Digital Mythology and the Internet's Monster

Explores the role of myth online, and through this the role and place of digital communities, using the case study of the Slender Man.

Exploring a prominent digital mythology, this book proposes a new way of viewing both online narratives and the online communities which tell them. The Slender Man – a monster known for making children disappear and causing violent deaths to the adults who seek to know more about him – is used as an extended case study to explore the role of digital communities, as well as the question of the existence of a broader “digital culture”. Structural anthropological mythic analysis and ethnographic details demonstrate how the Slender Man mythology is structured, and how its everlasting nature in the online communities demonstrates an importance of the mythos.