Most of us only celebrate Halloween each October, but some HASS experts research the strange and spooky all year round, from the history of horror stories to scary costumes.
Renowned fashion historian Honorary Associate Professor Margaret Maynard from the School of Communication and Arts said costumes have played an important part of rituals featuring ghosts for more than a thousand years.
“Disguises of the face and body have been a feature of pre-Halloween celebrations as a way of scaring off spirits,” Dr Maynard said.
Like costumes, ghost stories and horror books have been a staple of spooky celebrations for centuries, with Associate Professor Tom Aechtner from the School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry even teaching a course on the History of the Supernatural - exploring ghosts, vampires, witches and aliens!
