I’m thinking this morning about students and crushes. (Actually, I’m also thinking about UCLA basketball, my boxing footwork, pacifism, the health of one of my youth group teens, my wife’s smile, and my chinchilla, but those are not subjects for the blog today. Oh, and I still want a diet Coke very badly. Is Lent half over yet?)
Recently, I heard from one of my former students, "Darren." He took my class back when I was a new prof, in the mid-1990s. He eventually finished his degree, got his master’s, and is now himself an adjunct at several Los Angeles-area community colleges (PCC is not one of them). Darren and I email every once in a while, and I got a note from him a couple of weeks ago that’s been on my mind. Here’s some of what he wrote, which I’ve edited a wee bit:
Hugo, I love teaching, and I really believe I am supposed to be doing this. But I’m becoming aware of a problem I have, and I think it may be one you had too: student crushes. I’ve got a few women in a few of my classes who have crushes on me, and one or two of them have been flirting with me pretty heavily. I try and have good boundaries with them, because I’m only an adjunct. I don’t want to lose my job, and besides, I do very much want to be a professional in and out of the classroom. But it’s so hard, because outside of the classroom I’m so shy with women. Inside the classroom, I feel so desirable and powerful.
My question is this, Hugo: how did you or do you keep this from going to your head? How do you keep yourself from paying special attention to the ones who make it so obvious that they like you/want you? Any advice you can give me would be awesome.
I have Darren’s permission to address this on the blog. (Also, let me add three things: Darren is 31,single, and his name isn’t really Darren.)
I’ve already emailed Darren back, and I didn’t save what I wrote. But he’s had me thinking about how it is that we who teach can best think about the crushes our students will get on us.
First off, before this starts to sound like a narcissistic rant about how "crushable" a teacher I am, let me be very clear that I’ve rarely met a genuinely talented prof of either sex who wasn’t the object of desire from at least a few students. A truly effective teacher will often be the object of desire, regardless of what he or she looks like. Student crushes, I am convinced, are less about the physical attractiveness of the professor and more about that professor’s passion, certainty, and competence. Those three attributes are, for lack of a better word, intensely sexy for many people!
When I was an undergrad at Cal, I had a crush on a fellow student named Tiffany. Tiffany saw me as just a friend, however, in one of those all-too-common scenarios that most of us know plenty about. But Tiffany had a massive crush on one of her anthropology professors. He was in his late forties, and while he was reasonably fit for his age, no one would mistake him for a sex symbol. He wore earth tones (which didn’t suit him); he was balding and perhaps 5′6". But I was in his class too, and I have to admit, he was mesmerizing. He had passion for his subject, he was a gifted lecturer, he had a sense of humor, and he struck the perfect balance between self-deprecation and arrogance. (I’ve always thought that’s a tough needle to thread, and I find myself striving for it often.) Tiffany was in love with Professor P, and I eventually admitted I could see why. I asked her one day what she wanted from him, and she told me:
It’s not about sex, really. It’s that I want to be inside his head. I want to be near him, I want him to talk to me for hours, I want him to focus just on me and I want to sit next to him and soak up everything about him.
"Oh", I said. I didn’t get it.
But after thirteen years of teaching, I get it. Students get crushes on me from time to time, just as they do on "Darren" and "Professor P." Occasionally, some of those crushes have a specific romantic agenda. When I was single, I sometimes (not often) got asked out at the end of the semester or received other signs of clear interest in pursuing a relationship of some sort. But the vast majority of crushes were not and are not about actual sexual or romantic desire. Most are like Tiffany’s crush on Professor P.
If we’re doing our job right, we have the power to change the way a student thinks about himself or herself. At our best, those of us who love to teach are practiced seducers, Casanovas of the classroom. But my agenda isn’t about sexual conquest, it’s about creating an interest and a passion where none previously existed. It’s about getting students to want something they didn’t know they wanted! And when a student has a crush on me, I told Darren, it’s more often than not like Tiffany’s crush on Professor P. Though some students may sexualize their crushes, what they really want is to continue to feel the way you make them feel: excited, energized, provoked, challenged.
If we take advantage of student crushes, I told Darren, we make a huge mistake. We assume that the real interest was in us rather than in how we were able to make our students feel and how we were able to make them think. The best way, I told Darren, to think about student crushes is to take them as a sign that you’re probably doing your job pretty damn well. And while age and perceived physical attractiveness may play a small part in encouraging these crushes, the real precipitator is enthusiasm, talent, and an obvious commitment to your students.
There’s an old axiom in pop psychology: we don’t just get crushes on people whom we want, we get crushes on people whom we want to be like! Students don’t get crushes on me because they want to go to bed with me or be my girlfriend or boyfriend; they get crushes on me because I’ve got a quality that they want to bring out in themselves. They’re externalizing all of their hopes for themselves. And rather than encourage the crush to feed my ego, my job is to turn the focus back on to the student, encouraging him or her to take their new-found curiosity or enthusiasm or passion and use it, run with it, indulge it, let it take them places! That’s what student crushes mean to me.
After I wrote some of this to Darren, he wrote back:
"Hugo, thanks. But honestly, I’m a little bit crestfallen. I did want it to be about me! I did want my students to want me, even though I know that that seems so selfish and manipulative. At the same time, I’m glad to know that you think there’s a healthy function for these things. Still, I’m a bit chagrined."
I told him I knew how he felt.
As someone who’s had teacher crushes (and who hasn’t), this really rings true to me. Insightful post.
Thank you! I know exactly what you mean and I’ve had fits and starts when writing about this. I have a crush on you now — though I don’t think it’s that I want to be like you, it’s just that you expressed something I haven’t had time or fortitude to put into words! :)
I also think it’s a lot like the transference phenom in psychoanalysis, especially when you’re teaching about life changing issues such as, in my case, teaching sociology.
I don’t think I necessarily had any romantic crushes on my professors (okay, maybe once) but I was intensely curious about a couple of them, the really good ones. I absorbed with avid fascination any personal information they dropped or that others dropped about them — the name of a pet, how the professor met his wife, faculty politics, anything. I am not sure why this stuff was of such great interest to me, but it was.
“I try and have good boundaries with them, because I’m only an adjunct. I don’t want to lose my job”
I’m sure you told him this, but the more power and responsibility you have the less acceptable it is to show favoritism to hot girls or “pay special attention to”/screw the undergrads - not more. If he must do something, it’s far better that he do it as an adjunct, rather than waiting until he has tenure, so that a student who complains will get a hearing and so that he will face some consequences.
let me be very clear that I’ve rarely met a genuinely talented prof of either sex who wasn’t the object of desire from at least a few students.
And, uh, you don’t have to be talented, either. It happens to absolutely everybody eventually.
If we take advantage of student crushes, I told Darren, we make a huge mistake. We assume that the real interest was in us rather than in how we were able to make our students feel and how we were able to make them think.
What possible difference would it make if their real interest was in you? He needs to stop conflating “like you” with “want you,” true, but I had a purely sexual crush on a professor or two in my day, and so what? Good teachers don’t date students, and they also don’t use student crushes to prop up their egos. The sincerity and nature of the crush has nothing to do with this, and Darren really needs to figure that out.
Let me clarify, sophonisba, that I’m not suggesting that if the crush were purely sexual, that would justify responding to it.
I do think some profs are more likely to be the recipients of regular crushes than others, and talent and passion are likely to play a part in that.
