She is a very kind professor with a welcoming energy. However, I did not find this to be an easy GE. You have to watch long movies in Yiddish (with English subtitles) which took up a lot of time. The weekly quizzes were very detailed. I ended up having to take it P/NP, as it was becoming too stressful for no reason... If you are patient and eager to learn about Yiddish film then this could totally be the class for you! But I wouldn't necessarily call Yiddish10 an 'easy'' GE.

I took this class because there weren't many GE's left to take, but I honestly would recommend it if you're looking for a low commitment class. Lecture was 2 hours and 50 minutes long, but only once a week. The homework included assigned readings and 2 films each week, but the readings felt optional as we never discussed them in class. It was difficult to motivate myself to watch the films, as most of them were in Yiddish with English subtitles and sometimes slow, but watching them in 2x speed with a classmate can make it easier. Grades were made up of 20% quizzes, 20% participation, 20% papers, 20% oral presentation, and 20% final. There were 4 quizzes total that were all under 10 questions and not difficult if you just paid attention while watching the previous week's films and took notes on the previous lecture. I'm almost positive she ended up giving everyone 100% for participation. There were two papers that were only 1.5 pages long and graded leniently. The oral presentation was a 10 minute slideshow about one of the topics she provides. The final was open-note, including two short essays and 45 multiple choice. Overall, I believe the professor cares more about your understanding of Yiddish cinema and culture rather than harshly grading. Because I felt it was a low stress class, I enjoyed learning about Yiddish history more and retained more information from the class. As long as you complete the basic requirements, you'll get at least a B.

Don't take this class, you must be desperate to even consider it. It's easy enough but still. You can probably find worse, but you can find soooooo much better. Professor Koral is nice, but don't take this class unless you love dry lectures about 18 year old girls marrying 47 year old men for money.

I would say overall this class was worth it, meaning I dont regret it. Class was boring, but the material is engaging. I would say you will definitely enjoy the class more if you are jewish/ know jewish culture. Papers were annoying but not hard and quizzes were fine. Cool class and you learn a lot of interesting stuff

this class was anti-climatic in a way. although i did enjoy learning yiddish culture in film, i felt like there was unnecessary stress for no reason. movies range from 1.5 to 3.5 hours and there were a few readings. i did not do many of the readings but they certainly do help with the essay. for spring 2022, this is the grade layout:
10% oral presentation
20% papers (there were 2 papers)
20% quiz (4 quizzes)
20% final
30% participation
yes, this ge does have a lot of participation credit, however, if you screw up on one quiz, say bye-bye to a whole letter grade. the quiz and final were relatively straightforward, however, some questions are focused more on minor details (agree to disagree). she did have some issues replying to emails for whatever reason but did not take responsibility for it so if you have questions during class, it's best to ask during class and not over email. participation is important because she does take attendance. the good thing about this class is that it's once a week but it's for 3 hours so pick your poison. the final was mid ngl. it was talking a lot about the playwrights and producers and not too much about the film itself so make sure to pay attention in class for that. also in the class, sometimes she goes over the slides too fcking fast bro like i couldn't finish taking notes off of it. and no, she did not post the slides on canvas either just because she didn't want to (although many students asked her to). best if you take pics of the slides during class on the down low since she doesn't like students using electronics while she's talking. The nice thing was that i had an 88% in the class but she was kind enough to boost it up to an A-. idk how she did it or why she did but hey, an A- is better than a B+. If you truly love watching films, especially in black and white for the majority of the time, I would recommend this class!

I recommend taking this class if you want a low-stress GE. However, the workload isn't exactly "light" but it is very much doable and more time consuming rather than difficult.

Lecture:
3hr lecture w/ camera on that takes once a week with no discussion. The lecture is more discussion based rather than note-based. I recommend taking notes bc the slide material appears on quizzes and the final. The class is very long and zoom fatigue is veryy real but the material is pretty interesting.

Workload:
Most weeks you'll watch 1-2 Yiddish films were are 1-3 hours long EACH. If you watch them in 1.5x it shouldn't be too bad since most films are easy to follow. There's also a good amount of reading which I recommend skimming and taking some notes. There's 3 short papers which were all less than 2 pages are graded very fairly as long as you show evidence that you watch the films and did the readings.

Quizzes/Midterm/Final:
3-4 quizzes which are pretty easy as long as you pay attention. A good thing about this class is that there's NO MIDTERM. The final consists of a final exam and take-home final which aren't bad at all.

I am not artistically minded, and because of that I always felt out of place here. You will have to take quizzes most weeks about the movies you watched and articles or chapters you read for that week's class. However, Professor Koral is very nice and easy to talk to about the material.

Be prepared to contribute to detailed artistic discussions of old Yiddish films (mostly silent). I wasn't, so I took it P/NP.

Professor Koral is so sweet and obviously cares a ton about the course material. I (having little to no experience with either Yiddish or Jewish culture in the past) learned a ton and found the class quite fun!

Watching the films did feel quite tedious at times, as there was often 3-4 hours worth to watch each week. It was honestly more work than I thought it would be, especially because I took notes on all of the films (plot points, dialogue, etc.). However, the notes really came in handy for the essays and discussion in class.

Also, there were quite a lot of weekly readings, but I usually skimmed the history-heavy ones and did fine. There were a couple of stories/plays to read, and I read those more carefully and took notes (which I think paid off).

The grading scale was like this:
30% class participation
30% papers (3 of them)
20% quizzes
20% take-home final

I'm pretty sure almost everyone got the full class participation grade. The class each week is basically completely discussion-based, with tons of opportunities to speak your thoughts about if you enjoyed the week's film or other points. I'd say if you speak up once or twice each class you should be fine.

I thought the papers were pretty leniently graded. As long as you show that you really watched the films, thought about the essay prompt, and responded to the questions in the prompt your grade should be ok. She also really cares about things like grammar/spelling, so run your essay through a grammar checker or friend to double check that things are good. I'm not the best writer (I'm south campus major with rusty writing skills) but I did pretty well on the essays.

The quizzes were probably the hardest part about the class, as there were often pretty specific questions from the slides in class or details about the films. Each quiz was ~10 minutes, and was comprised of 6–8ish multiple choice questions. I highly recommend you take notes on the slides as she goes through them (especially numbers or lists of facts, as some questions are directly taken from points on the slides), and taking notes on the films also helps a lot.

The take-home final wasn't bad at all IMO. There was an essay portion consisting of two short-response questions, each 1/2 page max. Our questions were more or less about what you got out of the class, and the questions were released at the beginning of finals week (and graded super leniently). The other part was 30(I think?) multiple choice questions, mostly asking about facts from the movies or general questions about Yiddish culture. They were pretty basic (especially if you took notes on the films) and there was plenty of time to finish them.

Overall this class was more work than I expected, but the work was more on the tedious side than difficult. It was an interesting class and some of the films were really enjoyable.

Such a wonderful and kind professor. I read the other bruin walk reviews and I must confirm them. Professor Koral is very sweet and really wants her students to learn instead of just trying to earn a grade. Her thoughts are clear and her passion shines through.
The films are enjoyable, but the readings at times can be long.
Easy GE if you're taking a heavy workload. If you have the chance, take her class. Enjoy.

This class was pretty dope, especially for someone with an eastern-european Jewish background who was looking to learn more about Yiddish culture (most people in this class aren't Jewish though so don't think you'll stand out if you aren't). Films were solidly interesting and Miri really knows her stuff. You do have to put some time in and watch a movie once a week though (beyond the ones you watch in class) which is like 2-3 hours. I wouldn't say it's an easy A but if you put the basic time in it's a pretty sure bet.