FRNCH 16
Society And Self in Early Modern France
Description: Lecture, three hours; discussion, one hour. Role of religion, politics, and sociability in constructing self and understanding its relation with society in early modern France. Development of students' critical thought and knowledge of French and European intellectual tradition. P/NP or letter grading.
Units: 5.0
Units: 5.0
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Most Helpful Review
Spring 2017 - Before taking this class I read review about this professor that said something along the lines of "avoid this class like the plague." I disregarded this advice and now regret everything. Melzer likes to use word documents instead of slides to present her information and it pretty much turns the class into a cluster f*ck. Her presentations are simply multiple pages of fragmented thoughts that you have to piece together in your essays. She will say she will post the notes, but will only do so a few days before a paper is due. If you are looking for an easy GE without much workload, this class is not for you. You write SIX essays each three or four pages. She gives the prompt a week in advance, but by the time you decipher what she actually wants you to write you have about 4 days. Each prompt gives you two essays to write. So effectively you have about 4 days to write two essays about two very different topics. You do this three times and by the third time you start to question your will to live. The only thing that held this class together were the TA's and wishful thinking. Combine the disorientating presentations, the ditsy professor, frustrating essays and you get French 16.
Spring 2017 - Before taking this class I read review about this professor that said something along the lines of "avoid this class like the plague." I disregarded this advice and now regret everything. Melzer likes to use word documents instead of slides to present her information and it pretty much turns the class into a cluster f*ck. Her presentations are simply multiple pages of fragmented thoughts that you have to piece together in your essays. She will say she will post the notes, but will only do so a few days before a paper is due. If you are looking for an easy GE without much workload, this class is not for you. You write SIX essays each three or four pages. She gives the prompt a week in advance, but by the time you decipher what she actually wants you to write you have about 4 days. Each prompt gives you two essays to write. So effectively you have about 4 days to write two essays about two very different topics. You do this three times and by the third time you start to question your will to live. The only thing that held this class together were the TA's and wishful thinking. Combine the disorientating presentations, the ditsy professor, frustrating essays and you get French 16.
AD
Most Helpful Review
Winter 2019 - Her main goal is to really engage the students taking the class. She will always ask for students to speak up about their thoughts and how their thoughts compare to previous reading in order to build upon what you learned. This is NOT a memorization course and nice GE to take. When I took this class we had ~1 midterm, 1 final (Bluebook required) ~1 Group presentation based upon a reading given ~2 Forum posts about 1000 words (Totally doable!) No discussion which is nice since the discussion is mostly done in class. Be mindful that she does tend to be unorganized but this class is by no means difficult. I didn't do like 80% of the reading because they were pretty long, but by paying attention during the lecture you will understand the main ideas and subideas as well. Pros: She's pretty witty and adorable in her own way. Don't take her criticism too harshly, she just wants to better her students understanding. She dresses pretty cute too which is always nice. The books for the class are interesting and would I recommend reading those! **For exams there are Passage identifications but are quotes that stand out and have been discussed in class. (She won't pick a random quote from the reading without having discussed them before.)
Winter 2019 - Her main goal is to really engage the students taking the class. She will always ask for students to speak up about their thoughts and how their thoughts compare to previous reading in order to build upon what you learned. This is NOT a memorization course and nice GE to take. When I took this class we had ~1 midterm, 1 final (Bluebook required) ~1 Group presentation based upon a reading given ~2 Forum posts about 1000 words (Totally doable!) No discussion which is nice since the discussion is mostly done in class. Be mindful that she does tend to be unorganized but this class is by no means difficult. I didn't do like 80% of the reading because they were pretty long, but by paying attention during the lecture you will understand the main ideas and subideas as well. Pros: She's pretty witty and adorable in her own way. Don't take her criticism too harshly, she just wants to better her students understanding. She dresses pretty cute too which is always nice. The books for the class are interesting and would I recommend reading those! **For exams there are Passage identifications but are quotes that stand out and have been discussed in class. (She won't pick a random quote from the reading without having discussed them before.)
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