The clash of digital and traditional monsters: Slender Man adaptations and the Balkan culture

Abstract

Free movement inside the internet universe and the ability to adapt to almost every culture they encounter enable monster creations to develop through this process of exploring cultures other than theirs. Perhaps this is one of the qualities that contemporary monster creations need to have in order to become and stay alive. In this article, I argue that the Slender Man myth seems to have adapted in terms of monstrosity in many cultures of the world, where its digital quality is its greatest strength and at the same time its greatest weakness in cultures that do not have the capacity or interest to create an equivalent to it. Instead, the lack of a digital aspect makes the folklore of these countries like the Balkan ones more significant, which sabotages the adaptation of digital monsters into a non-digital monster culture that prides itself on its traditional folk stories and legends, like the rich Balkan culture. These digital products in return end up lost within certain cultures, as they do not have the means or the capacity to develop and adapt because of the clash of the digital and the traditional.