Conversation 1
Narrator：Listen to a conversation between a student and a professor.
Eric: Hi, Professor Mason, do you have a minute?
Pro: Yeah, of course, Eric. I think there was something I wanted to talk to you about too.
Eric: Probably my late essay.
Pro: Ah, that must be it. I thought maybe I’ve lost it.
Eric: No, I'm sorry. Actually it was my computer that lost it, the first draft of it. And, well, anyway, I finally put it in your mailbox yesterday.
Pro: Oh,and I haven't checked the mailbox yet today. Well, I'm glad it's there. I will read it this weekend.
Eric: Well, sorry again. Say, I can send it to you by email too if you like.
Pro: Great. I'll be interested to see how it all came out.
Eric: Right. Now, um, I just have overheard some graduate students’ talking, something about a party for Dean Adams?
Pro: Retirement party, yes, all students are invited. Wasn't there notice on the Anthropology Department's bulletin board?
Eric: Uh, I don't know. But I want to offer help out with it. You know whatever you need. Dean Adams, well, I took a few anthropology classes with her and they were great, inspiring. That's why I want to pitch in.
Pro: Oh, that's very thoughtful of you, Eric, but it will be pretty low-key, nothing flashy. That's not her style.
Eric: So there's nothing?
Pro: No, we'll have coffee and cookies, maybe a cake. But actually a couple of the administrative assistants are working on that. You could ask them but I think they've got covered.
Eric: Ok.
Pro: Actually, oh, no, never mind.
Eric: What's it?
Pro: Well, it's nothing to do with the party and I'm sure there are more exciting ways that you could spend your time. But we do need some help with something. We’re compiling a database of articles the anthropology faculty has published. There is not much glory in it, but we are looking for someone with some knowledge of anthropology who can enter the articles. I hesitate to mention it. But I don't suppose this is something you would...
Eric: No, that sounds kind of cool. I would like to see what they are writing about.
Pro: Wonderful. And there are also some unpublished studies. Did you know Dean Adams did a lot of field research in Indonesia? Most of it hasn’t been published yet.
Eric: No, like what?
Pro: Well, she is really versatile. She just spent several months studying social interactions in Indonesia and she's been influential in ethnology. Oh, and she's also done work in south of America, this is closer to biology, especially with speciation.
Eric: uh, not to seem uninformed...
Pro: Well, how species form. You know, how two distinct species form from one. Like when populations of the same species are isolated from each other and then develop into two different directions and end up as two distinct species.
Eric: Interesting.
Pro: Yes, and while she was there in South America, she collected a lot of linguistic information and songs, really fascinating.
Eric: Well. I hate to see her leave.
Pro: Don't worry. She'll still be around. She's got lots of projects that she's still in the middle of.