Genre and Sub Genre: Verbal Folklore, Horror Stories
Language: English
Country where Item is from: United States
Informant Data: Matthew Kang is a Dartmouth ’18 double majoring in Economics and Math. He’s from Tallahassee, Florida where his father is a chemist and his mother is a computer scientist; they both work for the Department of Environmental Protection. On campus, he is a staff writer and editor for the Dartmouth Business Journal, a member of Dartmouth Model United Nations, and a member of the Zeta Psi fraternity. After college, Matthew is interested in finance or potentially working for a startup.
Social Context: Matthew was interviewed one-on-one in a study room in McLaughlin. He participated in corporate recruiting during the Summer and Fall 2016 terms.
Cultural Context: Resume drops are a vital aspect of the corporate recruiting process and are standard for every job or internship. When submitting resumes, students implicitly agree to represent themselves fairly and accurately, but occasionally students exaggerate certain experiences or skills they have.
Item: Matthew recounted a story he heard regarding a fellow Dartmouth student’s on-campus interview. The student had taken some French courses at Dartmouth and on his resume had stated that he was fluent in French. During one of his interviews, the student got an interviewer who happened to be a native French speaker. The interviewer ended up asking him some of the interview questions in French and unfortunately his French wasn’t as good as he thought it was. He was unable to properly respond and ultimately did not get that internship offer.
Associated file (a video, audio, or image file):
Transcript of Associated File: “One of my friends actually put that they were proficient in French on their resume. And it turns out that the interviewer was a native French speaker, so they conducted some of the interview in French. It turned out that my friend’s French wasn’t as good as he thought it was, so it went south pretty fast.”
Informant’s Comments: N/A
Collector’s Comments: N/A
Collector’s Name: Sachin Vadodaria
Tags/Keywords: Verbal Lore, Horror Stories, Corporate Recruiting