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Ryan Luedtke
Mr. Sabot
English 2- Period 5
18 September 2015
Zombies: Is there More To The Myths?
Currently we are living in a world where zombies are making another resurgence into
Hollywood and people love it. The idea of zombies has been around for a long while but they
first originated deep in the Congo. Although many people see zombies as a popular fiction figure
there is proof that they exist. Moreover, zombies represent many time frames throughout the US
and Haitian history.
The Bakongo and Bandundu people both lived in the Congo and both spoke the language
Kikongo which, is where the word zombie originated from. These two people also believe in the
religion called Vodun and their word for god was nzambi. When the New World people came
to Africa during the slave trade the religion of Vodun was introduced to new people living in the
New World. Vodun and other religions currently in the New World mixed, and the result was a
new religion called Voodoo. Voodoo became very prominent in Haitian culture and that is
where many stories of current day zombies have come from.
Throughout the history of the United States zombies have been used by Hollywood to
represent the current threats facing the country. After World War 2 during the Cold War there
were many zombie movies released because filmmakers were trying to capture America's fear of
the possible impending Apocalypse. Later on in the 1980s zombies made another resurgence due
in part to the AIDS epidemic hitting the United States. Filmmakers knew that Americans were
fearful of the plague, so they made more zombie movies at the time to try and capture America's
worst fear at the time. Unlike the United States culture, the Haitian people believed zombies

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represented a whole different thing. When the slaves arrived in Haiti, slavery became an
everyday part of life more many people and thousands of people were robbed of their free will
and ability to make their own decisions. This is why zombies were symbolic of the loss of
humanity in Haitian culture.
How were zombies created and why were they created in Haitian culture? Zombies in
Haitian culture were not actually dead and were created if the family of a person was fed up with
his/her behavior. The family of the person hired a Bokor to take the person away and turn him
into a zombie. The Boker would give the person coup padre--coup padre is a powder that is
issued orally, the primary ingredient of which is tetrodoxin, the deadly substance of the
notoriously poisonous fou-fou, or "porcupine fish." According to legend, "a zombi(e) is someone
who has annoyed his or her family and community to the degree that they can no longer stand
to live with this person. They respond by hiring a Bokor..to turn them into a zombi(e)" (Keegan
qtd. in Zombies). The coupe padre would temporarily kill the victim and then the family would
bury them in the ground. Once buried, the Boker would get the victim out of the ground and
enslave him for the rest of their life. The victim would be a mindless human that can only
perform orders given to him and that cannot think for him/herself.
There is one piece of evidence to zombies and that came from Dr. Wade Davis. Wades
research was all based around one man, Clairvius Narcisse. In 1962 American doctors
pronounced Clairvius dead at a hospital in Haiti. When he was buried in the ground he was fully
aware of what was happening but he could not move or speak. Eighteen years later the sister of
Clairvius was approached by a man claiming to be her brother and the man told her a story. He
said that he was broken out of his coffin by a Bokor and his henchman and was turned into a
zombie. He also said he was forced to work on a plantation for 2 years before he escaped and
returned to the village.

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Zombies have been apart of mythology for a long time but what if they are more than just
words on a paper. Even though most people believe zombies don't, there is evidence that these
creatures have walked this earth.

Works Cited
Gandhi, Lakshmi. Zoinks! Tracing History of Zombie from Haiti to the CDC. NPR. NPR,
15 Dec. 2013. Web. 18 Sept. 2015.

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Hahn, Patrick D. Dead Man Walking.- Biology Online. N.p., 4 Sept. 2007. Web. 18 Sept.
2105.

Krystek, Lee. The UnMuseum-Rise of the Zombies. The UnMuseum-Rise of the Zombies.
N.p., 2012. Web. 18 Sept. 2015.

Zombies. Zombies. University of Michigan, n.d, Web. 18 Sept. 2015.

Advanced?
I believe my paper is advanced in all of the categories because of how in depth my paper
is. All of my work is in correct MLA format and all of my sources are also in accordance with
the MLA formatting. My paper also has no errors in grammar. Not only does my paper
synthesize all of my research and even more, it adds more than what only my guiding question
was asking. I explained all my thoughts clearly and made many connections to the past and

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present in my paper. I believe my paper gives the reader more to think about after they read it
because it questions many beliefs about science and how we look at the world. Instead of just
giving the reader surface level information I go more in depth into what zombies actually
represent in our culture today, which gives the reader another view into how our culture has
evolved.