content is super racist, ignorant, Jefferson-aggrandizing, and overall makes a lot of the students extremely uncomfortable. My TA once implied that enslaved laborers didn't work hard enough to access the education around them, and he was a just-graduated white man. Massive red flag. also, Waldman just superimposes plans onto random works of art and calls himself a genius. there's no connection and it's just ridiculous, pretentious drivel for 85 minutes.

superfluous bs. absolutely nothing useful or interesting. it's all vague abstractions based on genesis and other white authors that eliminate the racism that built the lawn. the assignment instructions are incoherent and extremely frustrating, as the TAs are extremely biased and give terrible advice as well as allow absolutely no room for creative interpretation despite the prompt being extremely vague and abstract. at least there's only six papers, but they increase in length by a page each time; still, it's only 6 pages for the final essay.

difficult to follow while speaking, even less coherent in his writing. VERY not politically correct, used the R-word in class and called the enslaved laborers who built the lawn "...a collaborative, not heroic, work force of citizens and strangers distinguished as Surveyors, Nomads and Lunatics." He is nice in person, but a highly questionable character, to put it nicely.

don't take this class. It's painful. it should not be a requirement for architecture. also, don't get the textbooks. the readings don't make any sense anyway, so it's not like you'll be missing out on content. just pay attention to the random things from the readings that he mentions in class.