CFP: Zombie Culture

Conference
Southwest Popular / American Culture Association (SWPACA)
41st Annual Conference
Hyatt Regency Hotel & Conference Center, Albuquerque
February 19 - 22, 2020
Stichtag: 2019 10 31

Proposals for papers and panels are now being accepted for the 41st annual SWPACA conference. One of the nation’s largest interdisciplinary academic conferences, SWPACA offers nearly 70 subject areas, each typically featuring multiple panels. For a full list of subject areas, area descriptions, and Area Chairs, please visit http://southwestpca.org/conference/call-for-papers/

The area chair for Zombie Culture seeks papers and presentations on any aspect of the zombie in popular culture and history. It seems as though the world has gone “zombie crazy.” There are zombie walks, games on college campuses like “Humans Vs. Zombies,” zombie children’s books, zombie poetry, fiction, video games, zombie ammunition and guns, and zombie running contests. Almost anything can be “zombified” and society and fans all over the world are literally “eating it up.” The zombie has come to represent the chaotic world we live in, and courses continue to pop up on college and university campuses all over the world. This is due in large part to the success of films like Night of the Living Dead, Zombi 2, Dawn of the Dead, 28 Days Later, Shaun of the Dead, Warm Bodies, World War Z and television programs like The Walking Dead, iZombie, Z Nation, and Fear the Walking Dead.

What is distinctively American (if anything) about zombies in film, literature, and popular culture in general? How does the zombie influence American culture in a way that resonates in our transmedia world?

Some topics to consider:

  • Directors: George Romero, Lucio Fulci, Umberto Lenzi, Todd Sheets, Danny Boyle, Sam Rami, Peter Jackson, Amando de Ossorio…
  • Specific zombie films: White Zombie, King of the Zombies, Dawn of the Dead, Tombs of the Blind Dead, Dead Alive, Evil Dead, World War Z, Train to Busan
  • Specific books/zombie literature: The Zombie Survival Guide, Zone One, The Girl with all the Gifts, the Newsflesh trilogy, The Reapers are the Angels, Cell
  • Zombie writers’ fiction and non-fiction: Stephen Graham Jones, H.P. Lovecraft, Robert Kirkman, Steve Niles, Max Brooks, Matt Mogk, Jovanka Vuckovic, Stephen King…
  • Zombie television: The Walking Dead, Fear the Walking Dead, Z Nation, iZombie, The Santa Clarita Diet
  • Zombie video games: Resident Evil, Call of Duty: Zombies, The Last of Us, Day Z, Dead Rising
  • Zombie comics (any aspect: history, cultural impact, storytelling, Marvel zombies…)
  • Zombies since 9/11
  • Zombie children’s books
  • Zombie runs and zombie cosplay
  • Fast vs. slow zombies
  • Zombie gore
  • Teaching the zombie (zombie pedagogy)
  • Can a real zombie outbreak happen?
  • The voodoo zombie and the historical roots of the zombie
  • The Euro-zombie, Nazi–zombies, Viking zombies
  • What exactly is a zombie?
  • Humans vs. zombies
  • Zombies across the world (Ro-langs…)
  • Zombies’ roots in cinema
  • Are mummies/Frankenstein’s monster zombies?
  • What does the rise in the zombie’s popularity tell us about society?

These are just a few of the topics that could be discussed.

Brandon Kempner, PhD, New Mexico Highlands University, bkempner@nmhu.edu

All proposals must be submitted through the conference’s database at http://register.southwestpca.org/southwestpca

For details on using the submission database and on the application process in general, please see the Proposal Submission FAQs and Tips page at http://southwestpca.org/conference/faqs-and-tips/

Individual proposals for 15-minute papers must include an abstract of approximately 200-500 words. Including a brief bio in the body of the proposal form is encouraged, but not required.

For information on how to submit a proposal for a roundtable or a multi-paper panel, please view the above FAQs and Tips page.

The deadline for submissions is October 31, 2019.

SWPACA offers monetary awards for the best graduate student papers in a variety of categories. Submissions of accepted, full papers are due January 1, 2020. For more information, visit http://southwestpca.org/conference/graduate-student-awards/

Registration and travel information for the conference is available at http://southwestpca.org/conference/conference-registration-information/

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