Linear algebra and abstract algebra simultaneously?

interloper

Is this a good idea (provided the university will allow it)? I'll be going into my sophomore year at my university. But I'm unfamiliar with exactly how much linear algebra an intro course in abstract algebra would require. In hindsight I probably should have taken linear last semester, but scheduling issues meant that I would have had to sacrifice a lot to do it. I'm interested in doing a major in pure math and maybe going to grad school, and thus I want to get involved with research as early as possible. For this reason I want to start taking advanced courses soon, and abstract felt like a good place to start.

There are other math courses I could take instead, but most of them seem to require linear algebra, and the ones that don't either interfere with my schedule or are only offered spring semester. Since abstract algebra seems to build from fundamentals, it felt like a good option. Thoughts?

Vanadium 50

Um...why are you asking us?

I think you hit a key point with "provided the university will allow it". Why would you take the recommendations of a bunch of folks on the internet over those of the university?

Courses in Linear vary from "a bag of computational tricks" all the way to "abstract lite". We can't tell how much rigor your particular university's version has, and we can't tell how much prior knowledge the abstract professor expects the students to walk in with. That's what prereqs and co-reqs are for. Taking them concurrently might work out, or you might get squashed like a bug.