Thank you thank us to get started.

Let me tell you a little bit
about what you know Diane

in the run up to this event and
you know we're reading.

Dr danced you will be presenting but
today we have Dr King and

I congratulate her and say marriage.

You know Michelle best in the future and
tell

everybody a little bit about Dr personally
so if you're a professor of religion and

African-American studies at Emory
University courses in the graduate and

undergraduate regular doctor you Peter.

Researches and
teaches interesting reading theologies

religious practices are going to ask for
with particular emphasis from our

African derived religions in
the Americas and the Caribbean.

So you know where a person
can possibly do this.

Whereas I'm just so
black and white minister for

liberation theology theory and method of
language studies interreligious dialogue.

I mean it is an African Diaspora
when we first met to talk about

our past of partition participation and
of shame for

me that she was actually planning stages
of research regarding origins of these

you know everything and
it happened to arrive religions and so.

You know I knew that she was the person
for the river research at least a part of

you represented what you have
to say today her darkest entitle

some plausible African embassies
of the zombie phenomenon in Haiti.

So joining me.

Dr Sandy.

At I

think you can you help me

and I feel like I want to like
share like I want to teach and

not really because I don't
know how to talk about the.

And everything that surrounds
him fifteen and twenty

four my prepared comments and I'll try to
read in a way that will not be boring.

I might have lived from time to time.

OK so every Stanford also let me.

Thanks them for inviting me.

I was a little skeptical when I first up
the invitation but thought what the for

but I know no one but the troopers
my students have been pushing me my

undergraduate students
are pushing me to teach or

as an upper level undergraduate seminar on
African Diaspora religions because when I

teach African religions I always make
connections to African American and

Caribbean communities where some of
these traditions have been returned.

So they get so
interesting when they say well why

don't you teach a course on that and so
that's what I was researching upon and

part of doing work on his children
do include looking at the family

phenomenon so I was a little taken aback
but then the more we talked about it.

Let's agree actually to do a symposium
like this or thanks for being

a part of this I look forward to what
the other presenters have to say as well.

OK For all that has been reported
illustrated in the magic about zombies

as a quintessential symbol of
nefarious African sorcery and

particularly Haitian sorcery the absence
of rigorous gargling research that

situates zombie phenomenon with in studies
of African and African at Lambton for

African Diaspora religious cultures
renders much of what we might

claim to know about the subject
as best educated hypothesis for

conjecture the realm of these
are known is very real when

it comes to reliable studies on
the zombie phenomenon in Haiti and

we should never lose sight of the distance
between the overwhelming popular appeal

of sensationalist narratives and impress.

Just for the cons of patients armies and
the less accessible findings

of the comparatively few disciplined
investigations conducted by credible

researchers my own research in
the area of African Atlantic religious

cultures allows me to claim with a high
degree of certainty that the African and

even some of the family
tradition are indisputable

though there is evidence to suggest the
protein and some specific awareness and

west central African heritage is and
what came to constitute patients on

the traditions less transparent are the
precise ethnic groups of the knowledge

of practices and institutions associated
with this Haitian phenomenon.

In the time alloted I would like to offer
some possible connections between African

religious cultures and
Haitian zombie traditions by emphasizing

how such ancient approaches
to life death and

security obtain from
a complex epistomological

orientation where spirituality
technology therapy and

social power are not discrete but
convergent and

sometimes indistinguishable domains
that is so important to understand

since the rise of the marble while
modern science in white men and

reason is separated from theology
the church no longer dictate on how

we rationalize what happens to us and
so these areas of knowledge even

the way they are disciplines are organized
is a natural sciences social sciences

humanities these the screen here reels
of knowledge are so foreign to the way.

Knowledge is understood and access to
news age and African orientations.

And I would think this ritual for

all engine orientations
European Asian others as well.

Native American on its very very very.

Mark the knowledge is a much
more integrated some religion is

signs of I can say that I can't say
that this technology is medicine.

It is police saying
injustice it's all mixed up.

OK This approach might help to clarify
some facets of what zombification and

similar phenomena signify in Haiti and
other regions of Africa and

the African Diaspora One might
also draw comparisons between

the institutional structures and
powers implicated in sundry traditions and

analogous institutional structures and
powers that are found in modern Western

societies to be sure some could
argue that there is no conclusive

evidence that zombies actually
exist in Haiti currently or

historically while I'm not
convinced that zombification occurs

as often as a record might imply and I'm
talking about from colonial reports and

local Opal or and
all kinds of image testimonies.

