Professor Mabanckou is extremely kind, understanding, charismatic, and engaging. I genuinely enjoyed his lectures and listening to him in class. That being said, this course was not at all what I expected. The class was described as “Sub-Saharan African Short Story,” which I was very much looking forward to, but we did not read any short stories. Instead, we read Mabanckou’s "8 Leçons sur l’Afrique" and Aimé Césaire’s "Discourse sur le colonialisme", both of which are long-form essays rather than short fiction, as the course description suggested. This was frustrating, as the actual content of the course differed significantly from what I was led to expect.
Additionally, we had few in-person classes and a handful of Zoom sessions throughout the quarter, with many classes canceled altogether. Without prior notice, Professor Mabanckou did not show up for the first class and was almost always late to the in-person classes we did have. While I recognize that it is a privilege to take a course with him as he is a highly sought-after and busy author, this felt unprofessional and contributed to a lack of structure and consistency in the course.

French 133 was by far the best French class I have ever taken. Prof. Mabanckou is congenial, charismatic, and HILARIOUS. He made the class laugh out loud several times per class! The lectures were really interesting and he grades very easily. I did most of the reading and wrote the papers and I received an A+ in the class; plus, I became quite interested in a topic I knew nothing about previously. I am not a French major, but I will go out of my way to take another course with Prof. Mabanckou before i graduate.

Prof. Mabanckou's French 121 - Studies in Francophone Cultures and Literatures was mainly focused on Rwanda and the 1994 genocide. Prof. Mabanckou teaches in French, is very approachable, and has a great ability to keep the class' attention by using humor and story telling. He is very knowledgeable and helpful in preparing for Midterm and advising for graduate studies. There was no midterm and no final...just a 6-8 page paper, instead. The assigned reading is paramount if you want an A. Count on reading approx. 50-100 pages per week. there were only 3 books for the quarter. If you can pay attention in class, take good notes, and are willing to do the readings, this is an easy A.

Fantastic and very easy class. No exams, just essays, and very engaging lectures on Francophone African literature. I highly recommend!

Fascinating overview of African poetry in French. No tests, just essays, and very good lectures.

The class was very laidback. Discussion of 3 books- all African-francophone literature. Professor is a famous author so it was cool to learn from him, but he was definitely very busy outside of class and did not answer emails/etc very quickly. Regardless, readings were interesting and the grading was very fair. Great class in the French department