Zombie
From Freepedia
- For other uses see Zombie (disambiguation)
A zombie is traditionally an undead person in the Caribbean spiritual belief system of voodoo. Essentially a dead body re-animated by supernatural means, the zombie creates dread among the living. Zombies have become a staple of horror fiction, where they usually engage in the consumption of human flesh. The term "zombism" is sometimes used to refer to the condition or disease associated with being a zombie.
Figuratively, a zombie is a very apathetic person, who may have little awareness of their surroundings, or may be easily manipulated by others. "Zombie" may also be used as a more critical alternative to "couch potato" to describe someone in the thrall of television.
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Zombies in voodoo
According to the tenets of voodoo, a dead person can be revived by a houngan or mambo. After resurrection, it has no will of its own, but remains under the control of the person who performed the ritual. Such resurrected dead are called "zombies".
In 1937, while researching folklore in Haiti, Zora Neale Hurston encountered the case of Felicia Felix-Mentor, who had died and been buried in 1907 at the age of 29. Villagers believed they saw her wandering the streets in a daze thirty years later [1] (although this was subsequently found to be false [2]).
Hurston pursued rumours that the affected persons were given powerful drugs, but was unable to locate anyone willing to offer much information. She wrote: "What is more, if science ever gets to the bottom of Voodoo in Haiti and Africa, it will be found that some important medical secrets, still unknown to medical science, give it its power, rather than gestures of ceremony."[3]
Several decades later, Wade Davis, a Canadian ethnobotanist, presented a pharmacological case for zombies in two books - The Serpent and the Rainbow (1985) and Passage of Darkness: The Ethnobiology of the Haitian Zombie (1988).
Davis travelled to Haiti in 1982 and, as a result of his investigations, claimed that zombies could be made by the ingestion of two special powders. The first, coupe poudre, induced a 'death-like' state, the key ingredient of which was the pufferfish (Tetraodontiformes) toxin tetrodotoxin (TTX). The second powder of dissociative hallucinogens held the person in a will-less zombie state. Clairvius Narcisse was alleged to have succumbed to this practice.
There was considerable scepticism to Davis's claims and opinions remain divided as to the veracity of his work.
Others claim zombies are sufferers of various psychiatric disorders such as catatonic schizophrenia, whose symptoms are simply misinterpreted as a return from the dead.
See also: History of Haiti
Zombies in history
In the Middle Ages, it was commonly believed that the souls of dead could return to earth and haunt the living. These revenants (someone who has returned from the dead) are well documented by contemporary writers of the time.
Zombies in fiction
Zombies are regularly encountered in horror- and fantasy-themed fiction, films, video games and role-playing games. They are typically depicted as mindless, shambling, decaying corpses with a hunger for human flesh, and in some cases, human brains.
Many works of fiction feature zombies who spread their affliction from one to another, in a viral fashion. More often than not, the condition is spread through means of a bite or scratch, and the victim will most likely die and mutate soon after. In others, however, the condition is only acquired after death.
A common plot in zombie fiction is an outbreak of the zombie plague growing out of control, resulting in an apocalyptic scenario. The story then focuses around a small group of survivors attempting to either stop the plague, or merely survive and escape the destruction. Often they hide in a building and try to avoid detection while hoards of zombies try to kill them. In typical horror fashion, zombie fiction rarely has a happy ending, generally ending in a dark or ambiguous manner. Popular causes of zombie outbreaks in fiction include radiation or other toxic chemicals acting on the brains of the dead, evil magic or Vodun, extraterrestrials, the use of drugs, viral infection (see T-Virus), and telepathic control.
In fiction zombies can generally be disabled by dismemberment or destruction of the brain and/or upper spinal column. In a few cases the entire body of the zombie must be destroyed, generally by burning, as individual body parts continue to move after being severed from the body. As a shotgun is effective in blowing off large parts of the body, such as they head, they are often featured in such stories.
Zombies in literature
In the novel Perelandra, the zombie Professor Weston acts as the analog of the serpent in the Garden of Eden; this is a rare example of a zombie who can talk, as it is actually being controlled by a demon.
