HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS GE. It may not be the class with the least workload since you're expected to submit a response to a prompt about the week's lectures every week (10 assignments total). However, you can resubmit all of them for a better grade so it's not that stressful or intimidating once you get used to it. Professor Duthie is an incredibly amazing lecturer and well-versed in Japanese history. He was also really considerate of the circumstances and he and the TAs offered late submissions with no penalties as long as you let them know. Overall, it has been one of the most interesting history GEs I've taken. The only downside I could see from this is that going to lecture is necessary to get an A so you really do have to go (sections are optional though).

I also recommend taking the course with TA Suong, she grades within a day of the deadline with feedback and is super lenient. Her sections also basically tell you what to write about and her notes are really helpful and detailed.

I am selling the textbook for $10, contact me @ (714)951-5468.

Torquil was a great professor and I enjoyed watching his presentations and reading the selected text. The TA I got, on the other hand, was super strict with grading and because of that, I ended up getting a B in the class despite understanding all of the course material. Simply writing over the word count was enough to ding points off my paper even though it added to the quality.

I had an extremely good experience in this class. Professor Duthie was a good lecturer and made the material very interesting and easy to understand. I also had an awesome TA, who broke down the weekly assignments very well. There were 10 assignments in this class and they were all the same format. I actually mostly struggled with going over the word count. Overall though, I enjoyed this class and would take it again, as well as recommend it to anyone else. I took this as a GE via zoom.

Pretty easy GE, would recommend. The structure of the lectures/class was really clear and easy to follow. There's a 500-700 word essay (almost) each week for a total of 10. I'd recommend writing these after discussion because the TA covers the main points that you should aim to discuss in your essay. My only criticism is that the topics felt the same each week, just for a different time period. "Discuss the political, economic, military, social, cultural aspect of ______" It felt dry by the end. I did like how we could choose the topic of the last essay from the TA recorded lectures since there was more variety and unique topics.

Taking this class in Fall 2020 during the infamous COVID-19 pandemic, this class is one of the easiest GE classes to take! Seriously, ALL you have to do is write one essay per week (500-700 word) for a total of 10 essays per semester and that's it! You even get to rewrite essays for a better grade (and the better grade will always be chosen, so there is no harm in resubmitting it). The remote lectures are very interesting because of the professor's clarity and occasional humor/sidenotes, especially if you have any interest in Japanese history (I mean, aren't you curious about why samurais came into rise of society, why did Japanese literary culture like mange or anime became popular worldwide, and such?)! As long as you can write fairly decent essays and you understand what the professor is saying, then you're 80% golden (just make sure you learn how to weave lecture information into essays, which the TAs will help guide you). Speaking of TAs, they are very helpful if you don't know where to get started, since they hint to you ideas that need to be discussed (and the deadline of the essays are about 9-12 hours after your Friday TA discussion, so you can technically go to Discussion section and then start writing the essay and still turn it in time). Overall, this class was very enjoyable, low-stressed (even though I am actually a terrible writer), and easy class. Also big thank you to my TA Thai (she was an amazing person :) ) You can essentially earn 5 unit credits for a relatively low-workload environment, so take it if you care about Japanese civilization or to get it for your GE.

My favorite class I've taken at UCLA! Duthie is a great lecturer and very understanding professor I hurt my hand near finals and he let me take an incomplete. I learned so much and even considered an Asian minor after this course even though I'm a stem major. The course load isn't bad at all: weekly 250 write ups on the weekly readings (which aren't bad and super interesting), one midterm (I remember it had ID sections and a section in which you were given a text excerpt and you had to give the title, author, year, and brief significance), and one non-cumulative final (same length/format as midterm). Section attendance is mandatory and worth it because you learn the significance of the readings you will be tested on, lecture wasn't mandatory but interesting and helpful for ID (Duthie is a great lecturer and I loved his accent), reading/ buying the book wasn't useful. In conclusion, 10/10 class very doable but memorization heavy which I personally like.

Easy class that just requires a lot of memorization. Go to test bank to look at previous midterms -- it's almost the same midterm every year.

The class is overall easy. Attending lectures and sections is helpful.

I took this class last minute for a GE as a P/NP. It was easy and I only attended the discussion. My TA gave us study guides for the test, and if you studied that enough your test grade was fine. I had to study a lot for the final (over the period of a day). If I had just attended lectures, no studying, I would have been fine. If you attend the lecture and try even a little bit in the discussion, you could probably get an A.
One thing I did not think about when taking the class, is that I have zero knowledge/understanding of the Japanese language so everything sounded like jibberish to me making memorization way harder. The people in the class with me who knew a bit more of the language found it way easier than I did.

Selling textbook for the class (text me 4848897254) as of Dec. 2018

This class was pretty easy; as long as you pay attention during every lecture/discussion and write your weekly 250-word paragraph, you should get a good grade.

Duthie is an above-average lecturer who explains information clearly and makes you feel like you were very productive during the time you were in lecture. He throws in jokes occasionally and dresses snazzily. His exams are fair and reasonable with very little unexpected content. Make sure you participate in discussion sections, as that's the most volatile part of your grade depending on your TA.