Work Shmirk

I continue my daily battle at work. At times, I love my job so much I can hardly stand it. Today, some students did a parody of my marriage for their dialogue. It was very funny, and the class enjoyed it a lot. I was amused but a bit concerned. At our wedding, my father hit on E's mother. After our marriage E kept running into my ex-boyfriends. He finally killed the boyfriends and then shot himself. I was a bit alarmed, until another student let me in on the joke. It was actually a parody of a popular Turkish soap opera, substituting my name and E's for the main characters. Phew!

My American Culture students were required to create newspapers for one of their other classes. Four different groups came to interview me, and one of them showed me the finished product today. It was very cute, and my quotes were fairly accurate.

However, another student told me that one of the newspapers had an article about me with the headline: "American Teacher Marries and Becomes Angry." This was from the same group of students who are apparently still very upset that gave them an announced quiz last week. I was very sorry to hear about it. And I know they submitted it to the Chair, who already gossips that I only come to campus to teach my classes (so untrue!).

I am thinking I need to confront my chair because I've been pretty ill-treated in my department since I arrived. For example, I just discovered the department has a lecture series (because I saw a sign about it and my Turkish is now good enough that I could read it). Every person in the department is giving a lecture during the semester . . . except for me.

In another example, the custodial crew has never cleaned my office. It is a disgusting mess with dirt, dust, leaves, etc., covering the floor. When I first arrived last semester, I asked one of my colleagues about it, and they told me I was required to clean my own office.

Well, that was a lie. I have recently acquired a new ally. One of the PhD students has finally swallowed his pride and realized I could really help him with his language and research. I told him about my filthy room last week, and today he called and the custodial crew finally came and swept the floor.

It is small and petty things like this that totally break my heart. I want to confront the chair, tell him, diplomatically, that if he has problems with me he should tell me. I also want to say that I have been very isolated in the department but could be a great resource for my colleagues (my students already know this and I spend hours helping them). I don't know if a confrontation would be productive or if I should just let it go. Argh and foo and sigh.