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human
My (undergrad) professor assigns 200 pages of readings a week and hasn't answered my last three emails :(

I'm in a senior research seminar for my humanities major. The professor is someone I completely adore. I have, in fact, a bit of a crush on him.

But he assigns so much in terms of readings - up to 250 pages a week but usually closer to 150. Do you guys think this is reasonable? Half of it is usually primary source material, half academic discourse, and then sometimes media pieces. So it's not like it's easy reading either.

And then, and I'm not upset about it but it just makes me feel a bit embarrassed/rejected, he hasn't answered my last three emails!

The first email was about something we were discussing in a meeting I had had with him. I thanked him for the meeting, sent him a picture which I had asked him a question about during the meeting, and commented about my interest in a memoir written by an academic he knows really well.

No answer. That's fine, I guess, the email didn't have any action items.

The second email was about my research proposal. I mentioned an author we had both been talking about, linked to a really interesting interview with him, and then asked the professor if he might be available to meet sometime in the next few days to help me refine some things for my research proposal, which would be due the following week.

No answer. Ouch! I was really embarrassed. After this, when I went to class, I was a bit quiet. He noticed, and he was like, you're quiet today. have you done the readings?

I was like yeah, of course I have. He said, so what's going on?

I didn't say much. But I was actually a bit hurt that he hadn't been answering any of my emails, and I was also really tired...

Anyways, I sent the third email a few days ago. In the email, I explained that I've always done the readings, all of them, take them really seriously, annotate extensively (my annotations document is about 70 pages now!), and then I mentioned that I find upwards of 200 pages of readings to be challenging (something all the classmates and I had agreed on - they were just too afraid to broach it with him), but that I still appreciated the readings and learned so much from them, and would even miss them after this class is over. I also asked if he assigns about this much in his grad classes. A few weeks ago, he'd said that I could take a grad class with him, so that's why I asked about that.

No answer!

I don't know what to do. Why isn't he answering any of my emails??
gpt
To be frank, your professors are busy. 2/3 of the emails you’ve described are basically attempts at having a conversation, which your prof isn’t going to want to do. Keep your emails short and to the point. If by the next class he hasn’t responded to your request to meet - which honestly he may not have read since it sounds like most of it was conversational - just ask him in class. Also, don’t let these things upset you to the point of affecting your in-class performance. It’s not personal. It’s just that your relationship is a professional one.