Aslanian is an excellent instructor. Through 10 weeks, he covers an extraordinary amount of material, never sacrificing depth for breadth. Even if you know next to nothing about Armenia, you will come away with a vivid picture of the nation's past and present.

The negative review of this course rom this term is misleading and bitter in its assessment of the course. While Aslanian did have a habit of going over classtime by a few minutes, this was often due to technical issues during the class or (perhaps overly) comprehensive responses to student questions. Aslanian did an excellent job of encouraging students to participate in class discussions, going so far as to structure large parts of several classes to center around discussions of the course material. I found these discussions to be interesting, even though Aslanian took an active role in correcting students when they made historical errors in their arguments. This may come across to some students as being 'mean', but I learned a lot from Aslanian's correction and never felt as though he was acting out of a desire to rebuke or put down a student's contributions. On the contrary, he consistently rewarded and praised students who made meaningful contributions.

Aslanian gave comprehensive and detailed answers to student questions during class while also encouraging students to submit parts of their midterm and final papers for feedback before the due date. I did not make use of this myself but it was very comforting to know that I could get preliminary feedback for the major assignments. Aslanian provided detailed feedback to each of the papers and I felt that both were fairly graded, perhaps more stringently than other history classes I've taken.

I learned an immense amount taking this class, but it requires a significant time investment. If you are genuinely interested in Armenian history and are willing to put in the time to do the readings, come to lecture (Aslanian took attendance every class), participate, and pay attention during classtime, you will find this to be a very enriching and rewarding course. I highly recommend it. I only wish I had the chance to take Aslanian's other classes on Armenian history.

I would go as far as to say that this is the most miserable class I have taken thus far at UCLA, and it is not because of the course material. Aslanian is the worst professor I have had here. He was disorganized, mean, and disrespectful of us as students. First of all, he went over class time EVERY. SINGLE. CLASS. There was not one class when we finished at 1:45 like we were supposed to. Second, he puts students down. I've heard him rebuke more student comments than respond or praise them. He will quite literally tell a student, "that wasn't it. brownie points for trying." He wants us all to participate, but when he makes it so embarrassing to not give a perfect answer, then WHO WOULD WANT TO PARTICIPATE?! Third, he picks favorites. Aslanian would quite literally point to this student and ask him to "enlighten" the rest of the class. He had another favorite, too, but this one was less obnoxious. Notably, his favorites were always male students. Fourth, he's disorganized. He does not even know the due dates of his own assignments. He would say one due date in class, and another one would appear on the assignment on the website. He did not seem to really care, either. When I met with him and told him I was confused about when the final was due, he seemed annoyed that I just couldn't keep up with all his changed. It caused me an incredible amount of stress. Fifth, his lectures are less than satisfactory. His slides are divided into two sections of notes that don't really capture what he says while the slide appears. Moreover, he goes on so many tangents in a class it's hard to tell what history is important to the material and what isn't. DO NOT TAKE THIS CLASS. Save yourself the misery.

Aslanian is incredibly knowledgeable about Armenian history. You can tell he's a brilliant man who's read widely and deeply. I learned quite a bit. Ethnic Armenians may find it more interesting, but if you come to the class with an open mind your background doesn't matter, a fact he stresses.

He's not particularly hard, especially if you are a good writer. I STRESS that you communicate with him throughout!! The class consisted of 10% for attendance and participation (make sure to raise your hand, he likes that stuff), 30% for the in-class ID/map exam which happened W4 Thursday, 25% for the take-home midterm (two 3-4 page essays), and 35% for the take-home final (two 3-4 page essays). The midterm/final are submitted on Turnitin, no hard copies.

He gives you a study guide beforehand for the ID/map exam. I had 15 locations given and had to locate 10 of those on a map. I also had 12 terms to study, 8 of which were on the exam. There was 8% extra credit on this exam if you got everything I believe.

The midterm/final were given a week or two in advance. Both had several straightforward prompts to choose from. For each "exam," you pick two prompts and write 3-4 page essays for each one, 6-8 pages total. Honestly, he has answered these prompts already in his lectures in his class if you paid attention. His essays do not take a terrible amount of creativity. You just have to make sure you synthesize all the sources that are relevant to the prompt in a way that makes sense. Your thesis should make sense. Don't include any cliches or flowery language - just be straightforward and answer the prompt, he hates filler. He assigns like 100-200 pages of reading every week. I didn't do any of them until the midterms/finals were assigned and I turned out fine. Honestly, it'd be helpful to skim them week to week so you don't get overwhelmed come essay time. You can't completely BS the sources, as he's fully familiar with them and several of them are his or his wife's own writings. The man is chill, but take him seriously.

ALL THE READINGS ARE AVAILABLE ONLINE FOR FREE ONE WAY OR ANOTHER! He provides like half of them, the others you can find with some smart Googling. You do not need to purchase anything.

A strong command of the English language, citing every relevant source, and paying attention/participating in class should get you far. He responds to emails relatively quickly and will even look at your introduction/thesis for you if you email it to him. I highly recommend communicating with him so you don't do something stupid on the essays. He's a pretty chill guy. He acts like he's harder than he is, I think, but the work is straightforward enough.

Occasionally, his lectures can get a bit dry and off track. He'll spend too long on a point that isn't too pertinent. Not a big deal though. He has some funny anecdotes.