zombie

English

English Wikipedia has an article on:

zombie

Wikipedia

Alternative forms

• zombi
• zomby (rare)
• zumbi (uncommon)

Etymology

First attested in 1871. From a Bantu language. Compare Kongo nzambi (“god”), zumbi (“fetish”), and Kimbundu nzumbi (“ghost”) (see Portuguese zumbi), and Caribbean folklore's jumbee (“a spirit or demon”). Origin from Spanish sombra (“shadow, phantom”) has also been suggested. May have come through Louisiana Creole . See also French zombi (1832).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈzɒmbi/
• (General American) enPR: zŏmʹbē, IPA^(key): /ˈzɑmbi/

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɒmbi
• Hyphenation: zom‧bie

Noun

zombie (plural zombies)

1. (voodoo, horror) A person, usually undead, animated by unnatural forces (such as magic), with no soul or will of his or her own.

   Synonyms: deadhead, ghoul, living dead, walker, (slang) walking dead, zed

   • 1943, Curt Siodmak, Ardel Wray, I Walked with a Zombie (motion picture):

     Betsy Connell: I don't know about zombies, doctor. Just what is a zombie? / Dr. Maxwell: A ghost. A living dead. It's also a drink.

   • 1962, “Monster Mash”, Bobby "Boris" Pickett and Lenny Capizzi (lyrics), performed by Bobby (Boris) Pickett and The Crypt-Kickers:

     The zombies were having fun
     The party had just begun
     The guests included Wolf-Man, Dracula, and his son.

   • 2008, BioWare, Mass Effect (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →ISBN, →OCLC, PC, scene: SSV Normandy:

     Ashley: Dad passed on a few years back. He's probably still watching, though.
     Shepard: He's not a zombie, is he?

   • 2017 February 23, Katie Rife, “The Girl With All The Gifts tries to put a fresh spin on overripe zombie clichés”, in The Onion AV Club‎:

     The zombies first show up 20 minutes in, after Melanie volunteers herself as the next child to mysteriously disappear in the middle of the night. That’s when we learn that Melanie and her classmates are all “hungries,” or people infected with a toxic fungus that turns them into mindless flesh-eating animals.

2. (figuratively) An apathetic or slow-witted person.
3. (figuratively) A human being in a state of extreme mental exhaustion.

   After working for 18 hours on the computer, I was a zombie.

4. An information worker who has signed a nondisclosure agreement.

   Synonym: intellectual prostitute

5. (computing) A process or task which has terminated but has not been removed from the list of processes, typically because it has an unresponsive parent process.
   • 1986, Maurice J. Bach, The Design of the Unix Operating System, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, USA, See "Process States and Transitions," p. 147.

     9. The process executed the exit system call and is in the zombie state. The process no longer exists, but it leaves a record containing an exit code and some timing statistics for its parent process to collect. The zombie state is the final state of a process.

6. (computing) A computer affected by malware which causes it to do whatever the attacker wants it to do without the user's knowledge.
7. A cocktail of rum and fruit juices.
   • 1976, Walter Becker, Donald Fagen (lyrics and music), “Haitian Divorce”, in The Royal Scam, performed by Steely Dan:

     She takes the taxi to the good hotel / Bon marché as far as she can tell / She drinks the zombie from the cocoa shell

   • 1976, Harvard Advocate CX:ii, pages 8 and 380:

     The maitre d’ introduced us and I had a zombie with him. Those zombies are wicked.

     I watched Mario and drank zombies out of a thermos.

8. (Canada, historical, derogatory) A conscripted member of the Canadian military during World War II who was assigned to home defence rather than to combat in Europe.
   • 1944, "Time for Decision," Time (US edition), 6 Nov.,

     Had the time come to order Canada's home defense draftees—some 70,000 zombies idling at home—to battle overseas?

