This is the best professor I have ever had. Taking Dr. Batiste finally made me feel like I was in college. I was able to put ideas I had learned in other classes together with more complicated theoretical materials and finally felt like I was getting what I paid for in college. Totally helpful awesomely smart. Took me to the next level.

This is an incredible class. Rarely has my thinking been changed or opinions so quickly shifted by a course or teacher. The texts have become some of my favorite reads, impacting me deeply, asking the questions I've been asking over the years, just in a more effective way. Pr Batiste is an incredible Professor, and I highly recommend her class.

I had the zombie section. No one read or went to lecture. Some that did go did not take notes or facebooked the whole time. I loved the class anyway. It was awesome & interesting. The prof was helpful and basically gave away the exams in lecture. So if you weren't there exams might have been hard. Music, film, photography and a live hip hop play.

Not an easy class but if you do all the readings you can get a good grade. Readings are very interesting. Batiste is very intelligent but does not give any hints to what will be on midterm. For final she gave us two of the three essays ahead of time. Grading is all up to your TA mine was great and graded easy because tests were so lengthy.

NO! Please avoid. Tests near impossible. Around 2000 pages of reading over a 10 week course (A lot in my opinion, others may disagree). Lectures boring and essentially a redundancy from reading the text. Paying close attention to section was the only reason I passed this class. First C in college.

Terrible professor! She expects too much out of students! There was an average of a D- on the midterm and she REFUSED to curve it. Lecture is extrememly boring, but that is where you'll need to pay the most attention. Novels are decently intersting. Overall, I would NEVER recommend this class to anyone. Avoid, avoid, avoid!

I am currently taking 38B and she is my favorite professor. All the texts we are reading are incredible and she is very knowledgeable. She is hard to follow at times, but if you're interested in gender, race, history, and English, you'll have no problem as long as you go to class and read.

I don't understand all the bad ratings. I was dreading the class but she kept it quite interesting. If you attend all the lectures (which you have to because attendance is taken) you only need to skim the readings. One warning, the final is much harder than the midterm. Over all an interesting class taught by a good prof.

Unclear, unhelpful, extremely tough grader. Expects way too much and gave way too much reading. Her final was a take home, she gave us 24 HOURS to do it. It was composed of a short essay and long essay. She expected a max of 12 pages! Ridiculous.

This professor is the worst professor I have had in all my 4 years at this school. She didn't follow the course description from GOLD, did not have a course website, and shamelessly plugged her crappy book on performance to our 1920s black literature class. She also took attendance every day, always the mark of a bad professor. Avoid at all costs!

Batiste assigns a ridiculous amount of reading for the class, so much that there is no time to analyze them. She is rude and unorganized. I dont recommend taking this class as long as she is teaching it.

most annoying teacher ever! content of the class was great and the books were interesting but Batiste could not analyze a book to save her life. her lectures were so unorganized and all she did was summarize plots and characters. she never knows what shes talking about, an 8th grader could have done a better job.

Her lectures are extremely boring. All she does is jumps from page to page summarizing the book.Talk way to fast. Unless you love the subject then take the course.If you are not so passionate then good luck!

Takes roll almost every lecture. Do not take the class for GEs unless you're interested in the subject because you have to do the reading. She gives quizzes when people don't participate enough in class. But, she's helpful outside of class and really enjoys the topic.

Batiste is extremely intelligent and truely wants her students to learn, though she is quick tempered. There are pop quizzes when she thinks students arent participating enough, but they're easy to pass. As long as you read majority of the novels and show up to lecture, you'll be fine. Defintiely write down page #s to use for the paper and final!

Not an extremely hard class, but there is a lot of reading (something like 8 novels + reader articles). If she gives you the chance to join the honors section, do it! It's a little more work, but the discussion is worth it and helps you on the midterm and final. One helpful tip is write down all page numbers she directly quotes in class, trust me!!

I didn't see what was so bad about her class. It seemed pretty normal to me - semi-random quizzes, a midterm, an essay, and a final. Her quizzes aren't insanely hard, either. She does speak quickly during lectures, but it's not hard to pick out when she's saying something "deep." All in all, a straightforward, moderately time-consuming course.

Professor Batiste made some interesting points about the readings and she never went completely off topic, but her apparent arrogance and quick temper definitely showed in her lectures. and she cannot figure out how to use a computer.

This is the worst class I have taken at UCSB. She made us sign in every lecture, but wouldn't pass out the sign in sheet until after class ended. People weren't taking enough notes for her liking so she assigned a final at the last minute. Waste of time.

Terrible class. She added an in class final during the middle of the quarter when we were already assigned a paper. I agree with the other comments, the GE units were not worth taking this class. This is the only class Ive taken where everyone stayed for the end of the quarter professor evals cause everyone was waiting to give her what she deserved

I have never written a review for a teacher before, but I feel compelled to this time. This is by far the worst professor I have ever encountered! Avoid her classes. The GEs are not worth the frustration. Trust me on this one!!

I took this class to get a GE done, but taking this class was the worst decision I've made at this school. The professor insulted the class and treated us like children because she was grouchy. She announced there was going to be a final midway through the class (it was not initially presented on the syllabus). Even the English majors hated class.

WORST PROFESSOR ON CAMPUS. Seriously, I've been on campus four years, but no professor has been as bad as Batiste. She's: arrogant, unhelpful, unclear and overall horrible. Her lectures were pre-written, so she stood in front reading super fast. She added a final on her presentations because people complained her lectures were unclear. DROP IT NOW!

this was the worst class i have ever taken! the teacher was a NIGHTMARE! if you are enrolled stop reading this now and drop!!! you could not pay me enough to take this class again!