The Post-Apocalyptic Turn: A Study of Contemporary

276 Pages·2016·1.36 MB·English

University of Wisconsin Milwaukee
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Theses and Dissertations
December 2014
The Post-Apocalyptic Turn: a Study of
Contemporary Apocalyptic and Post-Apocalyptic
Narrative
Hyong-jun Moon
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
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THE POST-APOCALYPTIC TURN:
A STUDY OF CONTEMPORARY APOCALYPTIC
AND POST-APOCALYPTIC NARRATIVE

by
Hyong-jun Moon

A Dissertation Submitted in
Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree of

Doctor of Philosophy
in English

at
The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
December 2014
ABSTRACT

THE POST-APOCALYPTIC TURN: A STUDY OF CONTEMPORARY
APOCALYPTIC AND POST-APOCALYPTIC NARRATIVE

by

Hyong-jun Moon

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2014
Under the Supervision of Professor Peter Y. Paik

Few periods have witnessed so strong a cultural fixation on apocalyptic calamity
as the present. From fictions and comic books to Hollywood films, television shows, and
video games, the end of the world is ubiquitous in the form of apocalyptic and post-
apocalyptic narratives. Imagining world-changing catastrophes, contemporary
apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic narratives force us to face urgent socio-political
questions such as danger of globalization, effect of neoliberal capitalist hegemony,
ecological disasters, fragility of human civilization, and so on. J. G. Ballard’s final
fictions, though they do not directly deal with apocalyptic events but evoke apocalyptic
mood, portray the bleak landscape of post-political, post-historical, late capitalist society,
where extreme boredom generates mindless violence. Unlike Ballard, Margaret Atwood’s
satirical MaddAddam trilogy not only envisions the real possibility of apocalypse under
the current neoliberal tendency but also presents a utopian desire in the form of a
religious group that actively resists the hegemony of neoliberalism. James Howard
Kunstler’s post-apocalyptic fiction focuses on a post-petroleum age, where people lead
simple and quotidian lives due to the scarcity of oil. By bringing the sense of scarcity to
the fore, Kunstler’s novel also formulates one version of realist worldview, in which the
scarcity of resources inevitably calls for the strict rule of law. As an ultimate social
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allegory of anxiety and fear in our times, the global zombie apocalypse envisages the
total destruction of civilization, examining the rising necessity of realist attitude that
fundamentally negates the traditional belief of progress. Although the scope of
contemporary apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic narratives is wide and varied, they share
one thing in common: the bold desire to imagine a totally different world by questioning
the current order of things.
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© Copyright by Hyong-jun Moon, 2014
All Rights Reserved
iv
DEDICATION

To my parents, Choon-shik Moon and Mi-sun Kang.
Also to my wife, Hye-jung Shin.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION: NARRATIVES THAT LEAP INTO THE FUTURE … AND BACK
TO THE PRESENT .................................................................................................1

CHAPTER ONE. VIOLENCE AND NEUROPSYCHOLOGICAL STIMULATIONS IN
LATE CAPITALISM: READING J. G. BALLARD’S FOUR FINAL
NOVELS ................................................................................................................19

Biopolitical Production and the Birth of the Depressed .......................................19

Cocaine Nights: Boredom and Violence in the Post-historical Leisure Society ...25

Super-Cannes: Violence in Neoliberal Utopia ......................................................35

Millennium People: Meaningful Violence in a Meaningless World .....................46

Kingdom Come: Consumerism Turned Fascism ...................................................56

CHAPTER TWO. “NOT REAL CAN TELL US ABOUT REAL”: NEOLIBERALISM,
LANGUAGE, AND UTOPIAN DESIRE IN MARGARET ATWOOD’S
MADDADDAM TRILOGY ...................................................................................74

Brave New Neoliberal World: The Commodification of Everything ....................80

“What is My Will?”: Violence and Acceptance in Neoliberal Political
Rationality ..............................................................................................................90

Dead End of the Language in Neoliberal Society ..................................................98

Hunters and Gardeners: Utopian Desire of God’s Gardeners ..............................108

Virtues and Writings: Toby as an Alternative .....................................................113

Utopia in Dystopia, and Vice Versa ....................................................................119

CHAPTER THREE. “THE LAW IS BACK IN BUSINESS”: COLLAPSE, SCARCITY,
AND THE POLITICS OF REALISM IN JAMES HOWARD KUNSTLER’S
WORLD MADE BY HAND ..................................................................................125

Collapse Discourses: From Growth to Collapse ..................................................125

“Everything was Local Now”: The World According to Kunstler ......................134

The Resource Problem: From Abundance to Scarcity .........................................140

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“Reaching for the Lower Branches Before We Get to the Stars”: Collapse and the
Realist Attitude ....................................................................................................146

“The Law is Back in Business Here”: Politics of Realism in Times of
Scarcity ................................................................................................................157

CHAPTER FOUR. OF ZOMBIES AND MAN: THE EVOLUTION OF THE ZOMBIE
AND THE RISE OF THE REALIST SUBJECT ................................................165

Zombie Diaspora: Zombie as an Allegory of Social Discontents........................165

The ‘Working’ Dead: Haitian Origin and White Zombie ....................................173

Ordinary Monster and American Anxieties: George A. Romero and the ‘Living
Dead’ Trilogy .......................................................................................................180

