Professor
Bryant Kirkland
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Most Helpful Review
Fall 2019 - Firstly, Kirkland is a great professor. His lectures are very theatrical and he makes them very interesting. You can tell the dude is really passionate about what he's teaching and genuinely cares. That being said, I never actually found the content of this class to be especially interesting (it mostly covers technical, mundane stuff like the architecture/ size of ancient buildings, memorizing Greek words, describing pottery etc.). Also, it seemed like everyone who took this class seemed to have an extreme interest in this stuff and a pretty solid background knowledge. I was kind of taken aback by this as this is supposed to be an intro course, and other people I talked to felt the same way. The professor and my TA would casually through around references to the Iliad, Odyssey, or Plato or something and and most people would nod in agreement, or entire discussions would be based on them and I'd get lost (I've read the Percy Jackson books and that's kinda it for my background knowledge). The lectures are also pretty fast paced, and he uses a very complex, academic vernacular, which made it hard to take notes on his slides. So overall, my main qualm with the class was it seemed like it wasn't very introductory or accessible, as it seemed like a lot of students in the class (or maybe more like a few, outspoken students) had a lot of background knowledge, and that the TAs and the Professor would cater to those students and assume everyone knew everything, rather than describing in plain terms who Penelope was, what the Parthenon was etc. That being said, the class is manageable. My TA was a fairly easy grader and the two papers weren't too difficult. Both the mid term and the final were purely based on you ability to memorize passages, pictures, and define words-- so if you study a few nights and advance you should do well on them (I'd recommend using quizelts and taking notes on his slides to study). Workload wasn't terrible. You can get away with not reading the textbook (McInerny, about 3 chapters per week), but you should read the weekly short (usually not-so-short) stories for section. If you can't understand them or if you're in a time crunch you can use spark notes for most of them.
Fall 2019 - Firstly, Kirkland is a great professor. His lectures are very theatrical and he makes them very interesting. You can tell the dude is really passionate about what he's teaching and genuinely cares. That being said, I never actually found the content of this class to be especially interesting (it mostly covers technical, mundane stuff like the architecture/ size of ancient buildings, memorizing Greek words, describing pottery etc.). Also, it seemed like everyone who took this class seemed to have an extreme interest in this stuff and a pretty solid background knowledge. I was kind of taken aback by this as this is supposed to be an intro course, and other people I talked to felt the same way. The professor and my TA would casually through around references to the Iliad, Odyssey, or Plato or something and and most people would nod in agreement, or entire discussions would be based on them and I'd get lost (I've read the Percy Jackson books and that's kinda it for my background knowledge). The lectures are also pretty fast paced, and he uses a very complex, academic vernacular, which made it hard to take notes on his slides. So overall, my main qualm with the class was it seemed like it wasn't very introductory or accessible, as it seemed like a lot of students in the class (or maybe more like a few, outspoken students) had a lot of background knowledge, and that the TAs and the Professor would cater to those students and assume everyone knew everything, rather than describing in plain terms who Penelope was, what the Parthenon was etc. That being said, the class is manageable. My TA was a fairly easy grader and the two papers weren't too difficult. Both the mid term and the final were purely based on you ability to memorize passages, pictures, and define words-- so if you study a few nights and advance you should do well on them (I'd recommend using quizelts and taking notes on his slides to study). Workload wasn't terrible. You can get away with not reading the textbook (McInerny, about 3 chapters per week), but you should read the weekly short (usually not-so-short) stories for section. If you can't understand them or if you're in a time crunch you can use spark notes for most of them.
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