, especially starting with the phrase “I think…” or “I feel…” Deborah Tannen’s book “You Just Don’t Understand” highlights a lot of the differences between how men speak and how women speak and how in business and science situations women are not taken as seriously because of phrases, such as these.
I think of it as “code-switching.” I don’t think you have to be rude but the rules of the game are different in different context. Personally I hate the whole academic-speak (way to full of jargon and makes you sound full of yourself) but there are definite situations where I have to use it so I switch it on. Same thing with how I’ll ask questions or phrase my thoughts in certain meetings. It’s a skill like any other and you get more comfortable with it the more you use it. But I don’t think (at least I hope) you don’t have to become a B*tch to succeed.
BTW, I tagged you for a fun little meme.
All the comments so far are great. I’m just going to add, be as southern as you want. That is who you are, so don’t be ashamed of it. But I’d suggest that you don’t need to worry about being a bitch or too rude. Just do what comes natural, people will form their own opinions of you no matter what you do.
I don’t want to be a bitch to succeed. But I’ve been trying to be more straight-forward in the way I talk, as otherwise I am not heard. As long as I don’t have to be mean or rude, it’s fine with me.
I think that one can speak confidently and ask good critical questions at seminars/journal clubs without being a bitch. Being a bitch is about treating other people in a hostile or insulting way, with the purpose of making them feel bad. You certainly did not do that.
Speaking confidently and asking critical questions, on the other hand, are essential skills for success in academic research (and many other careers). Fair or not, people who sound tentative give the impression that they don’t know what they’re talking about. And asking critical questions is actually helpful to the speaker even if it makes the speaker temporarily uncomfortable.
It’s much, much better to have the flaws in your talk pointed out by your labmates than be unexpectedly ripped to shreds at an international conference. Our lab once interviewed a postdoctoral candidate who gave a talk full of logical holes and missing controls. My overriding thought was that her PI, labmates, and department had utterly failed her by sending her off to embarrass herself in a job talk without having pointed those things out to her first.
I looked like a grade A bitch at a group meeting a while back. I (quite aggressively) went through a grad student’s work with a very fine toothed comb. The data was badly presented (like graphs with size instead of radius, and the wrong units), there were many careless errors and he just didn’t have a clue. He actually stopped answering my questions and just talked over me when I was trying to clarify and help him. In the end the boss told him to shut up and listen but I’ve never experienced someone be that rude. I was furious for days afterwards and now will not help this student one bit. And I was furious at some of the other students who told me I was a bitch for what I did (which was no worse than they do). I ended the conversation with one (who had been particularly nasty) by ‘pulling rank’ and saying ‘well I guess that’s why I’m the postdoc and you’re just the grad student’. Sometimes you just have to throw a punch to get noticed. Then you don’t need to do it again for a while because they remember what you are capable of!
Hi, Amanda.
I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but you are not even approaching the tail end of the distribution of bitchiness that exists in scientific discourse. I just posted this week about a total asshole who visited my poster. Check it out if you want to know what the ultimate in rudeness and stupidity is.
I have to say, however, that I disagree that people should be more “polite”. There is no point worrying about hurting someone’e feelings by asking a good, thought provoking question in a forum where such questions have been requested. You didn’t put the student in an awkward position. His shoddy controls did. Also, since there are plenty of true jerks out there, I think that those of us who want to ask questions for the right reasons should do so frequently – to outnumber them.
Southern Grad Girl: Advisor tells me the same thing. Hence, why I’m “practicing.” It has never occurred to me, though, that people may assume the opposite (I mean, how can they deny my intrinsic brilliance?) 😉
EtBr: We don’t present papers by students, but we do hold students responsible for researching the papers they present. Also, while the faculty advisors urge students to rip into the papers, students tend not to ask any questions.
Brigindo: I’m going to look into that book… and I’m still trying to figure out my six words.
Jennie: That’s true, I just hate making other people feel uncomfortable.
Science Girl: I don’t necessarily want to be a bitch, but speaking straight forward makes me think that I appear as one… if that makes sense?
Mad Hatter: The intent is rather important and I think that’s a good delineation between what is bitchy and what is not. And it is true that while our department can be nit-picky (that is the faculty are) it is much better to learn about holes in logic in a relatively friendly audience.
Propter Doc: That grad student was very rude! Talking over someone? Especially when their data/presentation doesn’t make sense or is rather shoddy. That’s just plain stupid to refuse help.
Acmegirl: Ok, you win! 🙂 However, I do think that people can be polite and still ask pointed questions.
I’ve been thinking about this since I read it yesterday since I share your general problem. When I feel I’m being aggressive, others still view me as being pretty gentle. So somewhere there’s a gap between perception and reality and I’m not sure how exactly to fix that. If my natural inclination is to want people to feel good, I struggle to overcome that to ask pointed questions in front of groups. I’m much more likely to send an email afterward because I see a presenter’s comfort as having more weight than my own desire to look smart and observant. Which doesn’t seem ideal.
It’s probably good I came late in the comments then, isn’t it? 🙂 Because I’m no help at all.
I agree that you can ask pointed questions in a polite way. What you described in your post was a good example of that. But I think it’s easy to equate being indirect or holding your toungue with being polite.
I’ve enjoyed this discussion!
When I taught undergrad courses, I had the reputation of being a horrid bitch because I actually expected them to think, and because of my natural tendency towards snark and sarcasm.
At our group meetings, we’re encouraged to present our current data, though a recent paper is OK, and we’re also encouraged to ask copious questions and tear into the work, whether it’s the work of the presenter or someone else’s paper.
Because our group meetings are so ungodly early in the morning, my tact meter has yet to turn on, so my comments tend to be blunt and to the point. When we have to have afternoon meetings, my comments are longer and their presentation more carefully considered, though the content remains the same. That is, when we meet in the morning, I sound like Boss. When we meet in the afternoon, I sound like “a girl.”
I don’t ask questions in the big department seminars. They still intimidate the hell out of me.
post-doc: I’m glad that I’m not alone… or at least I’m not that unusual.
acme girl: I think that is what I have problem with, mistaking polite for holding my tongue/being indirect. I think that for me (and possibly post-doc, too?), I value how the speaker feels much above my own scientific knowledge. Even though, I know that doing is as much a detriment to the speaker as to myself. I suppose we all must get used to feeling uncomfortable sometimes… so might as well be with a friendly-ish audience.
Title Troubles: In lab meeting I have no problem being a pain, but our journal clubs are departmental affairs. As in the chair of our department and most of the faculty attend each one. Hence my intimidation!