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05 March 2007

So many flashcards, so little time

For the past few weeks, my life has been consumed by flashcards. I made a million of them, with an image pasted on the front, and the vital stats on the back (e.g., artist's name, date, medium, location, artistic significance, etc.). This was in preparation for my M.A. exam, which was this morning.

The whole exam focused on seventeenth century England and fashion history, as reflected in literature (plays, poetry, essays, personal diaries, etc.) and art (paintings, portraiture, sculpture, engravings, etc.).

At the beginning of the exam, we were each given an envelope in which were printed copies of the following nine images, which I had to identify and write about (answering four separate essay questions), of course tying in additional paintings and literature as well.

To understand the gravity of the situation (and my panic), you must realize that the following nine images were selected from over 400 that we were required to know.

Now, I don't know about you, but memorizing the stats of 400 historical images is a bit much. Not exactly my cup of tea.

And out of those 400 flashcards that I studied, it all boiled down to the following nine images, which, thankfully, I knew without hesitation.

	Gheeraerts (attrib.) Queen Anne of Denmark 1612
	van Somer Elizabeth Grey, Countess of Kent 1619
	Hollar Winter, from The Seasons c. 1643-44
	de Critz Hester Tradescant and Her Stepson, John Tradescant 1645
	Anon. The Execution of Charles I c. 1649-50
	van Tilborgh The Tichborne Dole 1670
	Engraving of Ogilby and Morgan's Map of London: Its Presentation to Charles II 1682
	de St. Jean Homme de Qualite Garny de Rubans 1689
	Maubert John Dryden c. 1696-97

I am so glad the exam is over. I must say, I do not like the British way of education, with so much riding on one single exam.

This recent flashcards-cum-exam-horror is the second time I've voluntarily signed up for this sort of abuse.

I received my first Master's degree in England also, and eighty percent of our final grade rested on a single written exam, which took place in the cavernous, glass sky-lit-roofed architectural masterpiece that is the Royal Horticulture Society Hall in London.

Sounds like a nice place to sit a four-hour exam, eh?

Not so. I spent the entire four hours ticked off at the fact that the sun was streaming through the skylights and I was getting sunburned. And this is not to mention how ticked off I was at the fact that there were many a distraction in the exam hall: there were literally one thousand students sitting the exam with me, from all departments throughout the University of London system. Imagine: one thousand separate desks, with one thousand separate chairs moving about, and one thousand students sweating bullets. It wasn't pleasant.

As much as I disliked my first Master's exam experience, I thoroughly enjoyed writing my first Master's thesis, the title of which was:

.

Copyright 2007 KnittingJenny

jenny [at] knittingjenny [dot] com