"A zombie is supposed to be the living dead: people who die and are resurrected, but without their souls. And they can take orders, and they're supposed to never be tired, and to do what the master says . . . ." — Zora Neale Hurston, interview, January 25, 1943
Definition:
: a will-less and speechless human capable only of automatic movement who is held to have died and been supernaturally reanimated
About the Word:
Zombie is derived from the Louisiana Creole or Haitian Creole word zonbi. Although the word first appeared in English in the 1870s, it wasn't the subject of much interest among English speakers until the 1940s when zombie movies like I Walked with a Zombie (1943) and Zombies on Broadway (1945) saw the start of a trend we're still living with.
Photo credit: Tory Novikova
