Scholars have recently presented critical analyses of the popularity of zombies, vampires and witches to help explain the social and psychological implications of the undead in contemporary popular culture. Zombies are quick and easy metaphors that can be used for many purposes, representing any number of different themes. The proliferation of zombies in films, video games, graphic novels and advertising is extraordinary.

The zombie is a perfect metaphor, infecting all of these spaces, highlighting uncomfortable realities and repulsive domains. Zombies use fear to critique our understanding of humanity. The ‘zombie paradigm’ caters to society’s collective apprehension of terrorist attacks, war, natural disasters, infectious diseases, and the end of the world.

Dr. Kyle Bishop is a zombie scholar [yes, apparently there are zombie scholars!] In his critique, Dead Man Still Walking: Explaining the Zombie Renaissance, Bishop promotes the theory that terrorism and natural disasters are the primary reasons for what he calls the “zombie renaissance.” He points out that when people experience natural disasters or witness other horrific events, the most common reaction people have is to say, “It’s like something out of a movie!” Bishop argues that the film 28 Days Later takes inspiration from footage from the ‘killing fields’ of Cambodia during the Pol Pot regime, and newsreel footage of an actual street scene following a devastating earthquake in China. He states the ultimate truth that “today (zombie movies) are all the more shocking because of their familiarity.”

The zombie meme in particular is closely tied to war and destruction. The military disasters in Iraq and Afghanistan  played a role in the resurgence of the zombie motif in popular culture, but zombie ‘godfather’ George A. Romero claimed that his early films were a response to America’s heavily protested and highly televised involvement in the Vietnam War. Night of the Living Dead was released the same year as the devastating Tet Offensive in January 1968. It is no coincidence that Romero became active again post-9/11, leading to what Bishop refers to as the ‘zombie renaissance.’

This zombie renaissance reveals a connection between Sci-Fi cinema and post-9/11 cultural consciousness. Media monsters function as barometers of cultural anxieties, and zombie movies represent the inescapable realities of unnatural death while presenting a grim view of the modern apocalypse through scenes of deserted streets, piles of corpses, roving gangs of vigilantes: images that have become increasingly common in real life. Zombies can still shock and terrify a population that has become numb to other subgenres.

Recent polls have shown a staggering eighty-five percent of Americans feel that our current political system doesn’t allow them much in the way of actual participation. Between widespread political disenfranchisement and growing economic inequality, it’s easy to feel as if we’re facing a zombie apocalypse.

Vampires and witches are the other two primary memes. J.M. Tyree notes that sexual politics plays a prominent role in the vampire narrative in the article Warm-Blooded: True Blood and Let the Right One In. Vampires have taken on a wealth of meaning in popular culture, from their representation in classic horror films and novels to more recent portrayals as relatively sympathetic outsiders, such as in Twilight, Interview With A Vampire and the True Blood series. The key ingredient to the myth of the vampire is their seductive, often forbidden sexuality. Vampires are sexy.

Yet, vampires are also predators, and their sexuality is coded as a threat, not only to conventions, but also to their victims – who are still mostly women. The vampire’s bite is generally contextualized as a form of rape: a forced exchange of bodily fluids. But times have changed. Tyree wonders if the vampire is a metaphor for our age’s fantasies of non-exploitative tolerance and relatively equitable love relationships. By using vampires as an expression of the sexual dangers of the patriarchy, Tyree argues that True Blood exposes and defeats this concept. I’m not sure if I agree with this assessment.

This brings us to the most maligned media monster of them all: witches! Witches are one of the oldest, most resilient archetypes in the history of civilization. Witches have existed in various forms in virtually every culture since ancient times. Historically, the treatment of witches has reflected the values and social structures of the society where it has existed. This is because witches are usually portrayed as women. As Victoria L. Godwin explains in Love and Lack: Media, Witches and Normative Gender Role, there is an underlying misogyny motivating all media portrayals of women. She studied various pop cultural texts in relation to modern-day witches: Bewitched, The Witches of Eastwick, and Practical Magic, among many others. She also very astutely references the ancient codex Malleus Maleficarum, which was essentially a “how-to” manual for medieval inquisitors on torturing heretics.

Godwin’s analysis only applies to current media trends, however. In pagan cultures, a “witch” was a healer and an interpreter. Her input was vital to the community. The status of women as passive holders of incredible power was reflected in many cultures prior to the advent of Christianity. The witch was an emancipated woman, unencumbered by any bonds which normally restricted women in society. A witch was generally a strong female who lived alone and had no children.

Thus, she was an easy target for the clerical authorities.

Zombies, witches and vampires sell because they propose an outside threat: a menace beyond the control of regular people, not unlike the sort of nuclear apocalypse scenarios which resonated throughout The Cold War and most of my childhood. There seem to be even more feelings of futility and hopelessness now than there were back then.

Obsessing about dark fantasies and mythical “others” keeps people from asking too many questions about the real-live causes of inequity and political marginalization in our society. The current generation of young people was shocked into submission by the events of September 11th and they’ve never recovered.

Zombies, vampires and witches are powerful symbols of this collective fear.

References:

Bishop, Kyle W. American Zombie Gothic: The Rise and Fall (and Rise) of the Walking Dead in Popular Culture. Jefferson, N.C: McFarland & Co, 2010. Print.

Ruggerio, Alena A. Media Depictions of Brides, Wives, and Mothers. Lanham, Md: Lexington Books, 2012. Print.

Tyree, JM (2009). Warm-blooded: True Blood and Let the Right One In. 31-37.

[Re-post from 2015]