Exploring fear and fascination with a Popular Horror class

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When George Mason University English professor Eric Gary Anderson steps into the classroom to teach ENGL 419 Popular Horror, he's not just talking about things that go bump in the night-he and his students are exploring what makes people seek out horror in the first place.

HarperCollins issued a new edition of The Exorcist in 2025 with a glow-in-the-dark cover. Photo provided

For more than a decade, Anderson has taught classes that blend literature and the supernatural. He's led semester-long dives into vampires, ghosts, and zombies. His Indigenous literature class regularly focuses on ghosts and hauntings. "The ghosts are everywhere in Indigenous literature so it turns out to be a really nice way to introduce people to the subject," he said. "And it opens up doors for thinking about other cultural things."

He admits it is always a challenge deciding what goes on the syllabus. "Horror does so many different things-it goes in so many directions," Anderson said. "I didn't want the class to just be about bestsellers, but about what draws people to horror and the kinds of horror that are thriving right now."

The course breaks horror down into categories such as vampires, demonic possession, Indigenous horror, and found footage, pairing classic works such as Bram Stoker's Draculaand William Peter Blatty's The Exorcistwith films and more contemporary readings and criticism.

Though horror stories often center on isolation, Anderson's classroom is anything but lonely.

"This class is a blast," he said. "When you put horror fans together, there's this incredible bond. We're all kind of weird in the same way, and it makes it really fun."

In fact, that's why English major Madison Perino signed up for the class-the community. "I love horror and wanted to be around people who like horror and want to talk about it."

Eric Gary Anderson. Photo provided

Perino said she also appreciates hearing the different perspectives on the works being studied, and there are a lot of them. In the classes leading up to Halloween, Anderson was facilitating lively discussions about The Exorcist. The students complained about Father Karras dragging his feet in requesting an exorcism as they discussed the book in depth.

The walls of Anderson's Music and Theater Building class are covered in white boards and he gets the class up and moving around as they put their thoughts on the walls. One panel this week is simply labeled "Demons."

The students said that sometimes at the end of class they will take a kind of "gallery walk" around the room and read the walls. Anderson also documents the written comments with photos.

In addition to the discussions, English major Alex Miles said he finds horror and what it says about the culture fascinating. "And the fact that I get to 'hate watch' The Nun and write an essay about it makes me very happy," said Miles.

Anderson said, "It's fascinating to think about what was scaring people in the 1970s. [The Exorcistnovel] is a slow burn-it's unsettling in a different way than the movie. And when you pair it with the surge of interest in things like The Nun, which is one of the highest-grossing horror films of all time, it opens up questions about religious horror and why it continues to resonate."

He also sees horror evolving with new forms of media. "Some of my students encounter horror through gaming-zombie games, survival horror, found footage-style stories. That's all part of popular horror now."

Anderson also encourages creativity in his classes. For their final projects, students can choose to produce original works-short fiction, paintings, or multimedia pieces-alongside a critical reflection.

"The creative projects blow me away every semester," Anderson said. "Just opening that door and saying, 'You're allowed to do this,' is really meaningful for [the students]."

For those looking for a chilling Halloween read, Anderson recommends The Buffalo Hunter Hunterby Stephen Graham Jones, an Indigenous vampire novel that reinvents familiar tropes. "If you're a vampire, you start taking on the traits of whoever-or whatever-you've been drinking from," Anderson said. "It's such a clever twist."

He also praises Paul Tremblay's A Head Full of Ghosts, a modern possession story that blurs the line between faith, fear, and media spectacle. "It has one of the best unreliable narrators I've ever read," he said. "You're never quite sure what's real."

Ultimately, for Anderson, horror isn't just about fear-it's about fascination.

"It's a really great time to be alive if you like horror," he said. "These stories let us explore what scares us most, and in doing so, they help us understand the world-and ourselves-a little better."