ENGL BC3997

There is a lot of reading assigned, but he does not expect you to read every single page. If you thought that he demanded an in-depth read of every single assigned text, you failed to ~read between the lines~! Grading was never an issue and Dr. Hamilton was generous when it came to extentions. An empathetic and reasonable professor. Perhaps you failed to accommodate for differences in expression if you thought otherwise...

I have to *strongly* disagree with the two most recent reviews of Dr. Hamilton. Though I was likewise warned by friends and faculty, my worries quickly faded, as I found the course and Dr. Hamilton's teaching style to be enjoyable. Then again, I wasn't caught beating my keyboard texting friends while in class. (Maybe be less obvious next time!) The disdain felt amongst particular students was cumbersome and reeked of snobbishness and entitlement—a chronic affliction of so many at Barnard! One would think that a student body that claims to be left-leaning and "class conscious" (hah!) would applaud a professor like Dr. Hamilton, but we seem to be quite removed from our embodiment of this (because for most at Barnard, there is a profound absence of class consciousness) and are more so attached to the identity and ability to make this hollow claim! Contrary to my classmate's definitively negative statements, I'll offer up something a bit more nuanced. Are Dr. Hamilton's kids causing a ruckus in the background and does he occasionally tell them to hush? Absolutely. Would we be so publicly critical of an AFAB professor whose children were heard? Probably not. During one of my virtual office hours appointments, which I requested amidst a mid-semester semi-emergency, Dr. Hamilton's daughter sat on his lap; he spoke very lovingly and gently reminded her that he was working and could gi…

Not sure if he read anything that we ever wrote. Weekly discussion posts that he said he would give feedback on but stopped doing after the first week. We still have not received feedback on our thesis drafts. Had to sign up to teach two class sessions about readings that seemed thrown together and all over the place. Would frequently comment on how none of us were writing about what we were supposed to be in our theses, though I doubt he remembered what any of them were about.

This class was one of the worst experiences I have had in my time at Barnard. I was warned beforehand about Ross Hamilton's conduct by other students but brushed it off. I was told that he was discriminatory, misogynist, and self-centered. All of these were true. I have never felt like a class was such a waste of time as I have with this one. Students teach the class every week, and he never provides any feedback, so I am not really sure what his job or function in this class even is. Also, we are having an additional class when classes have ended solely because he made a mistake in the syllabus and refused to correct it, which happened multiple times throughout the course. Echoing what a fellow student in this course wrote, when I was meeting with him to discuss my initial thesis idea, he left me waiting outside of his office for 20 minutes before telling me that he just did not have the time to meet with me. Following this, he was completely unhelpful and dismissive about anything thesis-related. At the time of writing this, our final draft is due even though we never received feedback on the initial draft. This was such a horrible experience in the English department, and I am frankly shocked that Prof. Hamilton is the head of the department. In addition to all of this, when he did provide commentary or assistance in class with the readings, it was either extremely tangenti…

Weekly response paper, 25 pages thesis, two in class presentations, and no help at all; you're basically asked to do your work and his work ;)

Won't recommend taking any class with him. I seriously doubt whether Ross Hamilton takes the academic environment seriously as an instructor, or if he is simply too unqualified to teach. His meandering lacks logical coherence; he applies every conceivable academic lens to make arbitrary, weird, tangential remarks about the readings, such as claiming Kafka's The Metamorphosis is Jewish because Kafka is, or that Freud's writings reflect Jewish thinking due to his somewhat Jewish identity. Such superficial, unwarranted discussions were accompanied by sometimes obviously wrong historical facts he shared in class, such as that foot-binding lasted until 1949, or that every political official in ancient Chinese imperial counts were castrated. They were simply and outrageously untrue and oversimplifying. There's barely anything valuable in the class, even if there was, it's drowned in the cursory remarks of Professor Hamilton. The engagement with reading is basically Hamilton asking everybody to take up his role of analyzing the texts and present for every class. Whenever I mustered all my focus to listen to his soft, unengaging voice, I found myself trapped in an illogical, undisciplined mire. His approach is entirely misaligned with the rigorous methodology for English literature I've been trained in by other esteemed professors in this department. The one time I attended his office…

The readings were so long and impossible to find. I'm not even sure if he reads the weekly response papers. NO help on the thesis so it made it that much harder!!!!!!

For the love of all that is holy do not take his class. I thought it would be fine, because the topic (histories of body) would allow me to write what I wanted, but the course was so disorganized, his tangents were so weird, and the readings were SO long that I just had to write this review. He gave us NO assistance in writing our theses. Our only due date was 15 pages at thanksgiving (which he moved up the due date AND added 5 pages). DO NOT TAKE!