Americans remain spooked by ghosts

From Science Blog:

For Americans, ghosts represent much more than just spooky specters, says Central Michigan University English professor Jeffrey Weinstock.

Throughout time, ghosts in American literature have signified representations of the American culture at large: a yearning to reconnect with lost loved ones, a reminder of cultural dilemmas like racism and slavery, or personal struggles like domestic abuse, according to Weinstock.

Weinstock is the editor of “Spectral America: Phantoms and the American Imagination” and currently is working on the book, “Scare Tactics: Supernatural Fiction by American Women as a Form of Social Protest.”

“Ghosts have remained an area of fascination,” said Weinstock. “But no one had thought to try and actually examine in a book the importance of ghosts to American literature across time.”