Vampires as an Other

Vampires, in fiction, have long since represented something other than a blood-sucking monster. From Dracula to Vampire Diaries to Dead Until Dark and Twilight, they represent something other in society. In Dracula, the titular character and his vampire spawn represent many aspects of Victorian fear in societies. A part of it is xenophobia—Dracula is a foreigner invading England with the intent on preying on its citizens. He is a literal parasite, stealing life from the veins of “traditional English roses” like Lucy. There was a fear then, and even now, that foreigners would come in and “destroy” the society that already existed. There has been a lot of concern with this “problem” with the Muslim refugees who are entering the country. People are afraid that the immigrants want “Sharia law” enforced on everyone, even non-muslims. I’m not going to go into if their beliefs are correct or not, but the fact that this fear of an “other” is still so pervasive in England that even over a century after Dracula was written.

In the United States, we have our own love/hate relationship with immigrants. People love to boast about how they’re ¼ German, 1/8^th Italian, etc. Yet say you’re from Haiti, or Mexico, or Guatemala, and all of a sudden these same people have a problem. I have read people call the flow of undocumented immigrants into the United States an “invasion”. So the fear of immigrants is just as much a problem in the United States, but in different ways from England. This is why Dracula was able to become incredibly popular in the United States, as well.

In more modern perceptions, however, ideas around monsters have shifted. They’re not always the bad guys, determined to feed on the “teething millions” of Victorian London. Sometimes they’re just ordinary people, who happen to have something that “others” them. With this more sympathetic view towards monsters comes a more nuanced view of the “others” that they are. In Victorian England, they were the “others” going against the grain of society—the new woman, the immigrant. They were portrayed in a negative light, with monsters attacking society. They were considered harmful, whether or not they actually were.

The “others” that modern vampires can be likened to are racial minorities and people who are LGBTQ+. This is referenced directly in Dead Until Dark, when the vampires are described as “coming out of their coffins” (a play on the oft-repeated “coming out of the closet”). In 2001, when the book was written, the Cincinnati Riots happened, which, according to Wikipedia “…were the largest urban disturbance in the United States since the 1992 Los Angeles riots.” Both riots were sparked by the brutal treatment of black men at the hands of police. The presence of racism in the United States was very much felt an known, even if people tried to deny it. In 1994, Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, the policy that forbid homosexual people from serving openly in the military was enacted. So the idea of these people as “others” in American society, something to perhaps look down upon, was prevalent. So the vampires, which were previously mapped with a different kind of outsider, were mapped with those.