In the Botkin Folklife Lectures Plus series, we feature online presentations from our Benjamin A. Botkin Lecture Series that also have accompanying oral history interviews, placing both together in an easy-to-find blog post.
In one of our most recent lectures, “Conspiracy Theories, Folklore and Belief: Birds Aren’t Real, Loch Ness Monsters and Microchips,” folklorist Andrea Kitta discussed some definitions of conspiracy theories and how they fit into other belief traditions and narratives with a focus on understanding why people believe in conspiracy theories and how they function. The term “conspiracy theory” has become loaded and often used to dismiss the belief systems of others, especially those of opposing viewpoints. However, all of us engage in a little conspiratorial thinking at times. Dr. Kitta discussed how to identify the echo chambers these stories can create through the use of memes, humor, and other expressive strategies.
Dr. Kitta is a folklorist and professor at East Carolina University where she studies conspiracy theories, belief, and the supernatural, as well as vaccination, contagion and contamination narratives. Her monograph, “Vaccinations and Public Concern in History: Legend, Rumor, and Risk Perception,” won the Brian McConnell Book Award in 2012. Her book “The Kiss of Death: Contagion, Contamination and Folklore” won both the Chicago Folklore Prize and the Brian McConnell Book Award in 2020. Needless to say, we were delighted to welcome such a distinguished colleague to deliver a Botkin lecture. Watch it in the player below!
After the lecture, Nancy Groce and I interviewed Andrea Kitta about her career in folklore and her work as a scholar with a concern for public engagement and public health. We discussed her role during the pandemic; as a scholar knowledgeable about vernacular beliefs as well as the facts about disease and vaccination, she was often called upon to speak to media outlets and others in search of advice.
Collection Connections and Links
If you enjoyed Andra Kitta’s lecture and interview, you might be interested in other collections and programs relating to legends, rumors, and conspiracies. Check out some of the links below!
Collections
The World War II Rumor Project Collection documented rumors about the war. Although the word “conspiracy” is seldom used in the collection, many of the rumors about the government’s plans would, if true, require widespread conspiracies along the lines of “Birds Aren’t Real.”
The COVID-19 American History Project is a new collection of interviews telling stories of Americans’ experiences with the pandemic and the significant shifts it caused.
The Pinelands Folklife Project collection includes legends about the Jersey Devil, New Jersey’s resident cryptid. (Hint: they’re mostly discoverable through tape logs…follow this link!)
Public Programs
Andrea Kitta previously appeared in our 40th anniversary symposium, Collections, Collaborations & Connections. (Her presentation was in Part 1!)
The Botkin lecture “Newslore: Contemporary Folklore on the Internet” by Russell Frank explored some of the same issues brought up by Andrea Kitta.
The symposium Traditional Folklore in a Digital World looked folklore in podcasts and social media.
Blogs
The blog post “Fake News, Folk News, and the Fate of Far Away Moses” looked at legends about conspiracies to replace dead celebrities with imposters in order to continue capitalizing on their reputations.
The blog post “‘And a fire come out at night’: UFOs, space exploration and folklife” looked at UFO stories in the archive.
The blog post “On the Trail of Bigfoot in the Library of Congress” examined the famous cryptid as he appears in our collections.
Web Archives and Datasets
The American Folklife Center Web Archive collection aims to capture digital content related to the Center’s collectors and collections.
The Web Cultures Web Archive includes sites documenting the creation and sharing of emergent cultural traditions on the web.
The Creepypasta collected datasets are downloadable zip archives of the materials on the Creepypasta site, a wiki collection of horror-related urban legends or images that have been copy-and-pasted around the Internet.
The Snopes Archive preserves the site calling itself “the definitive fact-checking site and reference source for urban legends, folklore, myths, rumors, and misinformation.”
Thanks!
Thanks for watching and listening! As always, you can find the whole Botkin Plus series at this link.