My Chinese Studies Supervision Reports from 1st Year at Cambridge
I’m making my supervision reports from my first year of university public here (and I’ll do the same with second year soon). They might be interesting to other people taking the course, and making them public should be good motivation for me to get good reports in future! (It’s also so that I don’t lose the reports…)
Michaelmas Term 2009
East Asian History
*Supervisor: *Peter Kornicki For the four mini-essays set at the start of the course he produced excellent answers, distilling his research well; no problems with his English - on the contrary he has a nice, arresting style. His last essay of the term was a very thorough and well-informed response to a complex historiographical problem and he dealt competently with a range of issues. A good start.
East Asian History
Supervisor: Roel Sterckx Hugh’s essay on the First Emperor’s stele inscriptions was a confident piece that covered all main themes. With a bit more clarity in essay structure, Hugh should be able to set himself a high target for history work. He showed in supervision that he masters the key issues.
Modern Chinese Translation and Writing 1
Supervisor: Boping Yuan Hugh has been working hard and making very good progress in his modern Chinese studies. He is well prepared for his supervisions and his work is of good quality. If he makes extra efforts to enlarge his vocabulary and improve his fluency, he should be able to achieve a very good result in the Tripos next June.
Literary Chinese 1
Supervisor: J.P. McDermott Hard-working, intelligent, no problem.
Lent Term 2010
East Asian History
Supervisor: M.D. Shin A very good essay that was well argued with solid coverage of the readings. In a few places, he could have pushed the analysis further by putting Chong’s ideas more explicitly into their historical context. The essay did not cover the texts on inventions such as the pulley and immunization. This was a test of close reading skills – i.e., to show how a text that initially seems of little relevance actually has many connections to the other texts.
Modern Chinese texts 1
Supervisor: Boping Yuan Hugh continues to make good progress in his modern Chinese studies this term. He has good Chinese pronunciation and tone production and his understanding of Chinese syntax is good, but he should continue to work hard to enlarge his Chinese vocabulary, particularly his active Chinese vocab.
East Asian History
Supervisor: A. Boermel Hugh wrote a very good essay assessing the significance of population growth to the decline of the Qing dynasty. The essay was well-structured and displayed ample evidence of critical thought. It was a pleasure to read. He could have been a little bit more forthcoming during the supervision but what he said was intelligent and showed that he is in full control of the material.
Literary Chinese 1
Supervisor: Oliver Weingarten Hugh already has a good understanding of Classical Chinese. He participates actively in the supervisions and is always well-prepared.
Easter Term 2010
Literary Chinese 1
Supervisor: Oliver Weingarten Hugh is very interested in Classical Chinese, appears always well prepared and already has a good grasp of the language.
East Asian History
Supervisor: R.E. Clements In his essay Hugh made a good attempt to develop a line of argument rather than being purely descriptive. However, he would benefit from more help with this as his argument was a little unclear and in places contradictory. It is also important to come to a conclusion at the end of an essay. I suggest he have someone proof-read his essays, if he is not already doing this. But otherwise, a good effort!
Modern Chinese Translation and Writing 1
Supervisor: Boping Yuan Hugh has been doing well in his modern Chinese studies. His Chinese pronunciation and tone production are generally good and his vocabulary size has expanded quite significantly. He doesn’t seem to find Chinese syntactic structures very difficult although occasionally he may make careless mistakes. He has been working hard in his revision, and I wish him well in his Part IA exams.
Looking back, I like the way how my history essay reports get steadily worse! :-P
