Wog Zombie: The De- and Re-Humanisation of Migrants, from Mad Dogs to Cyborgs

Abstract

This essay examines several contemporary articulations of the figure of the migrant, exploring both the stigmatic representations of this figure in the public imaginary, and migrants’ own personal self-identifications. I argue that as today’s increasingly complex flows of capital, people and information continue to erode both the sovereign authority of nation-states and the hitherto dominant codes of belonging, the figure of the migrant has undergone a series of reconfigurations. In its contemporary manifestations, the migrant figure has been imagined variously as a mechanical, animalistic, spectral, zombified, vampiric or cyborg entity. I contend that this series of images reveals a complex set of cultural anxieties around issues of belonging, cultural identity, citizenship and mobility. Drawing on theoretical constructs including Giorgio Agamben’s notion of the homo sacer along with representations of the figure of the migrant that have emerged recently within popular culture, literature, political discourse and media reporting, I aim to examine the forms of dehumanisation that are expressed in contemporary debate on migration.