As a fellow scholar working in the intersection of horror and pop culture studies, I respectfully disagree. The zombie subgenre does not generally involve camp, although it can. Instead, it embraces a nihilistic form of horror for the most part. Horror has been shown to be a great genre in which to ask difficult existential questions, and modern zombie horror has does this in a number of ways, from the breakdown of the nuclear family to a critique of consumerism and more. It works because it does take itself and the issues seriously.
You write, “Academia has a problem dealing with scary futures, such as institutional failure, existential risk, influence and manipulation, and, more broadly, the genuine possibility that things could go very, very wrong. Talking about these topics carries reputational risk. Engaging with them can mark you as alarmist or fringe, or simply not serious.”
If this were true, how do you explain someone like the late Paul Ehrlich, who has been called the most spectacularly wrong public intellectual of the late Twentieth Century. And yet he remained highly regarded in academia for the remainder of his life. His Malthusian prognostications predicted mass starvation and the collapse of most large countries by the end of the 1980s.
The lesson is that alarmist predictions need to be monumental and help the reputational gatekeepers to get funding, and empower public officials to centralize power. Then you are protected.
A refreshing, creative, and useful exposé of camp. I've been taking things much too seriously these days. Thank you.
As a fellow scholar working in the intersection of horror and pop culture studies, I respectfully disagree. The zombie subgenre does not generally involve camp, although it can. Instead, it embraces a nihilistic form of horror for the most part. Horror has been shown to be a great genre in which to ask difficult existential questions, and modern zombie horror has does this in a number of ways, from the breakdown of the nuclear family to a critique of consumerism and more. It works because it does take itself and the issues seriously.
You write, “Academia has a problem dealing with scary futures, such as institutional failure, existential risk, influence and manipulation, and, more broadly, the genuine possibility that things could go very, very wrong. Talking about these topics carries reputational risk. Engaging with them can mark you as alarmist or fringe, or simply not serious.”
If this were true, how do you explain someone like the late Paul Ehrlich, who has been called the most spectacularly wrong public intellectual of the late Twentieth Century. And yet he remained highly regarded in academia for the remainder of his life. His Malthusian prognostications predicted mass starvation and the collapse of most large countries by the end of the 1980s.
The lesson is that alarmist predictions need to be monumental and help the reputational gatekeepers to get funding, and empower public officials to centralize power. Then you are protected.