And indeed, as a tenured professor, I chaired the college committee that developed a strongly-worded policy about consensual relationships between faculty and students.
Oh good. There’s also the question, if a professor is really so “shy with women” outside the classroom, of how exactly he can distinguish between flirting and, well, the good old-fashioned practice of sucking up. There are certainly times when no ambiguity can arise (if your students email you pornography, unbutton their shirts in class, sit next to you in your office and press their leg against your, or profess their love in essays - all things that Really Happened to people I know). But if this “flirting” takes the form of asking questions, going to his office hours, smiling, laughing, even bringing him baked goods or asking about his personal life - well, he should be careful that wishful thinking is not getting in the way of accurate observation. Undergrads don’t have the greatest sense of boundaries, either, and if a professor allows them to treat him as a friend and an equal, they will - but it doesn’t mean they have crushes.
He should also know that getting a reputation among the undergrads as someone whose vanity can be flattered in exchange for a higher participation grade is not something he will enjoy.
Indeed, which is why we probably ought to develop a whole taxonomy of crushes!
Great response, Hugo. When I started teaching, I was utterly unprepared for the crushes that I would encounter. It *is* flattering, at first, but easier to deal with when you realize that it’s not *you* up there in front of the classroom — it’s “super-you”, the one with all the facts at their fingertips and the confidence of knowing their material inside and out. Our students don’t see us struggling to understand what our mechanics are saying about our cars, how term-life insurance works, or which way to turn the knob to make the refrigerator colder. They don’t see us stumbling around the house first thing in the morning, or struggling to balance our finances so we can pay the bills (frankly, they don’t realize that adjuncts are typically dirt-poor). That is, for the most part they only see us in the one forum we’ve dedicated our lives to being good in.
There’s another aspect to this, though, that I think bears mentioning: I feel like a lot of my students — especially female students — thrive on the attention and approval that I offer. That is, for many of them, the college classroom is the first time and place they’ve been treated as someone worthwhile, who had a contribution to make and who was inherently interesting. This, of course, is not too far off from courtship (your word “seduction” is exactly right) and is easy to connect with romance. For female students, I think there’s the added “bonus” of being judged and respected on the basis of their mental abilities rather than on their physical attributes — very seductive to some young women.
In a sense, this is a good thing — students should learn that they have a value separate from their physical appearance. But it takes some learning to be the kind of professor that can make this into a good part of the student’s education. Obviously, acting out the seduction isn’t helping anyone. But we have to also prevent ourselves from seeking that flattery, and let’s face it — it’s hard to deprive yourself of something that feels good, even when it’s the right thing to do.
But wait, I have a question, too: Like “Darren”, I’m an adjunct — I teach the introductory classes so the full-timers can teach the advanced classes. I think a lot of adjuncts do the same — we teach one class and one class only, which means that we never see our students again (at least not as “our students”). So as a thought-experiment, what happens after the class when our authority vanishes (or does it?). What happens when we encounter our students months later, as “civilians”?
Dustin, well said. That’s what makes our role so vital, perhaps especially as male professors: that we can validate, listen to, and engage female students without responding to them sexually. It’s a potentially tremendously liberating experience.
In response to your second comment, nothing automatically wrong with dating a former student. Obviously, the greatest problem is a continued power imbalance — and how that former student might react when the fantasy she had about who you were (based on your teaching) is, uh, stripped away by reality.
I would be wary about relationships between former students and teachers as well. If a possibility of such a relationship exists, it seems like it would be easy for both parties to “lay the groundwork” during the class, blurring the lines in inappropriate ways (consciously or unconsciously) even though they wait to begin “official” romance.
One of my recurrent daydreams in my classes was to imagine what it would be like to sleep with the teacher. No further comment, just an impulse to pass the time.
Stentor, you’re kinda right, and kinda not. The trick is, not to see your students as potential sexual partners at all — which can be kinda hard! (I’m thinking of the recurring “hottie panic” that I run into on the web, on TV, and in my department offices, the ongoing concern on the part of adults with young women displaying themselves on the grounds that if I see a bare belly I might be sexually attracted to the owner of said belly, and what if she turns out to be 14?!) And I think I’m getting pretty good at turning that off when I walk into my classroom. But what I wonder about is the power relations, if and how they persist after the context in which they were formed ends. A lot of professors have married their students, which baffles me a little because even in relationships with non-students who weren’t as academically advanced as I was there’s been something of a struggle to avoid the teacher-student “thing”.
Great post, Hugo. I’d say that part of the dynamic is also that people who enjoy teaching enjoy the dynamic of being the learned, intelligent, powerful person leading the underlings to knowledge; that kind of enjoyment can get mixed up with romantic feelings, and for some people, that power dynamic is something they find sexually attractive as well.
All of my strongest crushes have always been towards teachers/professors. I’ve never acted or even flirted in reality, though I have often played it out in my head. I think there is some validity to the statement that I want to be closer to their intellect and that I’m attracted to the confident side I observe in class. But as I’m getting older and more sexually aware it seems to be a fantasy that I just can’t kick, and getting more tempted to act upon. It seems that many educators are responding, so I’m asking for advice on how I should deal and possible a “reality check” to make it stop.
Collegrl, I’m sorry that some educators are responding; ultimately, even if you are a legal adult, the obligation to maintain boundaries lies with the one in the greater position of authority.
I’m no therapist, but the most effective way I know to keep fantasies from becoming reality is to “think it through.” If you want Professor X, fantasize all the way through about what you want. Where do you see it going? What’s the fantasy really about? How will you feel afterwards? Usually, fantasizing all the way to the consequences helps restore some perspective…
Mythago, right on. I do enjoy being an intellectual seducer and a mentor; I don’t sexualize those feelings. Some folks, however, need some guidance to separate the two.
Hugo,
A student forms a crush on a teacher because of the student’s need. The crush is the result of the teacher somehow resonating with something missing in the student. In psychology, this is projection onto an object, and to the student in this case, the teacher is no more than an object.
Now, very often the need is for a competent person who can hold down a job, in which case competence is the cause. If the student feels rejected by parents and/or classmates, acceptance can be the cause. Especially during the period after puberty, the student might project a romantic need on the teacher, who *being older) appears to be more mature and desirable than the surrounding cohort. Power is always attractive to the powerless.
“At our best, those of us who love to teach are practiced seducers, Casanovas of the classroom.”
A seducer is someone with anti-social personality traits who manipulates the victims for his or her own need. While an instructor should strive to make knowledge attractive and to get the students to pay attention, a good teacher should never seek to selfishly meet his or her own needs through the students. Ok, I know the whole “we only do things for personal gain” psychology schtick, and so altruism is always for selfish motives. But in the case of an instructor, those motives should be things like “being the best teacher possible” and “self-satisfaction in the generative stage of life of passing on wisdom,” etc.
Anti-social people do go into teaching. The girls in the general science class in high school caught on that wearing short skirts was a way to do better in class. In the case of that blonde teacher in the news lately, I’m betting she’s got her own pathological issues that were being projected onto the student. She used the students, and those students were vulnerable to her because of their own needs and wounds. What she did seems less damaging than the male teacher on female student version, but it’s not. Those students will have to live knowing those needs and wounds were used against them.
A student forms a crush on a teacher because of the student’s need.
Or, in the case of college students, because the teacher’s hot.
