{"id":5740,"date":"2022-11-03T15:59:47","date_gmt":"2022-11-03T19:59:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hedgehogsandfoxes.org\/?p=5740"},"modified":"2022-11-03T15:59:47","modified_gmt":"2022-11-03T19:59:47","slug":"livia-gershon-on-colonialism-and-the-birth-of-the-zombie-movie-liviagershon-jstor_daily","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hedgehogsandfoxes.org\/index.php\/2022\/11\/03\/livia-gershon-on-colonialism-and-the-birth-of-the-zombie-movie-liviagershon-jstor_daily\/","title":{"rendered":"Livia Gershon on Colonialism and the Birth of the Zombie Movie @LiviaGershon @JSTOR_Daily"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Livia Gershon discusses the origins of the zombie movie here for JSTOR Daily. She notes:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><a href=\"https:\/\/daily.jstor.org\/the-d-i-y-origins-of-night-of-the-living-dead\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">George Romero<\/a>\u00a0created the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/daily.jstor.org\/the-living-dead-embody-our-worst-fears\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">modern zombie<\/a>\u00a0as metaphor for\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/daily.jstor.org\/walking-dead-the-science-behind-the-zombies\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">contagious disease<\/a>\u00a0and consumerism. But, as film scholar Jennifer Fay writes, the\u00a0<a class=\"jcitation\" href=\"https:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/41949582?mag=colonialism-birthed-the-zombie-movie\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">first feature-length zombie movie<\/a>\u00a0emerged from a different kind of metaphor\u2014Haitians\u2019 longstanding association of the living dead with slavery and exploited labor.<\/p>\n<p>When\u00a0<em>White Zombie<\/em>\u00a0premiered in 1932, Fay writes, the United States was in the seventeenth year of its\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/daily.jstor.org\/woodrow-wilson-and-american-empire\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">occupation of Haiti<\/a>\u00a0and was facing mass strikes and demonstrations that would lead to its full withdrawal two years later. The movie focuses on white characters\u2014the titular zombie is an American woman stolen from her husband on her wedding night by a rival with the help of the voodoo-practicing European plantation owner, Murder Legendre (played by horror icon Bela Legosi). But the backdrop of the action is occupied Haiti as described by US journalist and occultist W. B. Seabrook.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/daily.jstor.org\/colonialism-birthed-the-zombie-movie\/?utm_term=Colonialism%20Birthed%20the%20Zombie%20Movie201D&amp;utm_campaign=jstordaily_11032022&amp;utm_content=email&amp;utm_source=Act-On+Software&amp;utm_medium=email\">here.<\/a><\/p>\n\n<div class=\"twitter-share\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?via=HedgehogsFoxes\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Livia Gershon discusses the origins of the zombie movie here for JSTOR Daily. She notes: George Romero\u00a0created the\u00a0modern zombie\u00a0as metaphor for\u00a0contagious disease\u00a0and consumerism. But, as film scholar Jennifer Fay writes, the\u00a0first feature-length zombie movie\u00a0emerged&#46;&#46;&#46;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[81],"tags":[593,530],"class_list":["post-5740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-law-and-culture","tag-law-and-culture","tag-law-and-film"],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pasVL2-1uA","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hedgehogsandfoxes.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hedgehogsandfoxes.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hedgehogsandfoxes.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hedgehogsandfoxes.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hedgehogsandfoxes.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5740"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hedgehogsandfoxes.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5740\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5741,"href":"https:\/\/hedgehogsandfoxes.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5740\/revisions\/5741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hedgehogsandfoxes.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hedgehogsandfoxes.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hedgehogsandfoxes.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}