HIST W3665

Overwhelming. Four to seven articles to read each week, roughly thirty pages each, and only some of which have conclusions and abstracts to find the main idea. 10-15 page paper on a subject of your choice, with plenty of time but a five page precis that seemed kind of unnecessary. Midterm and final that are supposed to require explicit references to article authors (Holy Mother of God), but I only knew like three and I did alright. Pretty easily graded in the end.

The class has the potential the be really good; I would highly recommend it to anyone who's a) an amazingly good and efficient reader and b) has the background knowledge to coherently pull together your own understanding of a million different viewpoints on a very complicated subject. If you're interested in Latin America or economic history in general, you'll find this class interesting--in order to truly enjoy it, though, you have to be a crazy super student. I think the problem was in the structure. Each week you address a component of economic history, like schooling or government control or physical welfare, and read a million million-page articles on the subject, many which contradict each other (and all of which are very data-based, FYI, I felt stupid for not realizing this beforehand). Then you listen to two very sweet old professors summa-ruminate-chuckle over the subject and meet up in a discussion section to sit awkwardly and be confused. I ended up falling so far behind in reading and understanding that even though I had learned a lot about different concepts in economic history, I couldn't really apply them to Latin America, specifically. Maybe it's just really difficult to fit the economic history of Latin America into one class. The professors were wonderful--Coatsworth really is as funny and down to earth as all the other reviews imply, and Salvatore was so swe…

A geographical identification quiz at the beginning of the semester, one long, 10-15 page case study, and dense economic readings. 4-7 articles per week, each ranging from 20-50 pages (on average ~150 pages/wk).

descriptive haiku: economic his tory of latin amer ica: why so long? I came into this course struck by Coatsworth's (former) golden nugget CULPA rating, my interest/major in economics, and a searing fervor for all things Latin American. I came out of it with an addled, uneven understanding of Latin American economics tinged with a superfluous degree of actual history. In some ways, this class could have been brilliant (and for a friend of mine, it was). The organizational structure of the lectures are, as mentioned in other reviewed, centered on weekly questions. The questions did a very good job of stringing together the various articles we had to read that week, but the problem was that sometimes they did not flow together quite as well from week to week. It felt as though we were jumping around from topic to topic, and only were able to put things together several weeks later, when we had fuller pictures of what we were talking about. Some of the other issues that were brought up in my discussion session was that as a survey class, we were never able to fully delve into one country's economic history as a case study. Of course, this was supposed to be resolved by the case study papers we were to write for the semester, but these were nothing compared to an officially led discussion on the matter. The syllabus showed great organizational potential; it just never came togethe…

This was one of the worst classes I've taken here. The readings were either too dense or were disjointed. Coatsworth was an interesting lecturer and very impressive with his encyclopedia-like knowledge of Latin America. But Salvatore, who taught half the classes, was a complete bore and could not speak English quickly enough or well enough to communicate what he was trying to say. Salvatore must have gotten the idea that the students found his lectures terrible, since on the days he taught less than half the class showed up (and then kids left in the middle) but he failed to improve or organize his lectures. Also, whatever you do, DO NOT have Carlos as a T.A. This guy was such a self-absorbed prick. He rarely stayed on topic in class, preferring to talk about his phD work and to namedrop the professors he has worked with. I found him very annoying both on an academic level and on a personal level.

Try to get a good TA. Map quiz that my ridiculous TA graded harshly, midterm also graded harshly, case study, final, discussion section worth 20% of the class which is annoying when your section is full of the usual know-it-all-out-to-impress-the-TA Columbia type.

I've come to not trust CULPA reviews after taking this class based purely on the reviews here. If you like economic history--and only ECONOMIC history--go for it. All others, beware. The readings were dense, lengthy, numerous, and failed to substantially connect with each other. Each week was centered around one overarching question/theme, so the entire course felt disjointed and awkward. Coatsworth's lectures were alright but felt a little dumbed down in comparison with the readings, and Salvatore's lectures (the class was taught by both of them) either put me to sleep or failed to keep my attention. Perhaps I just don't do well with lectures, but this class was a waste of my time.

INTENSE. About 100-150 pages of reading per week. Discussion section with Courseworks postings, a midterm, final (both are based off a review sheet with ids and possible essays), and a term paper on the country of your choice.

AMAZING professor. Honestly one of the people that I have learned the most from. I took it in Fall 2007, when he was interim dean for SIPA, so he co-taught the class with another professor. Coatsworth is incredibly knowledgeable (he pretty much authored any piece worth reading over Mexico), and his lectures are very clear. The class basically seeks to answer why Latin America fell behind and Coatsworth does an excellent job synthesizing all of the readings with his own perspective. Don't be frightened by the title; you don't need to know a lot about economics to get something out of this class. Start your term paper early! The midterm and final will go alot more smoothly if you thoroughly outline all of the possible essays beforehand, as most were pressed for time. Put in the effort, and you won't regret it.