I am persuaded that some of the creation
is a real state of existence

that can be manufactured by
a dept ritual technicians and

I'm probably convinced of that because
I'm originally from The Cure view myself.

I remember on when I published my my
first book I'm trying to finish up

the essay My first but not the right time.

But now I do the research for it so long
ago my power just came out and asked me.

I mean do you believe this stuff
because I am I write about our

own do research on this kind of stuff all
the time and I said Yeah I actually do.

I'm I'm not supposed to say that but

I realize that I'm going to the field with
a different set of assumptions as a person

who was raised in a Caribbean American
household in a cure really immigrant

community than most Western
cultures I'm Western but I

have still been shaped by that orientation
and I really think that that's of the.

Mention I don't want to explain it.

I just have to say that on computers OK.

Others might not be but
I am convinced that big can occur.

I want to speak to some front because I
do not mean to spend the time offering

evidence that might convince
skeptics of the authenticity of

the Haitians on the inside but I would ask
upticks consider my comments in the light

of the fact that most Haitians especially
not only believe that zombies and

zombie Union factual errors are real and
so if zombies and

their manufacturers are not verifiable
by modern scientific standards.

What accounts for the currency of
this motif in the Haitian imagination

to began it is I'm more into the spry
of the particular phenomenon.

I intend to reference with the term zombie

there is a large body of literature
attesting to the human or

insider awareness of two types
of zombies and he she society.

Astral or spirit zombies and physical or
cadaver zombies astral zombies

are bodyless souls of the dead that are
extracted by or somebody manufacturers.

Often referred to as poor and
kept in containers to be

used at the will of its
own under the control

of their owners astral zombies are
suspected to cause unexplained illness and

death their owners are reputed to
punish enemies and exact revenge or

control over our others through
such astral zombie accomplices

kadabra zombies or
soulless bodies of those perceived to have

died while under the influence of
the zombie manufacturers compassion

that induces illness leverage and
cataleptic Sometimes

however zombies are Exuma sort shortly
after burial and given an antidote

in a ritualistic context that reverses
the effects of the original concoction.

But seals the fate of the host.

As an empty cell list vessel
totally subject to the will and

desires of his own or cadaver zombies are
reportedly made to labor lights ways for

their owners or
least start to work on farm labor camps.

According to anecdotal and scholarly
sources of zombie will be liberated from

such a miserable existence when her own or
dies or after ingesting salt or

food called with salt in such cases
some zombies reportedly return to their

home communities attempt to eat out some
semblance of a life on the margins of

society or see other means of adjusting
to a normal pattern of the existence but

often without ever gaining the kind
of healthful awareness and

sustenance previously experienced
before their debilitating ordeal.

In other words if release from
imprisonment as Andi's they remain damage

in some way for
the rest of the natural lives.

Time will not allow me to offer
intricate details about the ritual

process essential to zombie manufacturer.

It is important to know though
that these processes are elaborate

highly technical and involve expert
knowledge of why the medicinal and

toxic properties of specific plants and
specific species of fish

too expensive ingredients extracted
from human animal plant and

mineral sources of creation and
three esoteric speech mystical or

magical incantations songs and

all rinses that concretize a zombie
manufacturers intentions and

I want to know that gives
the use of cosmic or

mineral human plant and animal sources in

zombie potions is quite interesting
because this is exactly

how Congo the Congo can park their own.

Secret medicines in the Key see
that there must be some positive or

mineral elements from human element
plant and a woman animal element.

Also in order for some difficult decisions
to take effect the person who begins

the process of somebody's manufacturing by
compromising the health of the targeted

host must be present to our
specific words including

the zombies host name one exuding
the host from the burial ground and

attempting to administer the antidote that
will complete the zombification process

the Haitian Turnbow or be OK or
are all B. or B. or C. or R.

and even the title of
the female priests Do not do.

Mambo happier origins in the farm.

Are you watching R.J. every or Airways and

other neighboring ethnic cultures of
modern day Republic of Britain in Togo and

Don when we started the etymology
of the root term ball in Beauport

the ritual technician skilled in
Salmon manufacturing does the book or

one of the meanings of bow
in speech when the moment or

speaks ritualistically his
intentions become actualized

in other words his ritual speech isn't
the word and I'll say more about these and

other specific F.U.K. African connections
later the mystical technologies.

