Spring 2027

Western Culture: Literature and the Arts I

Explores the development of literature and arts in the ancient and medieval world, covering Akhenaton's Egypt, Homer's Troy, Euripides' Athens, Virgil's Rome, and Dante's Florence.

no offering record for this termCredits unavailable
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 No instructors listed

Summary

1 / 8

Past student reviews · Patricia Rosenmeyer, William Aylward, Nandini Pandey

The workload involved three exams, including identifying quotes, and mandatory reading and discussion participation. While some found the exams tough, others noted that studying effectively led to fair outcomes and manageable grades.

What you’ll be able to do

  • Demonstrate an understanding of major cultures, events, art, and literature within the ancient and premodern history of the Mediterranean world and the Near East.

  • Demonstrate skills in critical reading, thinking, and communication about literature, art, and culture.

  • Evaluate and critique the historical conditions that shape your own worldview through the humanistic study of ancient and premodern cultures.

  • Demonstrate critical acumen, cultural sensitivity, empathy, curiosity, and intellectual grounding through the study of ancient and premodern art, literature, and culture..

Source: UW Guide

Grade history

↗
average GPA
letter grades
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AB
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All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors

Prerequisites

Course map

None

  • None
ILS 203

This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree
  • None

Professors

Spring 2027

No instructors recorded for this selection.

Historical instructors & teaching patterns

NANDINI PANDEY is recorded teaching in Fall 2018, Fall 2020. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

PATRICIA ROSENMEYER is recorded teaching in Fall 2009, Fall 2010, Fall 2013, Fall 2015. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

WILLIAM AYLWARD is recorded teaching in Fall 2007, Fall 2008, Fall 2011, Fall 2012, Fall 2014, Fall 2016, Fall 2017, Fall 2019, Fall 2021, Fall 2022, Fall 2023, Fall 2024, Fall 2025. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Calendar & sections

Spring 2027

Schedule loads here as you scroll.

SectionModeEnrolled / capacityWaitlist

Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections.

Meeting source records
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Student experience

the class

Past student reviews · William Aylward, Nandini Pandey

Students described the lectures as passionate and engaging, with one noting genuine interest even when the content was outside their major. The course was generally viewed as manageable if students kept up with the required work.

Recent recorded grades — Fall 2023: 3.58 GPA, 77.4% A/AB (n=186 letter grades); Fall 2024: 3.69 GPA, 87.1% A/AB (n=210 letter grades); Fall 2025: 3.64 GPA, 79.0% A/AB (n=119 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

Past student reviews · Patricia Rosenmeyer, William Aylward, Nandini Pandey

The workload involved three exams, including identifying quotes, and mandatory reading and discussion participation. While some found the exams tough, others noted that studying effectively led to fair outcomes and manageable grades.

Past student reviews · Adrienne Hagen, Nandini Pandey

Discussion sections significantly enhanced the experience for some, with TAs relating material to student life and fostering engagement. Others appreciated open-note check-ins and the instructor's focus on detailed understanding.

Topics

  • Ancient and medieval cultures including Egypt, Troy, Athens, Rome, and Florence.
  • Literature and art in the context of society and ideas.

Skills

  • Critical reading, thinking, and communication about literature, art, and culture.
  • Evaluating and critiquing historical conditions that shape worldviews.

Grades

Latest available · Fall 2025— not enough history to project Spring 2027.

average GPA
A / AB grades
letter grades
Instructor

Grade distribution · % of letter grades

A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

Grades over time

Through Fall 2025

More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data

Where this course fits relative to

Latest available grades · Fall 2025 · all course levels

GPA

Higher than % of other courses in this group.

Course GPAs · red marks this course’s range

letter grades

More recorded grades than % of other courses in this group.

Typical course in this group: letter grades.

About this comparison

1316 courses over the same term, each with at least 30 recorded letter grades. Cross-listed courses count once. GPA is not a measure of difficulty or teaching quality. The typical course is the median by recorded grade count; tied values are not counted as lower. Grade counts describe course scale, not unique students or typical section size.

Descriptions compare GPA with this group’s average: at least 0.20 higher or lower; otherwise close to average. Section size uses median recorded enrollment: small up to 30, mid-sized 31–99, large 100+. Lectures and discussion/lab sections are described separately.

Sources & history

UW–Madison

Catalog & offerings

Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.

Catalog observation history

Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.

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Selected offering source records

No offering records for the selected term.

Raw records 
[]
Rate My Professors

Student reviews

Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.

Read original reviews
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Madgrades

Grade history

Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.

Explore recorded grades
Dataset & model

Recorded 2026-10-14

View the dataset on Hugging Face
Model outputs & technical records
Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B
LLM outputs across runs
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Full model traces

Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.

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Model & dataset provenance 
{
  "model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
  "model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
  "task_version": "17",
  "output_id": "4576955c0b0ae1cd68c1cbe3c29f2b8c269a02009d40587d32c87ade85f27489",
  "requirements_status": "valid",
  "dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}