This was honestly a pretty fun GE. Although the class itself may initially seem like a time sink (2 lectures, 1 discussion, multiple "required" readings, 1 film, and 1 response paper per week), many of these things are actually optional. Professor Hanscom is very knowledgeable and his prerecorded lectures are interesting enough(at least the analysis part), but you do not have to watch them at all to do well in the class. The same goes with the required reading. As long as you know how to write and identify key elements in a film, you will do well in the class. The 3 long essays that replace midterms and finals aren't even that long(750-1000), and you can easily get 95+ on them.

Do not buy the textbook. It was expensive and not at all necessary to do well in the class.

Professor Hanscom is very passionate about what he teaches. Here's a couple things I'll say after having taken his class:

The workload/homework load is pretty light. Every week, you have to watch a movie and read a short article about that movie. I would usually just skim the first page of the article though, and it worked out fine.

The test can be difficult if you don't prepare accordingly. His midterm and final exams consist of 3 parts: a film identification section, an SAQ section, and an essay question. The film identification is easy---he gives you some passage from the film and you spit out the name of the film, director, and year. The essay question is easy too since he gives you the prompts in advance. The hardest part is probably the SAQ section since it will ask about basically anything from the lectures, but if you attend lectures and study the lecture notes, you will be fine.

The lectures are very dense. The slides are like text walls, but there are usually 1-2 SAQs on the midterm or final that ask about some random detail on the slides. Would highly recommend typing all your notes to get everything down in time.

SELLING THE TEXTBOOK - "Rediscovering Korean Cinema"! I have a physical copy with only a few notes/highlights in it. Text me at ********** if interested.
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Professor Hanscom was really great! His lectures were really engaging, especially if you had done some of the reading beforehand. There is quite a bit of reading, and you honestly don't need to read everything to do well on the response papers and essays. Of all the readings, I would say the chapters of Rediscovering Korean Cinema are the most useful. and WATCH THE FILMS! They are so good and will make the class so much easier and the lectures more engaging. Plus what better homework than watching a movie.

Kim was a fairly difficult TA, but left good feedback on papers ig. Discussion was usually helpful if everyone in your sections watched the films.

Overall recommend this as an average GE!

My first quarter at UCLA was made that much better by taking a class with Professor Hanscom. Not only is he passionate about what he teaches, but extremely friendly and approachable. Going to his office hours is suggested, as he's willing to look over the group project or final paper before either are due. He'll happily let you know if you're headed in the right direction and offer advice/tips for proceeding. There's a decent amount of reading for this class, but you know what you're getting into by enrolling in any literature-based course. There are written assignments that coincide with each reading, along with presentations (at least once per quarter) and a final paper. You're made aware of this at the beginning and given ample time to prepare. English majors taking this as a "foreign literature in translation" course will likely find this to be light work!

Taking this class was totally worth it. I initially took this class while feeling a little nervous about whether this class would be difficult or if the professor would be very strict, however, after experiencing the class and meeting the professor in person, all of my concerns were for nothing. The lectures were engaging and fun and one could tell how enthusiastic the professor is when he talks about Korean literature. From my experience when talking to him in person, he was nice, fair, and helpful when asking for help or advice. He also replies back very quickly with helpful feedback through email after class. One should also keep in mind that this class also consists of weekly presentations until the end of the quarter and every student will have to do one at least once. There were also weekly discussions that must be done before that week's first or second lecture begins, depending on the amount of reading that is required. There was also a seminar paper (10~12 pages) that is half of your entire total grades but it has to be submitted by the end of the quarter. I had a great and fun time and experience while taking this class and would take another class with this professor when given the chance.

Professor Hanscom is a very passionate professor of Korean films. Lecture was mainly him providing key important elements of the films for the week including themes, patterns, and cinematic elements. The class was graded based on weekly film reviews that were solely graded by the TA (all of the grading is based on the TA, so hope you get a good TA to do your grading) as well as two essays and a final essay. The essays included being focused on one film, a comparative essay based on two films, and the final essay being on a Korean film not covered in class. Thinking watching a film each week would be time-consuming but not necessarily and completely doable. What helped me was taking notes on the film based on the discussion prompt for the week. Participation is really important in the discussion (graded) as you have to respond to people that are selected to present during that section.

