Ah, the arrival of a new school year means the arrival of a new cohort of graduate students unsure of what they are should call the professors in their new department, which means a new round of people referring to me as "Dr. Freese" or "Professor Freese". Since people insist on pronouncing my last name like it rhymes with knees instead of niece, Doctor Freese makes me sound like some kind of comic-book villian who slays victims with his icy death ray. For (a) this reason, (b) a general aversion to honorifics of any sort, and (c) an especial aversion to anything that seems to exult the Ph.D. well beyond what it deserves, I prefer to be called "Jeremy" not just by graduate students but by undergraduates as well. I suppose I would even prefer "Hey Teacher" or "Yo, Teach" if it came to that.
My dissertation advisor asserted that as I got older I would be less comfortable with undergraduate students calling me by my first name. I'm curious myself as to whether that would happen.
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