Zombie Rabbits

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Zombie From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to navigationJump to search For other uses, see Zombie (disambiguation). George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead is considered a progenitor of the fictional zombie of modern culture. Zombies Overview Zombie Zombie apocalypse Zombie walk Zombies in media Films List Zombie comedy Short films and nominal zombie films Series Video games Novels vte A zombie (Haitian French: zombi, Haitian Creole: zonbi) is a fictional undead being created through the reanimation of a corpse. Zombies are most commonly found in horror and fantasy genre works. The term comes from Haitian folklore, in which a zombie is a dead body reanimated through various methods, most commonly magic. Modern depictions of the reanimation of the dead do not necessarily involve magic but often invoke science fictional methods such as carriers, radiation, mental diseases, vectors, pathogens, scientific accidents, etc.[1][2] The English word "zombie" was first recorded in 1819, in a history of Brazil by the poet Robert Southey, in the form of "zombi".[3] The Oxford English Dictionary gives the origin of the word as West African, and compares it to the Kongo words nzambi (god) and zumbi (fetish). A Kimbundu-to-Portuguese dictionary from 1903 defines the related word nzumbi as soul,[4] while a later Kimbundu–Portuguese dictionary defines it as being a "spirit that is supposed to wander the earth to torment the living."[5] One of the first books to expose Western culture to the concept of the voodoo zombie was The Magic Island by W. B. Seabrook in 1929. This is the sensationalized account of a narrator who encounters voodoo cults in Haiti and their resurrected thralls. Time claimed that the book "introduced 'zombi' into U.S. speech".[6] Zombies have a complex literary heritage, with antecedents ranging from Richard Matheson and H. P. Lovecraft to Mary Shelley's Frankenstein drawing on European folklore of the undead. In 1932, Victor Halperin directed White Zombie, a horror film starring Bela Lugosi. Here zombies are depicted as mindless, unthinking henchmen under the spell of an evil magician. Zombies, often still using this voodoo-inspired rationale, were initially uncommon in cinema, but their appearances continued sporadically through the 1930s to the 1960s, with notable films including I Walked with a Zombie (1943) and Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959). A new version of the zombie, inspired by, but distinct from, that described in Haitian folklore, emerged in popular culture during the latter half of the twentieth century. This "zombie" is taken largely from George A. Romero's seminal film Night of the Living Dead,[1] which was in turn partly inspired by Richard Matheson's 1954 novel I Am Legend.[7][8] The word zombie is not used in Night of the Living Dead but was applied later by fans.[9] The monsters in the film and its sequels, such as Dawn of the Dead and Day of the Dead, as well as its many inspired works, such as Return of the Living Dead and Zombi 2, are usually hungry for human flesh, although Return of the Living Dead introduced the popular concept of zombies eating brains. The "zombie apocalypse" concept, in which the civilized world is brought low by a global zombie infestation, has since become a staple of modern popular art. After initially peaking with zombie films such as Dawn of the Dead (1978) and Michael Jackson's music video Thriller (1983), interest in zombies declined during the late 1980s in the Western world. A zombie revival later began in the Far East during the late 1990s, with the success of the Japanese zombie video games Resident Evil and The House of the Dead, which re-popularized zombies in mainstream popular culture from the late 1990s onwards. In addition, The House of the Dead introduced a new type of zombie distinct from Romero's classic slow zombies: the fast running zombie. The success of these zombie games was followed by a wave of low-budget Asian zombie films such as the zombie comedy Bio Zombie (1998) and action film Versus (2000), and then a new wave of Western zombie films in the early 2000s, including films featuring fast running zombies such as 28 Days Later (2002), the Resident Evil and House of the Dead films, and the 2004 Dawn of the Dead remake, while the British film Shaun of the Dead (2004) popularised the zombie comedy subgenre. The success of these zombie films and video games led to the zombie genre reaching a new peak of commercial success in the early 21st century. The late 2000s and 2010s saw the humanization and romanticization of the zombie archetype, with the zombies increasingly portrayed as friends and love interests for humans. Notable examples of the latter include movies Warm Bodies and Zombies, novels American Gods by Neil Gaiman, Generation Dead by Daniel Waters, and Bone Song by John Meaney, animated movie Corpse Bride, TV series Pushing Daisies and iZombie, and manga/anime series Sankarea: Undying Love. In this context, zombies are often seen as stand-ins for discriminated groups struggling for equality, and the human-zombie romantic relationship is interpreted as a metaphor for sexual liberation and taboo breaking (given that zombies are subject to wild desires and free from social conventions).[10][11][12][13] Contents 1 Etymology 2 Folk beliefs 2.1 Haitian tradition 2.2 African and related legends 2.3 Origins of zombie beliefs 3 Evolution of the zombie archetype 4 Modern fiction 4.1 In film and television 4.2 In print and literature 4.3 In anime and manga 4.4 In art 4.5 In video gaming 4.6 In government media 4.7 In music 4.8 In social activism 4.9 In theoretical academic papers 5 See also 6 References 6.1 Cited texts 7 Further reading Etymology The English word "zombie" is first recorded in 1819, in a history of Brazil by the poet Robert Southey, in the form of "zombi", actually referring to the Afro-Brazilian rebel leader named Zumbi and the etymology of his name in "nzambi".[3] The Oxford English Dictionary gives the origin of the word as Central African and compares it to the Kongo words "nzambi" (god) and "zumbi" (fetish). In Haitian folklore, a zombie (Haitian French: zombi, Haitian Creole: zonbi) is an animated corpse raised by magical means, such as witchcraft.[14] The concept has been popularly associated with the religion of voodoo, but it plays no part in that faith's formal practices. How the creatures in contemporary zombie films came to be called "zombies" is not fully clear. The film Night of the Living Dead made no spoken reference to its undead antagonists as "zombies", describing them instead as "ghouls" (though ghouls, which derive from Arabic folklore, are demons, not undead). Although George Romero used the term "ghoul" in his original scripts, in later interviews he used the term "zombie". The word "zombie" is used exclusively by Romero in his 1978 script for his sequel Dawn of the Dead,[15] including once in dialog. According to George Romero, film critics were influential in associating the term "zombie" to his creatures, and especially the French magazine "Cahiers du Cinéma". He eventually accepted this linkage, even though he remained convinced at the time that "zombies" corresponded to the undead slaves of Haitian voodoo as depicted in Bela Lugosi's White Zombie.[16] Folk beliefs Haitian tradition A depiction of a zombie, at twilight, in a field of sugar cane. Zombies are featured widely in Haitian rural folklore as dead persons physically revived by the act of necromancy of a bokor, a sorcerer or witch. The bokor is opposed by the houngan or priest and the mambo or priestess of the formal voodoo religion. A zombie remains under the control of the bokor as a personal slave, having no will of its own. The Haitian tradition also includes an incorporeal type of zombie, the "zombie astral", which is a part of the human soul. A bokor can capture a zombie astral to enhance his spiritual power. A zombie astral can also be sealed inside a specially decorated bottle by a bokor and sold to a client to bring luck, healing, or business success. It is believed that God eventually will reclaim the zombie's soul, so the zombie is a temporary spiritual entity.