Decorah Unitarian Universalists are pleased to host guest speaker and Iowa filmmaker S. Torriano Berry.
As a writer, Berry co-authored the film resource books, “The 50 Most Influential Black Films,” published by Citadel Press in 2001, and “Historical Dictionary of African American Cinema,” Scarecrow Press, 2007 & 2015 (“A to Z of African American Cinema” – Paperback) He has also self-published two fiction novels: “T.E.A.R.S.” based on his feature length screenplay addressing the roots of racism in America, and “The Honeyman’s Son,” a coming-of-age adventure set in the 1930s, Post-Depression America.
Berry is Professor Emeritus at Howard University’s Department of Media, Journalism, and Film. He received his BA in Art/Photography from Arizona State University and earned his MFA in Motion Picture Production from the University of California, Los Angeles. He lives in Coralville, Iowa.
It is a biological fact that we are more alike beneath our epidermis than we may know or want to admit, and if we accept and understand this basic truth, then the world might be a more peaceful and more tolerant place to live. By experiencing how the other half lives, breaths, and thinks on an everyday basis, perhaps some light may be shed on the commonality of our separate worlds that are forced to co-exist in this society.