“White Zombie” por Kieran M. Murphy: Murphy explica que, debido al cine de horror clásico, la figura del zombie como objeto de estudio provoca escasa atracción por parte del mundo académico. Por ejemplo, el sensacionalismo que buscaban aquellas películas y la propaganda de éstas neutraliza el hecho de que, según Murphy, el zombie es una figura que nace en Haití, no en un estudio de Hollywood. Además, se señala que otros dos factores son la mala prensa que el país caribeño posee y que, a través de los pimeros viajeros europeos que llegaron a la isla y comenzaron a escribir acerca de “lo zombie”, sumado a la aparición de esta figura en el cine estadounidense,a día de hoy, el zombie es una figura de la cultura popular en todo el mundo.

Abstract: The figure of the zombie is perhaps the most overlooked point of contact between Haiti and North America. Despite the familiarity and popularity it enjoys in both cultures, the zombie has not attracted much consideration from scholars, who tend to dismiss it as a phantasm inspired by an anthropological curiosity that contributed to Haiti’s bad press through its sensationalist evocations in travel literature and horror films. For instance, Michael Dash argues that Haiti’s continuous portrayal as the land of contagion, carnality, cannibals, Voodoo, and zombies “inexorably led to political attitudes of exclusion, paternalism and occupation” (45). The association of Haiti with the zombie accentuates and perpetuates Haiti’s “Otherness” by linking the Caribbean nation to bodies defiled by the barbarism of oppressive regimes and contaminated with infectious diseases (141–142). However, by attributing its popularity abroad solely to sensationalism, such association also neutralizes the significance of the zombie as an influential and remarkable Haitian invention. It eclipses the pioneering Haitian experience of modernity that produced the zombie phantasm in the first place, and that facilitated its passage into the American imagination during the Great Depression. Beyond the bad press, the Haitian zombie emerged as a global figure of modernity. That emergence also carries its own political weight that will be measured here through a genealogy of the figure of the zombie from early colonial literature to its first appearance in American cinema.

Tipo: Artículo en revista científica
Autor: Kieran M. Murphy
URL: https://doi.org/10.1080/17409292.2011.535263
Volumen: 15
Ejemplar: 1
Páginas: 47-55
Publicación: Contemporary French and Francophone Studies
ISSN: 1740-9292
Fecha: January 1, 2011
DOI: 10.1080/17409292.2011.535263
Accedido: 1/5/2018 12:03:27
Catálogo de: biblioteca Taylor and Francis+NEJM
Idioma: Inglés

Tags: Zombi. Haiti. Cultura pop. Cine clásico. Cine de horror.