Zombie Scholar

History and scholarship

Before the horde, there was a history

The zombie of film and fiction did not appear from nowhere, and it is not the same thing as the traditions it borrowed its name from. This section keeps the two apart and treats both with care.

Folklore and cultural history

Editorial introduction, awaiting specialist review

The English word "zombie" comes from the Haitian zonbi. In Haiti the zonbi belongs to history, religion and lived experience, and accounts of it are not the same as the flesh-eating monster of modern fiction. Zombie Scholar keeps these in a separate collection category and will not present a living religious tradition as a monster checklist.

Entries in this category are commissioned or reviewed with qualified sources, including Haitian perspectives, before they are expanded. Until then we point to institutions that have done the work. A good starting point:

Genre history, through the catalog

A genre history will be written from reviewed records, so every claim in it can point to an entry. For now, here is the catalog in order of first release.

  1. 1979FANGORIA (magazine) Periodical
  2. 1996Resident Evil (1996 video game) Video game
  3. 2002Resident Evil (2002 film) Film
  4. 2003The Walking Dead (comic series) Comic
  5. 2003The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead Book
  6. 2006World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War Book
  7. 2009FANGORIA Vol. 1 Issue #287 Periodical
  8. 2010The Walking Dead (television series) Television
  9. 2024Zombis (exhibition, musée du quai Branly) Scholarship

Criticism and bibliographies

Academic criticism, exhibition catalogs and scholarly periodicals are catalogued like any other work, with article-level records where they discuss specific titles. The bibliography opens with the scholarship shelf and grows as the source registry is reviewed.

Research methods

  • Cite the edition, not just the title: page numbers move between printings.
  • Give episode and timestamp, or game version and encounter, for anything seen on screen.
  • Record conflicting dates with their sources rather than picking one.
  • Use fan databases to find candidates, then confirm against primary or bibliographic evidence.
  • Write "unknown" when the work does not show something.