History of Zombies - Lecture notes All lecture PDF

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All of my notes from Prof. Thomas Duszynski's class in Fall 2017...

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History of Zombies      

Increasing in popularity since 2001 in the U.S. Countless movies Video games Television series Books In the U.S. dating back to approximately 1932

The Epic of Gilgamesh  Perhaps, the oldest written story on Earth.  Somewhere between 2750 and 2500 BCE  It comes from Ancient Sumeria, and was originally written on 12 clay tablets.  It is about the adventures of the historical King of Uruk  The main character warns of a time when “the dead go up to eat the living! And the dead will outnumber the living!” The Bride of Corinth  A Ghost Story from the 2nd Century CE  A young beautiful woman, Philinnion, dies and comes back to life, returning to her parents home  She meets Machates, who is betrothed toPhilinnion’s sister.  Machetes didn’t know this wasn’t his bride to be, he assumes that she is  They share a meal in the bedroom  They proceed to have sex over the course of 3 nights Philinnion and Machates       

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She is caught by her parents and confronted as to why she defiled her sister’s future husband "How dare you defile your sister's marriage bed?" Charito shrieked. "You have no right even to be here.“ "Mother and Father," she said, calmly. "You are both cruel and unjust, that you begrudge me just three nights of love, here beneath my father's roof. Now, because of your busy curiosity, you shall be made once again to mourn. But for me, I return to my appointed place, for you cannot think that I came here without the assistance of the gods." Philinnon, having spoken, collapsed onto the bed. Machates felt for her pulse, found none, realized that her flesh was cold. He stared up at her parents. "What have you done?" he cried. "You have killed your daughter with your words.“ "Words cannot kill," Demostratus insisted. "And you saw for yourself that neither I nor her mother laid hands on her. In any case, how could we kill her, when we ourselves have buried her these six months since?“ Machates ran from the house and through the streets of Corinth until he came to a steep wooded slope. He climbed it, and there looked down on the city. He watched as the body of Philinnion was carried to be cremated outside the walls of Corinth. As the smoke rose from the pyre of her second funeral, he heard her voice call to him. Unwilling to live without her, he took his dagger from his belt and fell upon it.

Keys to the story  Not what we think of as a “Ghost Story”  There is physical being not just a spirit or apparition  They eat food, they have sex  Arose from the dead to die again with assistance from the “gods”  Burned her this time…to keep from arising again

Mary Shelley 1818      

Probably the most famous zombie of all time Dr. Frankenstein’s Monster Reanimated the monster with lightening Many of features of our modern zombie Shelley personified the monster by giving it human emotions Rage based on rejection

Zombie Origins       

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The modern word zombie comes from Haitian voodoo origins. Actually originated in Africa Comes from the Kongo word for soul--nzambi When slaves were brought to Haiti, the voodoo religion grew amidst old African traditions. Harsh conditions of slavery bore the idea of a zombi Estimated that 80-90% of Haitians “serve the spirit” or practice Vodou In Vodou everyone dies in one of two ways o Naturally (sickness, God’s will) o Unnaturally (murder, before their time) Those that died Unnaturally linger at their grave Unable to join their ancestors who proceeded them in death Waiting for the Gods to approve Souls are vulnerable when they linger at the grave Could be captured by a powerful sorcerer (Boko) and locked in a bottle Or the use of coup padre (given orally) on a living being The primary ingredient was a tetrodoxin A poisonous substance derived from the puffer/porcupine fish Once given the Coup Padre they were prepared for their descent into zombidom and appear to die Their heart rate would slow to a near stop Breathing would become subdued, body temperature would drop Thought that the person was dead and would be buried The Boko would exhume them and would remain under the Boko’s power until the Boko died Boko uses this to control their un-dead/un-living body May let their body rest and just use their soul Not always seen as unpleasant for the victim A hard working person may rather continue working rather than laying in their grave waiting May be used by the Boko for good, such as healing The unsavory side is that the Boko kill a person just to create a zombi Black magic or evil intentions For the slave under French rule in Haiti in the 17th and 18th centuries, life was brutal: hunger, extremely overworked and cruel discipline. Slaves often could not consume enough calories to allow for normal rates of reproduction; what children they did have might easily starve. The only escape from the sugar plantations was death, which was seen as a return to Africa, or lan guinée (literally Guinea, or West Africa). This is the phrase in Haitian Creole that even now means heaven. The plantation meant a life in servitude; lan guinée meant freedom making death feared but also wished for Not surprisingly, suicide was a frequent recourse of the slaves. The plantation masters thought of suicide as the worst kind of thievery It deprived the master not only of a slave’s service, but also of his or her person, which was the master’s property. Suicide was the slave’s only way to take control over his or her own body. The fear of becoming a zombie stopped many from committing suicide. The zombie is a dead person who cannot get across to lan guinée. To become a zombie was the slave’s worst nightmare: to be dead and still a slave, an eternal field hand. It is thought that slave drivers on the plantations, who were usually slaves themselves and sometimes Voodoo priests, Used this fear of zombification to keep recalcitrant slaves in order and to warn others

