Articles and databases
Search these databases first for scholarly articles about monsters. You might try others listed on this guide's "Articles" page as well. Use general search terms like "monsters" OR "imaginary animals," or specific terms for particular creatures - e.g., "vampire," "chupacabra," "Gorgon," etc. You could try combining those terms with the names of cities, regions, nations, and peoples if you are interested in monster legends from a particular place or culture.
Encyclopedias and other reference works
In addition to the more general encyclopedias and similar reference resources listed on this guide's "Encyclopedias, etc." page, you might find these, which are about monsters and mythical creatures more specifically, useful as well.
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Giants, Monsters, and Dragons
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A richly illustrated encyclopedia that describes individual beings in their cultural context, grouping them across cultures and explaining common mythological themes. This illustrated encyclopedia not only identifies and describes individual beasts in their cultural context, but also groups them together across cultures and discusses common mythological strands and conceits. An extensive bibliography and useful appendixes assist further learning for students of all levels. Provides an extensive bibliography Includes useful appendixes that encourage further learning for students at all levels Fully illustrated
Call Number: General Collection GR825 .R67 2000Publication Date: 2000-06-13 -
Spirits, Fairies, Gnomes, and Goblins: An Encyclopedia of the Little People
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Drawing from ancient and modern folklore, myth, and religion, this reference work delves into the social and anthropological significance of supernatural beings such as angels, demons, dwarfs, encantados, fairies, keremets, nats and nymphs.
Call Number: General Collection GR549 .R65 1996Publication Date: 1996 -
Mythical Creatures Bible
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Fabulous animals, specters from the shadow world, nature spirits, and sacred beings: these are the monstrous, marvelous, and mythic creatures that have come down to us in folklore and legend. Some probably have their origins in reality; others spring completely from the imagination--and they are all here, in this stunningly illustrated bible. It's rich in history and images, and international in scope, covering dragons and serpents; weird insects like the Aztec Itzpapalotl; zombies, golems, and banshees; the watery Undi≠ the Monkey King, Sun Wukong; and much, much more. A fascinating and informative work.
Call Number: General Collection GR825 .R67 2009Publication Date: 2009 -
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Imaginary Animals by Fire-breathing dragons, beautiful mermaids, majestic unicorns, terrifying three-headed dogs--these fantastic creatures have long excited our imagination. Medieval authors placed them in the borders of manuscripts as markers of the boundaries of our understanding. Tales from around the world place these beasts in deserts, deep woods, remote islands, ocean depths, and alternate universes--just out of our reach. And in the sections on the apocalypse in the Bible, they proliferate as the end of time approaches, with horses with heads like lions, dragons, and serpents signaling the destruction of the world. Legends tell us that imaginary animals belong to a primordial time, before everything in the world had names, categories, and conceptual frameworks. In this book, Boria Sax digs into the stories of these fabulous beasts. He shows how, despite their liminal role, imaginary animals like griffins, dog-men, yetis, and more are socially constructed creatures, created through the same complex play of sensuality and imagination as real ones. Tracing the history of imaginary animals from Paleolithic art to their roles in stories such as Harry Potter and even the advent of robotic pets, he reveals that these extraordinary figures help us psychologically--as monsters, they give form to our amorphous fears, while as creatures of wonder, they embody our hopes. Their greatest service, Sax concludes, is to continually challenge our imaginations, directing us beyond the limitations of conventional beliefs and expectations. Featuring over 230 illustrations of a veritable menagerie of fantastical and unreal beasts, Imaginary Animals is a feast for the eyes and the imagination.
Call Number: ONLINEPublication Date: 2013 -
Encyclopedia of the Vampire
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An exhaustive work covering the full range of topics relating to vampires, including literature, film and television, and folklore. * Nearly 240 A-Z entries on all aspects of vampirism * Photographs and illustrations of vampire films, television shows, and other matters relating to vampires * Brief bibliographies referring the reader to secondary sources on individual entries * A general bibliography of scholarship on vampires
Call Number: ONLINEPublication Date: 2010 -
The Vampire Book: Encyclopedia of the Undead
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This reference presents vampire lore and legends from around the world, with coverage of the historical, literary, mythological, biographical and popular aspects of the vampire figure. It gives an alphabetical list of definitions of terms, descriptions of places and biographies of vampires (fictional and allegedly real), along with the actors who have portrayed them and the authors who created them. There are also descriptions of vampire appearances in different cultures and other topics, such as sexuality) associated with vampires. Many of the illustrations in the text are taken from the files of the Vampire Studies Society.