Or, you know, because they have nothing to do for three hours every week but stare at that teacher’s face and body and try to entertain their idle minds with lewd fantasies (no offense to those teachers who believe that crushes are due to their intellectual prowess, but it’s a lot easier to cultivate crushy fantasies when you stop listening to the lecture and let your mind wander.)
I find it disturbing that there seems to be a need to pathologize a simple crush in order to explain why teachers shouldn’t respond to them. Teachers don’t screw their students. Period. Not because students with crushes are wounded baby birds, or because they’re seeking father figures, or because there’s something “missing” (ugh) inside them. We don’t screw our students because screwing students messes up the teacher-student relation, destroys the trust that all students, not just the ones with crushes, are entitled to feel in their instructors, and destroys the teacher’s integrity (both real and perceived) with regard to grading standards. That’s really all the justification anybody should need.
Collegegrl: To some extent it depends whether your fantasies are purely romantic/sexual or if you really want a relationship. If the latter, it might help to know that people in academia gossip. This is an enormous understatement: people in academia gossip a lot. People say snide things about professors who married their graduate students thirty years ago, when that was a normal practice - what they’d say about a professor who carried on an affair with an undergrad, I can only imagine, but I assure you it would be horrible for you. And everyone would know. They always do. If the professor didn’t get fired, everyone would know that he should have been. You’d be accused of trading sex for grades, and if the professor you were involved with had ever taught you, you’d have no way to deny it (and if he were unethical enough to be involved with an undergrad, he’d probably pad your grades too, anyway.)
It’s more trouble than it’s worth. Wait a year or two, and bag a grad student. That has its problems, too, but not as many.
Rob, I think you have too narrow an understanding of seduction. Seduction can be about selfish gratification; it can also be an artful and exciting way of leading the seduced to new ways of seeing. That’s what non-sexual, intellectual seduction is all about. It has nothing to do with paying more attention to “hot” students of either sex.
Sophonisba, I’m not pathologizing student crushes. They are normal and healthy. I’m saying that a great many of them aren’t really about romance and sex (even if the students experience them that way); they are about seeing the world through new eyes.
Sophonisba,
I completely agree with this post. I remeber when I was in Hugo’s class, I liked him because I thought he was “hot” not because of his teaching ability(However, Hugo is the greatest lecturer I’ve had). It’s a nice way to spend time when you are bored.
Sophonisba,
Or, in the case of college students, because the teacher’s hot.
Or, you know, because they have nothing to do for three hours every week but stare at that teacher’s face and body and try to entertain their idle minds with lewd fantasies…
Maybe. I don’t think Hugo (or I, for that matter) are trying to “pathologize” student crushes, but to understand them. Sure, Hugo’s a hot, hot man, no doubt about that, with all the running and working out and boxing and all, but I’m a 30-pound overweight bearded man who doesn’t iron his shirts and who forgets to get his haircut for three or four months at a time. The question has to be, why do guys like me — who 19-year old women certainly weren’t falling all over when I was 19, and who 19-year old women certainly don’t fall all over when I’m out and about — seem attractive to a disproportionate number of 19-year old women in my classroom? Not *every* young woman has a crush on their professors, but a lot of them do, and I’m willing to bet that a) male students get crushes on their female profs, and b) everyone has gay students that get crushes on them. If pointing out that unequal power relations can be highly eroticized is “pathologizing”, then it’s not pathologizing the student but our society as a whole. I personally feel that this is only a part of what’s going on, though — I think in a broader sense that students are, almost by definition, experimenting with selves, including sexual selves, and that the older, more experienced, and hyper-competent professor-type “clicks” with one or more of those selves. As far as I know, none of my older students (and as a community college prof, I have lots of returning/non-traditional students) have had crushes on me. I happen to feel that it is our responsibility as educators to encourage such self-experimentation, up to a point, whch is why I said that student crushes can be a good thing, but none of that changes our responsibility not to exploit our students.
Oh, sorry, Dustin and Hugo. I was talking about Rob’s comments, not everyone’s (specifically these: A student forms a crush on a teacher because of the student’s need. The crush is the result of the teacher somehow resonating with something missing in the student.) I don’t think that this is a useful way to categorize and conceptualize most inappropriate attraction. Being young, dumb, and infatuated doesn’t imply that your crush object is somehow resonating with a missing part of you. Dustin’s remarks about “experimentation” make a lot more sense.
Former student, I don’t know whether to be complimented or not, but I’ll go with what I think is the prevailing sentiment, and say thanks.
Dustin, excellent point; Sophonisba, thanks for clarifying. The remark about using a crush to experiment makes a great deal of sense.
it seems to be a fantasy that I just can’t kick, and getting more tempted to act upon
Collegegrl, you need to make the decision to enjoy your fantasies as fantasies, without having to try and turn them into reality. An awful lot of fantasies only work because they are in your head.
“Rob, I think you have too narrow an understanding of seduction. Seduction can be about selfish gratification; it can also be an artful and exciting way of leading the seduced to new ways of seeing. That’s what non-sexual, intellectual seduction is all about. It has nothing to do with paying more attention to “hot” students of either sex.”
Sophonisba, I’m not pathologizing student crushes. They are normal and healthy. I’m saying that a great many of them aren’t really about romance and sex (even if the students experience them that way); they are about seeing the world through new eyes.”
Hugo reminds me of my third semester as a TA. I worked for this guy who was very stern. He told the students, “I do not teach sociology. I profess sociology. If you want a teacher, please leave now.” (He was from Germany where things were a little different because the introductory course is considered the hardest one.)
The first day, a young man raised his hands to ask a challenging question, dissing the discipline of sociology saying, “I think you’re just talking tough about a subject that isn’t that hard. It’s not even a science. I’m a physics major. That’s science.”
Well! I watched the instructor set up to seduce that young man — intellectually speaking! And that he did. In fact, by the end of the year, it was his senior year, he’d ditched the idea of becoming a physicist and was planning on going to grad school for sociology.
He and I stayed in touch and, as it happened, he’d had a crush on me since I was the substitute for he was straight and the professor was a man. It was patently obvious what was going on — and he of course had a legitmate crush on my because I also had the same passion for the discipline. It wasn’t all about his crush on a male professor, chanelled through me.
We talked about it and I tried to help him see what he was doing. He really didn’t want to date a woman 8 years his senior, packing a kid and a mangy dog. :)
UCLA is in the final four Hugo!!!!!! GO bruins! Let’s celebrate!
reminds me of what bell hooks says about eros and teaching in “teaching to transgress”. she says there is no truly good teaching without eros. she doesn’t see eros in a narrow, sexual way but puts it in an expansive context. eros is the spark, the passion, the sizzle, the excitement that comes with god teaching. alison bartlett writes about this, too - see http://www.usq.edu.au/users/bartlett/a%20passionate%20subject.htm, if you can handle/overlook the postermodern speak that these types of papers often have.
taking another tack, like so many others, of course i’ve had crushes on teachers, as well. for me it was about having crushes on father/authority figures, the same way i’d have a crush on a boss or older co-worker.
Despite being outplayed by Gonzaga for 39+ minutes. Grr. And don’t get me started on the Husky^2 game…
(Sorry, thread drift…)
Sophonisba, way upthread, made the following astute observation that rather clearly applies to me:
if a professor is really so “shy with women” outside the classroom, of how exactly he can distinguish between flirting and, well, the good old-fashioned practice of sucking up.
