Canon Horror Series: Language as Infection and the Systems of Horror v0.2

Language as Infection and the Systems of Horror is a bilingual working-paper package centered on the idea of language, perception, and media channels as systems of vulnerability in modern horror and science fiction. The materials are interconnected and refer to one another as parts of a single research corpus. This publication emerged from internal development discussions at Zhovten Games. It is a companion research output to the studio’s practical work, focused on questions of language, perception, horror systems, and narrative design. For the purposes of this article, “media horror” means horror in which fear is organized through media forms and channels of perception: speech, hearing, vision, recording, broadcast, signal, interface, or network. The term does not mean “horror about the media industry”; it refers to horror where mediation itself becomes part of the threat. The package includes: 1. Language as Infection - Media Communication as a Mechanism of Harm The foundational theoretical paper in the series. Within a limited corpus of media works, it shows how the channel of perception — speech, hearing, vision, and signal — itself becomes a vulnerability node and a scenario of subjective harm. 2. After the Nuclear Strike - The Transformation of Japanese Horror from Monster to Infected System This paper traces the Japanese material from a historical strike to long-term cultural regimes of fear: from the monster and bodily mutation to the media and institutional infrastructure of contagion. In comparison with the Ukrainian material, it shows a broader shift from strike to regime, from event to reproducible infrastructure in which body, space, and communication come under control. 3. When Disaster Becomes Environment - Chernobyl and the Spatial Model of Horror This paper develops the Ukrainian spatial model of horror: not a single event, but prolonged life inside a damaged environment where risk is distributed across space, infrastructure, and everyday adaptive practices. In comparison with the Japanese material, it shows a shift from one-time harm to reproducible infrastructure. 4. Viruses and Bioweapons -- Infection Mechanics and Media Analogues This companion working paper separates two analytical registers: the biological register, where a virus is an obligate intracellular parasite with a concrete replication mechanism, and the media register, where “contagion” functions as a transmission protocol through channels of perception: speech, hearing, vision, signal, and interface. The materials are published as working papers / preprints and are not peer reviewed.