Call Number: General Collection GR830.V3 M44 1999Publication Date: 1999 -
Encyclopedia of Demons in World Religions and Cultures
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This exhaustive volume catalogs nearly three thousand demons in the mythologies and lore of virtually every ancient society and most religions. From Aamon, the demon of life and reproduction with the head of a serpent and the body of a wolf in Christian demonology, to Zu, the half-man, half-bird personification of the southern wind and thunder clouds in Sumero-Akkadian mythology, entries offer descriptions of each demon's origins, appearance and cultural significance. Also included are descriptions of the demonic and diabolical members making up the hierarchy of Hell and the numerous species of demons that, according to various folklores, mythologies, and religions, populate the earth and plague mankind. Very thoroughly indexed.
Call Number: General Collection BF1503 .B346 2012Publication Date: 2012 -
Encyclopedia of Monsters
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The Encyclopedia of Monsters is a complete guide to more than 1,000 beasts, specters, werewolves, and other monsters that have chilled the popular imagination -- from the Bible's Leviathan to Hollywood's Alien.
Call Number: General Collection ; P96.M6 R68 1989Publication Date: 1989 -
Mythology Unbound: An Online Textbook for Classical Mythology
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Today people often use the word “myth” to mean an untrue story or false rumor. For example, if one person asked, “Is Friday the 13th an unlucky day?” another person might answer, “No, that is just a myth.” But the ancient Greeks did not use the word mythos (μῦθος) in this way. For the Greeks, a mythos was simply a story. It was not important whether the story was true or false; what was important was the fact that the mode of speech was that of a story. The Greek word logos (λόγος), on the other hand, means a rational explanation or analytical statement. These two words, mythos and logos, point to two different kinds of speech, corresponding to two different ways of thinking. One was not considered more important than the other; they were just different. If you put the two words together: mythos + logos = mythology. And “mythology” is the explanation or the analytical study of myths.
Call Number: ONLINEPublication Date: 2017
Books about monsters and mythical creatures
Below is a selection of books about monsters and mythical creatures. To find others, follow the instructions on this guide's "Books" page. You can use "monsters" as a search term, or the words for the specific kinds of monsters that interest you.
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The Ashgate Research Companion to Monsters and the Monstrous
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The field of monster studies has been growing dramatically over the past few years and this companion provides a comprehensive guide to the study of monsters and the monstrous from historical, regional and thematic perspectives.
Call Number: General Collection GR825 .A85 2012Publication Date: 2012 -
The Monster Theory Reader
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A collection of scholarship on monsters and their meaning--across genres, disciplines, methodologies, and time--from foundational texts to the most recent contributions Zombies and vampires, banshees and basilisks, demons and wendigos, goblins, gorgons, golems, and ghosts. From the mythical monstrous races of the ancient world to the murderous cyborgs of our day, monsters have haunted the human imagination, giving shape to the fears and desires of their time. And as long as there have been monsters, there have been attempts to make sense of them, to explain where they come from and what they mean. This book collects the best of what contemporary scholars have to say on the subject, in the process creating a map of the monstrous across the vast and complex terrain of the human psyche. Editor Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock prepares the way with a genealogy of monster theory, traveling from the earliest explanations of monsters through psychoanalysis, poststructuralism, and cultural studies, to the development of monster theory per se--and including Jeffrey Jerome Cohen's foundational essay "Monster Theory (Seven Theses)," reproduced here in its entirety. There follow sections devoted to the terminology and concepts used in talking about monstrosity; the relevance of race, religion, gender, class, sexuality, and physical appearance; the application of monster theory to contemporary cultural concerns such as ecology, religion, and terrorism; and finally the possibilities monsters present for envisioning a different future. Including the most interesting and important proponents of monster theory and its progenitors, from Sigmund Freud to Julia Kristeva to J. Halberstam, Donna Haraway, Barbara Creed, and Stephen T. Asma--as well as harder-to-find contributions such as Robin Wood's and Masahiro Mori's--this is the most extensive and comprehensive collection of scholarship on monsters and monstrosity across disciplines and methods ever to be assembled and will serve as an invaluable resource for students of the uncanny in all its guises. Contributors: Stephen T. Asma, Columbia College Chicago; Timothy K. Beal, Case Western Reserve U; Harry Benshoff, U of North Texas; Bettina Bildhauer, U of St. Andrews; Noel Carroll, The Graduate Center, CUNY; Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, Arizona State U; Barbara Creed, U of Melbourne; Michael Dylan Foster, UC Davis; Sigmund Freud; Elizabeth Grosz, Duke U; J. Halberstam, Columbia U; Donna Haraway, UC Santa Cruz; Julia Kristeva, Paris Diderot U; Anthony Lioi, The Julliard School; Patricia MacCormack, Anglia Ruskin U; Masahiro Mori; Annalee Newitz; Jasbir K. Puar, Rutgers U; Amit A. Rai, Queen Mary U of London; Margrit Shildrick, Stockholm U; Jon Stratton, U of South Australia; Erin Suzuki, UC San Diego; Robin Wood, York U; Alexa Wright, U of Westminster.