It’s not shyness so much as a really disfunctional radar for flirting for me. It’s a rather non-trivial problem in my social life. However, if you approach your students as a category of people whom it is entirely inappropriate to sexualize, in real or fantasy terms, it becomes entirely irrelevant. When the maybe or maybe not flirting happens, watch your boundaries closely. As long as the student doesn’t take it into the realm of the overt, which at least for me is much less common, it really doesn’t matter to me whether they’re just friendly or flirting. I’m not even curious anymore.
I think this is a good post that captures the reality of a wide swath of student crushes on teachers, but I’d be hesitant to ascribe some sort of universal theory of student crushes. Some teachers are just hot. Nuff said.
I’m thinking, DJW, about expanding this into a longer post where we create some dichotomies for student crushes; my initial thoughts may have excessively downplayed the role of perceived “hotness” of certain professors.
(I thought the officiating in the UW/UConn game was atrocious, for what it’s worth. You wuzz robbed. But I am very, very, happy to see UCLA do as well as they’ve done, especially with the lost art of defense.)
Everyone’s hot when you’ve got a crush on them.
I was talking to another professor and some graduate students about this post yesterday, and all the students (and the other profesor, for that matter) professed to have or have had crushes on professors at the school. Only one of the professors attracted attention because of his looks — the rest were all “hot” because of “their minds”. Now, there’s nothing wrong with being attracted to someone because they’re smart or confident or even because they’re good teachers — but I think there’s a minority of cases where the teacher is, against some societal standard, objectively “hot”.
By the way, if you want to see some serious blushing, simply inform students exactly how aware their professors are of the phenomena of student crushes. I don’t think it had ever occurred to many of the students I talked to!
There is, also, a reciprocal pehnomenon that few of us talk about: the crush on the student. Let me first explain what I mean by crush, here, because it’s almost explicitly not sexual. Lord knows that my sex life was awkward enough at that age–I certainly wouldn’t want to revisit it with a 15 years older body. But there are students with whom I become temporarily fascinated. Just as students there can be something intoxicating about the presence, the experience, the passion of someone at the front of the classroom, there is something similarly invigorating about the potential, the excitement, the newness of a really compelling student. I regularly develop these crushes. They’ve never grown into anything more than an occasional email correspondence after the student has gone, but the crushes do go both ways, and they more we try to divorce them from taboo sexuality (which seems to have little to do with it at all), the more we can address what they are, which is excitement about the very act of teaching and learning, personified in teachers and students who seem to embody those ideals.
but I think there’s a minority of cases where the teacher is, against some societal standard, objectively “hot”.
True, but, when you happen to be one of the youngest and fittest teachers on staff, you may attract more than your share of crushes (as well as more crushes than that same young, fit body would attract without the teaching role). There was one history teacher in my high school who was a huge magnet for girls’ crushes; he wasn’t exactly movie star good looking, but he was striking in being: a) male, b) younger than most of the other teachers, and c) possessed of a better figure than the couple of other young male teachers at the high school.
Not that even less young and fit people won’t also attract crushes if they’re in a teaching role.
Hello, I happened to stumble across this blog entry today, and I have to say that I am very glad I did– it makes me feel immensely better about my own prof. crush.
Everything you mentioned is true for me, at least, only I hadn’t been able to articulate it. I thought, “What is wrong with me? Why am I obsessing over my married, 40-something teacher, who objectively speaking isn’t even that good looking?”
It’s easy for me to think this is abnormal– none of my friends or classmates have ever told me about having such a crush. I think perhaps? we realise that the student-teacher relationship is in a way sacred, and that talking about it might call it into question– but that’s just my situation. Also, if it is as prevalent as you all say it is (which I’m sure it is), it makes me feel rather silly, and maybe will help me get over it ASAP, hah.
I have to agree with your friend Tiffany, that it’s about getting in the teachers mind. And I also agree with your use of the word “seduction”, there is definitely something very passionate and energising about a good lecture. It’s wonderful, really, a good class.
So once again, I thank you. I feel much better now. This is just a sign that I have a good, effective teacher.
I do have some nice fantasies, though….. hahaha.. Oh, the shame.
I’m glad to see an uninterested party felt the same way I did about the officiating. The wrongs can’t be righted, of course, but the fine boys of GMU took a step in that direction.
Lynn, it’s always the historians, isn’t it? ;-)
Cats and Dogma, an excellent topic for another post. I agree with you completely on the real nature of “crushes on students”… thanks for suggesting that angle.
Undergrad. enjoy the fantasies. Just don’t forget to take good notes.
Oh gosh, Hugo, this is soooo funny coming from you.
Seriously, do you think you are so highly rated at Rate My Prfoessor just because of how you teach? You ARE a good teacher, and like that professor, you do mix arrogance iwth being “self-deprecating”.
But when I was looking at you in History 1A I wasnt getting excited about Rome or the Hebrews. Hugo you were in some serious fantasies of mine.
I do believe that some girls might have crushes on you because of what you awaken in them. But some of us are just looking at you and your body and imagining all kinds of things that would make you blush.
Well, former student, if you’re saying “oh gosh”, then somethings I say in class rubbed off on you!
Dude, my gf was just like your Tiffany girl. She is in your class and says she has a “inocent crush” on you. I was pissed until she said all she really wnts is for you to pay attention to her. She told me to read this post and I have so much more respect for you now. Everyone said you were this hot teacher and it pissed me off but you seem pretty cool.
I’m taking your class this summer.
JDOGG
Really smart to start this conversation. (Me discovering it just now) I think it helps, like the one gal with the crush issue mentioned, to sort of deflate or lend a context a perspective to the one with the (sometimes vicious and painful) *crush*. You think you’re the only one and the object of your crush is the only one and this is it.
This coming from someone who, having gone to community college (and then, yes, I had fantasy issues about my teach) but have discovered and had to process other avenues of crushland which made no sense to act upon.
Myself not being a prof but a diversity counselor and LMT, it does go both ways as was touched upon. Learning, “this is it” this non-sexual closeness–joy of teaching/learning–is what we get to have and it gets to be enough and it is *good* … for me is part of growing up.
Darn. Oh well. :-)
I appreciate your clarity and integrity. And the fact that you (and others who responded) are putting it out there would help others think more clearly in those moments when it could get a little tricky.
I find it insulting when professors assume excitement about the topic, consistent eye contact, nodding in agreement & wanting to talk about the topic are about attraction to them.
I’m 37 & I’m not here for my MRS. I’ve made deep sacrifices to be here, & I want to better my life.
It really is hard as I want deeply to discuss the implications of what I’m learning, but am concerned over assumptions being made by a professor close to my age. As a result, I tend to try to avoid eye contact & talking too long to him. What a lost opportunity because maybe he can’t understand that it’s not about him!!
If I was a guy, maybe he wouldn’t assume so quickly that this was about sexual attraction.
I’m trying to figure out as a student with a crush on a former prof what my crush means and how to learn from it.
I actually went to see if it had a shot of being any more than a crush-well he’s with somebody, so he’s not “single” anyway-and he would not date a former student, either.
I do still think we have other stuff to talk about-both his field and the way he thinks as a person are still worth alot to me,
I wonder what I can learn from this-how it can make me stronger as a student and take his professionalism into account without undervaluing it because I feel like I’ve lost out.
