zombies

Noun

zombie (plural zombies)

1. (voodoo) A person, usually undead, animated by unnatural forces (such as magic), with no soul or will of his or her own, typically being slow, obedient, and harmless unless directed to be harmful.
   • 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.1943, Curt Siodmak, Ardel Wray, I Walked with a Zombie (motion picture)

   Synonyms:

   living dead

2. (horror) A dead person, reanimated through some fictional agency as a fungus, virus, or the like, that has an insatiable desire to eat living humans, typically depicted as aggressive, fast moving, and infectious.
   • Ashley: Dad passed on a few years back. He's probably still watching, though.
     Shepard: He's not a zombie, is he?2008, BioWare, Mass Effect (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →ISBN, →OCLC, PC, scene: SSV Normandy

   Synonyms:

   deadhead, walker, walking dead, zed

3. (figuratively) An apathetic or slow-witted person.
4. (figuratively) A human being in a state of extreme mental exhaustion.
   • After working for 18 hours on the computer, I was a zombie.
5. (figuratively) Someone or something that should be dead but is not.
   • I would advise anyone who does not share its politics — surely the great majority of gay men and lesbians — to shun NOLAG for the anachronistic zombie it is.1982 February 13, Wayne Dynes, “Unnatural”, in Gay Community News, volume 9, number 29, page 4
6. An information worker who has signed a nondisclosure agreement.

   Synonyms:

   intellectual prostitute

See all 14 meanings of zombie