This is one of the most interesting and easiest GEs that I've taken at ucla. Professor Duthie is incredibly knowledgeable and understanding about student stress, especially during online learning. There were no exams, just weekly writing assignments (500-700 words). The TAs help you with what to include in the weekly assignments, and you have a chance to rewrite all of them for a better grade.

I took this class during remote learning so the structure could be different from the class in real time. All I have to say is please take this GE!! It's literally amazing. Professor Duthie is a great lecturer with good humor and clear presentation structure. He expanded the content on the textbook and I've learned so much about Japan and its history in this class. The assignments are fairly graded, and you will get a good score as long as you write them carefully and integrate the class materials. Huge shoutout to my TA Kristin for teaching us how to write effective responses!!

As an incoming freshman to UCLA, I can say that this class with Professor Duthie was both interesting and a very good introductory to GE's. He is compassionate and displays clear care for his students mental wellbeing and academic success. If you take this course, I highly recommend TA Julia Clark as she was extremely helpful in writing the papers and overall very kind!

This class was a really nice GE to take during COVID since there were no tests just an assignment once a week. I pretty much waited until after the discussion to write the paper since my TA went through the prompt and what we should write about. I would say the class took me around 2 hours a week (minus the lectures) so I would def recommend if you are looking for an easy class. The content itself was also pretty interesting and lectures were a little long but prof duthie made it go by pretty fast :)

You don't really need the textbook, you just need to take notes on the slides, but the lectures are all recorded, so you can do that all asynchronously.

Professor Torquil was a very nice man. He did get a little boring sometimes and there were times when I didn't see the point in learning what we were learning (maybe I lacked the passion for the things we were reading, who knows). He's very knowledgable about old Japanese culture and is very passionate about the material that he teaches, which is great.

I took Japan 110A and 172 with him. Both were hard classes that I had to work hard in, but I ended up with A's in both. Classical Japanese is hard to learn in general, but it's good to know if you're seriously interested in Japanese culture. Likewise for 172; the literature gets weird sometimes but it reveals a lot about Japanese culture that, in the long run, proves to be insightful. They're not exciting, glamorous classes, which was honestly the only downer.

this is regarding the A portion of the class in the A/B series. you're supposed to study both grammar AND classical texts in this class, but in lecture he barely goes over the grammar (maybe about 10 minutes) and you're supposed to learn a new chapter of grammar for every single class. the rest of the class is devoted to translating the assigned texts. i wish he'd teach the grammar more because it's very difficult, rather than spending almost the whole time on the text, which you can look up translations for and explanations online.

When I took this course freshman year, it was his first time teaching it. Even so, he did a great job! The lectures were interesting and he mixed it up a lot so there were videos too. The material was not hard, just memorize what's on the midterm and final review sheets and you'll get a good grade. What you put in will reflect your grade in the class.

You TA will pretty much determine your grade, since they grade your responses, participation and your tests. The only thing Duthie grades is you response paper, which he admits he will give you full credit if you turn it in (barring that it is no complete BS.)

Nice guy, though lectures can get pretty boring. A pretty easy GE course.

Prof Duthie is totally awesome! He's super chill and wants people to learn for the sake of learning and not for GPA's. So like, his class isnt hard, but it isnt easy. Basically, if you put in the work for your grade, you'll get the one you deserve. You wont study hard and then get a crappy grade.