Hard to put into words but I do still want the attention and
how do I turn this into a positive and not take it personally?
(Bu the way-I want to become a teacher on some level myself eventually-so I could really learn from this in that respect.)
OMG! I am so happy I found this thread. I am a student who had a huge crush on my professor for 2 years and as this was my last semester, I attempted to make a move on him.
I first sent some e-mails from a fake address, he thought they were from an old friend. Then I sent an e-mail saying the others were fake and that I was a former student. He responded and was nice. I then sent him an e-mail saying it was me and he never responded back to me and now I feel absolutely awful!!!!!!!!!
Why didn’t he respond back to me? After reading alot of the above, I guess maybe my crush had more to do on his intelligence and stuff as opposed to him, as I don’t really know him. But still he is soooo HOT!!
T, I think the key is to realize that it’s okay to ask for attention (in a professional setting like conference hours) from someone you admire and whose validation you’re looking for. That’s a healthy part of the student-teacher dynamic. Part of my job is affirming that kind of student need, in a professional way that observes good boundaries.
You may find the intensity of the crush diminishing as you spend time with him — it’s paradoxical, almost, but also based on the fact that these sorts of crushes have lots of projection woven into them, the sort that may diminish with time.
How do I apologise to a professor that I e-mailed and made a move on? I want it to be sincere. How long should I wait before I contact him again to say I hope he can forgive me and move on and be friends?
I’m 42yo female and recently took up a degree in Information Systems. I was happily married prior to start of degree. I developed the type of crush you mention. It had its sexual elements but nothing I would have taken further. Sadly for me, I feel it went to the lecturers head. He picked up on it and I feel manopolised the situation. He is a great teacher and teaches a subject I had intended to specialise in in my second and thrid year. I am the only female of my age group in the class. We had several tutorials and power point deliveries in which he had placed snippets of music which were inappropriate for the lecture. On some free sessions (where you can go for extra tuition outside your normal schedule) when other students left the room) he stayed behind, even though I was not working in his subject. (Generally if an assignment is due, most students attend the free sessions and work on their assignment which I did). When the other students left I carried on with my assignment but after some time the tutor concerned teased me with his keyboard. I.e. I learned typing on an old olivetti typewriter and plonk noisily out of habit. He plonked also and when I tapped at the backspace (I dont depress) he did also but forcefully. The atmosphere was awkward. Some weeks before whilst on topic, when other students left, he left shortly after saying if I needed assistance to email him. So I could not understand why he stayed in classroom that day, but I sparked up conversation out of politements and found myself in a conversation that was not tutor-student but friend to friend. He talked candidly, my body language was reflected. This guy is in his mid 50’s and would normally I would not have found him attaractive. Something developed from the power points and the confusion in free periods though. The crush turned into something sexual after delivery of two power points. I felt singled out. The music snippets were from ordinary pop songs played into a tutiorial on software development and had no relevance to the topic. Throughout those power points.
The two power points had the following songs spliced into it:
Me and Mrs Jones
Got a thing going on
we meet at the same time same place
etc etc
The song is about extra marital affairs.
Next snippet:
We got married in a fever hotter than a pepper sprout
we’ve been talking bout Jackson ever since the fire went out
A johnny cash song. What went through my mind is that he was unahppy in his marriage right off the bat. Then this song:
“My darling I, I cant get enough of your love babe
I dont know I dont know why etc etc”
Barry White…
Next One:
“We must have been stone crazy, when we thought we were just friends
cos I miss you baby
and I got those feeling again
I guess I’m all confused about you
I gotta know
I feel so in love oh baby
What can I do
I’ve been thinking about you”
London Beat is the group. Throughout the course of those power points I felt embarrassed. As much as I may have been attracted in one sense, I felt they were being played for me and I felt there was some mutual attraction. The chat and the body in synch confirmed it. The day after one of those power points I was walking from my car at 8.30-9am in the morning into campus and I saw him approaching me with sunglasses on. He said hello. I wondered what the hell was happening. I said “Hi” flustered and walked on by. That day and the next I was a complete state. I felt seually attracted but I’m married and also as an adult student I knew the complexities that could arise from anything coming of it. I.e. harmless fling and someone gets hurt. If it winds up being me, I am going to feel uncomfortable studying in his class for the next three years. Next day in his lecture I wrote on my notepad, “Scared, VERY.” He came over and jabbed at it with his finger, then sat at the side of me and logged in to the PC laughing. Since then he has lost interest, and I think it is because he was concerned I was taking the unwanted attention in a different way - i.e. harrassment. Unfortunately the innocent crush and him ignoring me had another effect, I started to crush sexually. I was so wound up inside I sent emails to him last week anonymously but he picked up who they were from. By that point I had totally lost all interest in my partner, have fallen head over heels with this tutor, and quite literally fantasized about him when with my partner sexually. It’s been hell for weeks. Think my partner must have wondered what the hell got into me as my orgasms have been off the planet. Yes, it is probably funny. I can see the funny side of everything now but have had a hell of a week being dragged in front of the dean.
From your posts about what goes on in the staffroom I’m probably the laughing stock of that also at this moment in time.
I recognise now when reading this thread and how my innocent crush has been manipulated.
It is true that I admired him greatly for his knowledge and his mind and not much else to start ith.
The emails I sent however, he chose to take them to the dean and state I was sexually harrassing him. I assume he is very angry. What I cannot understand is the interest some weeks ago, and now, this absolute hatred. Frankly just approaching me and having a rant about it would have been less humiliating and would have had the desired effect as I am a mature student not a kid.
I now feel it was all just for his ego and when he had had enough, he just spat me out. I almost got thrown off the course apart from the fact the dean is looking into matters more thoroughly now.
Just thought I’d let your know the other side of it and that your students are human beings. Dont manopolise them. I’m lucky because he has made the error of saying I have been harrassing him for two weeks past only. However, I wrote 6 weeks ago to him to let him know that I was not really taking much of his class in due to crushing out on him and most of the lecture going over my head.
What is most shocking is the way he has chosen to deal with the matter. Again I think it is ego. “Look at me, I am being crushed over and this is the extent that I need to go to to get this woman dealt to.” I feel nothing but disgust in myself for getting involved with someone who thinks only of his ego and whom does and never did have my welfare as a student in the fore. In all this I have lost feeling for my partner and am devastated. I dont think it will ever be the same again. This man could have set me straight many weeks ago.
Thank you so much for writing this entry. It impressed me to the point of making me reflect on my own teacher crush: a man with a goatee, bald spot, toothy grin, boyish charm, and a remarkable enthusiasm for his subject. I have to admit that the heightened thrill of seeing him was just as you described: rather than wanting him sexually, I needed him as a mentor. He inspired me to change my way of thinking in more ways than one, and I remain grateful to this day.
Excellent post, Hugo. I’ve had a few teacher crushes in college. While both women were very beautiful and closer to my age than most professors (I’m a non-trad student in his late 20s), it took me a while to realize my crush was non-sexual and had everything to do with the fact they cared about my work to a degree few other college professors have.