In the Xanth series by Piers Anthony the zombies are re-animated by a magical talent held by the "Zombie Master" Jonathan. He can re-animate any creature, human or otherwise, and have it under his personal control. Even when he kills himself, he returns to life as a member of the undead. The zombies of Xanth can continually fall apart without losing any mass.
The character of Reginald Shoe in Terry Pratchett's Discworld books, becomes a zombie by refusing to stay dead after being shot and killed. He later forms a support group for other undead, claiming they are merely "differently alive". Several other Pratchett's zombies, including Mr. Slant, work as unsympathetic lawyers.
In the book Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J. K. Rowling, an Inferius is essentially a zombie, a dead body controlled by a dark wizard's spells.
The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks is a book of humor discussing how to avoid, defend, and attack zombies as well as historic accounts of zombie attacks.
Zombies in film
Although the depiction of zombies in film has recently become much more varied, they were originally presented in White Zombie (Victor Halperin, 1932) as mindless, unthinking henchmen under the spell of an evil magician/overlord. This depiction continued through the 1930's until they started to move around more of their own accord, as in I Walked with a Zombie (Jacques Tourneur, 1943).
In 1968, George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead premiered. Critics initially reacted negatively to its depiction of cannibalism, gore, and pessimism, but the film soon developed a strong following and is now considered a modern classic. Though cannibalism in horror was nothing new at the time, the movie standardised the practice of eating human flesh in zombies, and created new rules still in use today, such as a severe head injury being the only way to kill a zombie, and the zombie outbreak being a contagious virus spread through being bitten by an infected being. Romero's even more successful sequel, Dawn of the Dead (1978), can be regarded as the father of the modern zombie movie subgenre. The third entry in the series was Day of the Dead (1985), followed two decades later by the fourth entry Land of the Dead (2005).
Internationally, Dawn of the Dead was released under the name Zombi, inspiring Italian director Lucio Fulci to create Zombi II (1979), an unofficial sequel to Dawn of the Dead, which would be released in North America as Zombie and spawn its own series. In America, Dan O'Bannon's 1985 movie, Return of the Living Dead, took a more comedic approach to distinguish his movie from George Romero's; it had the zombies hunger specifically for brains instead of all human flesh.
After the mid-1980s, the subgenre became mostly relegated to the underground. Although director Peter Jackson made a notable entry with the ultra-gory Braindead (1992), and Michele Soavi received rave reviews for Dellamorte Dellamore (1994), it was not until the next decade's box office successes ( the Resident Evil movies (2002, 2004), 28 Days Later (2002), the Dawn of the Dead remake (2004), and homage/parody Shaun of the Dead (2004) ) that the zombie subgenre began to resurface, even allowing George Romero to create a fourth part to his zombie series.
Although 28 Days Later director Danny Boyle claims it is not a zombie film (the creatures are alive but diseased), it shares all of the basic characteristics of a zombie movie, and references the genre. It was largely responsible for the creation of what has been referred to as the "MTV zombie": this modern variety is much faster than the shambling hordes of the earlier generation.
It is a tradition that, within zombie films, the human characters never say the word "zombie", but use designations like "them", "those things", "creatures", "corpses", "bodies", "ghouls", etc. This formed the basis for the scene in Shaun of the Dead where Simon Pegg says "Don't say that" to Nick Frost when he uses the aforementioned word. However, in Land of the Dead, a character breaks this tradition once.
See also: List of zombie movies
Zombies in video games
Zombies are common foes in horror-themed computer and video games. Zombies are a staple of the survival horror genre of video games, which was popularised by the Resident Evil series. Many other genres, especially fantasy role-playing and adventure games, also prominently feature zombies as enemies. Some titles, such as Stubbs the Zombie, put the player into the role of the zombie itself.
See also: Zombies in computer and video games
External links
- Triple J's Dr Karl explains the pharmacological way to make a zombie.
- Jim Rage's Elite Zombie Hunting Squad - Zombie exterminators for hire.
- Zombie Dogs - Scientists reanimate dogs in America.
- The Ultimate Zombie Book List - Huge listing of zombie novels, anthologies, collections, comic books, and more.
- In Case of Zombies - Zombie humor.
- The Combat Guide - An extensive collection of original survival guides relating to zombie outbreaks.
- Zombie Hunters Another zombie extermination website.
