I would like to start by saying that Professor Dimuro is a really kind professor, and it's obvious that he puts a lot of effort into this class. I think he said he even helped design the Keywords in Theory courses. When I went for help, he really did try to help. That being said, this is not an easy class. You'll read a range of difficult texts from Marx to Raymond Williams and Mathew Arnold and even Pierre Bourdieu. You'll read complex sociology papers and journals and out of all the 50 pages of reading, you'll only need to understand one or two sociology based ideas and he will try and apply that to the idea of Culture and community. There's small responses due like 4 times in a quarter, two papers, and a final. Dimuro himself is softspoken and reads off of his notes for a good portion so sometimes it's hard to stay engaged, and alot of time time class passes by with sometimes meaningless over analyzation of the concepts we're learning. This class felt more sociology based than English based. I wouldn't recommend this class if you're looking for an easy A. I was thoroughly confused most of the quarter and was honestly surprised I got a B+. You do learn some cool concepts, and Dimuro is a nice guy.

Absolutely the most difficult class I've taken at UCLA. I love lofty thinking and learning about abstract theories/ideas, but for an undergraduate student taking a class online during COVID, it was way too much. I appreciate Dimuro's attempt to make us broaden our horizons and think about literature in new ways, but he's the type of professor to always ask for more and never truly explain the reading. The class would have been received better if he was less critical of students trying to wrap their head around new ideas.