I was professor D’s student 2 years ago, and I am still in that school but will leave this year. We had a lot of in common, and I can tell obviously we like each other a lot. I went to see him often and had long conversation for many times, he was very happy to see me and we talked a lot about our private life. I am at my 30s, and he is early 40, single. He is a very attractive man to me. Once I asked him out, he refused by saying it was not a good idea. you were my student. Is there a rule that a professor can not date his former student even they both like each other? I admit have the desire for him to be my boyfriend. and I can feel he has feeling for me too. But why we can’t? Is this imoral or unethical? I don’t understand. And I feel so sad because he is really suitable for me.
Forgot to say. we start that feeling a year after he was my teacher. Any one can tell if there is a rule even he is not my teacher now, we still can not be together? I think love is no boundary, it is unfair for two people who like each other unable to develop a relationship? Just because he was my professor?
For what its worth, I have no comprehension of why a tutor or professor would feel he is at a standing in life that he is above a student that is in his age group. When fully consenting adults, it is ridiculous. It’s not as if a tutor is a man of the cloth for goodness sakes. Although it feels like your in a position of power, the only difference between the tutor and the student is your on one side of the desk, and I’m on the other. It is an insult to assume that I expect higher grades because I am interested. I thought you’d all liked to know I got A- for my assignment. I probably got E for “tutor material (as in shagability) who knows…
I dont know how I got A- this week when I have been trated like scum. I mean your tutors your not Gods. *shrugs*
I was thinking of sophonisba’s post. I stumbled onto a situation where I saw my (technical) college instructor receiving oral sex from a woman 20 years younger than him (and he saw me!!). (I had a class adjacent to his office & she would perform on him, near his window in the dark while my class was going on.) I have suspicions something went badly the last time she was in there as there was a lot of banging & thrashing around, including a desk chair being turned over. She came out with a horrified look on her face.
He then ended up as my instructor. He bragged in class about what he’d “been offered for a better grade”. I realized what I saw might’ve been related. This is the dark side of fudging boundaries with people who are profoundly vulnerable to you.
He was a huge control freak. I was nearly driven out of the program except for a disability coordinator who felt he needed to protect me from this instructor. I never told him what I saw & that this instructor had been aware of what I knew. The DC just felt I needed to be protected from this man. (I do have suspicions this instructor may have manipulated my grade at one point to try to force an “offer” out of me. He did & said some things that leave me wondering.)
I could go on for several pages about the humiliation I’ve been through. I have been torn up about it for a long time & still feel like I failed to do *SOMETHING* right enough & that it would’ve never happened if I had just behaved correctly.
I also think about a married prof in the University I’m attending. He seemed to have a crush on a student who was painfully obviously attracted to him to the point of pestering him at all hours of the day for little things, including knocking on his door several times while doing homework with me one day. This prof seems to be just a nice guy with less than ideal boundaries.
However, it brought back so many awful memories. It was so obvious that although her feelings seemed so sexual, all she wanted was to be like him. (She made comments in class about him being a prof & how important that was.) I felt such a need to confront him (& protect her) about the way he was responding to her. I didn’t..thankfully.
I just felt so pissed off that he wasn’t pushing her away more…like he was feeding his ego by her feelings. He came dressed up one day & kind of seemed to want our female attention..preening, I guess. I blew him off as that’s not my job as a student to make him feel handsome.
The power differential between student/instructor is a very odd thing. It brings all sorts of hidden things to the surface. It can be a very powerful feeling when you know a man/woman is sexually aroused because of you. It can be a short-cut to feeling safer, & thus avoid any learning of how to cope with feeling vulnerable & scared.
Maybe student (and teacher) crushes are like the Stockholm syndrome. You identify with your “captor” so you can feel more in control.
BTW, I realized after that first paragraph what a victim I see myself as!
Actually, I came out the victor. I had gone all over the state to find another program I could complete w/o starting over, & there wasn’t one. This brough the Associate Dean into the situation as I went back to finish under him as I absolutely didn’t have a better option. That tech instructor was forced to change some things that ALL students needed him to do. He still is a major pissant who has brought more than a few students to a sobbing wreck during his final, but now is being watched much more carefully by the school.
(The school still doesn’t know about the oral sex w/ student in his office. I was afraid that would be perceived as manipulative on my part to bring it up.)
Sandy, thanks for some good comments. I really like this bit:
I just felt so pissed off that he wasn’t pushing her away more…like he was feeding his ego by her feelings. He came dressed up one day & kind of seemed to want our female attention..preening, I guess. I blew him off as that’s not my job as a student to make him feel handsome.
The power differential between student/instructor is a very odd thing. It brings all sorts of hidden things to the surface. It can be a very powerful feeling when you know a man/woman is sexually aroused because of you. It can be a short-cut to feeling safer, & thus avoid any learning of how to cope with feeling vulnerable & scared.
The part I put in bold is right on. As a teacher, it’s vital that I check my own motives all the time for my clothing, my words, my behavior. If I use my students to make me feel handsome, I do them, me, and my marriage a real disservice. Another reason to loathe the chili peppers on Rate my profesors!
I wanted to add to this as well. When I was 14 I had a huge crush on my Social Studies teacher. Yes, he did pay special attention to me and he was the first male that had ever done that. I made the mistake of writing him letters and telling him how I felt. Needless to say after that, he pretty much tried to avoid me at all costs. I’m sure he was worried about losing his job. I know I wasn’t the only one who had a crush on him,(I used to hear girls talk about him in the hallway). Well its 17 years later and I have tried to talk to him about this through the years(I’d send an email once or so every couple years), but he never responded to me. Recently I found out he had cancer and I actually started a fundraiser to help raise funds for him. He did acknowledge that, but he refuses to talk to me about this other issue. How do I get him to talk to me, because I feel so unresolved and I want him to know my intentions were good and to let him know I still care very deeply about him.
Me, I feel for you here. But there are teachers/professors who even years after the fact, are going to be uncomfortable acknowledging student crushes.
What would you like him to do? Are you looking to see if a romantic relationship is possible, or would you merely like to process your feelings out loud with him? While at 31 (which I gather you are) you are certainly no longer age inappropriate, your former student status could still create a significant baoundary in his mind. You may have to accept that.
I’m not looking to start a relationship with him, but I do still care very deeply about him, and he has set the standard for the guys I tried to date in my life, although most of them didn’t hold a candle to him. I would think 17 years later I could be seen by him as an adult and we could have a mature conversation about it. It’s not like I can get called down to the office for it :)
Well, it may be worth calling him, and if that doesn’t work, writing him a letter. Is he married or with someone? If so, be mindful of his commitments and the feeling of his spouse as well.
It is interesting, isn’t it, how our early crushes set standards for us!
One other thing I may add, is that because of my letter writing I did get in trouble for it and the social worker told me that I had to pretend he was dead and I couldn’t discuss it with him. Today, that seems pretty silly to me.
I did send him an email today, once again. I will see what happens. He is now a dean.
Thanks!
I just wonder why this bothers me some 17 years later. Probably because I never got the chance to talk to him, I feel very unresolved. The fact that he has cancer also, makes you realize how fast time goes. I just hope that I am not out of line for bringing this up now.
That was beautifully written. The way you explained the crushes is the absolute way I feel. That girl, the one you had a crush on, she was right on the dot. When a teacher is passionate, its damn attractive.
Very good article Hugo. I too had a crush on one of my professors. He wasn’t one of those professors who you would say was one of the “hot” professor on campus. The article definitely makes sense why I would be attrached to this professor. I have never really gotten over the crush. While in college, I never thought about making a move on this professor. Don’t know why I never thought about it. He was my advisor and was one of the best professors I ever had.
