We are just past the 2017 summer solstice (June 20 and 21 were the longest days of the year for anyone living north of the equator), and amid the celebrations, pagan rituals, and Stonehenge treks, there were many who performed a trick seemingly unique to that day....
Folklore
Daily Beast Interviewed Me on Gubmint Mind Control
I was interviewed last year for an article on government mind control conspiracies. Or was I? Find out HERE. You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the...
Was the Nightjar an Early Chupacabra?
Following up on my book Tracking the Chupacabra: The Vampire Beast in Fact, Fiction, and Folklore, I have occasionally written about varied speculativepseudohistories of the chupacabra, and indeed the subject is ripe for conjecture. In a blog titled "The Secret...
The Folklore Podcast on Chupacabra Folklore…
For those who missed it and are interested in spending an entertaining and informative--or at least minimally objectionable--75 minutes, may I suggest the most recent episode of The Folklore Podcast, in which we discuss folklore of the chupacabra... You can...
Early Chupacabra Reports?
Soon after my recent appearance discussing folklore of the chupacabra (the topic of my book Tracking the Chupacabra: The Vampire Beast in Fact, Fiction, and Folklore), I got the following e-mail from a listener named James: “I thought your appearance on The Folklore...
Squaring the Strange Episode 5: Jamaican Ghosts and Rolling Calf
Hey folks! The new episode of Squaring the Strange podcast is now out, and in it you can hear Pascual Romero and I in Part 2 of the series on Jamaican ghosts and folklore (this carving below is of a Jamaican "duppy"). Listen here!...
My Popobawa Research Sighted!
I recently stumbled across this photo on Twitter depicting an African Cultural Studies professor referencing my investigation into the skeptic-raping monster popobawa-- and my "Fortean Times" cover article on the topic... You can find more on me and my work...
My New Podcast: Squaring the Strange!
A new podcast cohosted by Pascual Romero and myself, Squaring the Strange brings evidence-based analysis and commentary to a wide variety of topics, ranging from the paranormal to the political, the mysterious to the mundane. Investigating ghosts. Debunking...
Fortean Times review of ‘Bad Clowns’
From a review of my book Bad Clowns in Fortean Times magazine (Issue 349): “Benjamin Radford shows in his masterful survey that bad clowns have always been with us.... This is not a dry or scholarly read, and there’s a lot of welcome debunking. Bad Clowns moves...
The True Story of ‘The Bye Bye Man’
A new horror film titled The Bye Bye Man scared up $16 million in box office sales over the past week. The film is based on the chapter “The Bridge to Body Island” in Robert Damon Schneck’s nonfiction book The President’s Vampire (reissued last year as The Bye Bye...