[17] The two types of zombie reflect soul dualism, a belief of Haitian voodoo. Each type of legendary zombie is therefore missing one half of its soul (the flesh or the spirit).[18] The zombie belief has its roots in traditions brought to Haiti by enslaved Africans, and their subsequent experiences in the New World. It was thought that the voodoo deity Baron Samedi would gather them from their grave to bring them to a heavenly afterlife in Africa ("Guinea"), unless they had offended him in some way, in which case they would be forever a slave after death, as a zombie. A zombie could also be saved by feeding them salt. English professor Amy Wilentz has written that the modern concept of Zombies was strongly influenced by Haitian slavery. Slave drivers on the plantations, who were usually slaves themselves and sometimes Voodoo priests, used the fear of zombification to discourage slaves from committing suicide.[19][20] While most scholars have associated the Haitian zombie with African cultures, a connection has also been suggested to the island's indigenous Taíno people, partly based on an early account of native shamanist practices written by the Hieronymite monk Ramón Pané, a companion of Christopher Columbus.[21][22][23] The Haitian zombie phenomenon first attracted widespread international attention during the United States occupation of Haiti (1915–1934), when a number of case histories of purported "zombies" began to emerge. The first popular book covering the topics was William Seabrook's The Magic Island (1929). Seabrooke cited Article 246 of the Haitian criminal code which was passed in 1864, asserting that it was an official recognition of zombies. This passage was later used in promotional materials for the 1932 film White Zombie.[24] Also shall be qualified as attempted murder the employment which may be made by any person of substances which, without causing actual death, produce a lethargic coma more or less prolonged. If, after the administering of such substances, the person has been buried, the act shall be considered murder no matter what result follows.[25] In 1937, while researching folklore in Haiti, Zora Neale Hurston encountered the case of a woman who appeared in a village. A family claimed she was Felicia Felix-Mentor, a relative who had died and been buried in 1907 at the age of 29. The woman was examined by a doctor; X-rays indicated that she did not have a leg fracture that Felix-Mentor was known to have had.[26] Hurston pursued rumors that affected persons were given a powerful psychoactive drug, but she was unable to locate individuals willing to offer much information. She wrote, "What is more, if science ever gets to the bottom of Vodou in Haiti and Africa, it will be found that some important medical secrets, still unknown to medical science, give it its power, rather than gestures of ceremony."[27] African and related legends A Central or West African origin for the Haitian zombie has been postulated based on two etymologies in the Kongo language, nzambi ("god") and zumbi ("fetish"). This root helps form the names of several deities, including the Kongo creator deity Nzambi a Mpungu and the Louisiana serpent deity Li Grand Zombi (a local version of the Haitian Damballa), but it is in fact a generic word for a divine spirit.[28] The common African conception of beings under these names is more similar to the incorporeal "zombie astral",[17] as in the Kongo Nkisi spirits. A related, but also often incorporeal, undead being is the jumbee of the English-speaking Caribbean, considered to be of the same etymology;[29] in the French West Indies also, local "zombies" are recognized, but these are of a more general spirit nature.[30] The idea of physical zombie-like creatures is present in some South African cultures, where they are called xidachane in Sotho/Tsonga and maduxwane in Venda. In some communities, it is believed that a dead person can be zombified by a small child.[31] It is said that the spell can be broken by a powerful enough sangoma.[32] It is also believed in some areas of South Africa that witches can zombify a person by killing and possessing the victim's body in order to force it into slave labor.[33] After rail lines were built to transport migrant workers, stories emerged about "witch trains". These trains appeared ordinary, but were staffed by zombified workers controlled by a witch. The trains would abduct a person boarding at night, and the person would then either be turned into a zombified worker, or beaten and thrown from the train a distance away from the original location.[33] Another antecedent is the Chinese jiangshi, a zombie-like creature dating back to Qing dynasty era jiangshi fiction of the 18th and 19th centuries. Origins of zombie beliefs Chemical hypothesis Several decades after Hurston's work, Wade Davis, a Harvard ethnobotanist, presented a pharmacological case for zombies in a 1983 paper in the Journal of Ethnopharmacology,[34] and later in two popular books, The Serpent and the Rainbow (1985) and Passage of Darkness: The Ethnobiology of the Haitian Zombie (1988). Davis traveled to Haiti in 1982 and, as a result of his investigations, claimed that a living person can be turned into a zombie by two special powders being introduced into the blood stream (usually via a wound). The first, coup de poudre (French: "powder strike"), includes tetrodotoxin (TTX), a powerful and frequently fatal neurotoxin found in the flesh of the pufferfish (order Tetraodontidae). The second powder consists of deliriant drugs such as datura. Together, these powders were said to induce a deathlike state in which the will of the victim would be entirely subjected to that of the bokor. Davis also popularized the story of Clairvius Narcisse, who was claimed to have succumbed to this practice. The most ethically questioned and least scientifically explored ingredient of the powders, is part of a recently buried child's brain.[35][36][37][verification needed] The process described by Davis was an initial state of deathlike suspended animation, followed by re-awakening — typically after being buried — into a psychotic state. The psychosis induced by the drug and psychological trauma was hypothesised by Davis to reinforce culturally learned beliefs and to cause the individual to reconstruct their identity as that of a zombie, since they "knew" they were dead, and had no other role to play in the Haitian society. Societal reinforcement of the belief was hypothesized by Davis to confirm for the zombie individual the zombie state, and such individuals were known to hang around in graveyards, exhibiting attitudes of low affect. Davis's claim has been criticized, particularly the suggestion that Haitian witch doctors can keep "zombies" in a state of pharmacologically induced trance for many years.[38] Symptoms of TTX poisoning range from numbness and nausea to paralysis — particularly of the muscles of the diaphragm — unconsciousness, and death, but do not include a stiffened gait or a deathlike trance. According to psychologist Terence Hines, the scientific community dismisses tetrodotoxin as the cause of this state, and Davis' assessment of the nature of the reports of Haitian zombies is viewed as overly credulous.[39] Social hypothesis Scottish psychiatrist R. D. Laing highlighted the link between social and cultural expectations and compulsion, in the context of schizophrenia and other mental illness, suggesting that schizogenesis may account for some of the psychological aspects of zombification.[40] Particularly, this suggests cases where schizophrenia manifests a state of catatonia. Roland Littlewood, professor of anthropology and psychiatry, published a study supporting a social explanation of the zombie phenomenon in the medical journal The Lancet in 1997.