I agree with you to a large extent regarding why any professor can become the object of a crush. But at what point does it really become something more meaningful and deeper than that? Over the last year, I have gotten to know one of my professors very well and on a very personal level. At some point during this, he stopped being “The Professor” and became an unlikely close and valuable friend. I’ve had a severe crush on his throughout this, but never flirted or made my feelings known to him in the slightest. However, calling it a crush at this point seems to cheapen what I feel for him. I know him, I know many his failings, and not just his strengths in research etc. And I’ve realized that in his humanization, I’ve come to love him.
I think student-professor relationships can be beautiful, intimate things, even if they never extend into the physical realm. Of course they often end up riding along on the thin line that separates nurture and inappropriateness. But however mine progresses, I will always look back on it as one of the more formative and meaningful relationships of my life, and no one can reduce that to silly schoolgirl desires.
I’m so glad I came across this Hugo… even if it is months after you posted it. It was good therapy for me to read this.
I would like to chime in on a warning to students (particularly older female students) about predatory male professors. I am in my mid 30’s and fell prey to an adjunct prof who was in his mid 40s. Early on this prof complemented me on my intelligence and seemed to want to engage me in conversation beyond class boundaries. About mid-way through the class, I decided to drop, and when I told him this during office hours he began to seduce me with kind words, physical closeness and inappropriate touching.
I was so shocked by his behavior I did eventually report him to the college. He used as a defense that he was having so many students drop his class, and he wanted me to stay since I was a good student. He was mildly disciplined at the time (actually simply warned not to do this again).
For the two years that followed, this prof. then sought revenge on me for reporting him. He went so far as to gain my personal information from my college records and attempted to sue me for damages to his career. He was stalking me at my home and work, and blackened my name at the college by filing a false and malicious police report (through which he also gained my driver’s license number).
Unbelievably, the college still did not fire him, until I publicly humiliated the college president and vice president at a board meeting for condoning his behavior.
Like many of the previous comments have alluded to… this professor was deeply psychologically disturbed. During the process, he described himself as shy and socially awkward; I suppose offered as some excuse for his behavior. It is not just the teenaged girls who use the student-teacher relationship to “try out” what works for them with the opposite sex.
This incident has sadly left me with an anti-social attitude towards my professors. And when a male professor now asks me to come to office hours I get nervous and upset.
Hi Hugo,
Thank you very much for this post. I am currently experiencing the most intense crush I have ever had on a professor, and it is extremely distracting, as I find myself thinking about him almost all of the time. My question to you is: do you think he knows how I feel about him? How could you tell when one of your students was crushing on you? I would be terribly embarrassed if he knew. At the same time, I’m curious to see if he’d be flattered…or disgusted. I’m not beastly, but there are certainly a lot of attractive girls in my class that he’d probably be more into. Any insight you could share would be very much appreciated.
You know, there’s no magical way a professor knows. Obviously, love notes and little gifts tend to give the game away — and there is the “googly eyes” phenomenon where a student’s gaze is so adoring that it’s hard to construe as anything other than a crush.
But frankly, it’s hard to tell whether a student is turned on by the subject or by the professor. Given that many students aren’t clear themselves which they find more arousing, it’s hardly surprising that professors can’t either.
Academics are rarely mind-readers. I think you’re probably pretty safe. And it is flattering to be the object of desire, but it’s important — as I made clear in this post — to be realistic about what that desire means, and more importantly, to be scrupulous about boundaries.
It’s unfortunate that such things as crushes can be criminalized under “sexual harassment” laws. What used to be worked out by consenting adults is now the purview of the academic inquisition.
Haha! You are the subject of quite a few student crushes, Hugo, and some of the students don’t just want to listen to you. Your popularity and your perceived sexual attractiveness are more closely linked than you would ever want to admit. Wait until you get older and gain weight and watch your evaluations fall and your popularity decline. I think you are a good teacher, Hugo, but your looks and your clothes play a part in your popularity. Deal with it.
Me, I don’t think you’re all that hot. I don’t get crushes on teachers, but if I did, it would be on someone with more meat on his bones than you, runner man.
Now this is a subject one doesn’t often see addressed, especially not in such honest and forthright terms! I am an educator myself, and, yes, I’ve experienced my share of student “crushes” but I, like you, recognize them for what they are and do not let myself get overly flattered. I also agree it’s wise to just let these things pass without encouraging further involvement.
I loved this article.. I was searching for something to put this in perspective for me and I think your article helped a lot. I’m a student with a massive crush on a professor..who is also an adjunt. Hes a great guy and is his personality that I really like and can relate with. But as your article states, he probably just is doing one hell of a job of teaching. He’s incredible at opening up our minds… and making us feel important.
After reading the article, as well as the responses, I can finally see the other side of things though. It’s hard to think of that side when your blinded by what you want.
I’m not sure what I’m going to do or what is going to happen.
But thanks.
It’s hard to think of that side when your blinded by what you want.
That’s why I wrote the piece. Been there, “lost”! Take care, and thanks for your kind words.
I’m in grad school and have a crush on one of my professors (big surprise I know). I had a crush on a professor in undergrad, but not like this one. With this guy, Dr. T, I am sexually and intellectually attracted to him. But like a lot of these posts have talked about, he is not a model looking guy, but he is sexy to me (these beautiful blue eyes). He’s not married, but he has or had(not sure)a girlfriend. He’s in his late 30’s and I’ve tried not to like him, or tell myself that its just an intellectual attraction, a sort of mentor need or something(or possibly the fact that I haven’t had sex in forever). But I am attracted to him, and I think he might be to me too. what do i do? (p.s: I just started the program this year, and have one class i’m in with him now)
Confused, the same rules apply in grad school — even more so, given the proximity we get to each other in grad programs. If your attraction is mutual, and you wish to have it go further, you both have to find a way to make sure that you are no longer in a professional relationship. And given the gossippy nature of virtually all grad programs, dating a prof — even one who is not your direct supervisor, can unfairly damage your budding professional reputation. That may not be fair, but it is a real possibility.
If the feelings are mutual, it is primarily his responsibility to make sure that you are in no way under his supervision before anything happens.
Hang in there.
thanks
This reply is probably a bit late since this topic has been posted for months now, but I’ve stumbled on this just right now so please indulge me. I think all of the explanations and stories presented by everybody are really helpful and enlightening for both students and profs.
I myself am an undergrad student who’s currently, madly infatuated with one of my former profs. I had never had any bonding or casual conversations with any of my former profs or teachers before this Prof D.. I attribute that to my, not exactly being an anti-authority, but more like an aversion to structured environment in which an authority figure is involved. To say it simply, I was never close to anyone who’s a figure of authority. Prof D was a breath of fresh air. In all of my university years, I’ve never encountered a prof who gives no due date on essays. He does have a “hypothetical due date” which means failing to hand in an essay on that date will receive no penalty at all. Needless to say, a lot of students handed in their essay on the day of the final exam. No penalty at all. His less structured style of teaching coupled with his passion and knowledge of his subject material(religion & film) are just amazing. His topic about humanity’s quest for spirituality require extensive introspection, which I still keep pondering on. I’m sure he’s a very introspective person himself to be able to develop a lesson plan like that. He changed the way I see films. Though I’ve always been passionate about films, he opened my eyes more and made me see the subtle messsages in them. i.e. extracting religious or spiritual themes in films like memento, or dogville, fight club, or royal tenenbaums, etc..