Call Number: ONLINEPublication Date: 2020 -
Eaters of the Dead: Myths and Realities of Cannibal Monsters
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Spanning myth, history, and contemporary culture, a terrifying and illuminating excavation of the meaning of cannibalism. Every culture has monsters that eat us, and every culture repels in horror when we eat ourselves. From Grendel to medieval Scottish cannibal Sawney Bean, and from the Ghuls of ancient Persia to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, tales of being consumed are both universal and universally terrifying. In this book, Kevin J. Wetmore Jr. explores the full range of monsters that eat the dead: ghouls, cannibals, wendigos, and other beings that feast on human flesh. Moving from myth through history to contemporary popular culture, Wetmore considers everything from ancient Greek myths of feeding humans to the gods, through sky burial in Tibet and Zoroastrianism, to actual cases of cannibalism in modern societies. By examining these seemingly inhuman acts, Eaters of the Dead reveals that those who consume corpses can teach us a great deal about human nature--and our deepest human fears.
Call Number: General Collection ; GN409 .W4866 2021Publication Date: 2021 -
Haunted: On Ghosts, Witches, Vampires, Zombies, and Other Monsters of the Natural and Supernatural Worlds
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An award-winning scholar and author charts four hundred years of monsters and how they reflect the culture that created them Leo Braudy, a finalist for both the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award, has won accolades for revealing the complex and constantly shifting history behind seemingly unchanging ideas of fame, war, and masculinity. Continuing his interest in the history of emotion, this book explores how fear has been shaped into images of monsters and monstrosity. From the Protestant Reformation to contemporary horror films and fiction, he explores four major types: the monster from nature (King Kong), the created monster (Frankenstein), the monster from within (Mr. Hyde), and the monster from the past (Dracula). Drawing upon deep historical and literary research, Braudy discusses the lasting presence of fearful imaginings in an age of scientific progress, viewing the detective genre as a rational riposte to the irrational world of the monstrous. Haunted is a compelling and incisive work by a writer at the height of his powers.]]>
Call Number: General Collection PN56.S8 B73 2016Publication Date: 2016 -
Monsters: Evil Beings, Mythical Beasts, and All Manner of Imaginary Terrors
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The human mind needs monsters. In every culture and in every epoch in human history, from ancient Egypt to modern Hollywood, imaginary beings have haunted dreams and fantasies, provoking in young and old shivers of delight, thrills of terror, and endless fascination. All known folklores brim with visions of looming and ferocious monsters, often in the role as adversaries to great heroes. But while heroes have been closely studied by mythologists, monsters have been neglected, even though they are equally important as pan-human symbols and reveal similar insights into ways the mind works. In Monsters: Evil Beings, Mythical Beasts, and All Manner of Imaginary Terrors, anthropologist David D. Gilmore explores what human traits monsters represent and why they are so ubiquitous in people's imaginations and share so many features across different cultures. Using colorful and absorbing evidence from virtually all times and places, Monsters is the first attempt by an anthropologist to delve into the mysterious, frightful abyss of mythical beasts and to interpret their role in the psyche and in society. After many hair-raising descriptions of monstrous beings in art, folktales, fantasy, literature, and community ritual, including such avatars as Dracula and Frankenstein, Hollywood ghouls, and extraterrestrials, Gilmore identifies many common denominators and proposes some novel interpretations. Monsters, according to Gilmore, are always enormous, man-eating, gratuitously violent, aggressive, sexually sadistic, and superhuman in power, combining our worst nightmares and our most urgent fantasies. We both abhor and worship our monsters: they are our gods as well as our demons. Gilmore argues that the immortal monster of the mind is a complex creation embodying virtually all of the inner conflicts that make us human. Far from being something alien, nonhuman, and outside us, our monsters are our deepest selves.
