Radical media, politics and culture.

zombiopolitics

shoot for the head

Yes, I should be doing other things (and Nate's suggestion for more specific research on biopolitics is a good point) but thought instead I'd take a short zombieshuffle down Theory Street instead -- zombie flics being excellent ways to pass the time thinking about the body, biopolitics, mass and movement -- not to mention gender, racism, sexuality and 'community', eg: Chopper Chicks in Zombietown.

Mark Fisher (k-punk) on use-value and zombification: "For a chilling image of how SF Capital induces auto-zombification in the master class, you only have to look at the face of our glorious leader [Blair]: that ashen carnival mask, its grim, cheerless Joker-grin flashing with ritual efficiency, its blank eyes illuminated by empty evangelism, darkened by perpetual irritation - the PM's being run by Videodrome ... and no-one owns Death TV."

Eugene Thacker on biopolitics and zombie flics: "One always makes an exception for 'life.' Is there any other way? In this regard biopolitics is precisely the articulation of 'life' as an exception. There is no better cultural expression of this than the films, novels, and games that constitute the 'zombie-epidemic' genre. Having gained a great deal of popularity recently with films such as 28 Days Later, Resident Evil: Apocalypse, the slapstick Shaun of the Dead, and an un-ironic remake of Dawn of the Dead, the genre has also expanded into comics (Criminal Macabre) and video games (the Resident Evil franchise). But the figure of the zombie – the living dead, the mass of living corpses that are only bodies, that are only bare life – is much older than this. [And so on]

Two very different approaches in the above, but interesting nevertheless. And not quite zombie, but close:Terri Schiavo: Bride of 'Compassionate Conservatism'.