AustLit

'Mapping Global Horror: Australia, Japan and Beyond brought world-leading scholars and filmmakers to Wurundjeri country for a two-day conference to navigate how the titular genre moves through time, space and cultures. Wurundjeri and Yorta Yorta Professor Andrew Peters opened the conference with an Acknowledgement of Country, which noted that the idea of the living dead (featured heavily at the conference) connects very deeply and very clearly with thousands of years of Indigenous thought. It’s within Indigenous culture to honour the dead, to understand that their spirits return and their connection to the living stays strong. While (particularly Western) horror conventions reflect the tendency to fear the dead, generally speaking, Indigenous cultures aren’t particularly disturbed by the spirit world. The conference reflected the maturation of horror film studies. It posited that perhaps the genre emerges from a place of empathy, as opposed to terror. Filmmakers and academics seemed to share an understanding that the horrors of human history are largely catalysed by asymmetrical power dynamics. Compelling horror cinema, or scholarship, will seek to reconcile with this.' (Introduction)