|  Oral exams, to practice foreign languages. Except when it's an oral exam in... sociology? Anyone who's tired of the Times New Roman font should be capable of sympathy, because this isn't my battle. This is everyone's battle.
Sociology is the study of "people do stuff, how interesting" and these people usually (somehow) go on to become social workers (theoretically useful), sociology professors (useless), or friendless drifters who think they exist outside the realms of contemporary society and go around pestering people about the things they do from day to day to collect pointless data nobody ever does anything with (totally useless, aka me, sans the "collecting data" bit). Sociology has done a lot of good for people who make pie charts and bar graphs and also for the Chief from the Carmen SanDiego game show. It's also done a lot of good for sociologists who just want to have sexual intercourse with strange people. But how exactly does an oral exam translate from this?
Well, here's how it goes. Become a professor who spends too much time on the internet until you become desperately lonely and realize you're entering your midlife crisis. Next try to urge your students to reach out to you by talking to you outside of the scheduled class time and sitting in the front of the class (fail anybody who sits in the back; they MUST be trouble makers, or bad people. Too bad that all 30 seats are occupied by 40 students). Phrases like "Feel free to discuss what you read for the day with me in my office" and "Please talk to me oh my God my dogs don't love me anymore" can get your point across quite well. Also swear a lot, it's hip and will help you connect with the younger (not at the halfway point of being deceased) generation. Swearing makes you cool.
Basically everyone goes to speak privately with the prof to take their oral exam (this is a good opportunity to become suspicious). They have to answer aloud an essay question they would have skipped on a normal exam while speaking face-to-face with the prof and be judged on such qualities as "content accuracy", "thoroughness", "connecting ideas", "differentiating concepts", "presentation", and "Judaic ancestry" whilst being tied up with piano wire. "Content accuracy" refers to knowing more about the subject than the prof, "thoroughness" refers to anything you forgot to say in your answer, "connecting ideas" means knowing more than you're asked, and "differentiating concepts" means not connecting ideas.
"Presentation" is the most important part of your oral exam, where the prof judges you based upon the following characteristics in regards to how well you presented your information: skin color, effeminateness, regional accent, breath, clothing choice, smell, personality, genetic code, drunkenness. This also includes bulging your eyes out and grinning demonically until your skull pops out of your head and orange light shines all around so that you sound REALLY ENTHUSIASTIC ABOUT WHATEVER GARBAGE YOU'RE BABBLING FORTH.
Prof: [Looks at Student's shirt] "So, I take it you -whirr- like -whirr- the animals!"
Student" [Hides shirt with coat despite it being uncomfortably warm and cramped in the office] "No. No I don't. Who told you that. I don't know where you got that from."
Prof: [Closes blinds, starts to unbutton shirt] "You struck me as one of those -whirr- internet-using persons."
Student: [monotone] "No. I just wear glasses."
Prof: [Disappointed that Student doesn't affirm Prof's assessments of Student's character] "Okay then, anything you'd like to talk about before we get started?" [Delaying tactics, insert perfunctory suggestion that Student will fail in Life if s/he doesn't conform, pours Student some brandy] "Want some?"
Student: "No thanks, I don't drink." [mumble]
Prof: [Decides to get started because attempts at getting Student to tell him WHAT ARE YOUR CRIMES??!? is failing. Student ends up failing and being even more underrated in class than s/he was before this oral exam.]
That's what happens when someone who isn't on crack takes the exam. Here's what happens when someone who is does:
Student: [Swaggers down hallway with arms outstretched, coat flapping in the nonexistent wind, greeting complete strangers with mundane yet personal questions. Student does the pistol-wink to Prof, they both high-five each other, and Student hops over the back of the office chair and farts upon sitting down. Student and Prof hit their fists together.] "Hello, fellow earth-child! I am ready! i even have my 'oral exam' ponytail and nerdish beard on!"
Prof: "I told the guys at the [heterosexual] bar about your theories! Alright then, let's get started! Here, I loaded the dice for you so that you get the question you wanted to answer, which was the hardest question with the most subquestions!"