9. (Australia, slang) Marijuana, or similar drugs.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:marijuana

   • 1980, Colin Hay, Ron Strykert (lyrics and music), “Down Under”, performed by Men at Work:

     Traveling in a fried-out Kombi / On a hippie trail, head full of zombie

10. (philosophy) A hypothetical being that is indistinguishable from a normal human being except in that it lacks conscious experience, qualia, or sentience.

    Synonyms: p-zombie, philosophical zombie

Derived terms

Translations

References

Czech

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key):
• IPA^(key):

Noun

zombie m anim or f or n

1. zombie

   Synonyms: zombík, nemrtvý

Declension

when masculine:

when feminine:

when neuter:

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from English zombie, from a Bantu language.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈzɔm.bi/

• Audio

  (file)

• Hyphenation: zom‧bie

Noun

zombie m (plural zombies, diminutive zombietje n)

1. zombie

Derived terms

• smombie

Finnish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈzombi/,

Noun

zombie

1. Alternative form of zombi.

Declension

Derived terms

compounds

• zombie-tähti (“zombie star”)

Further reading

• “zombie”, in Kielitoimiston sanakirja [Dictionary of Contemporary Finnish]‎ (in Finnish) (online dictionary, continuously updated), Kotimaisten kielten keskuksen verkkojulkaisuja 35, Helsinki: Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus (Institute for the Languages of Finland), 2004–, retrieved 2023-07-04

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /zɔ̃.bi/

• Audio

  (file)

Adjective

zombie

1. Alternative spelling of zombi
2. feminine singular of zombi

References

• “zombie”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé , 2012.

Italian

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): ^*/ˈd͡zom.bi/
• Rhymes: -ombi

Noun

zombie m or f by sense (invariable)

1. Alternative spelling of zombi

Norwegian Bokmål

Norwegian Wikipedia has an article on:

zombie

Wikipedia ^no

Etymology

From a Bantu language, via English zombie.

Noun

zombie m (definite singular zombien, indefinite plural zombier, definite plural zombiene)

1. a zombie

See also

• zombi (Nynorsk) (although the spelling "zombie" is apparently also used)

References

• “zombie” in The Bokmål Dictionary.

Polish

Polish Wikipedia has an article on:

zombie

Wikipedia ^pl

Alternative forms

• zombi

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English zombie.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈzɔm.bi/

• Audio

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔmbi
• Syllabification: zom‧bie

Noun

zombie m animal (indeclinable)

1. (voodoo) zombie (person, usually undead, animated by unnatural forces (such as magic), with no soul or will of their own)

   Synonyms: umarlak, zombiak, żywy trup

   Hypernym: nieumarły

2. (fiction) zombie (deceased person who becomes reanimate to attack the living)

   Synonyms: umarlak, zombiak, żywy trup

   Hypernym: nieumarły

3. zombie film
4. (computing) zombie (computer affected by malware)

Derived terms

Further reading

• zombie in Wielki słownik języka polskiego, Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
• zombie in Polish dictionaries at PWN

Portuguese

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English zombie.

Pronunciation

Noun

zombie m or f by sense (plural zombies)

1. zombie (the undead)

   Synonyms: morto-vivo, (Brazil) zumbi

Slovak

Etymology

Ultimately, from a Bantu language.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key):

Noun

zombie m anim (genitive singular zombieho, nominative plural zombieovia, genitive plural zombieov, declension pattern of kuli)

1. zombie

   Synonyms: zombi m, zombia f

Usage notes

May also be indeclineable.

Declension

References

• “zombie”, in Slovníkový portál Jazykovedného ústavu Ľ. Štúra SAV [Dictionary portal of the Ľ. Štúr Institute of Linguistics, Slovak Academy of Science] (in Slovak), https://slovnik.juls.savba.sk, 2024

Spanish

Noun

zombie m (plural zombies)

1. Alternative spelling of zombi

Swedish

Swedish Wikipedia has an article on:

zombie

Wikipedia ^sv

Etymology

Borrowed from English zombie, from a Bantu language.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈsɔmbɪ/

Noun

zombie c

1. zombie

Declension

References

• zombie in Svensk ordbok (SO)
• zombie in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)
• zombie in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)