University of Winchester academic explores zombie culture The resurgence of zombies in popular culture represents society’s role in its own crises, according to new research by a University of Winchester lecturer. Dr Gary Farnell, from the University of Winchester’s Department of English, Creative Writing and American Studies, is an expert in the fields of Gothic and Romantic studies. In recent years he has turned his attention to a renaissance of zombies in everything from television programmes to modern language, with terms such as zombie culture and zombie politics entering common usage. His most recent work is part of a collection of studies focusing on The Walking Dead – an American horror television series telling the story of a small group of survivors living in the aftermath of a zombie apocalypse. Dr Farnell – a former academic tutor to Winchester graduate Lauren Cohan who plays Maggie Greene in The Walking Dead – argues the show represents a paradigm shift away from the notion of the zombie as an alien towards a new understanding of post-humanism. “The Walking Dead is the first example of a zombie narrative that presents not just viral zombies, but also viral humans,” said Dr Farnell. “The premise of the story is that we’re all infected after the catastrophe of a zombie apocalypse so humans turn into zombies when they die, without having been bitten. “Previously the zombie has been read as a metaphor for a variety of social and political issues, from McCarthyism to the spread of consumerism for example. “The Walking Dead redraws the boundary of the human and accentuates the issue of what human beings become. At a time when crises, like zombies, are everywhere there is almost a sense of gallows humour about how the zombies are our pathological pals. Zombies are now the situation rather than the metaphor.” Dr Farnell presented his theory at the recent Research and Knowledge Exchange Symposium at the University of Winchester. His work in this field has also been presented at the universities of Stirling and Birmingham. ‘Talking Bodies’ in a Zombie Apocalypse is published in ‘We’re All Infected’: New Essays on ‘The Walking Dead’ and the Fate of the Human, edited by Dawn Keetley and published by McFarland and Company.
Posted on: Fri, 20 Jun 2014 10:46:10 +0000
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