Living Dead Conference – Call for Papers

The American
Philosophical Association is the main professional
organization for philosophers in the United States. Their Web
Site features
an informative "Call for Papers" section in which we came across the
following actual
call:

Abstracts are sought for a collection of philosophical
essays on the theme of the
undead.
Contributors are welcome to submit
abstracts
on any topic of philosophical interest that pertains to the theme of
the undead. We define "the undead" as that class of corporeal
beings who at some point were living creatures, have died, and have come
back
such that they are not presently "at rest." This would include
supernatural beings such as zombies, vampires, mummies, and other reanimated
corpses.

The editors are especially interested in receiving submissions
that engage the following perspectives: philosophy of mind; the metaphysics
of death; political and social philosophy; ontology and other topics
in metaphysics; ethics and bioethics; aesthetics; cultural theory and
globalization
studies; race and gender; epistemology; philosophy of religion; phenomenology
and existentialism.

Possible topics might include, but are not limited
to, the following: zombie-based critiques of functionalist theories
of mind; historical
treatments of the undead in philosophy; the films of George Romero,
Danny Boyle, and Joss Whedon; the novels of Mary Shelley, Bram Stoker,
Anne
Rice, Bruce Campbell, and Poppy Z. Brite; critical writing by Julia
Kristeva, Jalal Toufic, and Slavoj Zizek.

What about the work of Wade Davis, my old Ethnobotany classmate at
Harvard in the 70’s who wrote the definitive psuedo-scientific Zombie
book (inspired
perhaps by many nights of zombie consumption at the Hong Kong) "The Serpent
and the Rainbow", later a major motion picture? Last time I saw Wade was
on the Rio Napo in Peru 20 years ago. Are you still out there, Wade?)

Undead conference
details here