[41] The social explanation sees observed cases of people identified as zombies as a culture-bound syndrome,[42] with a particular cultural form of adoption practiced in Haiti that unites the homeless and mentally ill with grieving families who see them as their "returned" lost loved ones, as Littlewood summarizes his findings in an article in Times Higher Education: I came to the conclusion that although it is unlikely that there is a single explanation for all cases where zombies are recognised by locals in Haiti, the mistaken identification of a wandering mentally ill stranger by bereaved relatives is the most likely explanation in many cases. People with a chronic schizophrenic illness, brain damage or learning disability are not uncommon in rural Haiti, and they would be particularly likely to be identified as zombies.[43] Evolution of the zombie archetype Pulliam and Fonseca (2014) and Walz (2006) trace the zombie lineage back to ancient Mesopotamia.[44][45] In the Descent of Ishtar, the goddess Ishtar threatens: If you do not open the gate for me to come in, I shall smash the door and shatter the bolt, I shall smash the doorpost and overturn the doors, I shall raise up the dead and they shall eat the living: And the dead shall outnumber the living![46] She repeats this same threat in a slightly modified form in the Epic of Gilgamesh.[47] The actor T. P. Cooke as Frankenstein's Monster in an 1823 stage production of the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, while not a zombie novel in particular, prefigures many 20th-century ideas about zombies in that the resurrection of the dead is portrayed as a scientific process rather than a mystical one, and that the resurrected dead are degraded and more violent than their living selves. Frankenstein, published in 1818, has its roots in European folklore,[48] whose tales of vengeful dead also informed the evolution of the modern conception of the vampire. Later notable 19th-century stories about the avenging undead included Ambrose Bierce's "The Death of Halpin Frayser", and various Gothic Romanticism tales by Edgar Allan Poe. Though their works could not be properly considered zombie fiction, the supernatural tales of Bierce and Poe would prove influential on later writers such as H. P. Lovecraft, by Lovecraft's own admission.[49] In the 1920s and early 1930s, the American horror author H. P. Lovecraft wrote several novellae that explored the undead theme. "Cool Air", "In the Vault", and "The Outsider" all deal with the undead, but Lovecraft's Herbert West–Reanimator (1921) "helped define zombies in popular culture".[50] This series of short stories featured Herbert West, a mad scientist who attempts to revive human corpses with mixed results. Notably, the resurrected dead are uncontrollable, mostly mute, primitive and extremely violent; though they are not referred to as zombies, their portrayal was prescient, anticipating the modern conception of zombies by several decades.[citation needed] Edgar Rice Burroughs similarly depicted animated corpses in the second book of his Venus series, again without ever using the terms "zombie" or "undead". Avenging zombies would feature prominently in the early 1950s EC Comics, which George A. Romero would later claim as an influence. The comics, including Tales from the Crypt, Vault of Horror and Weird Science, featured avenging undead in the Gothic tradition quite regularly, including adaptations of Lovecraft's stories, which included "In the Vault", "Cool Air" and Herbert West–Reanimator.[51] Richard Matheson's 1954 novel I Am Legend, although classified as a vampire story would nonetheless have definitive impact on the zombie genre by way of George A. Romero. The novel and its 1964 film adaptation, The Last Man on Earth, which concern a lone human survivor waging war against a world of vampires, would by Romero's own admission greatly influence his 1968 low-budget film Night of the Living Dead;[52][53] a work that would prove to be more influential on the concept of zombies than any literary or cinematic work before it. A popular evolution of the zombie is the "fast zombie" or running zombie. In contrast to Romero's classic slow zombies, "fast zombies" can run, are more aggressive, and often more intelligent. This type of zombie has origins in 1990s Japanese horror video games. In 1996, Capcom's survival horror video game Resident Evil featured zombie dogs that run towards the player. Later the same year, Sega's arcade shooter, The House of the Dead, introduced running human zombies, who run towards the player. The running human zombies introduced in The House of the Dead video games became the basis for the "fast zombies" that became popular in zombie films during the early 21st century, starting with 28 Days Later (2002), the Resident Evil and House of the Dead films, and the 2004 Dawn of the Dead remake.[54] Tor Johnson as a zombie with his victim in cult movie Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959) Modern fiction In film and television See also: Zombie film Films featuring zombies have been a part of cinema since the 1930s, with White Zombie (directed by Victor Halperin in 1932) being one of the earliest examples.[55] With George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead (1968), the zombie trope began to be increasingly linked to consumerism and consumer culture.[56] Today, zombie films are released with such regularity (at least 55 titles were released in 2014 alone[57]) that they can be viewed as a separate subgenre of Horror film.[58] Voodoo-related zombie themes have also appeared in espionage or adventure themed works outside the horror genre. For example, the original "Jonny Quest" series (1964) and the James Bond novel and movie Live and Let Die both feature Caribbean villains who falsely claim the voodoo power of zombification in order to keep others in fear of them. George A. Romero and the modern zombie film (1968–1985) See also: Living Dead Zombie 'Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction' character First appearance Night of the Living Dead, 1968 Created by George Romero Information Alias "Romero zombie" Type Undead (influenced by Haitian Zombie), Vampire, Ghoul A young zombie (Kyra Schon) feeding on human flesh, from Night of the Living Dead (1968) The modern conception of the zombie owes itself almost entirely to George A. Romero's 1968 film Night of the Living Dead.[1][59][60] In his films, Romero "bred the zombie with the vampire, and what he got was the hybrid vigour of a ghoulish plague monster".[61] This entailed an apocalyptic vision of monsters that have come to be known as Romero zombies. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times chided theater owners and parents who allowed children access to the film. "I don't think the younger kids really knew what hit them," complained Ebert. "They were used to going to movies, sure, and they'd seen some horror movies before, sure, but this was something else." According to Ebert, the film affected the audience immediately: "The kids in the audience were stunned. There was almost complete silence. The movie had stopped being delightfully scary about halfway through, and had become unexpectedly terrifying. There was a little girl across the aisle from me, maybe nine years old, who was sitting very still in her seat and crying."[62] Romero's reinvention of zombies is notable in terms of its thematics; he used zombies not just for their own sake, but as a vehicle "to criticize real-world social ills—such as government ineptitude, bioengineering, slavery, greed and exploitation—while indulging our post-apocalyptic fantasies".[63] Night was the first of six films in Romero's Living Dead series. Its first sequel, Dawn of the Dead, was released in 1978. Lucio Fulci's Zombi 2 was released just months after Dawn of the Dead as an ersatz sequel (Dawn of the Dead was released in several other countries as Zombi or Zombie).[1] Dawn of the Dead was the most commercially zombie film for decades, up until the zombie revival of the 2000s.