Pandemic PhD Stories : My french struggle

If you haven't figured it out already from the title, in this blog, I am blaming the pandemic for my lack of french, among many other things. I'll admit it's my brain's fault as well. But lets put more blame on something that can't fight back. Just can kill me or heavily damage my lungs.

Starting with a little background- my name is Shivangi, and I am from India. The first time I ever travelled abroad was for my PhD. So you can imagine my excitement to move to France and finally start my salaried life :D

I took some french classes before arriving in Nantes in November 2019. Half a day here and I realised the left hemisphere of my brain is pretty useless. But also that I needed it to work in order to survive. This meant I had to re-take language classes if I wanted to show off my french back home.

So, I started my lessons again in January and was excelling them. Nice to know my rupees earlier and euros now were not all wasted. But like always, life had other plans (Somehow, they never really match mine). Fast forward two months, and we were in lockdown. I didn't know enough french to get around and didn't have enough knowledge to do my research alone at home. And so my best friends were Netflix and literature review.

The city opened up again and so did my vigour to learn french. I enrolled for the next semester. And, drumroll...... we were back in lockdown! But this one was not that strict and we were still having online classes. But that meant there was always a google translate page open, you know, just in case. I then figured it out- my french classes were triggering the lockdowns. So I gave up.... For the greater good.

Well, it's safe to say that my french sucks. But I get by. Although it does get overwhelming sometimes to constantly hear a language and catch only bits and pieces. The only relief was when I would go to international events but that was like twice in my last year, thanks again to the great pandemic.

Here I was, hoping to meet aliens, but the only foreign bodies I met should be trapped in my mask and thrown away!

But for anyone learning french, don't let it deter you. Like I slandered stressed said, it was the pandemic's fault. As long as you regularly speak it (with and without mistakes), you'll get there. Just keep practicing with a person, and not with a wall like I did.

Image Credits: Pinterest

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Shivangi Sharan is a third year PhD student at the Laboratory of Planetology and Geosciences in France. Her research focusses on the study of the magnetic field of planets and to infer their internal structure from it. She is an active member of the IAGA Blog Team and can be contacted via e-mail here.

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Online vs Offline Science

Science communication has changed a lot in the past few years. With the population online growing at an exponential rate, the presentation and promotion of science also shifted, or rather tries to co-exist, both offline and online. To a great extent, it is due to the pandemic. As soon as everything in the real world closed down, everyone was forced to look for alternatives using the internet.

Global overview of internet usage in January 2022. Credit : DataReportal

This led to a lot of changes in our daily routine. And it also led to changes in scientific outreach and it's participation statistics. The virtual participation in conferences or workshops unintentionally opened doors to a lot of people who couldn't attend before due to various reasons- be it lack of funding, location issues or maybe even stage fright. The registration fees were lower and a 'compromised timezone' was built to ensure maximum virtual presence.

Another issue that was addressed was the inclusion of minority groups. It is no secret that many groups have less representation in academics compared to others. If you ask me which, off the top of my head, I'll say women, black, queer and probably many others that I don't even know about. Female attendance grew by 253% while gender queer attendance grew by 700% (Source), thanks to virtual meetings!

Online scientific outreach also gave birth to a lot of new avenues. Many groups, laboratories and universities started web based chats to discuss both professional and personal life in the lockdown. People found it easier to reach out online vs offline. Webinars became much more frequent and interactive. One example is the MagNetZ (Magnetic NetworkZ) webinars, which is an informal space to present and discuss science related to Earth's and planets' magnetism. Another workshop I attended during the pandemic was the Deep Mantle mini-workshop by the SEDI (Study of the Earth's Deep Interior) community. I'm sure there are many more such involvements in all disciplines.

So, if you ask who wins in the online vs offline war, personally, I'd still say offline. I'm sure most of us, especially the early career researchers actively looking for networking, would prefer attending offline rather than online. Online participation can't beat the old school face-to-face interactions, but it's coming real close with present technological tools. If managed properly and coordinated carefully, hybrid meetings can go a long way, providing the possibility of not being able to attend physically but still being part of at least the important events we would have otherwise missed.

 

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Shivangi Sharan is a third year PhD student at the Laboratory of Planetology and Geosciences in France. Her research focusses on the study of the magnetic field of planets and to infer their internal structure from it. She is an active member of the IAGA Blog Team and can be contacted via e-mail here.

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