But what about Zombies? Cultural Imperialism & Vodou
Vodou has a distinctly demonized image in Western culture. This perception stems from French slave owners who were vastly outnumbered and fearful of any hint of unity among the enslaved Africans of Saint Dominique that may lead to insurrection. The image of Vodou as a backwards, superstitious faith has since been perpetuated by a white/Anglo/Protestant fear of African culture and serves a convenient narrative that supports the idea that Haitians need to be saved from themselves. In the case of Vodou, the myths present in pop culture cannot be simply explained as innocent cultural misunderstandings. Many legends act as propaganda, carrying insidious messages to perpetuate cultural imperialism. In Better Off Dead: The Evolution of the Zombie as Post-Human, authors Deborah Christie and Sarah Lauro explain, “Anxiety about Haiti in the United States translated to a fear of Voodoo, which was increasingly linked to cannibalism in the U.S. popular press to underscore supposed Haitian primitivism.” (9) This conception of Vodou would, in turn, fuel opponents to Haitian independence by linking revolutionary ideas with a supposedly barbaric belief system. This link would remain throughout the 19th century and well into the 20th where it continued to provide justification for the U.S. occupation of Haiti between 1915 and 1934.
Why did perpetuating myths about Vodou and Haiti benefit America? To answer that, Christie and Lauro suggest, “Haiti had to be demonized so as to create a situation where the civilizing forces of the white world could save the nation from itself… To most Americans, the United States occupied Haiti under the pretense of civilizing it, and a negative image of Haitians and of Voodoo in particular were instrumental in gaining and keeping support for the action.” (12–13) To critically analyze the perception of Vodou in American culture, the authors cite an article from a 1920’s era National Geographic article depiction of Haiti, reporting, “Here, in the elemental wilderness, the natives rapidly forget their thin veneer of Christian civilization and reverted to utter, unthinking animalism, swayed only by fear of local bandit chiefs and the black magic of Voodoo witch doctors.” (12)
Origins of the Zombie
“The earliest slaves were neither sick nor cannibalistic; they were victims of an exotic religion, used as slaves, forced to submit to the will of a zombie master.”
-Deborah Christie and Sarah Juliet Lauro in Better Off Dead: The Evolution of the Zombie as Post-Human
Zombie-lore of George Romero and The Walking Dead, creatures born of infectious pathogens and Hollywood imagination, bear little resemblence to the original incarnation of the Haitian Vodou zombie born from fear and metaphor. One of the few non-European urban legends to catapult to pop culture infamy, it is the only fictional characterization in a horror narrative that has “religious and cultural origins in the African diaspora.” Zombie mythology began to permeate Western culture since the time of the Haitian Revolution and reflects the collective fear of an independent black republic. Christie and Lauro reveal that the zombie acted as a powerful metaphor for slavery itself, “with its links to people of color, the zombie was a natural emblem for the slave, easily expendable and under the control of a powerful master.” (15)
The concept of zombies permeated U.S. culture through William Seabrook’s anthropological depiction of Haiti in The Magic Island. Now dismissed by most scholars for its evident racial biases, it is still valuable as a primary source to analyze the development of myths surrounding Vodou and Haiti. Seabrook introduces the zombie to his readers as:
“a soulless corpse, still dead, but taken from the grave and endowed by sourcery with a mechanical semblance of life- it is a dead body which is made to walk and act and move as if it were alive.” (93)
The term “zombie” did not become common in the American vernacular until 1929. It is interesting that this coincided with the Great Depression, at the very moment when society began to realize their powerlessness and feel disenfranchised by the capitalist system. Christie and Lauro argue, “Identification with zombies, then, may have been particularly resonant in the 1930’s United States, as zombies became an ideological critique of modernity in the form of capitalist exploitation.” (14) The economic disparity on American soil also exacerbated racial tensions and depictions of cannibal zombies and Vodou priestesses helped to fuel racial stereotypes.
Examinations of race in Hollywood films of this era reveal a distinct formula of a white women under threat of being victimized by an animalistic black man. These racial stereotypes, along with a newly added threat of sexual domination, are clearly depicted in the film clips above. The trailer for White Zombie warns, “With these zombie eyes he rendered her powerless… With this zombie grip he made her perform his every desire!”
“Both black men and white women were imprisoned in sexual stereotypes as a means of controlling them.”
— Deborah Christie and Sarah Juliet Lauro in Better Off Dead: The Evolution of the Zombie as Post-Human
Naturally, in the end, the zombie master was defeated. “Black Voodoo was no match for white reason” which continues to support negative stereotypes and implies “the need to reassert control over Haitians and the rest of the colonies.” (18)
It is clear that the history of zombies and the demonization of Vodou is inextricably linked to racism. Christie and Lauro highlight, “discourse surrounding Haitian Voodoo was transformed into a racialized discourse in early zombie films, but it becomes evident that over time, as the zombie matured, the overt link to Haiti and to Voodoo dissolved so that zombies came to represent any ethnic group.” Everything from cannibalisim to Voodoo Dolls can be viewed as an attempt to warp and discredit the nation of Haiti, and people of color on the whole.