I call them mythical technologies of
the book for accesses assembles and

deploys during the zombification
process are not in and

of themselves destructive or antisocial
and let me just make a comparison.

I can put a twelve year
old behind a car and

that can become a weapon because a twelve
year old doesn't know how to manage a car.

I can give him a police officer.

I've gone and a police officer
looking on defending my life I

can give a radius of gun but
radius can use that gun.

To rape me.

So it is.

We have similar kinds of analogies
from modern Western to ancient

African orientation so I'm making
the argument that these technologies

are not in and
of themselves destructive or anti-social.

In fact many of them
are employed in health and

healing therapies as well as law
enforcement and other protective measures

of social governance related to communal
security and stability in Haiti and

in analogous African countries where
indigenous priests care providers and

security forces from police
officers to soldiers and

judges have been empowered to
exercise authority for centuries.

John and be the pioneer of African
religious cultures describes

a widespread reliance
on mystical powers and

indigenous African societies
these powers according to him.

BT are not neither good nor
bad they are access for protection.

Detection prosperity success
revenge control etc This is what he

writes there is mistook power which
causes people to walk on fire these

talking generally about African
religious cultures to lie on forms or

nails to send curses or
harm including death from a distance to

change it to animals to spit on snakes and
cause them to split open and

die power to stupefy thieves so
that they can be hard read.

Power to make inanimate objects turn
into biologically living creatures they

respond or that enables experts to see
into secrets hidden information or

the future or to detect thieves and
other culprits African people's noses and

try to apply it in these and
many other ways.

For that reason they wear charms even
medicines or get them brought into

their bodies they consult experts
especially the diviners in medicine men

to counteract the evil of facts of
this power or to obtain powerful each.

Objects containing the same power
this mystical power is not fiction.

Whatever it is it is a reality and

one with which African peoples have
to reckon African peoples are aware

of the mystical power in the universe
the power is ultimately from God but

in practice it is inherent in or
comes from or through physical objects and

spiritual beings that means that
the universe is not static or dad.

It is a dynamic moving and
powerful universe and

my own research I've identified six major
features of African Dr religious cultures

and the Cure been in the America the six
feature suggests a starting point.

In other words and not limited to
research what a starting point for

understanding some of the legacies
of African civilizations and

religious cultures that came to shape
religious formation in the African

diaspora in slaveholding colonial and
post-colonial context and those are just

briefly mention them of communal
theistic understanding of the divine and

I prefer a community for the lives of time
offered by Oprah to who opened nigher He's

unable scholar I prefer community of them
because he gets around the the politics

of the baggage of monotheism vs polytheism
I think these religious cultures really

do conceive of the finest community
comprise of dates he's incest or

spirits and other invisible entities and

agents on the second feature his ancestral
veneration for Ponson communication and

interaction with one's ancestors
feeding one's ancestors on

being a relationship with them
consulting but keeping ancestral altar.

So it's one where That's what I mean
I'm a spirit manifestation mediumship

some of us are getting away from that
time possession of spirit possession and.

Spirit the manifestation of the vine and
teacher ancestral powers in

the human body cavity and
then full mediumship where the.

That alien entity takes over the full
body cavity and spins through that cavity

usually dressed in particular clothing
carrying particular implements etc But

lets the community know this is
a particular danger that your ancestor.

Food offerings and
animal sacrifice divination and

herbalists on which includes you know
medicine and health care practices and

therapies and finally a purposive
belief in neutral mystical power and

I put neutral there on purpose and
use of mystical technologies.

I argue that these features
I have are totally or

partially present beery configurations
across traditions I just patient will do

Brazilian condom blame humans on thirty or
Trinidadian rich show us the far and

our current Jamaican communists
are no means Caribbean and

others are the American O.B.L.
legacies and US conjure and who do.

Among other traditions.

What all of these features
of this are some scrutiny

in the discussion of possible African
roots of the Haitians on the phenomenon

in the interest of time I want to turn
our attention to the six feature.

Because it is most salient in
the zombie manufacturing process and

characterizes the ever rush of
ritual activities materials and

mediums that either produce actual
zombies or convince many in the wider

patient population that families are real
in so doing I want to examine more

causes some parallels between the zombie
phenomenon and one of the two most noted

Continental religious cultures to have
influenced the formation of Haitian

civilization West African voodoo and
other tradition is Congo Congo with a K.

