Fall 2025 Course Syllabus       Department of Horror Studies

 

Prefix, Number, Section, Title, and Credit Hours

HORR-666-X015 (3 credits)

 

Course Meeting Time and Location:

Monday, Wednesday, Friday

TikTok

 

Instructor Information:

Dr. duncan b. barlow

 

Office Location:

108 Ocean Avenue

 

Office Hours:

Eternal

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Office Phone Number:

976-EVIL

 

Some Suggested Reads for the Course:

Barker, Clive. The Hellbound Heart. Haper, 2007.—9780061452888

Blatty, Peter. The Exorcist. Harper, 2001.—9780552166775

Carroll, Noël.The Philosophy of Horror. Routledge. 1990.— 9780415902168

Graham-Jones, Stephen. The Only Good Indians. Galley/Saga Press, 2020.—9781982136451 Gran, Sara. Come Closer. Farber and Farber, 2021—9780571355556

Jemc, Jac. In the Grip. FSG, 2017.—978-0374536916

Lavelle, Victor. The Ballad of Black Tom. Doherty Associates, LLC, Tom, 2016.—9780765387868 Lovecraft, HP. “The Horror at Redhook.” Weird Tales, 1927

Moreno-Garcia, Silvia, and Ryszard Oślizło. Mexican Gothic. Mova, an Imprint of Wydawnictwo       Kobiece Łukasz Kierus, 2022— 978-0525620785

Oyeyemi, Helen. White is for Witching. Renouf Pub Co Ltd, 2009.—9780330458153

Smith, Scott. The Ruins. Vintage, 2008—9780307390271

 

Some Additional Supplemental Articles for the Course:

Arason, Colin. “Revealing the Hellbound Heart of Clive Barker’s Hellraiser.” Off Screen, 2014

BBC News. “Australia's Dark Heart Inspires Horror Movie Boom.” BBC News, 2016

Caterine, Darryl V. “Heirs through Fear: Indian Curses, Accursed Indian Lands, and White           

     Christian Sovereignty in America.” Nova Religion: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent

      Religions, 2014

Cousins, Helen. “Helen Oyeyemi and the Yoruba gothic: White is for Witching.” Sage, 2012

Cruz, Ronald Allan Lopez. “Mutations and Metamorphoses: Body Horror Is Biological Horror.” The Journal of Popular Film and Television, vol. 40, no. 4, 2012, pp. 160–68

Jancovich, Mark. In Focus: The Routledge Horror Film Reader. Routledge, 2002

Larsson, Naomi. “Out of sight: the orphanages where disabled children are abandoned.” The 

     Guardian, 2016

Wallace, Diana, and Andrew Smith. The Female Gothic: New Directions. Palgrave Macmillan,

      2009

 

Week 1

Framing horror: demarcation

Philosophy of Horror, Noël Carrol

 

Week 2

Monstrous feminine: abjection and the female body

The Exorcist, William Peter Blatty

 

Week 3

Body horror and metamorphoses

 

Week 4

Queer horror

Hellraiser, Clive Barker

 

Week 5

Weird horror and racism

“The Horror at Redhook,” H.P. Lovecraft

The Ballad of Black Tom, Victor LaValle

 

Week 6

Vampires and xenophobia

Dracula, Bram Stoker

Nosferatu, F.W. Murnau

 

Week 7

Consumption

White is for Witching, Helen Oyeyemi

 

Week 8

The Male Gaze

Refusing to refuse to look

 

Week 9

The Gothic

The Grip of It, Jac Jemc

Mexican Gothic, Silvia Moreno-Garcia

 

Week 10

Horror and Anxiety

Come Closer, Sara Gran

 

Week 11

Orphanages and disabilities

The Orphanage, J. A. Bayona

 

Week 12

Cursed lands

The Only Good Indians, Stephen Graham Jones

 

Week 13

Eco Horror

The Ruins, Scott Smith

 

Week 14

The thrill of horror & why we love horror The sound of horror