MDST 3490

Professor Rao is encouraging, understanding, and supportive. She's accommodating so long as you reach out to her, and she makes class interesting and engaging. There are joke journals and reading responses in the form of discussion posts you have to do every couple weeks, but they're easy as long as you follow directions. The joke journals are really up for interpretation (they're not graded harshly), and the reading responses are pretty straightforward. There are weekly readings and viewings, but they're typically not dense and can usually be avoided when it's not your turn to do the discussion post. Other grades include a proposal for your final project (2 pages), the final project (can be something creative like stand-up or something traditional like an 8-10 page essay about a specific piece of comedy/comedian), and a 5-6 minute presentation in class about your final project, which is presented as a "work-in-progress." It's hard to get a perfect score on the presentation and final project, but still likely that you'll get an A/A- as long as you put the effort in. Overall, I highly recommend this class to anyone. #tCFF23

This course was really interesting and approachable for a non-media studies major. Professor Rao has a very wide knowledge of the topic area and really enjoys teaching this course. Topics include theories of comedy ranging from Aristotle to 20th century scholars, the intersection of identity and comedy, and differences between different forms of comedy. Each week, there are a reasonable set of readings and viewings and then lecture would be a mix of Professor Rao going over the material and then whole class discussion. This class is so much better when everyone is engaged in the discussion so please only take this course if you actually want to discuss the content (I'm not usually one to talk a lot in class but the whole point of this class is discussing what we find funny and what we don't). Three times you have to submit a short reading response on Canvas and another three times you have to submit something funny that occurred in your life. The final is either to produce a new piece of comedy or to write a 8-10 page paper tying course readings to a comedy work/performer of your choice. #tCFF23