Wei Xu

The reading load in the second half of this class was brutal and centered around a very specific type of Chinese love literature. Some of the books were very interesting and Xu Wei is an awesome professor but the class is no walk in the park.

This is a very difficult class, but I believe Classical Chinese is super valuable for Chinese language learners. I never really grasped the core grammatical rules, and that made the entire semester a real challenge. Exams are very difficult: you need to be very detail-focused and memorize all the grammar rules and terms.

I was really excited to take this course because I was interested to learn more about attitudes toward gender, s*x and love in ancient China. However, I found the lectures to be very boring and disorganized. There was not any seminar-style discussion; the only way to participate was to raise your hand and basically interrupt the teacher. Professor Xu is obviously very passionate and knowledgeable about the material, but that does not transfer well to his teaching. Most of the class was very checked-out, with only a few people really giving their all. The readings themselves were super interesting and often fun, but in the second half of the class the pace ramped way up as Professor Xu had us read about three books in two months. I know only a few people who actually did all the readings. The class is primarily readings, listening to lectures, 3 papers, and a final presentation.

I was really excited to take this course because I was interested to learn more about attitudes toward gender, s*x and love in ancient China. However, I found the lectures to be very boring and disorganized. There was not any seminar-style discussion; the only way to participate was to raise your hand and basically interrupt the teac …Read more