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In traditional Voodoo belief, in order to get to lan guinée, one must be transported there by the Baron Samedi, the lord of the cemetery. One of Baron’s spiritual functions is to dig a person’s grave and welcome him/her to the other side. If for some reason a person has offended Baron Samedi, he will not allow that person to reach lan guinée. Then you’re stuck between life and death! After the Haitian Revolution in 1804 End of French colonialism Zombie became part of the Haitian folklore It was subsequently folded in the Voodoo religion It symbolized a nation haunted by the legacy of slavery and fear of its reinstitution There were several instances in Haitian history that slavery was on the brink of being reinstituted after the revolution Haitians do believe that the dead rise to either be helpers or at worst slaves again To most the zombi are folklore Most see the zombi as a metaphor for a hard life o Loss of control o Without reward o A loss of faith Haitians do not fear zombi, rather they fear becoming a zombi against their will Zombi are found more at the fringes of the voodoo religion and not the mainstream religion Although its meaning has changed slightly over the years, it refers to a human corpse mysteriously reanimated to serve the living. Zombies are the monsters that get stuck in death, Unable to move on to the afterworld, they wander the Earth killing as many victims as they can Like the spread of an infectious disease

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Zombie origins are deeply rooted in African slavery Increasing popularity in the past decade The Hollywood zombie is very different than the zombie origins Zombies are ancient concept

How Hollywood Got It Wrong Nosferatu (1922) • Silent film which pairs a vampire like creature with the spread of plague (the Black Death) • An unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula. • Famous scene in which Nosferatu (Count Orlok) arrives on a ship carrying his coffins of earth • When docked, Nosferatu leaves carrying his coffin amid rats leaving the ship • When the towns people begin to die, they blame the plague on Nosferatu Where did the modern notion of zombie(s) come from? • The Halprin brothers made the first movie which used the word ''zombie'', in 1932 with “White Zombie” • Then during World War II several other movies about zombies were used, including ''I Walked with a Zombie.'' • Those movies aren't about the brains-craving undead • They're about Haitian voodoo and bodily possession, the term merely namedropped in their titles. White Zombie 1932 • Based on the Haitian zombie • White Zombie is the story of Madeline Short and Neil Parker, two young people engaged to be married, who are traveling in Haiti. • Their host and friend Charles Beaumont covets Madeline for himself • Beaumont seeks the assistance of the notorious mill owner Murder Legendre (Bela Lugosi), who uses zombies to work his plantation. • Legendre gives Beaumont a small container of a certain drug. Madeline seemingly dies from inhaling the drug and is entombed in a crypt. • Coup Padre (Haitian powder?) • She is later removed from the crypt by Legendre. • The empty grave is discovered by the devastated Neil, who enlists his friend Dr. Bruner to rescue Madeline from Legendre's grasp. 1943, I Walked with a Zombie • Nurse Betsy Connell accepts a position caring for the invalid wife of Caribbean plantation owner Paul Holland • Jessica Holland isn't dead, but she might as well be. • She eats and breathes, but her willpower is completely gone and her eyes are fixed in an eternal trance. • Connell becomes determined to cure Jessica, partially because she sees it as her duty, but also because she loves Paul and wants to express that love as selflessly as possible. • When medicine fails, she begins to think that maybe the voodoo faith of the islanders may hold the answers. A shif • • • •

