Friday, June 12, 2009

Zombology

Zombie movies have always been an integral part of my life, much like Church or bathing for normal people. (I bathe daily, but if it meant missing a zombie flick on television, I’d just throw a towel over the couch and spray myself with Febreze.) Over the years I’ve discovered that zombie movies evoke very different reactions from the people in my life. My father, for instance, gets so much joy out of monster movies that he will loudly repeat lines he remembers regardless of where we are. My family had flown to New Orleans to visit my grandparents, and on the first night there we went out to an upscale restaurant for dinner. When the waiter brought us our food, my grandfather (ever to jibe us for being Northerners) exclaimed, “Now y’all Yankees ah goin’ to get to eat some real soul food!” The word “soul” triggered my father, who, having recently watched “Army of Darkness”, twisted his face into a devilish grin and cried, “I’ll swallow your soul!” My mother kicked him under the table, but my grandfather didn’t respond in the least. It was unclear whether his failing hearing had saved him from having to decide on an appropriate reaction or if the codes of Southern hospitality recommend ignoring tourettes-like outbursts.

My girlfriend feels very strongly about zombie movies, but lacks the positive enthusiasm that my father and I have. At first I assumed that she hated zombie movies because she was afraid, since so much of the horror genre is off-limits when we make trips to the rental store. But after a good solid round of whining and badgering, she revealed that zombie movies bore her; in fact, she doesn’t find monster movies of any kind very scary. It’s the realistic horror that frightens her (to the point of irrational hysteria, I often mutter under my breath), specifically films that depict women being assaulted or sexually abused. She suggested a scene from the horror film Saw as an example: a stranger breaks into a woman’s house at night and after tying her up together with her daughter, he threatens to blow their brains out with a handgun.

“Do you see?” she asked me as I stared blankly, “That could really happen, and that’s why it’s terrifying!”

“Personally, I find the threat of being devoured alive by an undead horde much more existential and disturbing, a fate transcending your trite and pedestrian fears that are more befitting the average lobotomized ‘Lifetime’ viewer.” Actually, I didn’t really say that. Instead, I offered these words of comfort: “If you were ever attacked in real life, you’d probably be in so much shock from being raped and stabbed that you wouldn’t have time to contemplate the gravity of your situation.” This, like half the things I say to my girlfriend was met with a barrage of tiny bony fists with each individual punch carrying so little force that the resulting dull, throbbing pain was miraculously unmarked by a bruise. This attack, at which most women seem to be particularly adept, is the reason why there are fewer reported cases of domestic abuse against males. Without proof, there’s no point in bringing it up with the law. Maybe my girlfriend's right; real pain is much more terrifying than the imaginary.

Zombology

Everything that I understand about the world I have learned from zombie movies. Actually, what I mean to say is that I could have learned everything from zombie movies. Most people dismiss these films as uninspired gore-fests, the intellectual equivalent of clowning in the world of theater. However, zombie films have more to offer than just cheap scares and the canonized chainsaw-to-the-face; this slice of American culture offers a wealth of information about what we humans think of our bodies, our society, and our place in the world.

Historically, zombies are deceased individuals brought back to life by Voodoun witchdoctors known as bokors. The undead then serve these African sorcerers and aid them in their dark magic ceremonies. In the last few decades zombies have come to represent much more to the American public, no longer serving as mere familiars or ghoulish servants. Because zombies are creatures that are human in origin, movies starring the undead give us the opportunity of self-examination and allow us to recognize important social trends and human concerns.

In fact, there is so much pertinent self-reflection inherent in even the most mediocre undead cinema that I suggest our public schools adopt a zombie-oriented curriculum. Our children can benefit from “zombology” in almost every core discipline, including but not limited to art, philosophy, and biology. Besides, we should jump at the chance to make learning more interesting for today’s youth. In the following sections I will present a number of common K-12 disciplines and develop my proposition that zombie culture can provide a plethora of pertinent information.

Welcome to the International School of Zombology.

ART

It’s said that Jackson Pollock was heavily influenced by patterns of blood-splatterings that he found freshly spurted throughout the remains of an isolated Midwestern town. Pollock was the not the first artist to be influenced by the work of our undead brethren; Van Gogh, the classic Dutch post-impressionist painter, is the only artist known to survive a direct zombie attach and live to paint a self-portrait about it. A letter that he later sent to his sister (a correspondence long assumed to be the product of insanity and thus had been, until now, left unpublished) revealed the details of Van Gogh’s encounter with a zombie:

“My dear beloved sister,

I have seen the sky painted with the brightest of rosy hues, yellows and cyans more exquisite than anything produced by my contemporaries. On another note, a rather decrepit-looking fellow accosted me and took a rather nasty mouthful from my ear this morning. The hot oxygenated cardinal reds gushing from my bubbling canal were breath taking in their vibrancy, more beautiful than any pigment I have come across.”

