The good news: 1) You'll probably get an A in any class she teaches, (I took 20 and 2D and was happy with the results). 2) She often brings her bulldog, Norton von Snorten, to lecture with her and lets him scoot up and down the aisles at will. Sit on the end of your row and it'll pretty much make your day. 3)The midterm and final are both cake, moderate memorization skills required. 4) She podcasts her lectures for your convenience when you're studying the night before the midterm and final. This means you can do whatever tickles your fancy in lecture: facebook, doodles, slumber, writing anonymous love letters to her (she's kind of a fox).

The bad news: 1) You must attend lecture. Well, sort of. She gives "attendance quizzes" which are comprised of writing your name on a piece of paper or checking in with your TA. Look at it this way, it's a hassle free portion of your grade. 2) I'm not a huge fan of her lecture style and you probably won't be either. 3) Your level of enjoyment and possibly your grade depend heavily on your TA. I had a good one and then a bad one, and it made a world of difference. 4) 2-hour long discussions once a week. WTF? Unnecessary. A good TA will let you go early...
That's all I got! Peace!

History 2D:

This is one of those classes that you either love, or hate, but there's no middle ground. Personally, I LOVED it! Seriously, it was one of the best classes I've ever taken at UCLA. Even though I loved it, other people I know hated it. The subject matter wasn't easy, but it's so interesting that it's not hard to learn. Also, she gives you a study guide with everything listed out for you a week in advance. Other history classes are not like that at all-- in my world history class, we just got handed 3 focus questions and were told to write some essays. Professor Raia's study guides are way better! Professor Raia is such a poised instructor, who really cares about what she's teaching. She's passionate about the topic, and is a great lecturer who knows her stuff. Seriously, she's the kind of person you would NOT want to take on in a debate, because she's very articulate, and draws on facts that she just pulls out of nowhere! We learned about some of the most famous thinkers in history, and their involvement with the occult (hermeticism, emmanationist ideas, and more than you'd ever believe). We also studied the development of different religious sects, and the tenuous relationship between science, magic, and religion. The main point of the class was that Science, Magic, and Religion struggle for power over the public sphere. Religion used the be institutionalized (educationally, governmentally), but now science has started to take over, pushing religion to the private sphere (mostly). And magic has always been there, but was pushed aside by religion (all though today it's still very much alive). If hypnotism, religious sects, historical figures interested in the occult, hermeticism, techno pagans, and scientific investigation of the paranormal, doesn't interest you then don't take this class! I'm a pretty artistic north campus person who's very spiritual, and I loved that this stuff was approached from an objective academic perspective. People who were more south campus science-types didn't seem to like it as much. . .