Zombie Hierarchies: Power, Class, and Conflict in the Undead Imagination
This special session invites papers on zombies and the undead as figures through which literature, film, television, games, and popular culture imagine power, hierarchy, and social conflict. In keeping with PAMLA 2026’s theme, “Our Ruling Classes: Culture, Power, Conflict,” this panel explores how zombie narratives dramatize the fragility of social order, the failures of ruling elites, and the tensions between collective survival and unequal power.
