i just read a book chapter on this! here is a quote i think rly stood out to me from it. “Zombification conjures up the Haitian experience of slavery, of the disassociation of man from his will, his reduction to a beast of burden at the will of a master [...] the man whose mind and soul have been stolen and who has been left only the ability to work.”
there is an episode of x files where it is revealed that an immigrations officer is performing zombification rites on soldiers to abuse haitian refugees. i was interested in this particular episode and used it in a project for a class, examining how diasporic practices like vodou can be abused in the hands of white oppressors and used against the very people whose cultures, identities, and communities rely upon these practices. for a show that came out in the mid 90s it did a pretty decent job of unpacking the complexity vodou in the American consciousness. your essay does an excellent job of exploring these ideas as well!!
i just read a book chapter on this! here is a quote i think rly stood out to me from it. “Zombification conjures up the Haitian experience of slavery, of the disassociation of man from his will, his reduction to a beast of burden at the will of a master [...] the man whose mind and soul have been stolen and who has been left only the ability to work.”
please please share the author/book that is so eloquently and fittingly put
it’s from the cambridge companion to gothic fiction! the specific chapter is:
Colonial and postcolonial Gothic - the Caribbean by Lizabeth Paravisini-Gebert :)
there is an episode of x files where it is revealed that an immigrations officer is performing zombification rites on soldiers to abuse haitian refugees. i was interested in this particular episode and used it in a project for a class, examining how diasporic practices like vodou can be abused in the hands of white oppressors and used against the very people whose cultures, identities, and communities rely upon these practices. for a show that came out in the mid 90s it did a pretty decent job of unpacking the complexity vodou in the American consciousness. your essay does an excellent job of exploring these ideas as well!!