SPAN 4500

Spanish Civil War Narrative is a fascinating class. You get to read old and newer novels, short stories, a nonfiction book, and also watch a few movies a long the way. The work consists of roughly 30-40 pages per class (so 90-120 per week) and there are 3 papers for the whole semester that are evenly weighted. There are no exams, tests, quizzes, or homework at all. Anderson is a really nice guy and it seems like he really cares about the class so that makes the class more enjoyable.

Professor Anderson is clearly knowledgable about the Spanish Civil War. He is engaging, and his British accent is entertaining. The combination of texts and films throughout the class makes sure you never get too bored.

I really enjoyed this course for a couple reasons: group work was a focal point of the class which kept things interesting, Professor Anderson had a lot to say about the poems we read for each class, and he did seem to push you to look at the texts a bit further. Each day you were responsible for reading over the poem or two that was assigned for homework, so homework wise this class was very light. The midterm and final were poem commentaries where Professor Anderson gave you a poem the day of class and you had the entire class period to write a commentary on it. There were very few guidelines for these commentaries. The second half of the semester was supposed to transition to student led discussion where each student would lead the class discussion for the day (this individual presentation was the third major grade for the class, in addition to the midterm and final). However, be aware that Professor Anderson gives very little guidance and feedback. In class he is super helpful. Outside of class he is incredibly hard to reach and incredibly slow at returning any grades which left students with no idea how they were doing the course. While I took this class during the COVID 19 outbreak where the second half of the course transitioned to online and there are obvious setbacks to any class switching to an online format, I found it very hard to learn/get any feedback whatsoever from him in general.