Tropical Liminal: Urban Vampires & Other Blood-Sucking Monstrosities

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.25120/etropic.16.1.2017.3574

Keywords:

vampires, Tropics, Gothic, Tropical Gothic, monstrosities

Abstract

Vampires and other blood-sucking monstrous beings constitute some of the most famous myths, legends and stories that continue to haunt contemporary societies. This special issue examines the presence of these beings within cities and their rural surrounds. The contributions to this special issue reflect upon vampires and other monstrosities in relation to the tropical regions of the world from historical pasts to present-day manifestations, and imaginary tropical futures, including: the British colonial empire in the tropical east, New Orleans in the deep south of the United States, across the border to Mexico and Latin American communities, over to India and Southeast Asia, including Bangkok in Thailand, Singapore, and Sabah on the island of Borneo, and to the tropical east coast of Australia. However, the concept of the tropics is not simply a geographical construct, the imaginary of the tropics also emerges out of the spaces of mythology and oral storytelling, ethnographic reports, literature, science fiction magazines, film and television, video games and the internet.

Author Biographies

Anita Lundberg, James Cook University Singapore

Associate Professor Anita Lundberg is a cultural anthropologist whose research engages people and places of South East Asia. Her work concerns the lived experiences of tropical liminal spaces. Anita’s projects include ethnographies in Singapore, and previously, Malaysia and Indonesia.  Anita has received awards for outstanding teaching, research supervision, and innovative research and has held numerous international fellowships. She has curated exhibitions in Singapore, NY, LA, Paris and Sydney and her own research, theoretical, and artistic works have been exhibited at the Australian National Maritime Museum, the National Art Gallery of Malaysia and Alliance de Française. Anita has a PhD from the University of New South Wales, Australia and was a Post-Doctoral Fellow with Cambridge University, UK.

Lennie Geerlings, James Cook University Singapore

Lennie Geerlings is an interdisciplinary researcher and sessional lecturer whose practice engages anthropology, psychology, sociology and allied social sciences. Her research relates to the social effects of globalisation of knowledge and movements of people, with an ethnographic focus on Southeast Asia. Lennie holds an MPhil (Interdisciplinary Studies) and has been accepted as PhD Candidate in Anthropology at Leiden University in the Netherlands.

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Published

2017-05-30

How to Cite

Lundberg, A., & Geerlings, L. (2017). Tropical Liminal: Urban Vampires & Other Blood-Sucking Monstrosities. ETropic: Electronic Journal of Studies in the Tropics, 16(1). https://doi.org/10.25120/etropic.16.1.2017.3574