Jamie A. Thomas
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Video & perspectives on communication, intercultural learning & the impact of anthropological research.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Title Delivers (A Little Too Much)

3/13/2016

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by Romeo Luevano and Gretchen Trupp 

Romeo and Gretchen's movie review comes after our field trip to see the new movie, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2016), as part of our Spring 2016 seminar, Languages of Fear, Racism, and Zombies at Swarthmore College. **SPOILER ALERT**
The film is so White that we can mistake it as one of this year’s Oscar nominations. 
Key zombie character from the movie.
Winners of *most memorable zombie duo* from the movie.
From the beginning of the movie, it seemed fairly clear that Pride and Prejudice and Zombies would carry a healthy dose of all the title promised, some of it being from the producers rather than content of the book itself. The zombie virus itself came from “the colonies”, and could be transferred by a bite. Having the virus come from European colonies and then affect the greater London area seems to indicate fears that the colonizers had about their own power and who they were trying to control. For the first few hours (up to days depending on individual circumstance), the zombie would blend in with humans-- only their decaying flesh would give them away. Most of the zombies bitten while alive retained their speech capabilities and memories-- a trait not often seen in zombie movies. A big part of this seemed to be for shock and horror value, as the violence appeared to be pretty gratuitous for a PG-13 rating.

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Film Leaves Us Wanting More Flesh

3/4/2016

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by Eojin (Jin) Choi, Shuang Guan, & Tiauna Lewis

Jin, Shuang, and Tiauna's movie review is a response to a field trip to see the new movie, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2016), as part of our Spring 2016 seminar, Languages of Fear, Racism, and Zombies at Swarthmore College. **SPOILER ALERT**
The Bennett sisters put their sword skills to work.
The Bennett sisters work their way through the party in full style.
Following the trend of mash-ups between history, literature, and the supernatural, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies takes the British classic by Jane Austen and adds in a zombie-fighting quest. The love story between Jane and Mr. Bingley, and between Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy, unfolds against a backdrop of a zombie outbreak that is rapidly taking over England. In the end, Darcy and Elizabeth overcome their initial impressions of each other and work together to minimize the spread of the outbreak.

In the movie, viewers see hundreds of zombies that constantly hunt for brains while being hunted down themselves. Historically, this stems from the Haitian belief, in which zombies came in multiple forms: They were spirits stolen by magicians, humans who willingly became zombies, or mindless servants of their zombie creator. In American society, however, the historical appeal of the zombie initially came largely from the creature's lack of autonomy. Many even considered zombies to be the ideal slaves, since they could work for long hours and survive on minimal amounts of food. This characterization of the zombie as a mindless corpse is what the American public is most familiar with today.

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Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Part 2: A Movie Review

3/2/2016

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by Alexander Jin

Alexander's movie review is a response to a field trip to see the new movie, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2016), as part of our Spring 2016 seminar, Languages of Fear, Racism, and Zombies at Swarthmore College.
Seminal moment from 2016's Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.
Preparing for Bingley's ball: Equal parts well-placed daggers, and signature empire waist.
In essence, I found this movie to be eh. Overall, the film struggles to find the appropriate balance between the aristocratic romance presented by Jane Austen's original novel and the absurd (somewhat comedic) zombie motif. 

The film does a relatively good job in creating the alternative history setting but fell short when it attempts to provide additional information surrounding the rise of the zombies. For example, a little bit of 'pride and prejudice' may have affected the decision to convey that the zombie infection originated from overseas territories, when ironically the opposite was true. In reality, White explorers brought all sorts of diseases that ravaged indigenous populations through their expeditions. Additionally, the description of the sisters' training unnecessarily eroticizes 'The Orient' and the knowledge of faraway lands. Even if one is to disregard the fact that having specialized training in East Asia makes absolutely no socioeconomic sense, the manner in which all of the characters fight in the movie is distinctly Western.

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Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Part 1

2/20/2016

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By Jamie A. Thomas
Chalkboard from my seminar course on February 17, 2016.
Brainstorming in my seminar course, *Languages of Fear, Racism, and Zombies* (Spring 2016) on February 17.
"There was, however, a savage wildness that could only impress us with forebodings respecting Mr. Farewell and his party, of whom we were in search, which led us to apprehend that they had all fallen by the savage hands of the tribes who might occasionally visit the coast." - Travels and Adventures in Eastern Africa: Descriptive of the Zoolus, Their Manners, and Customs, Vol. 1 (1836, p. 10)

"Scary Sh*t."

In the seminar course I'm teaching this semester, we'll be attending a movie theater showing of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2016) next week. This in mind, my goal has been to prepare my students for a critical examination of the film by studying concurrent 19th century discourse. Jane Austen's novel was originally published in 1813, the same time in which European colonial expansion was underway, slavery in the U.S. (and Americas) was reaching its zenith, and modern linguistics and anthropology were also taking shape. Other texts from this historical period include Nathaniel Isaacs' Travels and Adventures in Eastern Africa, Vol. 1 (1836), famous for its (now debunked) descriptions of King Shaka Zulu, as well as Solomon Northrup's (1853) autobiographical account (now feature film) Twelve Years a Slave, and Charles Darwin's Descent of Man ​(1871).

As I critically examine key examples of thought and discourse from this period together with my students, we are additionally drawing crucial connections to the rise of the 
zombie in U.S. American popular culture. This week, we examined excerpts from each of Isaacs' and Darwin's popular pieces. This was for my ongoing Spring 2016 course, Languages of Fear, Racism, and Zombies. In class, I guided students in using critical discourse analysis to examine these important texts.

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    Jamie A. Thomas is a linguistic anthropologist and digital media producer. Her forthcoming book Zombies Speak Swahili is all about the undead, videogames, and viral Black language. She teaches at Santa Monica College.

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