Professor Hanscom was a bit disorganized in his lectures and often went off on unrelated tangents. However, if you are interested in Korean cinema or popular culture, I'd say this class is worth a shot! You have to watch a movie and then write a response paper each week. There are two big response papers in lieu of exams. I liked this because you have time to work on them and can also get help from your TA and professor.

In my discussion, my TA made everyone speak a certain number of times and he kept track how much everyone spoke to count it towards the participation grade. This was a bit annoying.

Overall, I think was a nice medium difficulty GE. You get to learn a lot about Korean history starting from the Japanese colonial period to current issues by watching movies every week.

List of films watched during my quarter: Age of Shadows, Spring on the Peninsula, A Stray Bullet, Sopyonje, Peppermint Candy, Secret Sunshine, I'm a Cyborg but thats OK, Train to Busan, Welcome to Dongmakgol.

Prof. Hanscom is by far the best professor that I have at UCLA .

His Korea C151 class is FANTASTIC. The class materials, readings, and powerpoint slides are splendid.

If you read all required readings before each class, you will learn that it is a blessing to be able to go to a class taught by someone who masters the subject and cares about the materials in great details.

Prof. Hanscom is very approachable, extremely smart, funny, and willing to help students.
This class will offer you an invaluable chance to develop a sophisticated taste for Modern Korean Fiction from authors such as Yi Kwangsu, Hwang Sok-yong, Cho Se-hui, Kim Yong-ha, Pak Mingyu, and many more.

The class ends a while ago, but I often think of T. H. White's passage " still the light of memory weaves" that Prof. Hanscom introduced during one of the classes.
Highly recommend this class to anyone who loves literature or cares to "learn from one of the best UCLA professors" before graduation.

This class was definitely a lot of readings, but they were very interesting. Before coming into this class, I really hated readings. But the readings in this class made me think more deeply and I now have the desire to read more. Professor Hanscom is also very very knowledgable, nice and approachable. His language ability impressed me.
In terms of the class itself, you write weekly posts answering one question regarding the readings you did. Have one midterm on materials covered roughly in week 1-5 and a final paper. As long as you do the readings and listen in class, the midterm was not that tough. I really liked this class despite the amount of readings assigned and I would definitely try to take more classes with this professor in the future.

This class has some really interesting Korean movies ranging from the 1940s to 2010s and allows me to learn more about Korean society/culture/history, ranging from the colonization era to Korean War, and even to events such as the Gwanju massacre/uprising and the globalization of Korea.

Every week there are two asynchronous lectures of 40ish mins and a movie, as well as readings regarding the film to read at your own pace, which I find to be a plus, as I can absorb some of the concepts at my own pace.

The readings, lectures, and movies were accessible to me, and overall the ideas that Professor Hanscom talked about were very interesting and insightful into learning about Korean cinema as a whole.

The assignments are manageable: One page (well, 250 word) response papers to a certain prompt regarding the movie every week, with three "bigger" but still manageable (1000 word) writing assignments; a film analysis paper, a comparison paper between a short story and its film adaptation, and a film review of a Korean movie not listed in the syllabus (picking one was really hard because there are so many good Korean movies!).

For the discussion section, there is only one assignment where you do a group project with 2 other people which you sign up for a specific week, making a Google Slides presentation to discuss the film with the discussion section, which is manageable as well, though watch out for triple weeks, in which the Writing assignment, weekly response paper and group presentation are all due.

If you've read the Bruinwalk reviews, I'm not sure why people say professor Hanscom gives unnecessary tangents. Maybe it might be because sometimes the lectures are not directly related to the weekly response paper assignments/writing assignments, such as when Professor Hanscom is talking about historical or demographic changes, but I find that to be a plus, as I can have more leeway into choosing whether I can include the historical evidence in my arguments, and sometimes I do use the historical evidence. I like how Professor Hanscom does not force a particular approach/ interpretation of a movie and doesn't require us to strictly use the readings in our homework.

If you're a cinephile and like to watch a movie (sometimes 2 hours) every week, or if you are interested in Korean culture/society/history in general, or both, take this class!