What would happen if there were really a virus that created zombies? How quickly would it spread across the city? Would scientists be able to contain the outbreak? … and would you and your friends survive? Join Manchester Metropolitan University academics, Professor Jo Verran, Dr Matthew Crossley and Dr Chloé Germaine Buckley to find out more at Bad Bugs: Zombie Outbreak! - Play and Read on Saturday 12 October (1.30-3.30pm), inside the Business School at Manchester Metropolitan University. Part of the Gothic Manchester Festival, this is a unique workshop - ideal for young people aged 11 upwards - exploring zombies in fiction, science and gaming too!

Popular culture seems as obsessed as ever with the zombie. Indeed, judging by the huge numbers of books, television shows, films and games featuring the undead, zombie-ism is infectious!

Bad Bugs

As Chloé Germaine Buckley shows in her work, this increasing popularity of the zombie in mainstream culture has opened up a space for the monster in children’s literature. Book series such as Darren Shan’s Zom-B (2012-2016) and Charlie Higson’s The Enemy (2009-2014) play with the figure of the zombie in interesting ways. In her novel, Dread Nation (2018), YA author Justina Ireland uses the zombie to imagine an alternate history of the United States and comments on real histories of racism and the nefarious science of eugenics.

In her work, Professor Jo Verran uses books to get people interested in science, specifically microbiology. In 2009, she established a Bad Bugs Bookclub, providing a place for the discussion of disease in fiction. Jo thinks children’s zombie fiction has something to tell us about real world infectious diseases, too.

At the upcoming “Bad Bugs: Zombie Outbreak Event”, Chloé, Jo and Matthew will be investigating the “science” of zombies and exploring how similar zombie-ism is to infectious diseases that we are more familiar with. Usually, in the zombie story, symptoms are passed on after a bite or perhaps even a scratch from an infected ‘person’. Transmission is 100% effective.

In reality, no diseases that we know of are as effective: if our pathogenic (dangerous) viruses and bacteria killed everyone they infected, and infected everyone they came into contact with, then they would run out of people to kill – and that would not be a good idea for the germs or for us! Also, we have ways of preventing the spread of infectious disease (for example by vaccination or by isolation), and of treating infected individuals (for example using antibiotics for bacterial infections).

In fiction, a lot of zombie outbreaks are caused by an infectious agent. The incubation period is usually very short (if the incubation period is too short, then it is difficult to spread the infection unless there are a lot of other susceptible individuals close by). The only means of prevention is to avoid contact: vaccination is a disastrous failure in Dread Nation! There is no cure: destruction of the brain is the only way of ending the infection (as well as ending the host!).

However, there are always small variations in the epidemiology of zombie outbreaks, and often evolution of symptoms. This affects how the main characters behave, how the story develops – and how games and simulations can be modified to present different scenarios. For example, in Dread Nation, the heroine Jane knows it is important to kill the newly infected first, because they move faster; she also notices that the zombie hordes are beginning to show some organisation and communication – which will affect future battles. The infected adults in The Enemy save the character Small Sam for later: they are displaying some behavioural intelligence. ‘B’ in Darren Shan’s Zom-B realises that the infected do not treat their victims in the same way – some are turned into zombies through biting, whilst others are used as food. Noticing these features of the disease proves vital to the characters’ survival.

Features of actual disease outbreaks help us to identify the infectious agent and disease epidemiology. We try to identify the source of the outbreak and the cause. We also need to know the incubation period, transmission, whether all infected individuals show symptoms, disease pathogenesis (the progress of the disease in an individual) and virulence (how serious) – and of course prevention, control and treatment.

So is zombie-ism just another infectious disease? Join Jo, Chloé and Matthew for a workshop exploring the fiction and the science of zombies. It will take a look at scenes from books by Darren Shan, Charlie Higson and Justina Ireland, investigating these imaginary scenarios with scientific models.

The workshop also draws on the spread of zombie-ism to games. From video games to board games, the zombie makes a fearsome opponent against whom players must test their survival skills. Likewise, at Bad Bugs, participants can try a specially-designed card game: will participants make it out alive or succumb to the undead?

This event is part of the 7th annual Gothic Manchester Festival which is themed on 'Gothic Times'. This year the festival will span the whole of October with a whole range of events exploring the Gothic throughout time for you to get involved in.

This workshop is suitable for children and young people aged 11 or above. Tickets are free.

With thanks to Professor Jo Verran and Dr Chloé Germaine Buckley