I was in the 9 person Honors class about Ethiopia, Mali, and Kongo. I disagree with a lot of the things that the other person said.

Readings: yes there was too much and much of it wasn't too great. But I thought it was absolutely relevant to what we discussed in class/assignments

Workload: a few short papers that she graded very lightly imo. A 5 page and 10 page paper- 5 pager on a presentation we did in class. You had to talk, but if you did the readings it wasnt difficult to say something. No midterm, final was big essays on topics she gave us. Yah, it was a review of sorts, I dont see what people are complaining about. No one had much valid original thought to produce on African culture...

Lecturing: Very monotone, but rather interesting. It was all over the place as was the class, I think mostly bc she rightly assumed we didnt know much about African history.

Overall, it was a better class than I expected. It was rather academic, not in the sense that we had to do abstruse work (more busy work actually), but in the readings and topics. It gave me a perspective on Africa that I didnt have before. Dont fear taking her if ull do some work and swallow your pride

This is the only class I've taken at UCLA that I truly wish I hadn't. Prof. Strother simply cannot teach no matter how hard she tries. Her communication skills are indeed "abysmal" and I'm not sure she cares. She delights in all-girls-high- school activities that are not only silly, they have nothing to do with the subject matter. Her classes are not difficult, but she assigns a ridiculous amount of reading, does almost nothing she says she is going to do and never directly answers questions. When she answers whatever it is she perceives is being asked, the answer has nothing to do with what the student was talking about. Her comments on papers and assignments are useless, unclear and sometimes inane. She seems to try very hard to look for things to grade down on. She has a paper and final. The final in this class was excessively long and consisted of things we repeatedly discussed (in a very small class).
I try always in reviews to state good and bad points, but this one is tough. Strother clearly has an amazing knowledge of African art. It's a shame that she can't communicate it. I wanted very badly to learn about African art,but this class was a huge disappointment. At best she is mildly interesting on some days. Most honors classes have wait lists. This one had about 8 or 9 people in it. I strongly advise against it. Perhaps she is passably decent in her regular classes.