Middle Eastern, South Asian, And African Studies · Columbia University
i can't recommend this class enough. every lecture was genuinely so interesting and honestly mind blowing at times. he brings attention to details i had never thought of before and has sources to backup everything. professor massad is truly a wealth of knowledge. he's also a really funny guy! 100% a columbia gem.
Joseph Massad is phenomenal. He is a brilliant intellectual with an endless understanding of the world. I hang on to his every word and look forward to each of our classes. He is approachable, friendly, and charismatic. I really can't say enough good about him. Easily my favorite professor at all of Columbia.
He really blurs the line between facts and opinions, which gets on everyone’s nerves. Massad treats a lot of his course like a media appearance advocating for one side and berating the other. I can’t say he is as intense as some of his fans in the course who think everyone criticizing him is just trying to paint him as an anti-Semite, but Massad can be frustrating to work with. He brings a lot of analysis to the course but much of that is skewed, something that wasn’t obvious to classmates of mine who were less familiar with the course material than I was.
Frankly, I don't understand the hype. Issues of political bias aside, Massad simply wasn't a very good professor. His lecturing was scattershot and rambling, especially compared to Janaki Bakhle, who taught the first half of the class. For example, our lecture about (ostentiably) Saudi Arabia was around 20 minutes of discussion as to whether or not the author of our assigned reading was an Orientalist (a term you'll grow thoroughly sick of during the course) and a good 45 minutes of ranting about Israel. He was perfectly courteous to me when I approached him after class with some questions that could be interpreted as an attack, which I appreciate greatly. However, that can't make up for the unfocused, rambling lectures and the bizarre nature of the readings. Can you imagine a class on abortion where the only assigned reading was Planned Parenthood pamphlets? Well, Professor Massad's only assigned reading on Zionism/Israel was the classic anti-Zionist work "Israel: A Colonial Settler State?" by Maxime Rodinson. The class started with the birth of Islam as if all of the important events that took place in the MIddle East--the rise and fall of the Persian Empire, the birth of Judaism, the birth of Christianity--hell, the birth of civilisation! paled in significance before Islam. All in all, Professor Massad seems to be the darling of the Middle Eastern professors around the coun…
He teaches a polemic, not an academic class, and abuses the position of teacher to rant at his students, offering little analysis grounded in anything resembling reality. He won't engage in actual debate, instead changing the subject any time it looks like someone might pin down his having simply made things up. He also barely mentions the CC books. The syllabus might as well not have existed. The fact that this man is allowed to teach at the university is a disgrace and tarnishes its academic integrity. The problem isn't that I disagree with his views; the problem is that he seems to think he can just state them as facts, and anyone who disagrees is either stupid or part of some grand conspiracy. By the way, he's Jordanian, not Palestinian.
Prof. Massad was arrogant and humorless. He was a bad language teacher; he put zero thought into the classes, made fun of our translations, and went straight from our (crappy) book. He might make an interesting professor for political science or something, but as a language teacher he was awful. His only qualification for teaching Arabic was that he speaks Arabic. In my opinion, he lied to us about word etymology, and if he didn't know something he it sounded like he would make it up, instead of researching the question and getting back to us. He obviously didn't care about the class. I notice that he has not taught Arabic for the past few semesters, but if he ever pops up as a teacher of Arabic, try to take someone else (like Taoufiq).
He's friendly, charismatic, and interesting. He's smart too. Really nice guy, presents some fantastic ideas (none of which are his, of course) that will likely change the way you view the world. Runs lectures like big class discussions at times, though he tends to cut people off. NOTE: While Massad is very smart and interesting, he is very opinionated and radically biased. Do NOT take this course unless you are prepared to filter what he says. Massad tells you as much himself, and if you learn from Massad in a constructive way, you will be much more able to learn from other Columbia scholars who are equally biased in less conspicuous ways.
Key psychoanalytical concepts taught interestingly with foundational readings and authors in the field Developing thesis research Breaking down theory and norms into digestible concepts
a lot of readings but you can get by without doing all of them as long as you listen well in lecture. you will be expected to cite from the readings on the exams though.
Workload was definitely manageable. Even though it was a very small seminar (like 12 of us), you don't need to expect to be put on the spot to prove what you read. There are readings every week and you have to send him a 2 page response paper each week. Each person is assigned a week to present on the readings. At the end of the semester, you submit an essay based on your presentation and the feedback he gave you during the presentation. He talks a LOT (which I don't mind at all), so even when you do your presentation there is less pressure because he'll interrupt to expand/lecture on whatever you are talking about.