[64] The 1981 film Hell of the Living Dead referenced a mutagenic gas as a source of zombie contagion: an idea also used in Dan O'Bannon's 1985 film Return of the Living Dead. Return of the Living Dead featured zombies that hungered specifically for brains. Relative decline in the Western world (1985–1995) Zombie films in the 1980s and 1990s were not as commercially successful as Dawn of the Dead in the late 1970s.[64] The mid-1980s produced few zombie films of note. Perhaps the most notable entry, the Evil Dead series, while highly influential are not technically zombie films but films about demonic possession, despite the presence of the undead. 1985's Re-Animator, loosely based on the Lovecraft story, stood out in the genre, achieving nearly unanimous critical acclaim,[65] and becoming a modest success, nearly outstripping Romero's Day of the Dead for box office returns. After the mid-1980s, the subgenre was mostly relegated to the underground. Notable entries include director Peter Jackson's ultra-gory film Braindead (1992) (released as Dead Alive in the U.S.), Bob Balaban's comic 1993 film My Boyfriend's Back where a self-aware high school boy returns to profess his love for a girl and his love for human flesh, and Michele Soavi's Dellamorte Dellamore (1994) (released as Cemetery Man in the U.S.). Early Asian zombie films (1985–1995) In 1980s Hong Kong cinema, the Chinese jiangshi, a zombie-like creature dating back to Qing dynasty era jiangshi fiction of the 18th and 19th centuries, were featured in a wave of jiangshi films, popularised by Mr. Vampire (1985). Hong Kong jiangshi films became popular in the Far East during the mid-1980s to early 1990s. Prior to the 1990s, there were not many Japanese films related to what may be considered in the West as a zombie film.[66] Early films such as The Discarnates (1988) feature little gore and no cannibalism, but it is about the dead returning to life looking for love rather than a story of apocalyptic destruction.[66] One of the earliest Japanese zombie films with considerable gore and violence was Battle Girl: The Living Dead in Tokyo Bay (1991).[67] Zombie revival in the Far East (1996–2001) See also: Japanese horror According to Kim Newman in the book Nightmare Movies (2011), the "zombie revival began in the Far East" during the late 1990s, largely inspired by two Japanese zombie games released in 1996:[67] Capcom's Resident Evil, which started the Resident Evil video game series that went on to sell 24 million copies worldwide by 2006,[66] and Sega's arcade shooter House of the Dead. The success of these two 1996 zombie games inspired a wave of Asian zombie films.[67] From the late 1990s, zombies experienced a renaissance in low-budget Asian cinema, with a sudden spate of dissimilar entries, including Bio Zombie (1998), Wild Zero (1999), Junk (1999), Versus (2000) and Stacy (2001). Most Japanese zombie films emerged in the wake of Resident Evil, such as Versus, Wild Zero, and Junk, all from 2000.[66] The zombie films released after Resident Evil behaved similarly to the zombie films of the 1970s,[68] except that they were influenced by zombie video games, which inspired them to dwell more on the action compared to older Romero films.[69] Worldwide zombie film revival (2001–2008) The zombie revival which began in the Far East eventually went global following the worldwide success of the Japanese zombie games Resident Evil and The House of the Dead.[67] Resident Evil in particular sparked a revival of the zombie genre in popular culture, leading to a renewed global interest in zombie films during the early 2000s.[70] In addition to being adapted into the Resident Evil and House of the Dead films from 2002 onwards, the original video games themselves also inspired zombie films such as 28 Days Later (2002)[71] and Shaun of the Dead (2004).[72] This led to the revival of zombie films in global popular culture.[70][71][73] The turn of the millennium coincided with a decade of box-office successes in which the zombie subgenre experienced a resurgence: the Resident Evil movies (2002–2016), the British films 28 Days Later and 28 Weeks Later (2007),[74][75] the Dawn of the Dead remake (2004),[1] and the comedies Shaun of the Dead and Dance of the Dead (2008). The new interest allowed Romero to create the fourth entry in his zombie series: Land of the Dead, released in the summer of 2005. Romero returned to the series with the films Diary of the Dead (2008) and Survival of the Dead (2010).[1] Generally, the zombies in these shows are the slow, lumbering and unintelligent kind first made popular in Night of the Living Dead.[76] The Resident Evil films, 28 Days Later and the Dawn of the Dead remake all set box office records for the zombie genre, reaching levels of commercial success not seen since the original Dawn of the Dead in 1978.[64] Motion pictures created in the 2000s, like 28 Days Later, the House of the Dead and Resident Evil films, and the Dawn of the Dead remake,[54] have featured zombies that are more agile, vicious, intelligent, and stronger than the traditional zombie.[77] These new type of zombie, the fast running zombie, has origins in video games, with Resident Evil's running zombie dogs and especially The House of the Dead game's running human zombies.[54] Continued film success and zombie TV series (2008–2014) The success of Shaun of the Dead led to more successful zombie comedies during the late 2000s to early 2010s, such as Zombieland (2009) and Cockneys vs Zombies (2012).[70] By 2011, the Resident Evil film adaptations had also become the highest-grossing film series based on video games, after they grossed more than $1 billion worldwide.[78] In 2013, the AMC series The Walking Dead had the highest audience ratings in the United States for any show on broadcast or cable with an average of 5.6 million viewers in the 18- to 49-year-old demographic.[79] The film World War Z became the highest-grossing zombie film, and one of the highest-grossing films of 2013.[70] At the same time, starting from the mid-2000s, a new type of zombie film has been growing in popularity: the one in which zombies are portrayed as human-like in appearance and behavior, retaining the personality traits they had in life, and becoming friends or even romantic partners for humans rather than a threat for humanity. Notable examples of human-zombie romance include the stop-motion animated movie Corpse Bride, live-action movies Warm Bodies, Camille, Zombies, Life After Beth, Burying the Ex, and Nina Forever, and TV series American Gods, iZombie, Babylon Fields, and Pushing Daisies.[10][80] According to zombie scholar Scott Rogers, "what we are seeing in Pushing Daisies, Warm Bodies, and iZombie is in many ways the same transformation [of the zombies] that we have witnessed with vampires since the 1931 Dracula represented Dracula as essentially human — a significant departure from the monstrous representation in the 1922 film Nosferatu". Rogers also notes the accompanying visual transformation of the living dead: while the "traditional" zombies are marked by noticeable disfigurement and decomposition, the "romantic" zombies show little or no such traits.[10] Relative decline (2015–present) In the late 2010s, zombie films began declining in popularity, with elevated horror films gradually taking their place, such as The Witch (2015), Get Out (2016), A Quiet Place (2018) and Hereditary (2018).[73] An exception is the low-budget Japanese zombie comedy One Cut of the Dead (2017), which became a sleeper hit in Japan, and it made box office history by earning over a thousand times its budget.[81] One Cut of the Dead also received worldwide acclaim, with Rotten Tomatoes stating it "reanimates the moribund zombie genre with a refreshing blend of formal daring and clever satire."[82] Zombie apocalypse Main article: Zombie apocalypse Intimately tied to the concept of the modern zombie is the "zombie apocalypse"; the breakdown of society as a result of an initial zombie outbreak that spreads. This archetype has emerged as a prolific subgenre of apocalyptic fiction and has been portrayed in many zombie-related media after Night of the Living Dead.