Call for papers: Southwest Popular / American Culture Association – Zombie Culture

Make plans to join the Southwest PCA/ACA for our 35th annual conference, February 19-22, 2014, at the Hyatt Regency Hotel and Conference Center in beautiful Albuquerque, New Mexico Hyatt Regency Albuquerque.

The conference theme this year is: Popular and American Culture Studies: Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow 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 “eat it up.” The zombie has come to represent the chaotic world we live in, and courses continue to pop up on college and university campus all over the world. This is due in large part to the success of films like Night of the Living Dead, Zombie Flesh Eaters (Zombi 2), Dawn of the Dead, 28 Days Later, Shaun of the Dead, and most recently Warm Bodies, World War Z and the television program The Walking Dead.

Any aspect of zombie culture will be given consideration. However, in keeping with the theme of the conference SPECIAL ATTENTION will be paid to those proposals which discuss the distinctive American aspects of the zombie 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, Zombies on Broadway, World War Z…..
Specific books/zombie literature: Zombie Bake Off, World War Z, Book of All Flesh, Case of Charles Dexter Ward…
Zombie writers’ fiction and non-fiction: Stephen Graham Jones, H.P. Lovecraft, Robert Kirkman, Steve Niles, Max Brooks, Matt Mogk, Jovanka Vuckovic. Stephen King…..
The Walking Dead
Zombie comics (any aspect: history, cultural impact, storytelling…)
Zombies since 9/11
Zombie children’s books
Zombie running
Fast vs. slow zombies
Zombie gore
Teaching the zombie (zombie pedagogy)
Zombie cosplay
Zombie brains-food
Zombie video games
Zombie ants
Can a real zombie outbreak happen?
The voodoo zombie-the historical roots of the zombie
The Euro-zombie
Nazi–zombies
Viking zombies
Marvel 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.

Please submit your title, and 100- to 250-word abstract by November 1, 2013, through our database, which can be accessed at: http://conference2014.southwestpca.org/