Frances Pritchett

This class was a waste of my time last semester, apart from the fact that it goes towards a major requirement. The first 20-30 minutes were spent looking at Prof Pritchett's website, which she has compiled to have images of essentially all that is visual to do with India. It's a great website, a great source of information, but she'd rush through what we were seeing so fast that I'd have no idea what she was talking about. Furthermore, none of what she showed us or said in that part of the class was important for any part of the final exam (no midterm, which was nice). Then Prof Pritchett would lecture from her notes for the rest of class. This was the really painful bit, since she was trying to get across her clearly enormous knowledge as quickly as possible, making her lectures incredibly dense, confusing, and usually disorganized. Looking back over my notes while studying for exams, I often found that we'd be going in circles through time, going back to people we'd talked about at the beginning, and usually for no good reason. Often, Prof Pritchett would read to us long quotes from the textbook reading that we'd already done. This wouldn't be too bad except that Stein's History of India was incredibly dense and not particularly well-written. The copious assigned primary source readings were not important to your success in the class. I didn't do them for the second half of…

Unique style- 1 hour discussion led by a student and 1 hour discussion led by her. Very laid back class, informal. Everyone voices whatever they think and no perspective is too ridiculous to argue. She doesn't seem to know very much more than the students, so if you enjoy arguing on equal footing with a professor, go for this class. Basically, this is a class for arguing with others students about great literature. If you want a brilliant lecture every class, stay away.

Prof Pritchett is an extremely knowledgeable person and has a lot to share with her students. Some of her lectures can be a little dull at times, and she's a little too enthusiastic about her website, but she's still a fabulous teacher. The class is a great overview of the history of South Asia and includes insider trips to never seen exhibits at the MET! A must for anyone interested in South Asian culture and history!

What a sweet lady! She's so passionate about poetry that its sort of embarrassing because I don't have that passion, especially as a South Asian. This class is for those who enjoy taking a relaxing class during their hectic coursework. Light reading although can take some time if you aren't familiar with the Urdu language, especially since some have tons of Persian in it. Good-hearted lady who really wants you to do well and enjoy Urdu. Plus she grades each student on an individual basis, i.e. not comparing him/her to the rest of the class.

The class is entirely confusing. The assigned readings are very long, dense, unrelated, and completely unnecessary. Pritchett divides her lectures into 2 halves: pretty picture time and Indian name time. The first half she shows maps of India, Indian Gods, heroes, and anything else she can get her hands on. She spews out names of Indian places and people, and you won't even be able to tell them apart. She doesn't understand that the class has no idea what's going on, and doesn't bother to write any of those names or places on the board. The second half she reads from her notes. Here she throws out so many names that it's impossible to follow. She has so many things to say and so little time that she tries to say everything and never actually teaches important things to the class. She never touches upon things that you might actually need to know for the final, or god forbid, the midterms. You must go to lecture, though, because you must turn a comment about the readings as a form of attendance. On the upside though, the readings are basically optional. She's like an Indian encyclopedia, she knows EVERYTHING about India, and I really mean everything. There are only 2 homework assignments: 2 essays, each 6-7 pages long. The midterm is taken directly from her website and she tells you everything you need to know. The TA's grade the essays, which is very unfortunate. One TA is a m…

Like others have been saying, she is a wonderful woman, however if you would like to be taught by a professor and not your fellow classmates, stay away from her class. I felt that she should have just stayed teaching her middle eastern material. She has a great personality and always wanted the class to go to her outings (I went to a few...all fairly nice). But when it comes down to course work, the students did all the work. Yea, the last hour (which really wasnt an hour for her...more like 30mins) was taught by her, but after she was done making certain points in the book, she would call on people she knew didnt read the book, or really didn't have anything to say...Now I know that's what an instructor should do, but knowing that other Lit Hum prof. were teaching for 2hrs, and this woman wasn't...it really bothered me. Nevertheless, if you're looking to be taught, stay clear of this class...If you want to lead dissucions, hand in daily comments, and teach your fellow classmates what you weren't trained to teach, then hey, go for it!

I had no prior knowledge of Islam or South Asia, and I found this class interesting and informative. I appreciated Prof Pritchett's occassional walks down the primrose path, sharing moderately relevant photos or artwork that she enjoys, and found her charming, supportive and infinately available. She truly seems to want her students to walk away with a real appreciation for South Asian culture and a working knowledge of Islam's impact on that culture. She tries to tailor her class to that end, rather than on rigorous exams or long papers. It's an easy class that served as a nice afternoon "break" from the hard-core schedule that I carried last semester. You can do well in it with no prior experience in either topic, and the professor will do her best to keep the lectures informative and fundamental. I would recommend this class.

Prof. Pritchett is a sweet and helpful lady.She's also famous in southasian studies circles, but you wouldn't know it from her friendly, self-deprecating manner. If you have an elementary or an intermediate level grasp of Urdu, you'll enjoy and greatly benefit from the class. If you are directly from India or Pakistan, or your parents speak it at home and you are fluent, avoid this class. Her accent is sometimes a little too...errr...well, let's put it this way--if you were blindfolded and she spoke Urdu to you, you would know you were not in India or Pakistan. She is extremely knowledgeable on history and culture but lacks analytical depth needed to understand tough poetry and prose. I sense she is threatened somewhat by native speakers with a background in Urdu studies and very at ease with non-Southasian Indophiles, and can be cold to you if you are in the first group. I appreciate her enthusiasm and effort in Urdu Studies, but she should only be teaching at the undergraduate level. To give you an indication of what to expect: First class, expect maybe 15 peopleto show up. 5 or 6 will be fluent or near fluent speakers or grad students. Next class expect the 5 or 6 fluent speakers and any grad students with a southasian background not to show up...for the rest of the semester!

The previous reviewer obviously did not read the syllabus or exam prep instructions for the course. Firstly, I would like to correct the misstatements that were made: (1) The 125 items for memorization were not 'slide IDs'. They were terms (people, places, events, etc.) that she selected from the lectures and readings. She also gave us the terms fairly quickly after each class, so there isn't much excuse for not having time to find the appropriate information. The final had no visual component. (2) Attendance was not extra credit. Both Professor Pritchett and the TAs for the course were very amiable and willing to assist throughout the course. The lectures really supplemented the readings, highlighting the main points that students needed to know. This allowed for efficient skimming of the materials before class, as an in-depth understanding of the readings was not requisite. This style of learning helps fit to the professor's purpose in the course of giving student's conversation material for their Indian peers or for their future journeys to the subcontinent. Class time does lack a great cohesive structure, but that makes the class much more of a conversation about India rather than narrative. This really can be a positive or a negative, depending on the student. Overall, I would highly recommend this class.

She is nice and friendly and has a system in which a student (called, the discussant) runs the class for the first hour, which everyone has to do at least once per semester, then a 10-minute cookie break with cookies provided by that day's discussant, then she leads the class for 40 minutes where she goes over administrative stuff like papers, midterms, and parties, and she gives us some of her favorite quotes and calls on the people who didn't speak for the first hour. She grades the two papers based on content but she makes grammar corrections just to help you out. She definitely loves the Core and the Iliad but doesn't really teach much which can be good because it forces the students to discuss it amongst themselves and come to their own conclusions. Of course she does interject with her own comments. To help your grade, participate in class as much as you can, don't be absent and don't be late.