[83] In a zombie apocalypse, a widespread (usually global) rise of zombies hostile to human life engages in a general assault on civilization. Victims of zombies may become zombies themselves. This causes the outbreak to become an exponentially growing crisis: the spreading phenomenon swamps normal military and law enforcement organizations, leading to the panicked collapse of civilized society until only isolated pockets of survivors remain, scavenging for food and supplies in a world reduced to a pre-industrial hostile wilderness. Possible causes for zombie behavior in a modern population can be attributed to viruses, bacteria or other phenomena that reduce the mental capacity of humans causing them to behave in a very primitive and destructive fashion. Subtext The usual subtext of the zombie apocalypse is that civilization is inherently vulnerable to the unexpected, and that most individuals if desperate enough cannot be relied on to comply with the author's ethos. The narrative of a zombie apocalypse carries strong connections to the turbulent social landscape of the United States in the 1960s, when Night of the Living Dead provided an indirect commentary on the dangers of conformity, a theme also explored in the novel The Body Snatchers (1954) and associated film Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956).[84][85] Many also feel that zombies allow people to deal with their own anxieties about the end of the world.[86] One scholar concluded that "more than any other monster, zombies are fully and literally apocalyptic ... they signal the end of the world as we have known it."[83] While zombie apocalypse scenarios are secular, they follow a religious pattern based on Christian ideas of an end-times war and messiah.[87] Simon Pegg, who starred in and co-wrote the 2004 zombie comedy film Shaun of the Dead, wrote that zombies were the "most potent metaphorical monster". According to Pegg, whereas vampires represent sex, zombies represent death: "Slow and steady in their approach, weak, clumsy, often absurd, the zombie relentlessly closes in, unstoppable, intractable." He expressed his dislike for depictions of fast zombies, and argued that zombies should be slow-moving and inept; just as a healthy diet and exercise can delay death, zombies are easy to avoid, but not for ever. He also argued that this was essential to making them "oddly sympathetic ... to create tragic anti-heroes ... to be pitied, empathised with, even rooted for. The moment they appear angry or petulant, the second they emit furious velociraptor screeches (as opposed to the correct mournful moans of longing), they cease to possess any ambiguity. They are simply mean."[88] Story elements John A. Russo portrays a zombie in Night of the Living Dead. Initial contacts with zombies are extremely dangerous and traumatic, causing shock, panic, disbelief and possibly denial, hampering survivors' ability to deal with hostile encounters.[89] The response of authorities to the threat is slower than its rate of growth, giving the zombie plague time to expand beyond containment. This results in the collapse of the given society. Zombies take full control, while small groups of the living must fight for their survival.[89] The stories usually follow a single group of survivors, caught up in the sudden rush of the crisis. The narrative generally progresses from the onset of the zombie plague, then initial attempts to seek the aid of authorities, the failure of those authorities, through to the sudden catastrophic collapse of all large-scale organization and the characters' subsequent attempts to survive on their own. Such stories are often squarely focused on the way their characters react to such an extreme catastrophe, and how their personalities are changed by the stress, often acting on more primal motivations (fear, self-preservation) than they would display in normal life.[89][90] Movie poster for the 1968 film Night of the Living Dead In print and literature One of the various zombie panel discussion at the 2012 New York Comic Con featuring writers who have worked in the genre (l-r): Jonathan Maberry, Daniel Kraus, Stefan Petrucha, Will Hill, Rachel Caine, Chase Novak, and Christopher Krovatin. Also present but not visible in the photo was Barry Lyga. See also: List of zombie novels In the 1990s, zombie fiction emerged as a distinct literary subgenre, with the publication of Book of the Dead (1990) and its follow-up Still Dead: Book of the Dead 2 (1992), both edited by horror authors John Skipp and Craig Spector. Featuring Romero-inspired stories from the likes of Stephen King, the Book of the Dead compilations are regarded as influential in the horror genre and perhaps the first true "zombie literature". Horror novelist Stephen King has written about zombies including his short story "Home Delivery" (1990) and his novel Cell (2006) concerning a struggling young artist on a trek from Boston to Maine in hopes of saving his family from a possible worldwide outbreak of zombie-like maniacs.[91] Max Brooks's novel World War Z (2006) became a New York Times bestseller.[92] Brooks had previously authored The Zombie Survival Guide (2003), a zombie-themed parody of pop-fiction survival guides published in 2003.[93] Brooks has said that zombies are so popular because "Other monsters may threaten individual humans, but the living dead threaten the entire human race.... Zombies are slate wipers." Seth Grahame-Smith's mashup novel Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2009) combines the full text of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice (1813) with a story about a zombie epidemic within the novel's British Regency period setting.[93] In 2009, Katy Hershbereger of St. Martin's Press stated "In the world of traditional horror, nothing is more popular right now than zombies.... The living dead are here to stay."[93] 2000s and 2010s were marked by a decidedly new type of zombie novel, in which zombies retain their humanity and become friends or even romantic partners for humans; critics largely attribute this trend to the influence of Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series.[94][95] One of the most prominent examples is Generation Dead by Daniel Waters, featuring undead teenagers struggling for equality with the living and a human protagonist falling in love with their leader.[12] Other novels of this period involving human-zombie romantic relationships include Bone Song by John Meaney, American Gods by Neil Gaiman, Midnight Tides by Steven Erikson, and Amy Plum's Die for Me series;[95] much earlier examples, dating back to 1980s, are Dragon on a Pedestal by Piers Anthony and Conan the Defiant by Steve Perry.[96][97] In anime and manga There has been a growth in the number of zombie manga in the last decade, and in a list of "10 Great Zombie Manga", Anime News Network's Jason Thompson placed I Am a Hero at number 1, considering it "probably the greatest zombie manga ever". In second place was Living Corpse and in third, Biomega, which he called "the greatest science-fiction virus zombie manga ever".[98] During the late 2000s to early 2010s, there were several manga and anime series that humanized zombies by presenting them as protagonists or love interests, such as Sankarea: Undying Love and Is This a Zombie? (both debuted in 2009). Z ~Zed~ was adapted into a live action film in 2014.[99] In art Artist Jillian McDonald has made several works of video art involving zombies, and exhibited them in her 2006 show, "Horror Make-Up," which debuted on 8 September 2006 at Art Moving Projects, a gallery in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.[100] Artist Karim Charredib has dedicated his work to the zombie figure. In 2007, he made a video installation at villa Savoye called "Them !!!" where zombies walked in the villa like tourists.[101] In video gaming See also: List of zombie video games and Survival horror The release of two 1996 horror games, Capcom's Resident Evil and Sega's The House of the Dead, sparked an international craze for zombie games.[102][67] In 2013, George Romero said it was the video games Resident Evil and House of the Dead "more than anything else" that popularised zombies in early 21st-century popular culture.