Analysis of Monster Culture (Seven Theses)

In Cohen’s essay, there are seven theses about monster that he has pointed out, and among these seven theses I agree with the opinion that the body of the monster is actually the body of the culture and function as an alter ego. What I do not quite agree is that the monster always escapes and revives again in another place. I believe that the monster serves for a special moment, and dies when this moment ends. 

I agree with Cohen that “The monstrous body is pure culture” (Cohen 4). There are often several elements inside a monster’s body, such as “fear, desire, anxiety and fantasy” (Cohen 4). All these elements have given the monster life and literally created the monster. Cohen states that the monster is usually born in a specific cultural moment and the creation of monsters is to search certain kind of cultural moment. In my opinion, the monster is always created for reasons. It may be created to interpret some abnormal phenomenon happened in human’s lives or another way to represent some dark events or evil side hidden in a specific time of history, as described in many stories. 

The monster is living inside cultural differences. For example, in medieval France, Muslims were transformed as demonic caricatures. And most Chinese people regarded westerners with totally different appearance features as Gweilo, which has the similar meaning of monster in Chinese culture when the society was isolated from western countries. The cultural and national difference is what facilitates monster culture. Back to the time during the Second World War, “the Jews were exactly regarded as a kind of monster, and Nazis even figured out a scientific way to try to wipe out all the Jews” (Buttsworth and Abbenhuis, 155). All these cultural differences in the history have created those monsters, just like the Native Americans being regarded as savages, which also bear the similar meaning of monster in more civilized societies.

Cultural border cannot be crossed. As many movies and literature works about monsters have shown and demonstrated that, most of the curiosity cases about things unknown are often punished instead of being rewarded. In many literature works, we can see the monster is created as something terrible and evil, and people who are curious about it usually ends up with a bad result. As mentioned in the last paragraph, monsters are various in different cultures. In another word, monster’s world indicates of different culture. Therefore, exploring monster’s world symbolizes crossing different culture’s border, which also means a kind of invasion on other cultures. We can find that there are basically two parallel descriptions about a monster, one is about the creation and the birth of the monster, and the other is about the testimony of its existence. Inside the border, it is the world and the society that we live in, but the other side is the monstrous world, filled with strange and unnatural things that beyond our control. 

“The monster can function as an alter ego, as an alluring projection of (an Other) self” (Cohen, 17). Monsters are the manifestation of our inner desire. Human beings endow the monster with superpower, which they cannot possess. Satan is the earliest prototype of monster in religion, which has always been the name for evil. However, Milton in Paradise Lost depicts him as a rebellious hero, fighting for the omnipotent God.

At least our envious Foe hath faild, who thought
All like himself rebellious, by whose aid [ 140 ]
This inaccessible high strength, the seat

Of Deitie supream, us dispossest.(Milton, 8)

Although Satan was finally defeated by the angels, however he is the only one who has the courage to defy God and fight for his freedom. The Almighty God serves as a tyrant in the poem. In reality, most people choose to obey the power of the rulers. So in this novel, Satan functions as a monster who satisfies people’s wishes to defy the authority and gain more freedom. 

What I disagree with Cohen is that the monster always escapes, at least not “always”. Vampires are cursed, and according to the famous vampire story of Dracula, it is indeed that Dracula always gets rebirth in other places and it is extremely hard for the other characters to kill them all. However, it doesn’t mean that the vampire cannot be killed. At the end of that story, we can see that Dracula is successfully killed by the characters with their courage and strong will. Also in many other famous works, such as the Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter, the evil monsters in the story are finally killed and can never be reborn in other places.

Personally, the creation of the monster comes from the inner desire of human beings and also a way to represent different culture. So monsters would be vanished forever when cultural problems are solved.  

In conclusion, the monstrous body is culture itself. The existence of monsters represents the desires of human beings desire and different cultures in terms of nation, race or religion and so on. Monster culture also symbolizes the social problems existing among different cultures or the struggles lying inside individuals. So monsters can be eventually defeated only the social problems or individual desires are tackled.   

 Works Cited

Buttsworth, Sara and Abbenhuis, Maartje. Monsters in the Mirror: Representations    of Nazism in Post-War Popular Culture.155-156. print.
Cohen, Jeffrey Jerome ed.. Monster Culture (Seven Theses), from Reading Culture. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996.
Milton, John. Paradise Lost. London: Chapman and Hall, 193, Piccadilly, 1859. Web. 
URL:http://books.google.com.hk/books?id=5cEzAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA8&lpg=PA8&dq=At+least+our+envious+Foe+hath+faild,+who+thought+All+like+himself+rebellious,+by+whose+aid+%5B+140+%5D+This+inaccessible+high+strength,+the+seat+Of+Deity+supreme,+us+dispossessed,&source=bl&ots=dvw4bU-reu&sig=ueZ_AHa66FuL1r-AxAaDfWgTTWw&hl=zh-CN&sa=X&ei=7LxtVIjfItPUoASszIHIBQ&ved=0CCkQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q&f=false




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