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urban legends
by Alex Burns (alex@disinfo.com) - December 20, 2000

You are probably familiar with the classics: vanishing hitchhikers, choking dobermans, microwaved poodles, ominous hooks, sewer-dwelling alligators, and solid-cement filled Cadillacs.

Urban legends and folklore are mysterious stories and anecdotes that we impulsively spread whilst huddled around camp fires and the corporate office water cooler. They subsequently resurface in newspaper accounts, alternate versions, oral histories, and the inevitable debunking by skeptics.

For over twenty years, Jan Harold Brunvand, professor emeritus at the University of Utah, has been collating and analyzing urban legends. In books such as 'Too Good To Be True' (W.W. Norton & Co, 2000), Brunvand traces the life-span of individual urban legends, and what these stories reveal about popular anxieties. In the 1990s, communications scientists and memeticists such as Richard Brodie and Aaron Lynch began to outline the epidemiological mechanisms by which these stories momentarily beguile us, drawing provocative analogies to the Roswell mythos and Heaven's Gate tragedy. By tracking and studying how urban legends spread through society, we can apply this understanding of deep memetic patterns to emerging political movements and sociological phenomena.

Urban legends are marketed as benign fun, but they also have a dark side. In 'Hystories: Hysterical Epidemics & Modern Media' (Columbia University Press, 1997), Princeton literature professor Elaine Showalter reveals that 'hysterical epidemics' such as 'Satanic Ritual Abuse', alien abductions, and recovered memories spread like urban legends. Showalter found that film imagery and television talk shows blended unconscious biases and irrational fears with serious consequences for legal test-cases, government institutions, corporations and individuals. Rampant computer viruses such as 'Good Times' or 'Love Bug' are dangerous parallel developments.

Neal Stephenson's popular cyberpunk novel 'Snow Crash' (Spectra Books, 1993) depicts the future of urban legends being deployed as psychological warfare amongst warring corporate-franchise city-states (interestingly, Snow's model society of information control - Sumeria - was also the choice of Graeco-Armenian magus George Gurdjieff). Aspects of 'Snow Crash' are already realities: during the 1980s, the Proctor & Gamble Corporation spent millions debunking the urban legend that it supported the Church of Satan. It will only be a matter of time before some interprising viral marketeer uses low-level urban legends to discredit competitors.

"Many people are still living conceptually in the Dark Ages," notes conspiriologist Robert Anton Wilson. Urban legends flourish in technologically advanced societies with moderate education levels and little understanding of contemporary science. It's time to band together and reverse this trend.

Urban Legend
The 'Internet Movie Database' file for 'Urban Legend' (1993) lists cast, credit, and plot information on this tepid horror thriller.

The Ring Of Folklore & Urban Legends
Check out the ever-growing folklore and urban legends Web ring here, and find out information on how to add your site to the extensive list.

Terry Chan's Main Urban Folklore Page
Learn about the 'Magnetic Girl' phenomenon and how to inform someone that they have been fooled by an urban legend at this informative Web site.

Andrew Warinner
Could the infamous 'Philadelphia Experiment' be an urban legend? Seen a chicken cannon lately? Learn about more wacky urban legends and subversive folklore courtesy of Andrew Warinner.

Legends From A Small Country
An illuminating collection of African folklore, mythology, and legends.

We're With Stupid
This 'Salon' magazine article (January 3rd, 2000) by Carina Chocano offers commentary from the 'Darwin Awards' team about a notorious urban legends event.

They Coulda Been A Contender
This 'Salon' magazine article (January 3rd, 2000) lists the Salon team's favourite 'Darwin Awards' contenders, who truly deserved to win the award posthumously.

Urban Legend Machine
Shape the disinformation superhighway by generating your own urban legends!

The Generosity Virus
A viral urban legend worth spreading!

Internet Virus Antidote
Memeticist Richard Brodie offers some common sense advice on how to 'de-virus your mind' from Internet-spread folklore and urban legends. A must-read!

Six Degrees of Separation
The Internet Movie Database file, for Six Degrees of Separation (1993), includes cast, credit, and plot details. An intriguing film based on folklore and urban legends.

Alligator
This Internet Movie Database file, for Alligator (1980), lists cast, credit and plot details for an effective urban legends spoof.

Professor Emeritus Jan Harold Brunvand
Find contact details and a publication history for Jan Harold Brunvand, the world's most pre-eminent chronicler of folklore and urban legends.

The AFU & Urban Legends Archive
The most comprehensive searchable database of urban legends and folklore on the Internet. An incredible resource!

Urban Legends Reference Page
Courtesy of the 'San Fernando Valley Folklore Society', here is a vast collection of urban legends covering horror, sexuality, trivia, music, love, and many other topics. A mailing list, message board, randomizer, and database is also included in a very comprehensive Web site.

Official Darwin Awards
Darwin Awards celebrate Charles Darwin's theory of evolution by commemorating the remains of the individuals who contributed to the improvement of our gene pool by removing themselves from it in a really stupid way. A mindblowing Web site that has to be truly seen to be believed!

Urban Legends & Folklore
The About.com Web site team has assembled a growing collection of folklore and urban legends, including a discussion forum and information on Internet hoaxes to avoid.

Six Degrees
Six degrees is your home for building real-life relationships with the people you're interested in, starting with the people you know. Based on the theory of six degrees of separation, you form your personal community by adding the people you know to your list of sixdegrees contacts.

Email Thought Contagions
Memeticist Aaron Lynch explains how those annoying email spam messages work, and includes a debunking letter for you to retaliate. Masterfully researched and effective.

Thought Contagion & Mass Belief
A perceptive research article by memeticist Aaron Lynch which introduces preservation and proselytic modes (and other cognitive tools) to enable the tracking and coding of memes and urban legends across social and geographic landforms. Invaluable for the serious communications research analyst!

Memes & Mass Delusion
This 'Philadelphia Association for Critical Thinking' lecture (February 21st, 1998) by memeticist Aaron Lynch examines such topics as astrological star signs and Roswell. Now, if only he could apply this in-depth analysis to 'The Hook' or the 'Microwaved Poodle' urban legends!

CNN: Jan Harold Brunvand Speaks!
This 'CNN' chat transcript (September 22nd, 1999) reveals urban legends chronicler Jan Harold Brunvand's thoughts and methodologies.

Urban Legends Research Center
This site is dedicated to the examination of Urban Legends, Urban Beliefs, Ghost Legends and folklore in general. A well-designed and informative Australian Web site with plenty of background information on how urban legends are devised, and why people spread them.

4 Urban Legends
A great collection of urban legends, animistic beliefs and folklore, hoaxes, pranks and more! Specially selected and reviewed by the 4 Anything.com editorial team.

Disinformation Dossier on Memetic Engineering
Check out the Disinformation dossier on Memetic Engineering.

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