Bill Berry: Master of Horror and Sci-Fi

by Zora Fiset Morin

Underground classes are ready to be discovered at 4C’s.

Professor Bill Berry has been teaching in the English department at 4C’s since 2007. Between 2008 and 2009, Berry ran the idea to teach a Masters of Horror class.

The class is a survey class of the horror genre. Students look at short stories, films, do film theory, research on horror, as well as other writings. The class also will explore race and ethnicity, gender, queerness, fear, and terror, as well as the unknown. The class is now offered every other year during the fall.

“It’s an opportunity for fans of the genre to get together and learn something new, talk about what they love,” Berry says.

This upcoming spring, he teaches a “hard science fiction class” in which students explore human nature, aliens, space exploration, as well as hypothetical future scenarios with technology. Students will look at how science and knowledge inform science fiction but also look at a genre mix with horror and science fiction.

Berry says that he views the classes as an entry point. He was drawn into the class because of his passion and wanted to provide an access to reading and discussions that were relevant to people’s interests.

“I thought it would be a gateway drug,” he says.

Teaching the classes are a great way for Professor Berry to let students talk seriously and deeply about their interests and explore new ideas. The classes provide a space for people to be creative. Berry says people have presented plays in his classes on horror, some created card and board games, and come into class dressed up in costumes.

“The class is only as good as those who make it,” says Berry

The classes “attracts all sort of different people,” Berry says. “People who know nothing about horror, die-hard fans, older people, younger people, women, men, non-binary.”

 Berry argued that when people are curious enough and take the risk, they find things in the genre that can through an academic lens be really intriguing.

One time a woman came to class and demonstrated on one of the other students how to do prosthetic makeup and made it look like someone’s jaw was half off.

“She came to class with a slice down her face and part of her mouth kinda hanging off. It was fascinating and bizarre,” Berry says.

Professor Bill Berry (Zora Fiset Morin)

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