The legend of the Slender Man: The boogieman of surveillance culture

Abstract

Western societies have developed a culture of surveillance that frames how social actors understand institutional and vernacular forms of “watching”. Through the intersection of folklore, anthropology, and sociology, I explore the performances of the Slender Man legend as a monstrous cultural artifact representative of cultural anxieties around surveillance, social control, and secretive agencies. This blend of disciplines will help illuminate central cultural fears and anxieties within Internet sub-cultural groups. My goal in this paper is to understand how participants of alternate reality games (ARGs) exhibit anxieties about ubiquitous surveillance through uncoordinated collective storytelling.

Kansanperinne 2.0. Sukelluksia 2000-luvun vernakulaariin kulttuuriin

“…Ei-inhimillinen, jatkuvasti läsnä oleva teknologia on ottanut vallan kehittäjistään ja mahdollistaa jotain mitä emme tahtoneet. (Cooley ja Milligan 2018, 208-209;Curlew 2017;Heikkinen 2019, 68-71;Keller 2013, 96. ) Mennytkään ei ole enää turvallista, ja nostalgia osoittautuu erehdykseksi.…”