[103][104] The modern fast running zombies have origins in these games, with Resident Evil's running zombie dogs and especially House of the Dead's running human zombies, which later became a staple of modern zombie films.[54] Zombies went on to become a popular theme for video games, particularly in the survival horror, stealth, first-person shooter and role-playing game genres. Important horror fiction media franchises in this area include Resident Evil, The House of the Dead, Silent Hill, Dead Rising, Dead Island, Left 4 Dead, Dying Light, State of Decay, The Last of Us and the Zombies game modes from Call of Duty title series.[105] A series of games has also been released based on the widely popular TV show that first aired in 2010, The Walking Dead. PopCap Games' Plants vs. Zombies, a humorous tower defense game, was an indie hit in 2009, featuring in several best-of lists at the end of that year. The massively multiplayer online role-playing game Urban Dead, a free grid-based browser game where zombies and survivors fight for control of a ruined city, is one of the most popular games of its type.[106] DayZ, a zombie-based survival horror mod for ArmA 2, was responsible for over 300,000 unit sales of its parent game within two months of its release.[107] Over a year later, the developers of the mod created a standalone version of the same game, which currently is in early-access on Steam, and so far it has sold 3 million copies since its release in December 2013[108] Romero would later opine that he believes that much of the 21st century obsessions with Zombies can be traced more towards video games than films, Noting that it was not until the 2009 film Zombieland that a Zombie film was able to grose more the 100 million.[109] Outside of video games, zombies frequently appear in trading card games, such as Magic: The Gathering or Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game (which even has a Zombie-Type for its "monsters"), as well as in role-playing games, such as Dungeons & Dragons, tabletop games such as Zombies!!! and Dead of Winter: A Cross Roads Game, and tabletop wargames, such as Warhammer Fantasy and 40K. The game Humans vs. Zombies is a zombie-themed live-action game played on college campuses.[110] Writing for Scientific American, Kyle Hill praised the 2013 game The Last of Us for the game's plausibility, which based its zombie enemies on a fictional strain of the Cordyceps fungus, which has real-world parasitic properties.[111] Despite plausibility, to date there have been no documented cases of humans infected by Cordyceps.[112] Zombie video games have remained popular in the late 2010s, as seen with the commercial success of the Resident Evil 2 remake and Days Gone in 2019.[113] In government media Main article: Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse On 18 May 2011, the United States' Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published a graphic novel, Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse providing tips to survive a zombie invasion as a "fun new way of teaching the importance of emergency preparedness".[114] The CDC goes on to summarize cultural references to a zombie apocalypse. It uses these to underscore the value of laying in water, food, medical supplies, and other necessities in preparation for any and all potential disasters, be they hurricanes, earthquakes, tornadoes, floods, or hordes of zombies.[114][115] On 17 October 2011, The Weather Channel in the United States published an article, "How To Weather the Zombie Apocalypse", that included a fictional interview with a Director of Research at the CDD, the "Center for Disease Development".[116] Questions answered include "How does the temperature affect zombies' abilities? Do they run faster in warmer temperatures? Do they freeze if it gets too cold?"[116] In 2011, the US government drafted CONPLAN 8888-11, a real plan detailing a strategy to defend against a zombie attack. [117] In music Michael Jackson's music video Thriller (1983), in which he dances with a troop of zombies, has been preserved as a cultural treasure by the Library of Congress' National Film Registry.[118][119] Many pop culture media have paid tribute to this video, such as a gathering of 14,000 university students dressed as zombies in Mexico City,[118] and 1500 prisoners in orange jumpsuits recreating the zombie dance in a viral video .[120] The Brooklyn hip hop trio Flatbush Zombies incorporate many tropes from zombie fiction and play on the theme of a zombie apocalypse in their music. They portray themselves as "living dead", describing their use of psychedelics such as LSD and psilocybin mushrooms as having caused them to experience ego death and rebirth. In social activism A Zombie Walk in Pittsburgh Main articles: Zombie walk and Zombie Squad The zombie also appears as a metaphor in protest songs, symbolizing mindless adherence to authority, particularly in law enforcement and the armed forces. Well-known examples include Fela Kuti's 1976 album Zombie, and The Cranberries' 1994 single "Zombie". Organized zombie walks have been staged, either as performance art or as part of protests that parody political extremism or apathy.[121][122][123][124][125] A variation of the zombie walk is the zombie run. Here participants do a 5k run wearing a belt with several flag "lives". If the chasing zombies capture all of the flags the runner becomes "infected". If he or she reaches the finish line—which may involve wide detours—ahead of the zombies the participant is a "survivor". In either case an appropriate participation medal is awarded.[126] In theoretical academic papers Researchers have used theoretical zombie infections to test epidemiology modeling. One study found that all humans end up turned or dead. This is because the main epidemiological risk of zombies, besides the difficulties of neutralizing them, is that their population just keeps increasing; generations of humans merely "surviving" still have a tendency to feed zombie populations, resulting in gross outnumbering. The researchers explain that their methods of modelling may be applicable to the spread of political views or diseases with dormant infection.[127][128] Adam Chodorow of the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law at Arizona State University investigated the estate and income tax implications of a zombie apocalypse under United States federal and state tax codes.[129] Neuroscientists Bradley Voytek and Timothy Verstynen have built a side career in extrapolating how ideas in neuroscience would theoretically apply to zombie brains. Their work has been featured in Forbes, New York Magazine, and other publications.[130] See also Wikimedia Commons has media related to Zombie. List of zombie short films and undead-related projects Smombie (a combination of "smartphone" and "zombie") Ophiocordyceps unilateralis a fungus that creates so-called "zombie ants" or more generally, behavior-altering parasites Rabbit From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to navigationJump to search For the woodworking term, see Rabbet. For the musician, see Rabit (musician). For other uses, see Rabbit (disambiguation). "Bunny" redirects here. For other uses, see Bunny (disambiguation). Rabbit Temporal range: Late Eocene-Holocene, 53–0 Ma PreЄЄOSDCPTJKPgN Oryctolagus cuniculus Rcdo.jpg Scientific classification Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Chordata Subphylum: Vertebrata Class: Mammalia Order: Lagomorpha Family: Leporidae in part Genera Pentalagus Bunolagus Nesolagus Romerolagus Brachylagus Sylvilagus Oryctolagus Poelagus Rabbits are small mammals in the family Leporidae of the order Lagomorpha (along with the hare and the pika). Oryctolagus cuniculus includes the European rabbit species and its descendants, the world's 305 breeds[1] of domestic rabbit. Sylvilagus includes 13 wild rabbit species, among them the 7 types of cottontail. The European rabbit, which has been introduced on every continent except Antarctica, is familiar throughout the world as a wild prey animal and as a domesticated form of livestock and pet. With its widespread effect on ecologies and cultures, the rabbit (or bunny) is, in many areas of the world, a part of daily life—as food, clothing, a companion, and as a source of artistic inspiration. Contents 1 Terminology 2 Taxonomy 2.1 Differences from hares 2.2 Domestication 3 Biology 3.1 Evolution 3.2 Morphology 3.3 Hind limb elements 3.3.1 Musculature 3.4 Ears 3.5 Thermoregulation 3.6 Respiratory System 3.7 Digestion 3.8 Reproduction 3.9 Sleep 3.10 Diseases 4 Ecology 4.1 Habitat and range 4.2 Environmental problems 5 As food and clothing 6 In art, literature, and culture 6.1 Folklore and mythology 6.2 Superstition and urban legend 7 See also 8 References 9 Further reading 10 External links Terminology Male rabbits are called bucks; females are called does. An older term for an adult rabbit is coney, while rabbit once referred only to the young animals.