The Rise of Global Zombie Apocalypse: Globalized Fear and American
Anxiety ................................................................................................................196

Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1): 28 Days Later and the Ideological
Representation of the Realist Subject ..................................................................206

Beyond the Pleasure Principle (2): The Walking Dead, the Realist Subject, and the
Critique of Nihilist Attitude .................................................................................220

CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................235

WORKS CITED ..............................................................................................................244

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
In preparing this project I have been able to rely on the knowledge, support, and
friendship of a wide array of people. Peter Y. Paik, my advisor and mentor, was an
undried source of inspiration throughout writing. Without his guidance, this dissertation
would not have been written. My dissertation bears his imprints from beginning to end.
As dissertation committee members, Tasha Oren, Peter Sands, Jason Puskar, and
Theodore Martin read the manuscript of my dissertation and provided me with insightful
ideas and indispensable criticism. I deeply thank them for encouragement and scrutiny
that I received from their careful minds. My teachers at University of Wisconsin-
Milwaukee, Jane Gallop, Kumkum Sangari, Gilberto Blasini, Andrew Kincaid, and Joe
Austin trained me hard and guided me through the various fields of English literature,
culture, history, and theory. I would like to thank Chung-ho Chung, Nae-hui Kang, Boo-
eung Koh, Sookhee Cho, Jeong Hee Sohn, Young-jin Choe, Jae Uk Choo, Nury Kim,
Yeong Don Roh, and Kwang Yeong Shin at Chung-Ang University and Myung-Hwan
Kim, Myung-Sook Ryu, Sangjun Jeong, and Doo-Sun Ryu at Seoul National University
for teaching, encouraging, and supporting me in my immature years.
I wish to thank my friends in Korea and in Milwaukee, without whom my life as a
doctoral student would have been more dismal and less pleasant. My special gratitude
goes to Ha Seung-woo, Soyoung Kwon, and Dani Shuster, whose beautiful hearts always
impress me. I thank Josh, Marisa, Jamie, Shawn, Dave, Lissy, and Quinn at Colectivo
(former Alterra) on Prospect for the free coffees and friendly talks. Thanks to them, I
could use Colectivo as my own study, where most of my dissertation had been written. I
thank Bok Do-hoon for his incessant interest in my project. Park Chan-kyong gave me a
chance to present my ideas on apocalypse and catastrophe at the pre-biennale workshop
for the Mediacity Seoul 2014 program. I can never forget that winter night with endless
talks in Chicago with Minouk Lim. My thanks go to Hyang-woo Park at Minumsa for her
careful concern that materialized into unexpected book boxes from Korea. I thank Go-
eun Park, Paul Perry Clem, Jonathan Krovitz, and Mark Thorstenson for their smiles. For
Meridith Kruse and Paul Gagliardi from Modern Studies at UWM, I wish their academic
lives be evermore prosperous. All these people’s kindness, generosity, and cheerfulness
helped me realize that ‘the end of the world’ has not yet come.
My very special thanks go to my family in Gwangju and Daejon: Choon-shik
Moon, Mi-sun Kang, Na-hyun Oh, Myung-shik Shin, So-hyun Moon, Byong-sam Choi,
Hye-jin Shin, Ju-won Kim, Yu-rim Shin, Jeong-hyuk Kwon, Hye-bin Shin, and Gi-whan
Shin. Without their endless love and unwavering support, I couldn’t even continue my
study in the US. I will pay my debt to you for the rest of my life.
To my wife as well as my companion, Hye-jung: I give you my deepest love and
gratitude. Your sacrifice, your inspiration, your tolerance, your food, and your love—I
will not forget. My dictionary is so small that I cannot find a right word that describes
your immense role in this dissertation. This one’s for you.

viii
1
INTRODUCTION

NARRATIVES THAT LEAP INTO THE FUTURE …
AND BACK TO THE PRESENT

The end of the world has already occurred.
—Timothy Morton, Hyperobjects

History is the subject of a structure whose site is not homogenous, empty
time, but time filled by the presence of the now. Thus, to Robespierre
ancient Rome was a past charged with the time of the now which he
blasted out of the continuum of history. The French Revolution viewed
itself as Rome reincarnate. It evoked ancient Rome the way fashion
evokes costumes of the past. Fashion has a flair for the topical, no matter
where it stirs in the thickets of long ago; it is a tiger’s leap into the past.
—Walter Benjamin, “Theses on the Philosophy of History”

This dissertation is a study of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic narratives in the
contemporary period, which concerns such themes as breakdown of community,
economic crisis, environmental catastrophe, collapse of civilization itself, and so on. The
term “apocalyptic narrative” is used here as a sub-genre of speculative fiction that is
concerned with the collapse of civilization through various disasters such as nuclear war,
plague, energy shortages, flood, earthquake, or political conflict. Post-apocalyptic
narratives are set in a world or civilization after such a disaster has taken place. They
often depict the aftermath of a world-changing catastrophic event. Post-apocalyptic
narratives confront us with the fragility of human civilization, which is conveyed by such
themes as the relationship between violence and boredom, neoliberal hegemony and
subjectivity, resource depletion, and the inhuman condition that challenges the
conventionally humanitarian values, all of which are manifested in connection with
catastrophic events that render these various narratives the particular title of ‘apocalypse.’
Apocalyptic motifs have long been a part of the western literary tradition since the
writing of the Book of Revelation, and millenarian movements have been a recurring