Tracking the zombie from Hollywood back to its origins in the voodoo folklore of Haiti. There are zombies among us! From the rotting hordes of TV's The Walking Dead to the blockbuster nightmares of World War Z and 28 Days Later, our popular culture is overrun with the ravenous undead. But where do these strange creatures come from, and what peculiar tales of mesmerism, freemasonry, pig sacrifice and revolution would they tell if they could talk? Artist and writer John Cussans tracks the zombie from Hollywood back to its origins in the voodoo folklore of Haiti, a Caribbean island with a history that is a strange composite of fact and fantasy in the long struggle for independence from colonial intrusion. Turning a keen eye on the way Haiti has provoked mysterious images in the popular culture of the twentieth century, Cussans asks how the sensational imaginings of William Seabrook, Graham Greene, and Wes Craven, among others, have served to inform impressions of the country on the world stage, and in turn, how these representations might have influenced the way that Haiti formulates an image of itself. Cussans weaves fascinating stories from the most significant moments of the country's past, through the slave uprisings of the Bois Caïman in the eighteenth century to Papa Doc Duvalier's reign of terror in the 1960s and beyond. At once a visceral analysis of dubious racial myth, pop-cultural history and philosophical provocation, Undead Uprising asks how ecstatic ritual, voodoo possession, zombie labourers, and meddling spirits have come to meld Haiti's f national identity for better or worse.
Author(s): John Cussans
Publisher: National Geographic Books
Year: 2017
Language: English
Pages: 392
UNDEAD
IPRISIHG
UNDEAD
UPRISING
THE ZOMBIE COMPLEX
THESE PEOPLE, THOSE THINGS
DEMONS THROUGH THE ETHER
INTIMATIONS OF A PHANTOM HAITI
KLINIK ZONBI
LEAVING THE MAGIC ISLAND
"THE WAY IS OPEN AND CLOSED"
DARK WOMB OF TERRIBLE ECSTASIES
SEABROOK AND THE OCCUPATION
THE GOAT WITHOUT HORNS
DEAD MEN WORKING
THE BATAILLE - SEABROOK CONNECTION
POSTSCRIPT
SLEEP WALKING WITH ZOMBIS
MASTERS NATURAL AND SUPERNATURAL
REVOLUTIONARY SOMNAMBULISTS
MASS MIND-SAVAGE CROWD
THE BLACK BLOOD OF SOULLESS ROBOTS
A MIND OF ONE'S OWN?
THE ROMANCE OF REVOLUTIONARY VODOU
THE ETHNOGRAPHIC RECLAMATION OF "VODOU"
WAR ON VODOU
FOUNDING OF THE BUREAU OF ETHNOLOGY
THE MYTHOPOESIS OF BOIS CAIMAN
SUMMONING THE LWA OF INSURRECTION
SUMMONING THE LWA OF INSURRECTION
SACRIFICE, FETISHISM AND THE BLACK GOD OF LIBERTY
LIVE AND LET DIE:
RISE OF THE BARON
BOND'S BLACK OPS
PAPA DOC'S VODOU NATION
THE END POINT OF COMEDY
SECRETISM, JU JU JOURNALISM OR ZIN?
POSTSCRIPT
NO MORE ROOM IN HELL
UNDEAD UPRISING
MEDIA ZOMBIES AND THE TELEVISION REVOLUTION
BLACK SOULS ON COLD WAR ICE
BIFURCATION OF THE ZOMBIE COMPLEX
RETURN OF THE HAITIAN ZOMBI
AGENTS OF THE CURSE
THE SERPENT AND THE RAINBOW
SECRET GOVERNANCE
ALTERED STATES
BLACK TERROR/WHITE HOPE
THE WORLD MUST KNOW ABOUT THIS
GHOSTS OF CITE SOLEIL
LIVING PHANTOMS
CONVERSION OF THE CANNIBAL ARMY
THE CREATION OF AN OCCULT CRIMINAL MACHINE
DANGEROUS LIAISONS
EVERY DOOR IS CLOSED
CHIMERICAL OPTICS
NIGHTMARES IN A DAMAGED BRAIN
METAPHYSICAL MALADIES
A VOODOO POSSESSION?
FEEDING DEMONS HUNGRY FOR BLOOD
INTIMATIONS OF A PHANTOM HAITI (REVISITED)
TELEVISION DOCUMENTARIES
ARTICLES
INTERVIEWS AND PUBLIC PRESENTATIONS
FILMOGRAPHY
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