[2] Another term for a young rabbit is bunny, though this term is often applied informally (especially by children) to rabbits generally, especially domestic ones. More recently, the term kit or kitten has been used to refer to a young rabbit. A group of rabbits is known as a colony or nest (or, occasionally, a warren, though this more commonly refers to where the rabbits live).[3] A group of baby rabbits produced from a single mating is referred to as a litter,[4] and a group of domestic rabbits living together is sometimes called a herd.[5] Taxonomy Rabbits and hares were formerly classified in the order Rodentia (rodent) until 1912, when they were moved into a new order, Lagomorpha (which also includes pikas). Below are some of the genera and species of the rabbit. Brachylagus Idahoensis Pygmy rabbit Nesolagus netscheri Sumatran Striped Rabbit (Model) Oryctolagus cuniculus European rabbit (Feral Tasmanian specimen) Pentalagus furnessi Amami rabbit (Taxidermy specimen) Romerolagus diazi Volcano rabbit (Taxidermy specimen) Sylvilagus aquaticus Swamp rabbit (Juvenile) Sylvilagus audubonii Desert cottontail Sylvilagus bachmani Brush rabbit Sylvilagus brasiliensis Tapeti (Taxidermy specimen) Sylvilagus palustris hefneri Lower Keys marsh rabbit Order Lagomorpha Family Leporidae Genus Brachylagus Pygmy rabbit, Brachylagus idahoensis Genus Bunolagus Bushman rabbit, Bunolagus monticularis Genus Lepus ← NOTE: This genus is considered a hare, not a rabbit Genus Nesolagus Sumatran striped rabbit, Nesolagus netscheri Annamite striped rabbit, Nesolagus timminsi Genus Ochoronidae ← NOTE: This genus is considered a pika, not a rabbit Genus Oryctolagus European rabbit, Oryctolagus cuniculus Genus Pentalagus Amami rabbit / Ryūkyū rabbit, Pentalagus furnessi Genus Poelagus Central African Rabbit, Poelagus marjorita Genus Prolagidae ← NOTE: This genus is extinct. Genus Romerolagus Volcano rabbit, Romerolagus diazi Genus Sylvilagus Swamp rabbit, Sylvilagus aquaticus Desert cottontail, Sylvilagus audubonii Brush rabbit, Sylvilagus bachmani Forest rabbit, Sylvilagus brasiliensis Mexican cottontail, Sylvilagus cunicularis Dice's cottontail, Sylvilagus dicei Eastern cottontail, Sylvilagus floridanus Tres Marias rabbit, Sylvilagus graysoni Omilteme cottontail, Sylvilagus insonus San Jose brush rabbit, Sylvilagus mansuetus Mountain cottontail, Sylvilagus nuttallii Marsh rabbit, Sylvilagus palustris New England cottontail, Sylvilagus transitionalis Hare Johann Daniel Meyer (1748) Rabbit Johann Daniel Meyer (1748) Differences from hares Main article: Hare Hares are precocial, born relatively mature and mobile with hair and good vision, while rabbits are altricial, born hairless and blind, and requiring closer care. Hares (and cottontail rabbits) live a relatively solitary life in a simple nest above the ground, while most rabbits live in social groups underground in burrows or warrens. Hares are generally larger than rabbits, with ears that are more elongated, and with hind legs that are larger and longer. Hares have not been domesticated, while descendants of the European rabbit are commonly bred as livestock and kept as pets. Domestication Main article: Domestic rabbit Rabbits have long been domesticated. Beginning in the Middle Ages, the European rabbit has been widely kept as livestock, starting in ancient Rome. Selective breeding has generated a wide variety of rabbit breeds, many of which (since the early 19th century) are also kept as pets. Some strains of rabbit have been bred specifically as research subjects. As livestock, rabbits are bred for their meat and fur. The earliest breeds were important sources of meat, and so became larger than wild rabbits, but domestic rabbits in modern times range in size from dwarf to giant. Rabbit fur, prized for its softness, can be found in a broad range of coat colors and patterns, as well as lengths. The Angora rabbit breed, for example, was developed for its long, silky fur, which is often hand-spun into yarn. Other domestic rabbit breeds have been developed primarily for the commercial fur trade, including the Rex, which has a short plush coat. Biology Evolution Development of the rabbit heart (wax models) Because the rabbit's epiglottis is engaged over the soft palate except when swallowing, the rabbit is an obligate nasal breather. Rabbits have two sets of incisor teeth, one behind the other. This way they can be distinguished from rodents, with which they are often confused.[6] Carl Linnaeus originally grouped rabbits and rodents under the class Glires; later, they were separated as the scientific consensus is that many of their similarities were a result of convergent evolution. However, recent DNA analysis and the discovery of a common ancestor has supported the view that they do share a common lineage, and thus rabbits and rodents are now often referred to together as members of the superorder Glires.[7] Morphology Skeleton of the rabbit Since speed and agility are a rabbit's main defenses against predators (including the swift fox), rabbits have large hind leg bones and well developed musculature. Though plantigrade at rest, rabbits are on their toes while running, assuming a more digitigrade form. Rabbits use their strong claws for digging and (along with their teeth) for defense.[8] Each front foot has four toes plus a dewclaw. Each hind foot has four toes (but no dewclaw).[9] Melanistic coloring Oryctologus cuniculus European rabbit (wild) Most wild rabbits (especially compared to hares) have relatively full, egg-shaped bodies. The soft coat of the wild rabbit is agouti in coloration (or, rarely, melanistic), which aids in camouflage. The tail of the rabbit (with the exception of the cottontail species) is dark on top and white below. Cottontails have white on the top of their tails.[10] As a result of the position of the eyes in its skull, the rabbit has a field of vision that encompasses nearly 360 degrees, with just a small blind spot at the bridge of the nose.[11] Hind limb elements This image comes from a specimen in the Pacific Lutheran University natural history collection. It displays all of the skeletal articulations of rabbit's hind limbs. The anatomy of rabbits' hind limbs are structurally similar to that of other land mammals and contribute to their specialized form of locomotion. The Bones of the hind limbs consist of long bones (the femur, tibia, fibula, and phalanges) as well as short bones (the tarsals). These bones are created through endochondral ossification during development.[12] Like most land mammals, the round head of the femur articulates with the acetabulum of the ox coxae. The femur articulates with the tibia, but not the fibula, which is fused to the tibia. The tibia and fibula articulate with the tarsals of the pes, commonly called the foot. The hind limbs of the rabbit are longer than the front limbs. This allows them to produce their hopping form of locomotion. Longer hind limbs are more capable of producing faster speeds. Hares, which have longer legs than cottontail rabbits, are able to move considerably faster.[13] Rabbits stay just on their toes when moving this is called Digitigrade locomotion. The hind feet have four long toes that allow for this and are webbed to prevent them from spreading when hopping.