Reading response 2-Communal After-Living: Asian Ghosts and the City

Lee Tsz Chun 3036066373

This book explores the intersection of urban environments, Asian ghosts’ narratives, and some cultural belief in Asia. Asian culture had believed that ghosts and humans have always been a part of the universe. The article had highlighted an interesting point that Asian horror movie often happened in an apartment like Apt mentioned in it. The article contrasts them with the Western horror movie, stating the difference of living space Asian living place are often crowded and intensive, and people seldom had conversions with neighborhood. They represent the loneliness in Asian urban style and implies the cultural difference between East and West.

Moreover, in contrast to Western horror movie, Asia horror movie was often bringing out some sociocultural issues or political issues. The article mentioned Rigor Mortis as an example. Rigor Mortis was a movie happening in an ordinary housing estate in Hong Kong, providing cheap housing units for citizens to live in. The article highlighted that the Asian zombie ‘Jiang Si’ are actually representing the apartment in nowadays. The presence of zombie tended to be transient. Suffering from high price of apartments, we cannot easily buy one of them and instead, we had to rent it. For apartments, we are also transient for them.

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