Up until now, all of the zombie depictions in the movies and cultured stemmed from the Haitian model A person who appeared dead, but really wasn’t In a trace, unable to think for themselves, doing the work of someone who controlled their mind Along comes George Romero

1969 “The Night of the Living Dead” • The Hollywood zombie of today came from this movie • The first zombies of the of flesh eating corpses variety • Invented by Romero and another comic book fan who took the visual details of animated corpses from various comic books published Inspiration for Romero • Richard Matheson's 1954 city-overrun-with-vampires novel I Am Legend as an influence, but his original thought was this: Death is not the end. • Romero inspired by that concept built what we know as the modern day zombie • Actually in Romero’s original script the word zombie didn’t appear were simply called “flesh-eaters.”

Transformation and Cultural Shif • Released in the same year that Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated Night Of The Living Dead was radical enough to feature a black hero who was besieged by a mob of brain-dead attackers. • From then on, zombies have stood for unreasoning, destructive conformity. • In Romero’s 1978 sequel, Dawn Of The Dead (which was remade in 2004), the zombie hordes are seen lumbering around a shopping mall, still driven by an overwhelming urge to consume, even after death. George A. Romero, 'Night of the Living Dead' creator, dies at 77 (July 2017) • Romero's zombies, however, were always more than mere cannibals. • They were metaphors for conformity, racism, mall culture, militarism, class differences and other social ills. • "The zombies, they could be anything," Romero told The Associated Press in 2008. • "They could be an avalanche, they could be a hurricane. It's a disaster out there. • The stories are about how people fail to respond in the proper way. They fail to address it. • They keep trying to stick where they are, instead of recognizing maybe this is too big for us to try to maintain. • That's the part of it that I've always enjoyed." Zombie Infection • Danny Boyle’s 2002 hit 28 Days Later the mindless cannibals weren’t called zombies − they were simply ‘the infected’ • In Romero’s films and their many imitators, however, the monsters are either the cause or a symptom of a complete societal breakdown • When a botched science experiment, a radiation leak, or a glowing meteorite begins zombifying the populace, the result is a pandemic which leaves the world in chaos Scientific Evidence for Zombies? • So are zombies real? • Many believe so, but evidence is scarce. • There are a few supposed cases of real zombies, including a mentally ill man named Clairvius Narcisse • 1980 claimed that he had “died” in 1962, then became a zombie and forced to work as a slave on one of Haiti’s sugarcane plantations. • He offered no evidence of his claims, and could not show investigators where he had supposedly worked for almost twenty years. • Eventually the workers killed their captor and escaped • Narcisse learned that his brother was the one who had him poisoned over a property dispute • He returned to his hometown in 1981 after he had learned that his brother had died • Other cases similar to Narcisse are heard throughout modern day Haiti The Serpent and the Rainbow, 1985 • One of the most famous studies of Haitian zombies was ethnobotanist Wade Davis’ 1985 book The Serpent and the Rainbow • The highly controversial book sought to discover how zombies were created. • Wade studied the case of Clairvius Narcisse who supposedly was an actual zombie through a combination of drugs (including puffer fish venom and toad venom) in order to mimic death • Then given the hallucinogenic drug tetrodotoxin to keep him in a zombie-like state. Scientific Evidence for Zombies? • Wade Davis claimed to have discovered a secret “zombie powder” while working in Haiti. • The main active ingredient was said to be a neurotoxin • Davis returned from Haiti with samples of the zombie powder. • Topical application of the powder on rats induced a state of suspended animation, akin to that seen in victims of fugu poisoning • Davis expounded his thesis that tetrodotoxin is the active ingredient in the zombie powder Causation? • The actual manufacture of a zombie has never been documented. • Belief in zombies is almost universal in Haiti • The zombie powder always contains puffer fish • The flesh of the puffer fish time contains medically significant quantities of tetrodotoxin • Tetrodotoxin can induce a state of suspended animation almost indistinguishable from death. • These facts, along with the facts of the case of Clairvius Narcisse, may not add up to proof beyond a reasonable doubt

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Indeed, it may be that zombification is no longer practiced in Haiti, and if this be the case, it may be that Davis deserves the credit for exposing the reality behind this cruel practice.