[14] Rabbits do not have paw pads on their feet like most other animals that use digitigrade locomotion. Instead, they have coarse compressed hair that offers protection.[15] Musculature The rabbits hind limb (lateral view) includes muscles involved in the quadriceps and hamstrings. Rabbits have muscled hind legs that allow for maximum force, maneuverability, and acceleration that is divided into three main parts; foot, thigh, and leg. The hind limbs of a rabbit are an exaggerated feature, that are much longer than the forelimbs providing more force. Rabbits run on their toes to gain the optimal stride during locomotion. The force put out by the hind limbs is contributed to both the structural anatomy of the fusion tibia and fibula, and muscular features.[16] Bone formation and removal, from a cellular standpoint, is directly correlated to hind limb muscles. Action pressure from muscles creates force that is then distributed through the skeletal structures. Rabbits that generate less force, putting less stress on bones are more prone to osteoporosis due to bone rarefaction.[17] In rabbits, the more fibers in a muscle, the more resistant to fatigue. For example, hares have a greater resistant to fatigue than cottontails. The muscles of rabbit's hind limbs can be classified into four main categories: hamstrings, quadriceps, dorsiflexors, or plantar flexors. The quadriceps muscles are in charge of force production when jumping. Complimenting these muscles are the hamstrings which aid in short bursts of action. These muscles play off of one another in the same way as the plantar flexors and doriflexors, contributing to the generation and actions associated with force.[18] Ears Within the order lagomorphs, the ears are utilized to detect and avoid predators. In the family leporidae, the ears are typically longer than they are wide. For example, in black tailed jack rabbits, their long ears cover a greater surface area relative to their body size that allow them to detect predators from far away. Contrasted to cotton tailed rabbits, their ears are smaller and shorter, requiring predators to be closer to detect them before fleeing. Evolution has favored rabbits to have shorter ears so the larger surface area does not cause them to lose heat in more temperate regions. The opposite can be seen in rabbits that live in hotter climates, mainly because they possess longer ears that have a larger surface area that help with dispersion of heat as well as the theory that sound does not travel well in more arid air, opposed to cooler air. Therefore, longer ears are meant to aid the organism in detecting prey sooner rather than later in warmer temperatures.[19] The rabbit is characterized by its shorter ears while hares are characterized by their longer ears.[20] Rabbits' ears are an important structure to aid thermoregulation and detect predators due to how the outer, middle, and inner ear muscles coordinate with one another. The ear muscles also aid in maintaining balance and movement when fleeing predators.[21] Anatomy of mammalian ear Outer ear The Auricle (anatomy), also known as the pinna is a rabbit's outer ear.[22] The rabbit's body surface is mainly taken up by the pinnae. It is theorized that the ears aid in dispersion of heat at temperatures above 30 °C with rabbits in warmer climates having longer pinnae due to this. Another theory is that the ears function as shock absorbers that could aid and stabilize rabbit's vision when fleeing predators, but this has typically only been seen in hares.[23] The rest of the outer ear has bent canals that lead to the eardrum or tympanic membrane.[24] Middle ear The middle ear is filled with three bones called ossicles and is separated by the outer eardrum in the back of the rabbit's skull.The three ossicles are called hammer, anvil, and stirrup and act to decrease sound before it hits the inner ear. In general, the ossicles act as a barrier to the inner ear for sound energy.[24] Inner ear Inner ear fluid called endolymph receives the sound energy. After receiving the energy, later within the inner ear there are two parts: the cochlea that utilizes sound waves from the ossicles and the vestibular apparatus that manages the rabbit's position in regards to movement. Within the cochlea there is a basilar membrane that contains sensory hair structures utilized to send nerve signals to the brain so it can recognize different sound frequencies. Within the vestibular apparatus the rabbit possesses three semicircular canals to help detect angular motion.[24] Thermoregulation Thermoregulation is the process that an organism utilizes to maintain an optimal body temperature independent of external conditions.[25] This process is carried out by the pinnae which takes up most of the rabbit's body surface and contain a vascular network and arteriovenous shunts.[26] In a rabbit, the optimal body temperature is around 38.5–40℃.[27] If their body temperature exceeds or does not meet this optimal temperature, the rabbit must return to homeostasis. Homeostasis of body temperature is maintained by the use of their large, highly vascularized ears that are able to change the amount of blood flow that passes through the ears. Rabbits use their large vascularized ears which aid in thermoregulation to keep their body temperature at an optimal level. Constriction and dilation of blood vessels in the ears are used to control the core body temperature of a rabbit. If the core temperature exceeds its optimal temperature greatly, blood flow is constricted to limit the amount of blood going through the vessels. With this constriction, there is only a limited amount of blood that is passing through the ears where ambient heat would be able to heat the blood that is flowing through the ears and therefore, increasing the body temperature. Constriction is also used when the ambient temperature is much lower than that of the rabbit's core body temperature. When the ears are constricted it again limits blood flow through the ears to conserve the optimal body temperature of the rabbit. If the ambient temperature is either 15 degrees above or below the optimal body temperature, the blood vessels will dilate. With the blood vessels being enlarged, the blood is able to pass through the large surface area which causes it to either heat or cool down. During the summer, the rabbit has the capability to stretch its pinnae which allows for greater surface area and increase heat dissipation. In the winter, the rabbit does the opposite and folds its ears in order to decrease its surface area to the ambient air which would decrease their body temperature. Ventral view of dissected rabbit lungs with key structures labeled. The jackrabbit has the largest ears within the Oryctolagus cuniculus group. Their ears contribute to 17% of their total body surface area. Their large pinna were evolved to maintain homeostasis while in the extreme temperatures of the desert. Respiratory System The rabbit's nasal cavity lies dorsal to the oral cavity, and the two compartments are separated by the hard and soft palate.[28] The nasal cavity itself is separated into a left and right side by a cartilage barrier, and it is covered in fine hairs that trap dust before it can enter the respiratory tract.[29][28] As the rabbit breathes, air flows in through the nostrils along the alar folds. From there, the air moves into the nasal cavity, also known as the nasopharynx, down through the trachea, through the larynx, and into the lungs.[29][30] The larynx functions as the rabbit's voice box, which enables it to produce a wide variety of sounds.[29] The trachea is a long tube embedded with cartilaginous rings that prevent the tube from collapsing as air moves in and out of the lungs. The trachea then splits into a left and right bronchus, which meet the lungs at a structure called the hilum. From there, the bronchi split into progressively more narrow and numerous branches. The bronchi branch into bronchioles, into respiratory bronchioles, and ultimately terminate at the alveolar duc