How Can Zombies Help Us Understand Society?

The British appetite for zombies is becoming a growing trend. From computer games and films to organised zombie walks though Britain’s cities, the proliferation of zombies seems to be everywhere.  Yet, this high interest in zombies enables researchers to link zombie-like behaviours to current models of public attitudes and actions.

Researcher Dr Nick Pearce will present findings from his new study of Britain’s zombie phenomenon at an event organised as part of the Economic and Social Research Council’s (ESRC) Festival of Social Science 2011. The event will be an interactive talk on the metaphor of the zombie in everyday life, followed by a screening of the first ever zombie film, White Zombie (1932).

“Zombies are very now,” Dr Pearce points out, “but what’s really interesting and potentially worrying is how far today’s zombies – whether on TV, films or computer games have departed from the original concept.”

Early zombies, as first portrayed in the White Zombie film, were the demoralised, undead slaves of voodoo priests.

“Crucially, the end of that film and others of its time, spoke of hope and featured the overthrow of the controlling voodoo master by his ‘zombie’ slaves,” Dr Pearce explains. From the late 1960s the nature of zombies changed and they were portrayed as hordes of brain-consuming monsters with no voodoo context and no controlling master.”

“With no voodoo master, today’s zombies have no clear controller to turn against and free themselves from,” Dr Pearce argues. “That means there are no effective plans for resistance and no hope for the future. Zombies may well be popular today because they speak to a similar feeling of powerlessness shared by many members of our society.”

“The key question,” he continues, “is why, like today’s portrayal of zombies, are we unwilling to take a stand against the powers-that-be and are overwhelmed by a lack of political interest.  It seems the time is right to reclaim the original zombie concept of a controlling sorcerer but one that can successfully be resisted. Today’s zombie phenomenon is a really good opportunity to get people thinking about who may be wishing to control our brains and what resources we have to resist.”

But what do we feel powerless against? Among the many possibilities, researchers suggest private ownership is a high profile offender. Clearly it’s in the interests of competition to encourage mindless consumerism.

“In the past, zombies wandered around consuming brains, but today’s zombies are encouraged to wander around consuming the latest, heavily advertised, branded goods,” Dr Pearce explains.  And for those with power, it’s clearly useful to them to have a ‘zombified’ society that does not challenge their decision-making under any circumstances.

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White Zombie (1932) – Victor Halperin

White Zombie is often described as being the first ever zombie movie. It is about a young couple who go to visit an acquaintance who lives in Haiti. Unfortunately the the girl is so attractive that she turns the head of a local Voodoo master, played by Bela Lugosi, who wants her for himself, so he turns her into a zombie.
See also…Bela Lugosi – Rare 1955 Interview
This shows him leaving the California State hospital after a 90-day morphine detox program. Lugosi was the first celebrity to go public with a drug addiction problem.

see more zombie related films …..

Night of the Living Dead (1968)…

Radiation from a fallen satellite has caused the dead to walk, and hunger for human flesh. Once bitten, you become one of them. And the only way to kill a Zombie is by a shot or blow to the head.

view film

Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959)

A pair of aliens, angered by the “stupid minds” of planet Earth, set up shop in a California cemetery. Their plan: to animate an army of the dead to march on the capitals of the world…… see film

City of the Dead/Horror Hotel (1960)

College student Nan Barlow visits the village of Whitewood as research for her paper on witchcraft in New England, particularly the case of Elizabeth Selwyn. Her tutor, Professor Alan Driscoll(Lee), recommends the Raven’s Inn, run by a Mrs. Newless.
Rather unwisely, given the amount of low-hanging fog outside(and against the advice of Mrs. Newless), Nan takes an immediate interest in the basement…see film

King of the Zombies (1941)

Three men in a plane searching the Caribbean for a missing admiral crash-land on an island where voodoo is practiced and zombies roam. They soon find a mansion occupied by a family of Austrian refugees, headed by Dr. Sangre. Dr. Sangre is up to no good, and when he learns of the men’s mission they begin to disappear.

see film

Maniac (1934)

Notorious film from early exploitation king Dwain Esper, who brought us such classic early titles as “Sex Madness,” “Narcotic,” “Reefer Madness,” “How To Undress In Front Of Your Husband,” and “Marihuana.”

see film

Music

Torn Flesh Records Presents Vestigial Sickness 2010

This is the Id of Your Musical Psyche

Grind, Death, Noise, Electronic, IDM, Dancecore, Metal, Experimental

Listen

Zombie – Daisychain Massacre

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