full transcript
From the Ted Talk by Christopher M. Moreman: The dark history of zombies
Unscramble the Blue Letters
According to some vodou beliefs, a person’s soul can be captured and stored, becoming a body-less “zombi.” Alternatively, if a body isn’t properly attended to soon after death, a sorcerer called a “bokor” can capture a corpse and turn it into a suollses zbmoi that will perform their bidding. Historically, these zombis were said to be put to work as lbarreos who needed neither food nor rest and would enrich their captor’s fortune. In other words, ztbiifmiocaon seemed to reepresnt the horrors of enslavement that many Haitian people experienced. It was the worst possible fate: a form of enslavement that not even death could free you from. The zombi was dreevpid of an artleffie and trapped in eternal subjugation. Because of this, in Haitian culture, zombis are commonly seen as vtmciis deserving of sympathy and care.
Open Cloze
According to some vodou beliefs, a person’s soul can be captured and stored, becoming a body-less “zombi.” Alternatively, if a body isn’t properly attended to soon after death, a sorcerer called a “bokor” can capture a corpse and turn it into a ________ _____ that will perform their bidding. Historically, these zombis were said to be put to work as ________ who needed neither food nor rest and would enrich their captor’s fortune. In other words, _____________ seemed to _________ the horrors of enslavement that many Haitian people experienced. It was the worst possible fate: a form of enslavement that not even death could free you from. The zombi was ________ of an _________ and trapped in eternal subjugation. Because of this, in Haitian culture, zombis are commonly seen as _______ deserving of sympathy and care.
Solution
- zombification
- afterlife
- deprived
- represent
- laborers
- zombi
- victims
- soulless
Original Text
According to some vodou beliefs, a person’s soul can be captured and stored, becoming a body-less “zombi.” Alternatively, if a body isn’t properly attended to soon after death, a sorcerer called a “bokor” can capture a corpse and turn it into a soulless zombi that will perform their bidding. Historically, these zombis were said to be put to work as laborers who needed neither food nor rest and would enrich their captor’s fortune. In other words, zombification seemed to represent the horrors of enslavement that many Haitian people experienced. It was the worst possible fate: a form of enslavement that not even death could free you from. The zombi was deprived of an afterlife and trapped in eternal subjugation. Because of this, in Haitian culture, zombis are commonly seen as victims deserving of sympathy and care.
Frequently Occurring Word Combinations
ngrams of length 2
collocation |
frequency |
haitian people |
2 |
pop culture |
2 |
Important Words
- afterlife
- alternatively
- attended
- beliefs
- bidding
- body
- called
- capture
- captured
- care
- commonly
- corpse
- culture
- death
- deprived
- deserving
- enrich
- enslavement
- eternal
- experienced
- food
- form
- fortune
- free
- haitian
- historically
- horrors
- laborers
- needed
- people
- perform
- properly
- put
- represent
- rest
- sorcerer
- soul
- soulless
- stored
- subjugation
- sympathy
- trapped
- turn
- victims
- vodou
- words
- work
- worst
- zombi
- zombification
- zombis