Dear Editor,
It remains the highest academic institution of learning in the country but the rapid decay is so pungent and chronic at the Turkeyen Campus. So what am I talking about?
First, there is the emerging culture of music across the lawns and along the catwalk throughout the day. I am generous in saying music, which serves as a euphonious substitute for noise. The roughness of the pieces, combined with the puerile and prurient nature of the lyrics betrays the listenership: a group of dilettanti, mere callow paraders, who have become quite otiose. They disrupt classes and annoy lecturers.
What are they studying? How come they have so much time to dawdle away? Why be so disruptive? What are they seeking to compensate for? I think this is a good starting point. This deliberate show of pretentiousness is a veneer that needs a quick paring, and I hope the authorities establish and enforce a proper university code of conduct for students. This will make campus life very salubrious and challenging. However, I have a second grouse.
Currently, there is the semblance of a campaign for the UG students’ presidency, and it leaves so much to be desired. The morbibundity of this culture is quite poignant-there is an absence of the fever and fervour which characterize these events. One hardly knows the candidates, and I guess it is because they are not worth knowing. The few faces on the notice boards on campus reflect the flippancy of the whole event. I ask a few simple questions-does anyone of the candidates have something akin to a manifesto? Does anyone have the capability to be engaged in live debates, which are devoid of any kind of persiflage? The very foppish nature of these few unknown candidates reflects the need for a death to this institution at the Turkeyen Campus. It is a waste of time and it elevates a few grandee manques. Down with the whole thing.
Yours faithfully,
Student (Name and address supplied)
Loud music on campus, etc? Ah well, just another microcosm of Guyanese society.
For the dictionarilly-challenged:
1. pungent – sharply painful
2. euphonious – pleasing to the ear
3. puerile – silly; childish
4. dilettanti – an admirer or lover of the arts; a person having a superficial interest in an art or a branch of knowledge; dabbler; amateur
5. callow – lacking adult sophistication;immature
6. otiose – producing no useful result; futile; being at leisure; idle; lacking use or effect; functionless; vain
7. dawdle – to spend time idly; to move lackadaisically; to spend fruitlessly or lackadaisically; delay
8. pretentiousness – making usually unjustified or excessive claims; exaggerated importance; showy
9. veneer – a superficial or deceptively attractive appearance
10. paring – to trim off an outside, excess, or irregular part of
11. salubrious – favorable to or promoting health or well-being
12. morbibundity – Merriam-Webster gave up on this one! The writer either meant moribundity – being in the state of dying; approaching death; being in a state of inactivity or obsolescence, or morbidity – a highly diseased state, or he/she has coined a new word in combining the two!
13. poignant – deeply affecting the feeling
14. flippancy – unbecoming levity or pertness especially in respect to grave or sacred matters
15. persiflage – frivolous teasing talk
16. foppish – foolish; silly
17. grandee – a man of elevated rank or station
18. manque – short of or frustrated in the fulfillment of one’s aspirations or talents
19. student – scholar; learner; one who attends a school; an attentive and systematic observer
20. anonymous – not named or identified; of unknown authorship or origin; lacking individuality, distinction, or recognizability.
21. Anonymous student – an oxymoron
MXQ, let me complete the vocabulary list: Idiot, dumbo, stupid. If I were to grade this letter it would get a D-. The D is for dumbo. ISNM
Verbosity that puts most to shame. To appreciate good one must be exposed to mediocrity and even the distasteful.
We Guyanese got to be really appreciative then!
I understand the important points of the letter, but s/he over did it. Sounds like the educated fools that I normally think twice of before hiring. U.G. needs revamping, I am willing to help.
Language is a means of communication. Brief, but precise, for the sane. Superfluous for the insane.
I remember in high school, one student writing about a nice meal she had. ” The morsel was so goluptious that it coerced me to gorbandise it.” We nick named her GORBANDISE.
Well Diamond ! I think this one should be termed, ‘morbibundity’, since MXQBH said Merriam-Webster gave up on it. Ha!
The writing in this letter is so typical of UG students: use nuff big words and some people will think you are intelligent. I am sure he/she is on course for a distinction.
I would encourage this letter writer to take his/her education in his/her own hands and not rely so much on the lecturers at UG. We know he/she can use the internet and there are many well written, articles, essays and even books he/she can access by this very medium. Read these, then perhaps they too will “disrupt classes and annoy lecturers”, most of whom leave much to be desired.
this student must be a young professor wills from buxton.
LOL! This unbelievable piece of flatulence has to be tongue-in-cheek. It MUST be! Its author does well to be anonymous in case it isn’t and gets a well-deserved nickname like “Persiflage”, “Percy” for short.
writer has only touched iceburg of problems at this university of DISASTER(sorry)Guyana
many significant problems exist:
very large classes- very small whiteboard for lecturers to write on
too many whitish looking blackboards; needs repainting
very large computer classes-very few computers (functioning) available, but lab fees a must-payable; that is farce
night classes- not all lights working/bad lighting overall
very poor audio system if available
very frequent visits by students find heads of Jeopardepartments not in arfices; so where are their offices
no curse sorry,course outlines; some lecturers have no plans, rather they carry students all over the webb (sorry webb feeters)
and the list lengthens: enjoy the PRESIDENCY whoever wins
UG needs to do better than to tell students to find info on the NET. there are copywrite laws and the internet is a huge place and students can lose their way.
lecturers need to identify sites to send students to to get relevant info and not have them waste time searching the entire web
sooooooooooo carry on President in the making.
BIG WORDS will come with the “Technological Experience”
MXQB ! Rightly so . Wait a minute, they still begin speeches with, ‘on this stupendous occasion…’ Writer, a word of advice. ‘KISS’ – Keep it simple, stupid.