Call Number: General Collection GR825 .G45 2003Publication Date: 2003 -
On Monsters: An Unnatural History of Our Worst Fears
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Monsters. Real or imagined, literal or metaphorical, they have exerted a dread fascination on the human mind for many centuries. They attract and repel us, intrigue and terrify us, and in the process reveal something deeply important about the darker recesses of our collective psyche.Stephen Asma's On Monsters is a wide-ranging cultural and conceptual history of monsters - how they have evolved over time, what functions they have served for us, and what shapes they are likely to take in the future. Asma begins with a letter from Alexander the Great in 326 B.C. detailing anencounter in India with an "enormous beast - larger than an elephantthree ominous horns on its forehead." From there the monsters come fast and furious - Behemoth and Leviathan, Gog and Magog, the leopard-bear-lion beast of Revelation, Satan and his demons, Grendel and Frankenstein, circus freaksand headless children, right up to the serial killers and terrorists of today and the post-human cyborgs of tomorrow. Monsters embody our deepest anxieties and vulnerabilities, Asma argues, but they also symbolize the mysterious and incoherent territory just beyond the safe enclosures of rationalthought. Exploring philosophical treatises, theological tracts, newspapers, pamphlets, films, scientific notebooks, and novels, Asma unpacks traditional monster stories for the clues they offer about the inner logic of an era's fears and fascinations. In doing so, he illuminates the many waysmonsters have become repositories for those human qualities that must be repudiated, externalized, and defeated.Asma suggests that how we handle monsters reflects how we handle uncertainty, ambiguity, insecurity. And in a world that is daily becoming less secure and more ambiguous, he shows how we might learn to better live with monsters - and thereby avoid becoming one.
Call Number: General Collection GR825 .A86 2009Publication Date: 2009 -
Wonder Beasts
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This book presents tales of mythical beasts, offering primary sources (e.g., the writings of Herodotus, original fairy tales, poems) within the context of background material and commentary. Discussion questions and activities complete each chapter. Focusing on the phoenix, the griffin, the unicorn, and the dragon, this book combines tales and lore of each, presenting primary sources (e.g., the writings of Herodotus and original fairy tales and poems) within the context of background material and commentary. The shifting images of these animals offer a unique perspective on myths, religions, art, literature, and science in history. Discussion questions and learning activities at the end of the chapters guide students in exploring the worlds surrounding each beast. Sure to appeal to all ages, this fascinating collection makes a wonderful supplement to world history courses and is a great resource for reports.
