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Allen165

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"I wrote my thesis with Prof. X."

When you read that sentence, do you think the professor was involved in the writing? Or do you understand it to mean that the professor merely supervised the thesis?

I'm looking for a translation of the following sentence in German:

Ich habe meine These bei Prof. X geschrieben.

It means that Prof. X is the person under whose supervision I wrote the thesis. A friend of mine tells me that "bei" should be translated with "with," but I think you have to write something along the lines of "I wrote my thesis under the supervision of Prof. X."

Thanks.
 

Raymott

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"I wrote my thesis with Prof. X."

When you read that sentence, do you think the professor was involved in the writing? Or do you understand it to mean that the professor merely supervised the thesis?

I'm looking for a translation of the following sentence in German:

Ich habe meine These bei Prof. X geschrieben.

It means that Prof. X is the person under whose supervision I wrote the thesis. A friend of mine tells me that "bei" should be translated with "with," but I think you have to write something along the lines of "I wrote my thesis under the supervision of Prof. X."

Thanks.
There's no literal translation. Your last line is correct. Here are some alternatives:
Prof. X supervised my thesis.
Prof. X supervised the writing of my thesis.
Prof. X was the supervisor for my thesis.
My thesis was supervised by Prof. X.
 

Allen165

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There's no literal translation. Your last line is correct. Here are some alternatives:
Prof. X supervised my thesis.
Prof. X supervised the writing of my thesis.
Prof. X was the supervisor for my thesis.
My thesis was supervised by Prof. X.

How about simply writing "I wrote my thesis under Prof. X."? It sounds fine to me.

Thanks.
 

Raymott

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How about simply writing "I wrote my thesis under Prof. X."? It sounds fine to me.

Thanks.
You could. There are those amongst us who would read certain sexual connotations into that phrasing. Not me, of course! - but it is a known problem of using that construction.
You would get comments such as "Well, that's one way to get a good mark!"

You could say "under the guidance/supervision of Prof. X".
 

Allen165

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You could. There are those amongst us who would read certain sexual connotations into that phrasing. Not me, of course! - but it is a known problem of using that construction.
You would get comments such as "Well, that's one way to get a good mark!"

You could say "under the guidance/supervision of Prof. X".

I think I can live with such a (mis)interpretation. "Under the guidance/supervision" sounds too formal to me.

Thanks.
 
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