Class was a breeze. I barely did anything and got a solid A. Professor's lectures are good, and the guest speakers were interesting. The material overall is cool. Easy Upper Div English class. You definitely should take it.

Easiest class ever taken at UCLA with the nicest professor ever. Seriously, Professor Torres is so kind and passionate about what he's teaching and he's really approachable. You never have to go to lecture because the slides are always posted and the information is always common sense (but sometimes I go anyway because he's so nice that I feel bad for skipping).

We originally were supposed to have 1 group project due week 8ish, 1 individual paper due week 10, and a take-home final. The professor ended up shifting the group project due date to week 10 and canceling the individual paper. The take-home final is ridiculously easy and is more reflective (how did this class affect you, etc) than information-based.

***SELLING "Keywords for American Cultures" 2nd Edition for $25, lightly annotated in 2-3 pages! TEXT @ *************

Professor PT is a godsend. First, he is the kindest professor in the world. He absolutely fosters a positive learning environment. He always answers questions, asks for clarification, and makes sure the class is focused to his lectures by simply asking if we are comfy. He edits work as its given and makes sure there is no extraneous work being put on us. To the actual dirty part of the review, we did have guest lecturers throughout the course discussing different topics (we discussed things past literature, like film and music [this class was not like a typical English class and focused more on approaching race than race in literature]) that occasionally made lecture long and boring.

The final was a take-home final of 500-700 word responses to two questions. There is one group project (which was the only assignment) where you discussed any racial topic of your liking. He also lets you rate your group members at the end so you can say who sucked. If there were any negatives to this class, it could be the group project (because sucky members), certain boring guest lecturers, and readings.

In terms of a textbook, he asks for one actual book and a textbook ($8 or $30, respectively). Both are pretty low reads (the book is 132 pages total but a really easy read and the textbook readings are 5 pages tops). The longest readings are the excerpts/PDFs posted on CCLE, which can be 8-48 pages.

In all honesty, TAKE THIS CLASS. It is the best thing I've ever done.