Meaning the back Congo people on

a meaning of speaking about the ethnic
group the kingdom of Congo.

This might be an appropriate place to
say something about Haitian voodoo and

the zombie phenomenon as I mentioned
earlier the title of the zombie

manufacturable car and

the food to priest as Mambo
are etymologically linked to West African.

Two civilizations.

Well I know of no direct harmony for
the term folklore.

Mambo meaning mother of bow
carries the same signification

of West Africa as a dozen Haiti
identifying female ritual specialists and

leaders in the voodoo tradition to
identify someone as the mother of all is

nothing to take lightly given the complex
meanings indexed by the WHO term

Bowl be all and
its cognates boat G.B. or air boat.

Boy is pampered ties and empowered speech.

It is a piece of metal cord or
chain garnish with different objects and

which one pronounces obscure
formulas to make them act.

It is a power found in the magic
formulas that one pronounces

on a material object
hoarding to a divine ritual.

Of correlating figure or
object boat she is also quite

prevalent in West African expressions of
food too especially among the far and

I use all in southern been then both She
all are empowered cadavers bowl and power.

She all come down from one
show in their non figure or

both counterpart so when I say non figure
let me figure a meaning there statues in

the shape of a human figure and
some of them are non figure or

they could be arrows they could be other
kinds of implements round balls or

square or wooden squares just
non figure also the figure ones

are bocce all the empowered cadavers that
take the form of a human is that you and

the nonfederal are both so
their counterparts both of these bowing

mochi all function in conjunction with to
do energies both in protecting humans and

in offering avenues of individual
empowerment and change.

And patient and
West African who do expressions.

There is also the male priest that we
got on our survey which means chief of.

To go into the room even boat and do know
what those mean what take a long time.

A survey of the literature on Haitian
voodoo and zombie traditions offer no

consensus concerning the relationship
between the church some scholars maintain

that the whole subject was on the Summer
vacation is not part of hoodoo religion.

And that there is no formal theological
sanctioned relationship between the Bopara

as a soloist with no temple or
the forty's and

the mambo own gone who leaves
a community of the forties and

manages a temple in Temple
activities on the other hand authors

who regularly reference encounters with
zombie manufacturers when they call on and

in a few cases Mambo could be
a careless substitution of titles but

it's at this point I don't know
I haven't done enough research.

If the West African analog offers any
insight manufacturers of ball propitiate

some of the food to spirits especially the
dwarf like a forest creatures Earth Gods

and the who do beauty laid by Moreover
Boettcher manufacturers including.

Priests identify with various
voodoo voodoo meaning not

the religion as we call it in
the medium which is open to color but

on the collection of data and
in in in Berlin there.

The food you are the pull action of the
what we call the pantheon of the Indies

on so precise tend to fire
with various mood to do and

powerbomb even in West Africa far
diviners far as the divination

system used by food to practitioners
just like the five is used by

Europe practitioners in Nigeria or
are by people practitioners in Nigeria.

So far diviners individuals who
sell additives materials and

knowing the properties of such
attitudes can be employed to empower.

Both sculptures scenes are a little
bit of a counterpart to the book or

sorcerers sometimes called Mothers
of malice or masters of fire and

individuals with a pirate knowledge
passed down through family recipes.

And indeed the feel research of
scholars such as Michel like air and

way Davis suggests
important connections and

distinctions between who to specialise and
zombie manufacturers.

Regulated by the overlapping yet

specialized functions of the family
tradition and the network of secret

societies that emerged from the room
in our prior to and after the Haitian.

Revolution.

So when I talk about the room and
John talking about Africans African slaves

school absconded into the deep woods and

swamps to set up their own
societies civilizations really

over against on the slave societies and
they work by powerful in Haiti

and so these are secret societies
who emerge out of that time period.

Subsocieties most commonly known
by the markers be some go and

sump pump oil some point
meeting with Alistair right.

French for with us can operate as

an underground government of Quezon
impolitic court and judiciary arm

of the food to society charge with
the protection of the community building

upon the cares contributions toward
the mythologizing the exaggerated and

distorted image of secret societies
even held by some who do Prince.

Wade Davis spent several months
familiarising himself with the B. sample

societies to participate in observation
including a lower level initiation and

interviews with high ranking D.'s on the
officials and he concluded the following

it appears that the bees onco
societies working either directly or

through certain bone or may have a direct
role in the creation of spirit and

or physical surroundings
the creation of a son.

