Hi,

My prospective supervisor is a "reader" at the department. What does it mean? He has got a Dr. title, so does "reader" correspond sth like assistant professor?

In UK universities, the academic hierarchy goes something like:

undergraduate student-->postgraduate student-->postdoctoral researcher-->junior lecturer-->lecturer-->senior lecturer-->reader-->professor

So he's not an assistant prof as such (that's an American thing where practically everyone in academia who isn't a student is some kind of prof ) but he's fairly high up the academic ladder.

I'm curious, what do you mean by 'sth'?

Does a reader usually have research assistants? or rıght to hire a research assisstant? Compared to US is it harder in UK to find research assistantships in Humanities?

sth=something...an assistant professor..

Humanities is not my field so I cannot comment.

Any academic with the funding and a decent project (approved by research degrees committee as appropriate for a research degree) can employ a research assistant.

That would make him a member of the BPI - the British Pornographic Industry.

hey..dont talk about my supervisor like that..

Or does he study the 'New breed of secret agent'?

Any lecturer at whatever level can apply for a research assistant, but they usually have to get funding themsleves for a project and ask the University to approve it out of that funding