Call Number: General Collection ; GR830.P4 N54 1995Publication Date: 1995 -
Vampires, Burial, and Death: Folklore and Reality
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In this engrossing book, Paul Barber surveys centuries of folklore about vampires and offers the first scientific explanation for the origins of the vampire legends. From the tale of a sixteenth-century shoemaker from Breslau whose ghost terrorized everyone in the city, to the testimony of a doctor who presided over the exhumation and dissection of a graveyard full of Serbian vampires, his book is fascinating reading. "This study's comprehensiveness and the author's bone-dry wit make this compelling reading, not just for folklorists, but for anyone interested in a time when the dead wouldn't stay dead."--Booklist "Barber's inquiry into vampires, fact and fiction, is a gem in the literature of debunking... [and] a convincing exercise in mental archaeology."--Roy Porter, Nature "A splendid book about the undead, illuminated by the findings of morbid anatomy.... The main value of this most interesting book is to remind us how far we have come in our ability to explain the world and how this has released us from at least some terrors."--Anthony Daniels, Spectator "This book is fascinating reading for physicians and anthropologists as well as anyone interested in folklore."--R. Ted Steinbock, M.D., Journal of the American Medical Association "A fascinating and pain-staking (sorry!) thesis, which welds together folklore, epidemic panic, communal stupidity, and forensic and funereal science."--Huw Knight, New Scientist
Call Number: General Collection GR830.V3 B35 2010Publication Date: 2010 -
An Introduction to Yōkai Culture
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"Since ancient times, the Japanese have lived with superstitions of strange presences and phenomena known as "yokai," creating a culture by turns infused with unease, fear, and divinity. Tsukimono spirit possessions. Fearsome kappa, oni, and tengu. Yamauba crones. Ghostly yurei. Otherworldly ijin ... Where did they come from? Why do they remain so popular? Written by Japan's premier scholar of yokai and strange tales, this book is both an introduction to the rich imagination and spirituality of Japan's yokai culture and a history of the authors and writings that have shaped yokai studies as a field"--Back cover.
Call Number: General Collection ; GR340 .K67513 2017Publication Date: 2017 -
The Boggart Sourcebook
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Comprising three parts, this book is a companion volume to The Boggart: Folklore, History, Place-Names and Dialect. Part one, 'Boggart Ephemera', is a selection of about 40,000 words of nineteenth-century boggart writing (particularly material that is difficult to find in libraries). Part two presents a catalogue of 'Boggart Names' (place-names and personal names, totalling over 10,000 words). Finally, part three contains the entire 'Boggart Census' - a compendium of ground-breaking grassroots research. This census includes more than a thousand responses, totalling some 80,000 words, from older respondents in the north-west of England, to the question: 'What is a boggart?' The Boggart Sourcebook will be of interest to folklorists, historians and dialect scholars. It provides the three corpora on which the innovative monograph, The Boggart, is based.
Call Number: General Collection ; GR141 .Y68 2022Publication Date: 2022 -
Mythical Monsters in Classical Literature
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This engaging, readable yet impeccably scholarly investigation of monsters in Classical literature will entertain and stimulate as well as inform. It covers all the major mythical monsters mentioned by Greek and Roman authors (Medusa, Hydra, Polyphemus, the Minotaur, Sphinx, Harpies, Sirens, Cerberus, Chimaera, Centaurs, and many more) along with Classical precursors of vampires, werewolves and the living dead. Versions of these creatures that appear in later literature and film are also discussed. Mythical Monsters is original in considering monsters squarely from a literary standpoint, introducing elements of literary analysis gradually as the work progresses, and building up to quite a sophisticated approach. This will increase readers' critical appreciation and plain enjoyment of these stories, which continue to fascinate today. To facilitate browsing, each chapter can be read independently. There is a useful bibliography, and the book is enlivened by illustrations from ancient and more recent art.
Call Number: General Collection ; PA3015.R4 M87 2007Publication Date: 2007 -
Book of Sea Monsters
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A stunning collection of fantasy illustration by the 1996 Hugo Award-winning Best Artist, bringing the beauty and the terror of the sea lifeFor millennia, humankind has been fascinated by -- and naturally fearful of -- the awesome power of the sea and the creatures sheltered by its depths. In the past, ocean crossings toward new horizons were not just challenges of the physical elements but a defiance of the perils that the human imagination projects onto the unknown. Now, in The Book of Sea Monsters, the lore of the sea comes rushing forward to reality. From the serpent of Midgard and the biblical Leviathan, through the kraken feared by Scandinavian mariners and the sightings by many respectable and otherwise sober-minded seafarers of the infamous monster of Loch Ness, the sea monster has been accepted through most of history as one of the shockingly real perils of the deep.These unnatural creatures of the elements are brought to unnerving reality by acclaimed artist Bob Eggleton, along with Nigel Suckling's well-researched text. Exploring the myth, legend, scientific documentation, and fiction inspired by these strange beasts at the edge of imagination, The Book of Sea Monsters will thrill and fascinate all lovers of mythology, legend, and the many secrets of the sea.