B. or indeed the right of zombification
is not imposed in either a random or

critical way on the contrary there
appears to be a logical purpose

to zombification consistent with
the heritage of the people and

their need to protect that heritage
a zombie is not an innocent victim but

an individual who has transgressed be a
stab wish and acknowledged holds of his or

her society Davis' contention that

quote The act of zombification represents
the ultimate social sanction and

of power is indeed backed by Haitian
the supreme to do spiritual leader.

This is how I found his title in
many places Mexico was a Columbia

was a porno University graduate
engineers an engineering degree or

no university very interesting to
do with some comments form on it.

So he's a voodoo spiritual
leader who described

some of occasion as a form
of capital punishment.

According to Bob law in the United States
Americans execute their most abominable

criminals but in Haiti Haitian
voodoo civilization such criminals

are doing punish these on the cation
one need not search very far to

find a bunch of examples of African secret
societies charged with the duties of

social governance that is policing
the judging and punishing anti-social or

criminal behavior for this reason Robert
Faris Ponson is able to draw a compelling

parallels between the cracking of whips
on the run in both Haitian be fungal

ceremonies and classical Congo ritual
religious rituals Thompson credits and

Digitas theorists when safety and

I've also consulted with Professor inside
and she said Dr Zahi as in my own work.

He credits him for explaining how
quote the cracking of whips and

the firing of reasonable name for

guns are used again and again in Congo
in context of ritual reconciliation.

Or to protect a village from Mystic
sources of jealousy and envy in the night.

Adding to this way.

Davis offers a number of plausible
connections between the Haitian courts

ritual use of potent plants and
poisonous substances and

those used by ethnic priests and

ritual specialists of southeastern
Nigeria in adjudication Katyn cases and

their feet were very predominant in
the in the slave trade in particular our

moments in the slave trade history and
controlled wide portions

of the of the trade on the African coast
is so it's an interesting comparison.

He also notes many areas of overlap
between the ritual practices and

structures of Haitian based on those
secret societies and those the poor or

secret societies among the men day in
Sierra Leone including the logical

structure of esoteric communication
patterns secret passwords passports and

handshakes.

When it comes to the actual zombie
manufacturing phenomenon there

are numerous accounts in other African and
African Caribbean traditions of Seoul

the region later has tons of
them shuttle catching soul and

mind control folklore noting local
zombie manufacturing traditions

also exist among the little baby and

the soon to South Africa the bar bar Razzi
of San Diego as well as inns of Tanzania.

According to Hans Ackerman
engineering gone here in Berlin.

Then it is for
was believe that after dying.

An apparent death by imaginations
of a sorcerer people were buried

taking out of their graves and
then lead to servitude in a faraway land.

Overall there is ample evidence indicating
that the zombie phenomenon is not

unique to the Haitian context rather it
might be more global than many have been

led to thing as the example of Tibet and
the role lines zombies move us from the.

African continent to the Asian continent.

This notwithstanding I find
the African foundations

of patients zombie traditions to be
quite compelling most intriguing for

me is how in been in we seem wooden
figure on objects chill on time.

Whose literal translation is
empowered that are these figural

cadavers were meant to
protect their owners.

I don't like to death harm or

any debilitating condition to be sure
Haitian voodoo and other African derived

Atlantica religions have no shortage of
such mystical they're punitive devices.

However in Haiti the was in doubt
with the power of bowl the bowl or

inversely manufacture
from the human endeavor

a different kind of bocce
all the impotent zombies.

There are is probably no moment
to the number of corrupt Beauport

specialists willing to exploit
such power over life and

death just as medical practitioners and
pharmacists in American society have been

known to breach the professional standards
of their guilt by inflicting harm or

death on patients under their care or just
as less than fifty years ago entire police

prisons were saturated with corrupt
officers who either killed black prisoners

or allowed the local white vigilante
groups to lynch them classical

African institutions and approaches
the power of technology life and

death are no more or less vulnerable
to corruption ethical misconduct and

mismanagement than modern Western
approach approaches to the same with

this in mind we might do well to wrestle
with the claim that zombie manufacturing

is an approved social sanction for
protecting the health and

security of the broader
Haitian communities doing so.

Mine encourage outsiders
the part of the world

profound significations of knowledge and
power in their eyes.

By I do and other classical
African traditions and Haiti and

the wider African Diaspora than I

am.