Zombies As American Zeitgeist Proxies

blackbearnh writes "No doubt, there will be more than a few brain-munching glassy-eyed zombies showing up on the typical doorstep tonight, demanding brains, brains, brains, or at least some Milk Duds. But according to this essay over on Forbes.com, zombies are more than just the trendy monster on the block, they are to Americans what Godzilla is to Japanese: a personification of our fear of science and technology. 'It seems you can't throw a half-eaten cerebrum these days without hitting a posse of zombies brought to life by some kind of biological mishap (28 Days Later, Resident Evil, Planet Terror, Quarantine). Like Godzilla, zombies keep up with the times, always ready to mirror whatever aspect of science and technology people feel most uncertain about at the moment.'"

Comments

Re:Fear of Science...

[Colonel Korn]

This seems a bit of a stretch, since Americans embrace Science and Technology readily.

Almost all Americans are willing to embrace technology, but few really embrace science. In fact, a large number are overtly hostile to some branches of science (especially the biological sciences). The majority seems content to retain an ignorance of science in general, or perhaps fear that they are incapable of understanding it.

Agreed. And Americans are mostly willing to embrace technology that's been well advertised as either cool or sexy. Even the very well educated non-scientists in America (read: humanities professors) are largely fearful of or hostile toward science. When I've been in France and Germany, that's not been the case. Also, regarding the GP's rejection of the zombies-represent-fear-of-science hypothesis, look back to early zombie movies. They tend to clearly state that the zombies arose because of some new phenomenon that was pulled (and distorted) from relatively avant garde science of the day. Just wait - we'll soon have zombies based on gamma ray bursts or the sequenced human genome.