Call Number: General Collection ; QL121 .S83 1998Publication Date: 1998 -
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Anatomy of a Beast: Obsession and Myth on the Trail of Bigfoot
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Part history, part road trip, and part biography, this is the true story of a remarkable group of men whose obsession with Bigfoot turned the giant hominid into an American icon. Award-winning journalist Michael McLeod tells of Bigfoot's rise to tabloid stardom in a fast-paced account that begins with his own journey to investigate a famous 1967 film clip of a Bigfoot in a California forest. McLeod proceeds to uncover a trail of clues reaching from the late nineteenth century, when a few ambitious, imaginative naturalists and explorers synthesized historical and indigenous folklore with Darwinian ideas and speculated that a proto-hominid "missing link" might still be alive in remote areas. That speculation would eventually inspire a colorful cast of loggers, hunters, con artists, and businessmen in the twentieth century to create the modern myth of Bigfoot, all of them angling for a piece of a monster that the media and the public still can't get enough of. Told through vividly narrated interviews and anecdotes, Anatomy of a Beast offers a unique perspective on the deep roots of counterfactual thinking--and how obsession and myth are created out of it.
Call Number: General Collection ; QL89.2.S2 M38 2009Publication Date: 2009 -
A Lycanthropy Reader: Werewolves in Western Culture
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Our understanding of lycanthropy is limited by our association of it with contemporary portrayals of werewolves in horror films and gothic fiction. No rational person today believes that a human being can literally be metamorphosed into a wolf; therefore, in the absence of an historical context, the study of werewolves can appear to be a wayward pursuit of the perversely irrational and the sensational. This Reader provides the historical context Drawing on primary sources, it is a comprehensive survey of all aspects of lycanthropy, with a focus on the medieval and Renaissance periods. Lycanthropes were on trial in the courtrooms of Europe, and on examination in medical offices and mental hospitals; they were the objects of communal fear and pity, and the subjects of sermons and philosophical treatises. In the Introduction to the Reader, Charlotte Otten shows that the study of lycanthropy uncovers basic issues in human life the significance of violence and criminality, the role of the demonic in aberrant behavior, and ultimately the nature of good and evil The implications for modern life are immediately apparent. The Reader is divided into six sections ( 1) Medical Cases, Diagnoses, Descriptions; (2) Trial Records, Historical Accounts, Sightings; (3) Philosophical and Theological Approaches to Metamorphosis; ( 4) Critical Essays on Lycanthropy (Anthropology, History, and Medicine); (5) Myths and Legends; and (6) Allegory . Each section has an introduction that summarizes and interprets the materials.
Call Number: General Collection GR830.W4 L93 1986Publication Date: 1986 -
Passage of Darkness: The Ethnobiology of the Haitian Zombie
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In 1982, Harvard-trained ethnobotanist Wade Davis traveled into the Haitian countryside to research reports of zombies--the infamous living dead of Haitian folklore. A report by a team of physicians of a verifiable case of zombification led him to try to obtain the poison associated with the process and examine it for potential medical use. Interdisciplinary in nature, this study reveals a network of power relations reaching all levels of Haitian political life. It sheds light on recent Haitian political history, including the meteoric rise under Duvalier of the Tonton Macoute. By explaining zombification as a rational process within the context of traditional Vodoun society, Davis demystifies one of the most exploited of folk beliefs, one that has been used to denigrate an entire people and their religion.
