This is not a Wikipedia article: This is a
workpage, a collection of material and work in progress that may or may not be incorporated into an article. It should not necessarily be considered factual or authoritative.
Section cleanup
This page is for rewriting, merging, heavily editing, or drafting sections of the
Roswell incident article. All editors are invited to contribute.
Current section being worked on
Roswell as modern myth and folklore
The mythology of Roswell involving increasingly elaborate accounts of alien crash landings and government cover-ups has been analyzed and documented by
social anthropologists and skeptics.[1]Anthropologists Susan Harding and Kathleen Stewart highlight the Roswell Story was a prime example of how a discourse moved from the fringes to the mainstream, aligning with the 1980s zeitgeist of public fascination with "conspiracy, cover-up and repression".[2] Skeptics
Joe Nickell and James McGaha proposed that Roswell's time spent away from public attention allowed the development of a mythology drawing from later UFO folklore, and that the early debunking of the incident created space for ufologists to intentionally distort accounts towards sensationalism.[3]
Charles Ziegler argues that the Roswell story exhibits characteristics typical of traditional folk narratives. He identifies six distinct narratives and a process of transmission through storytellers, wherein a core story was formed from various witness accounts and then shaped and altered by those involved in the UFO community. Additional "witnesses" were sought to expand upon the core narrative, while accounts that did not align with the prevailing beliefs were discredited or excluded by the "gatekeepers".[4][5]
Clancy, Susan A. (2007). Abducted: How People Come to Believe They Were Kidnapped by Aliens (First paperback ed.). Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
ISBN978-0-674-02401-4.
Klass, Philip (January 1997a).
"The Klass Files"(PDF). The Skeptics UFO Newsletter. Vol. 43. The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry.
Archived from the original on April 19, 2013. Retrieved February 6, 2013.
Klass, Philip (January 1998).
"The Klass Files"(PDF). The Skeptics UFO Newsletter. Vol. 49. The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry.
Archived from the original on December 24, 2013. Retrieved April 7, 2015.
Nickell, Joe; McGaha, James (May–June 2012).
"The Roswellian Syndrome: How Some UFO Myths Develop". Skeptical Inquirer. Vol. 36, no. 3. Committee for Skeptical Inquiry.
Archived from the original on January 26, 2013. Retrieved February 6, 2013.
Ricketts, Jeremy R. (2011). "Land of (Re) Enchantment: Tourism and Sacred Space at Roswell and Chimayó, New Mexico". Journal of the Southwest. 53 (2): 239–261.
doi:
10.1353/jsw.2011.0004.
JSTOR41710086.
S2CID133475439.
This is not a Wikipedia article: This is a
workpage, a collection of material and work in progress that may or may not be incorporated into an article. It should not necessarily be considered factual or authoritative.
Section cleanup
This page is for rewriting, merging, heavily editing, or drafting sections of the
Roswell incident article. All editors are invited to contribute.
Current section being worked on
Roswell as modern myth and folklore
The mythology of Roswell involving increasingly elaborate accounts of alien crash landings and government cover-ups has been analyzed and documented by
social anthropologists and skeptics.[1]Anthropologists Susan Harding and Kathleen Stewart highlight the Roswell Story was a prime example of how a discourse moved from the fringes to the mainstream, aligning with the 1980s zeitgeist of public fascination with "conspiracy, cover-up and repression".[2] Skeptics
Joe Nickell and James McGaha proposed that Roswell's time spent away from public attention allowed the development of a mythology drawing from later UFO folklore, and that the early debunking of the incident created space for ufologists to intentionally distort accounts towards sensationalism.[3]
Charles Ziegler argues that the Roswell story exhibits characteristics typical of traditional folk narratives. He identifies six distinct narratives and a process of transmission through storytellers, wherein a core story was formed from various witness accounts and then shaped and altered by those involved in the UFO community. Additional "witnesses" were sought to expand upon the core narrative, while accounts that did not align with the prevailing beliefs were discredited or excluded by the "gatekeepers".[4][5]
Clancy, Susan A. (2007). Abducted: How People Come to Believe They Were Kidnapped by Aliens (First paperback ed.). Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
ISBN978-0-674-02401-4.
Klass, Philip (January 1997a).
"The Klass Files"(PDF). The Skeptics UFO Newsletter. Vol. 43. The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry.
Archived from the original on April 19, 2013. Retrieved February 6, 2013.
Klass, Philip (January 1998).
"The Klass Files"(PDF). The Skeptics UFO Newsletter. Vol. 49. The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry.
Archived from the original on December 24, 2013. Retrieved April 7, 2015.
Nickell, Joe; McGaha, James (May–June 2012).
"The Roswellian Syndrome: How Some UFO Myths Develop". Skeptical Inquirer. Vol. 36, no. 3. Committee for Skeptical Inquiry.
Archived from the original on January 26, 2013. Retrieved February 6, 2013.
Ricketts, Jeremy R. (2011). "Land of (Re) Enchantment: Tourism and Sacred Space at Roswell and Chimayó, New Mexico". Journal of the Southwest. 53 (2): 239–261.
doi:
10.1353/jsw.2011.0004.
JSTOR41710086.
S2CID133475439.