PHILOSOPHY

The application of the zombie genre to the field of philosophy is more obvious than with other disciplines. First of all, there is a popular maxim that poor people often say: “The only certainties in life are death and taxes”. If your annual salary is as low as mine, then the latter doesn’t really apply to you. But death has always been a concrete truth for humanity and life in general. Death is feared, expected, and sometimes desired. For the depressed death is a release from the seemingly endless tortures of everyday life. And for those who aren’t writers or artists, death can be frightening, a dark mysterious existence whose nature is unimaginable. But one thing that everyone can agree on is that death is necessary, and in the grand scheme of things it’s good. Without death, the world would become overpopulated, Hitler would still be alive, and it’d be much harder to eat a hamburger that’s lowing as you take a bite. Zombie movies provide us with an alternate reality where the dead don’t stay dead, where death stops being a passive threat of inevitability and spurns fate as its emissaries actively take lives. The only thing more frightening than dying at the hands of the undead army is knowing that you will join its ranks post-mortem.

While zombies force us to reconsider the facts about death that we’ve taken for granted, the modern depiction of the living dead in film reveals to us our own stubborn reluctance to give up the now antiquated idea of mind/body duality. Man has often wondered “where” his soul is and how it is tied to his body, looking for both the metaphysical and corporeal anchor of the mind. Many of today’s zombies reflect the Descartian philosophy that the mind and body are indeed separate entities, one as ethereal and the other bodily. The body may survive after the mind is gone, still engaging in its most base and animalistic functions.[1] In general we fear our biological instincts because they are not under our control, and so zombies epitomize the worst-case scenario based on this fear. (Of course, if you’re the type of person who finds confronting humanity’s most base and vulgar qualities entertaining, you can always ride the New York City subway system and save yourself the price of a movie ticket. However, riding NYC public transit increases your chance of actually being eaten alive, or masturbated upon, which is a fate worse than death.)

On the other hand, many people would like to think that they are irreducibly complex (to borrow Michael Behe’s phrase) and that human beings cannot be condensed to mere biological components. More contemporary portrayals of the undead follow a monist philosophy; because the brains of the undead are often reported as degenerated and atrophied, their minds (which according to monism are manifestations of the chemical reactions in the brain and are thus are completely dependant on the welfare of the body) suffer the same fate. I believe that this change can be attributed to the developing fields of neuroscience and neuropsychology; as our understanding of human anatomy increases, the zombie mythos adapts and presents some very interesting introspective conclusions regarding human nature.

BIOLOGY

Our knowledge of human biology is constantly changing and improving, especially in regards to our brains and how consciousness arises. For one thing, the forever-illusive homunculus[2] (or physical representation of the mind in the brain) has long been believed to be the brain in its entirety. “Shoot the brain and the body dies” has long been canonized as the most efficient method for killing a zombie, implying that whatever is controlling the body is confined within the cranium. And when neuroscience became a more popular field and the prefrontal cortex’s role in personality and behavior became common knowledge (popularized by the most famous neurological patient, Phineas Gage), zombie movies followed suit by introducing more anatomically sound explanations for the existence of zombies. Resident Evil, for example, exemplifies this willingness of the zombie industry to adapt to the dynamic field of neuroscience: in the R.E. universe, zombies are humans who have been infected with a deadly virus that attacks the brain. The virus eats away at the frontal lobe, leaving the victim a mindless shell of his former self.

Romero’s 2005 Land of the Dead also demonstrates an increased understanding of neurology. The “protagonist” zombie, affectionately dubbed “Big Daddy”, continues to “work” at the gas station which employed him in life. In the opening shot Big Daddy is shown attempting to fuel a car that is no longer there, suggesting that the areas of his brain responsible for storing and recalling implicit memories (and thus habitual exercises) have been preserved. These implicit memories may suggest how a zombie can perform past habitual activities without having any conscious knowledge (or at least severely limited levels of conscious knowledge) of doing so.

The “limited consciousness” theory is supported by a later scene in the film where Big Daddy kills Dennis Hopper’s character by trapping him in a crude gasoline/propane firetrap.[3] Big Daddy seems to be exhibiting a rudimentary thought process when he utilizes past knowledge to solve a problem in a new, unfamiliar environment. While most zombies appear to only crave the taste of human flesh, Big Daddy kills for revenge, not by instinct.

The need for an updated version of zombie biology also reflects the general public’s growing impatience with the religious or “soulless” explanation for the undead.