Call Number: General Collection ; BL2530.H3 D37 1988Publication Date: 1988 -
Living with Monsters: Ethnographic Fiction about Real Monsters
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For every generic type of monster-ghost, demon, vampire, dragon-there are countless locally specific manifestations, with their own names, traits, and appearances. Such monsters populate all corners of the globe haunting their humans wherever they live. Living with Monsters is a collection of fourteen short pieces of ethnographic fiction (and a more academically inclined introduction and afterword) presenting a playful, spirited, and engaging look at how people live with their respective monsters around the world. They focus on the nitty-gritty dos and don'ts of how to placate spirits in India; how to domesticate Georgian goblins, how to live with aliens, how to avoid being taken by Anito in Taiwan, while simultaneously illuminating the politics of monster-human relations. In this collection, anthropologists working in fieldsites as diverse as the urban Ghana, the rural US, remote Aboriginal Australia, and the internet present imaginative accounts that demonstrate how thinking with monsters encourages people to contemplate difference, to understand inequality, and to see the world from new angles. Combine monsters with experimental ethnography, and the result is a volume that crackles with creative energy, flouts traditions of ethnographic writing, and pushes anthropology into new terrains.
Call Number: ONLINEPublication Date: 2023 -
Monster Anthropology: Ethnographic Explorations of Transforming Social Worlds Through
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Monsters are culturally meaningful across the world. Starting from this key premise, this book tackles monsters in the context of social change. Writing in a time of violent upheaval, when technological innovation brings forth new monsters while others perish as part of the widespread extinctions that signify the Anthropocene, contributors argue that putting monsters at the center of social analysis opens up new perspectives on change and social transformation. Through a series of ethnographically grounded analyses they capture monsters that herald, drive, experience, enjoy, and suffer the transformations of the worlds they beleaguer. Topics examined include the evil skulking new roads in Ancient Greece, terror in post-socialist Laos's territorial cults, a horrific flying head that augurs catastrophe in the rain forest of Borneo, benign spirits that accompany people through the mist in Iceland, flesh-eating giants marching through neo-colonial central Australia, and ghosts lingering in Pacific villages in the aftermath of environmental disasters. By taking the proposition that monsters and the humans they haunt are intricately and intimately entangled seriously, this book offers unique, cross-cultural perspectives on how people perceive the world and their place within it. It also shows how these experiences of belonging are mediated by our relationships with the other-than-human.
Call Number: ONLINEPublication Date: 2020 -
Haunting Experiences
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Ghosts and other supernatural phenomena are widely represented throughout modern culture. They can be found in any number of entertainment, commercial, and other contexts, but popular media or commodified representations of ghosts can be quite different from the beliefs people hold about them, based on tradition or direct experience. Personal belief and cultural tradition on the one hand, and popular and commercial representation on the other, nevertheless continually feed each other. They frequently share space in how people think about the supernatural. In Haunting Experiences, three well-known folklorists seek to broaden the discussion of ghost lore by examining it from a variety of angles in various modern contexts. Diane E. Goldstein, Sylvia Ann Grider, and Jeannie Banks Thomas take ghosts seriously, as they draw on contemporary scholarship that emphasizes both the basis of belief in experience (rather than mere fantasy) and the usefulness of ghost stories. They look closely at the narrative role of such lore in matters such as socialization and gender. And they unravel the complex mix of mass media, commodification, and popular culture that today puts old spirits into new contexts.
Call Number: ONLINEPublication Date: 2007
Internet sources
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A Book of CreaturesA well-sourced guide to monsters and mythical creatures, excellent for learning about beings you might be unaware of. Search using the search box or browse using the categories menu, both on the right side of the homepage.
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The Aberdeen BestiaryThe Aberdeen Bestiary describes real and imaginary animals. It was written in England around the year 1200. This online version is presented by King's College, University of Aberdeen.
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Chasing American Monsters (ebook at Internet Archive)A compendium of more than 250 legendary creatures purported to live in the U.S., comprised of a chapter for each state.
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Classic MonstersHorror fan Nige Burton describes the appearances of various kinds of monsters in horror films.
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Books about folklore available online at Project GutenbergMore than 60 books about folklore are available online at Project Gutenberg.
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Bigfoot Field Researchers OrganizationThe Bigfoot Researchers Organization catalogs and investigates reported Bigfoot sightings. Its website features a geographic list of reports.