Student: "Oh, boy, that IS a hard one! That's okay, I can answer ALL of these questions, because like the theory of absolute zero, they're all connected! And also because I am ever so smart!"
Prof: [Slouching comfortably] "Sure, man, if you want, man, but I can't give you extra credit, man!"
Student: "NO NEED, Doc! I'm just here to LEARN what life's really all about! Allow me to begin! Goffman Durkheim Durkheim Marx socialist disease impregnate George Herbert Mead! Did you hear how that actually wena bout, furthermore is ascribed by did you know that in some instances they also drink poisoned kool-aid, yeah it's true, where you aware of that! It's all illustrated by David Lynch and the House of Leaves with subliminal backmasking!"
Prof: "WOODSTOCK, WOO!!!"
The question to be asked on the oral exam is decided at random (via 84-sided dice) so that you need to know more than you need to know in order to know what you need to know to pass the exam. This helps the prof to feel empowered in his quest to try and find friends from his students because he has none himself. The first question is the most straightforward one perhaps: Define concepts not specifically defined in class. This is rendered needlessly complicated by adding how many concepts need to be defined for just this one question, how many examples must be provided for each, and tacking on the obligatory subquestion "why or why not?". These methods allow any question to expand geometrically in its answer like a pyramid scheme.
The second question begins with the phrase "with some thought" as though the first question didn't require any. The second question only covers one key term however, and so must be augmented with noxious qualifiers in order to intimidate the student and obscure what the intended answer is going to be. This is easily achieved through using wordy and vague phrases designed specifically to make the student ask "How?". Using phrases in the question that have been spoken aloud in the scheduled class time no more than three times (at most, if ever) helps. Make sure you first go out and get a life for those so-called "real life" examples.
The third question is the shortest, which raises suspicions. This question says "define" which means anything but and also that the student must define the course title's key concept despite the fact that any given professor will skirt around defining this term throughout the entire semester. The question is suspiciously simple-sounding (by COMPARISON), which is actually a trick. The prof uses this to say (lie)"Oooh, you got the EASY question," come oral exam time, and somehow this justifies him grading you harder than the students which he thinks are prettier.
The fourth question is what college is all about: using your newfound knowledge to backup your prejudices. Take a bland issue that is both scary and supposedly pertinent to your life situation (i.e. school violence when you're a college student) and render a book-inspired judgement against stereotypes (ex. "People who listen to loud music commit school violence!"). Depending upon whether the prof likes you or not or "just gets the impression" that you pay attention in class (read as: do the prof's job for him by answering his questions in class) or not will determine whether your arse-minded assumptions are correct or not. This question is then split up by having to awkwardly compare the issue to key terms, except that you must bridge everything together somehow instead of organizing things so that you're more apt to remember them without sounding like you know nothing when everything becomes a total mishmash like this run-on sentence.
The fifth question is flat-out a book question, geared towards people who can afford the several-hundred-dollar cost for the assigned text which the prof gets a profitable cut from for assigning (usually to afford more internets or more beer at the local techno/male strip club for "research"). The fifth question is also another judgemental question this time seemingly directed at actual specific people within the class whom the prof doesn't think are paying attention hard enough. S/he does this partly out of spite but also under the delusion that it will magically inspire the student like some Disney made-for-TV movie to think the prof has him/her pegged on accident, but instead it just targets them and puts them on radar. For example, this question has to do with depression and suicide, which will doubtlessly be on everyone's mind when preparing for this oral exam.
The sixth question is a tacked-on question, and luckily for the student who actually attends class (you better suffer with the rest of us, pal) this might be one of the easier questions to answer (don't be so sure, though). For some reason, this question contains the bizarre phrase "don't be glib" and why the hell that's there is apparently some form of being witty in the way profs like to try. Here's a hint: Oscar Wilde may have been slightly amusing in his own time, but he by NO means belongs in THIS generation.
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