RELIGION

The famous tagline for Romero’s Dawn of the Dead claims that “when Hell is full, the dead will walk the earth”. The concept of the “zombie” is understandably intertwined with religion. While the word “zombie” originates from the Voudoun “zombii”, the idea of the dead terrorizing the living is present in almost every culture. From Arabian “ghuls” to Medieval “night shades”, the undead can be found equally in the folklore of Eastern and Western societies, new and ancient. The fear of Hell being full may speak to modern Western society’s dissatisfaction with the ethical and moral corruption of current times, the frustration with governmental and socially sanctioned debauchery. As anyone who has seen a zombie movie knows, it’s always the arrogant jerk and skank who die first (even before the black guy). In contemporary films there seems to be an overabundance of less-than admirable characters, and so oftentimes much of the movie is spent happily anticipating their grizzly deaths.

The threat of an undead army also speaks to the Christian fear of Armageddon and the degeneration of a society dominated by Judeo-Christian values. 28 Days Later’s church scene demonstrates the degradation of the Church construct and the seemingly indiscriminate destruction that will ensure during Earth’s last days.

SOCIAL STUDIES

Zombie movies paint an accurate portrait of general social concerns, many of which are a product of the last century’s industrialization and technological advancements. The exponential growth of biotechnology, for example, has inspired movies like Resident Evil and Doom. Uncontrolled genetic and viral experimentation is a prevalent concern for many paranoid citizens, especially those who still refer to East Asians as “Chinamen” and begin every other sentence with “Back in Naam…” Xenophobia is also a pertinent issue for a post 9/11 United States occupied by citizens with conflicting opinions regarding border policies and immigration laws. The waves of undead are the epitome of “the other”, and perhaps more specifically, they represent the hoards of non-English speaking immigrants who are flooding in from all sides. The fear of overpopulation runs parallel to this xenophobia; as population increases we all feel the effects of a declining economy, one that is unable to support the multitude of heavy consumers that prey upon it.

MATHEMATICS

Zombie movies provide some much more practical applications in addition to abstract social commentary. For instance, the more successful zombie hunters/escapees are particularly adept at rationing their supplies, a skill that is invaluable for anyone who ever goes camping or drives through the Midwest. Efficiency and vigilance is required to fend off the undead, and the living must be able to calculate food amounts, ammo quantities, the weight of items that need to be carried, and days needed to travel. It’s important that individuals know how to identify and pack the essentials, particularly weapons and food. Surviving is definitely contingent on mathematical skill and accuracy.

PHYSICS

The physics of zombie movies can prepare the general viewer for many worst-case scenarios, such as fending off an attacker (alive or dead) or hunting out of necessity on a camping trip gone awry. Zombie film ballistics allow us to discover what rounds are best for piercing entire torsos, while melee attacks show us what ordinary household objects can be used as deadly weapons. Flight of the Living Dead teaches viewers that golf putters, umbrellas, and even bare fists can all be used to behead an attacker at close range. It should be noted, however, that this might only be possible if the attacker’s flesh has been severely weakened by decomposition. The author does not suggest trying this on a deer or that asshole who lives across the street.

ENGLISH

English is the only core subject to which zombie movies cannot directly contribute. The argument that Milton made in his Aeropagitica could potentially be applicable to a zombie film’s screenplay; after all, you can’t know what good literature is without first knowing what bad literature is (and vice versa). But even Milton would agree that the school systems would never accept that bullshit (the “whitest of excrement”, I believe he said).

There is a reason that the zombie genre has been (and will continue to be) so successful in America. For one thing, we’re all gun-toting hicks at heart and nothing twists our britches in a knot like watching a zombie’s head explode. But more importantly, zombie movies offer a concise medium for social commentary, which in turn can be used for educational purposes. Today’s youth is more or less born with ADHD, so as responsible, understanding individuals we should embrace any method that gets kids engaged in learning the basics of academia.


[1] Interestingly enough, zombie sexuality is something curiously absent from most zombie movies. Undoubtedly filmmakers are wary about simulating necrophilia on the big screen (even when between two consenting parties), and any scenes displaying ghoul-on-ghoul action would either be inappropriately humorous for a horror flick or excessively disturbing. I can think of only one film that successfully pulls off the depiction of undead copulation: Peter Jackson’s 1992 Dead Alive (US title). However, the subsequent infanticide of the zombies’ offspring arguably offsets any lasting humor that the conception would have had.

[2] The homunculean theory of consciousness is inherently flawed as it dictates that the human consciousness is composed of a smaller “self” who observes the plethora of sensory input data the brain receives. However, there is no explanation as to how the smaller “self” observes what it does, and thus yet another tinier “self” is needed to explain the workings of the smaller “self”. This argument is akin to Michael Behe’s “irreducible complexity” theory, which attempts to prove the existence of God by claiming that certain biological systems are so complex that they had to be designed. The logic behind this argument rests on a shaky foundation, however, since an entity able to create something complex would necessarily be as complex or more so than the invention, and then we’ve entered a vicious cycle to which there is no end in sight.

[3] I can’t help but imagine that this scene would have been much funnier if the actor playing Big Daddy looked more like Hank Hill from King of the Hill. Who else loves propane that much?

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