A University of Florida African American Studies course interprets the horror genre based on “racial identity and oppression” while using materials on “whiteness,” “black feminism,” and “queering personhood.”
The course, “Black Horror, White Terror,” explores “the relationship between horror and Black literary modes and traditions focusing on key moments that depict fears of Blackness and/or the terror associated with being Black in America,” according to a spring 2023 syllabus.
Students in the course must read classic works by 19th-century white authors to study how they have “affected racialized discourses.” These include Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein,” Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” and others.
Part of this inquiry includes reading an academic article titled, “The Power and Horror of Whiteness,” which argues that Poe was “haunted” by black people based on his fiction writings. The course includes two other resources with “whiteness” in the title
The College Fix emailed Professor Julia Mollenthiel, who currently teaches the course, and asked what is meant by the term “whiteness,” how it is portrayed in the course, and why it is necessary to include material on queer sexuality. She did not respond to two inquiries sent in the past two weeks.