Set and Setting • One question remains: why is it that Japanese diners who ingest too much tetrodotoxin not turn into zombies? • The answer lies in what Davis calls the “set and setting” • Set being the individual’s expectation of what the drug will do to him • Setting being the environment, including the matrix of beliefs in which an individual is embedded. Zombie Culture “How does an infection spread?” • In movies, shows, and literature, zombies are often depicted as being created by an infectious agent, which is passed on via bites and contact with bodily fluids. • Harvard psychiatrist Steven Schlozman wrote a (fictional) medical paper on the zombies presented in Night of the Living Dead, and refers to the condition as Ataxic Neurodegenerative Satiety Deficiency Syndrome caused by an infectious agent. • Other zombie origins shown in films include radiation from a destroyed NASA Venus probe, as well as mutations of existing conditions such as prions, mad-cow disease, measles, and rabies Zombie culture • It can’t be a coincidence, then, that zombies are in vogue during a period when banks were failing, • When climate change is playing havoc with weather patterns, • When both terrorist bombers and global corporations seem to be beyond the reach of any country’s jurisdiction. • The Walking Dead got off to its hugely successful start just weeks after the United States federal government shut down. • “We’re living in very uncertain times,” People have a lot of anxiety about the future. • They’re constantly being battered with these very scary, very global catastrophes. • People need a ‘safe place’ to explore their apocalyptic worries. • They can’t read stories about real plagues or nuclear war. That’s too scary. • Zombie stories give people the opportunity to witness the end of the world they’ve been secretly wondering about • At the same time, allowing themselves to sleep at night because the catalyst of that end is fictional. • Zombies embody the great contemporary fear • For some people, the great contemporary fantasy − that we’ll soon be surrounded by ravenous strangers, with only a shotgun to defend ourselves. Zombie Preparedness • The rise of zombies in pop culture has given credence to the idea that a zombie apocalypse could happen. • In such a scenario zombies would take over entire countries, roaming city streets eating anything living that got in their way. • The proliferation of this idea has led many people to wonder “How do I prepare for a zombie apocalypse?” CDC uses the zombie popularity • Wonder why Zombies, Zombie Apocalypse, and Zombie Preparedness continue to live or walk dead on a CDC web site? • Began as a tongue in cheek campaign to engage new audiences with preparedness messages has proven to be a very effective platform. • "If you are generally well equipped to deal with a zombie apocalypse you will be prepared for a hurricane, pandemic, earthquake, or terrorist attack." Zombie homes • More than 770,000 homes are in foreclosure in the U.S. roughly one in five of these -- over 150,000 in all -- has been abandoned by its owner and remains unclaimed. These properties are referred to by the industry as “zombie” homes. • In these "zombie foreclosures," borrowers move out after their bank schedules a foreclosure auction the auction never takes place meaning the borrower still technically owns the house. Zombie Drug • Krokodil, technically known as Desomorphine, has a similar effect to heroin, but is significantly cheaper and easier to make. • In the last few years, it's been wreaking severe havoc on the bodies and lives of Russian youth. The drug earned its nickname—the Russian word for crocodile—because of the ghastly side effects it has on the human body. Wherever the drug is injected, the skin turns green and scaly, showing symptoms of gangrene. In severe cases, the skin rots away completely revealing the bone beneath. • Other permanent effects of the drug include speech impediments and erratic movement. Rotting flesh, jerky movements, and speech troubles have prompted media outlets to tag krokodil the "zombie drug."

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According to Time, the average user of krokodil only lives two or three years, and "the few who manage to quit usually come away disfigured.

Zombie Car • BEIJING – Residents on a street in China finally said good riddance Friday to a car, almost completely engulfed by foliage, which has become a social media sensation since it was abandoned a year ago. • The old, blue-colored van was dubbed ‘Zombie Car’ by social media users after it was reportedly left by its owner in a parking space on Peace Road in Huayang village, Sichuan province sometime in 2012. SUMMARY: •

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The Hollywood version of the zombie is very different from the Haitian Voodoo zombie • Re-animated deceased person • A person who appeared dead, but is actually under a mind control drug The use of zombies in pop culture has grown significantly in the past decade May actually be a means of escape from the stress of real world events

How would a zombie apocalypse work? Zombie Characteristics • Zombies have a one track mind and only think about one thing: Consumption • Zombies only take what they want (typically brains). They are not productive members of society • Zombies gather in large hordes that...