I guess what I’m trying to say from my extensive illustration, is that Hugo’s pop psychology quote that we get crushes on people whom we want to be like, is a very valid point. In my case, I value freedom-loving, unstructured, introspective, film-loving qualities in a person..by film-loving I mean someone who’s a HUGE film buff.. I’ve always been aware of those values of mine and in fact, those are what I look for in my potential partner. It amazes me to meet a person who possesses all that. His non-authoritative demeanor is precisely what attracted me to him so I guess the idea that women sometimes look for a power figure doesn’t apply to me. I heard someone said that we tend to admire a person or bestow our love upon someone whose qualities we hold dearly in ourselves. I really agree with that.
I had felt a sense of sadness when the class had finished. But I still email him and he seems to enjoy our exhanges of film knowledge. I’ve never moved past our friendly exchanges. I am actually in my late 20s now and so have gained a bit of maturity not to expect anything from these exchanges, they are merely for enjoyment and enlightenment purposes. On that note, I don’t think I can ever express my infatuation on him
yesterday i saw my crush flirting with another girl. she was really pretty and the guy i like, i have liked for two years now so i don’t want to stop liking him. it did hurt me though when i saw him flirting. what should i do?
Wow. This post is a bit dusty, but I just happened upon this blog and can’t help but reply to it.
For going on 6 years now, I’ve had an “issue” with a professor that I kept to myself. I’m sure I slurred some words about it to a girlfriend of mine when I was drunk, but aside from that, I kept it from everyone–including the professor, my fiance, and a therapist I saw for a while. Prof. A was my undergraduate advisor and was in his early 40s when I met him; I was in my early 20s. He was married, happily, I am pretty sure, with 2 kids. I was a troubled young woman and was in the early phase of figuring out who I was outside of the confines of my family home, a place where I was nobody. When I began my “career” at the university, I wasn’t a very good student. For the most part, I was an apathetic student who really didn’t try, because I was so fuc*ing depressed and had learned early on that I was stupid anyway.
A very long story short, Prof. A. came to the university a year after I transferred there and he became my advisor. I didn’t really know my old advisor and didn’t speak with any of my other professors, but there was something about Prof. A that made me want to talk to him and take classes from him. He was a quiet man and seemed thoughtful, sensitive, caring, and a bit depressed, so that’s probably why I was initially drawn to him–he was sort of an older male version of myself. I took a sociology class with him and during the semester, personal matters at home led me to make the decision to voluntarily hospitalize myself in a local psych. ward. (Bummer.) I shot an e-mail to my prof. right before I went into the hospital, and he was the only one I notified because I didn’t trust anyone else to know. He never said anything when I came back to class, but I gave him a doctor’s note so that he knew I wasn’t bsing him about missing classes. I did okay in his class (got out with a B), and decided to take another class with him. Before the next semester began, I went to his office, proceeded to beat myself up about some academic reason or another, and he told me that he thought I was smart. Nobody ever told me that before. The following semester, I began making a huge academic turnaround; instead of the crappy Cs, Ds, Fs, and rare Bs I was getting, I started making As in all of my courses and began to really love learning. I made the Dean’s list every semester, and even started tutoring for Prof. A.
I’m embarrassed to admit it here, although I doubt that anyone will even read this, but I am pretty sure I fell in love with my professor. The poor guy ended up being my go-to-guy for everything–mostly things of a personal nature. I e-mailed him novels about family issues and addiction issues (of my fiances) as they came up, and although I felt bad for leaning on him, I felt like there was nobody else in the world I could lean on. (He was always good about it and offered support when he could.) I had the feeling that I was burdening him all along and really hated myself for it, but whenever I needed to talk to someone, he was always the first person that would come to mind. Besides killing him with e-mails, I realized after a while that I had fallen into a pattern of thinking about him daily. It was disturbing because I didn’t know what was going on. For a while, I convinced myself that I had “daddy issues” and that since mine was such an abusive bastard, I was looking to Prof. A to fill a gaping emotional hole in me. That thought made me sick. It really messed me up pretty bad psychologically, partly because I wasn’t sure if I was interested in Prof. A sexually, and was ashamed at what Freudian type of thing that could mean for me if I was intersted in him that way. Eventually, I learned how to block the thought out whenever I started engaging in that heavy sort of questioning and it felt seriously threatening.
As the years passed, I kept feeling more and more for him. I didn’t keep my more innocent feelings from him, and praised the guy over and over for helping me develop both academically and personally. I told him that I loved him, and I’m sure that he understood it to be an asexual type of love. But it always bothered me not knowing what kind of love it really was. He was affectionate with me–we’d hug every once in a while, but it was always a public hug . . . in the soc. department in plain sight (I was on hugging terms with a few profs by then, both men and women), whenever we greeted each other outside of the classroom, stuff like that. But, there were some students who picked up on what I can only assume was some chemistry between us: one of my tutees asked me point blank if we were having an affair. Being asked those questions was unnerving, because I didn’t know what they were seeing, and certainly didn’t want to do anything to add to any potential rumor. I wrote Prof. A an e-mail and mentioned to him that one of his students asked me if were having an affair–he never said anything until we were at a local bar with some other students. He was attempting to embarrass me by repeating it in front of them, and one of the other female students admitted that she thought something was going on between us, too. (Enter awkward moment.) I personally think we were both flattered to think that others thought our sex lives were more exciting than they really were.
We had our share of awkward moments, but nothing was ever said about any possible attraction. We went out for drinks occasionally–always with other students, and did quite a bit of low-grade partying during my last semester. I worked on some research with him and a couple other students that last semester, so we met outside of the classroom a lot and had a BYOB policy when we met in the evenings (off campus). That semester was amazing. It was a great experience to take part in an actual research project and put into practice all of the theory, methods, and other knowledge gained over the years. I was never so happy in all of life, and never before felt so stimulated. The bitter-sweet component was that I was getting closer and closer to graduation, which I knew would be emotionally difficult. And it was.
So, I’m a gradute student now (at a different university) and still have a habit of thinking of Prof. A every now and again. I’ve done a hell of a lot of growing up since I graduated and I’ve had the opportunity to put a lot into perspective, but one thing I know for sure is that I still love him very deeply and I always will. I miss him a lot, too. We met for drinks shortly after I started grad school and had a good time, but I wish I could see him more often. I guess I keep my distance now because I know I have to move past my undergrad experiences, and because I’m afraid of finding out if there’s more to my love for him than I know. I still care for him very much and hate knowing that his students basically treat him like garbage now. I also still care what he thinks about the choices I make, and that sort of makes me feel uncomfortable; I shouldn’t think about that so much, because the reality is that he’d never judge me as harshly as I do myself, anyway.
Before I get the urge to ramble on any more or meticulously edit what I’ve already written, I’m just going to end by saying thank you, Hugo, for this *old* post. I know I’m not the first person to ever have a crush on a professor, but I’ve felt pretty guilty and confused about it for a very long time now. And so it was really nice to stumble upon your blog and see this *very popular* post.
Hugo (or Prof. Schwyzer as a student like myself would probably call you), thank you so much on your very, very, VERY insightful entry on teacher and student crushes, particularly from the professor’s viewpoint. Even though it was written almost two years ago, I see people still find it