Welcome to my website
David Clarke is Associate Professor in the Department of Media Arts and Communication at Sheffield Hallam University, UK. He teaches media law and his research specialism is contemporary legend. Previously he worked as a journalist for The Sheffield Star and Yorkshire Post and spent four years working as a Press Officer in local government. His PhD in Folklore and was completed at the National Centre for English Cultural Tradition, University of Sheffield, in 1999. From 2008-13 he acted as consultant and curator of the MoD UFO files project with The National Archives. His books include The Angel of Mons (2004) and How UFOs Conquered the World: the history of a modern myth (2015). In 2018 he co-founded the Centre for Contemporary Legend at Sheffield Hallam University. This blog covers his twin research interests in journalism and folklore. The views expressed in the contents are entirely his own.
What is Folklore?
Once upon a time… ‘Folklore’ meant ancient ballads or fairy tales or the peculiar superstitions and customs of ‘primitive’ peoples. Today folklore is a tool for studying custom and belief, urban legends, modern myth and even rumours spread via the internet. Much folklore can be found online and buried in the narrative content of media and social networking - from legends and reports of ghosts, UFOs and 'big cats' to language, customs and traditions. The study of folklore is centrally and crucially important 'in our attempts to understand our own behaviour and that of our fellow human beings' according to one scholarly definition. Folklore is a vital and ongoing area of study and one of the few academic disciplines that engage, in a fundamental way, with everyday life.My Tweets
- @showroomcinema Fantastic I hope you will showing Nomadland? 7 hours ago
- RT @showroomcinema: 📢BIG ANNOUNCEMENT: Grab yourself some popcorn, make your way to your favourite cinema seat and wait for the lights to d… 7 hours ago
- RT @Al_Humphreys: “Solitude restores body and mind. Lonelinesss depletes them.” An interesting distinction for adventures: https://t.co/bua… 10 hours ago
- RT @AndrewMarr9: Another extraordinary thing about Shirley Williams. As prisons minister, in 1966, she wanted to find out what life was rea… 10 hours ago
- RT @yorkshirepost: A woman looking for shellfish on a beach near Filey was astonished to find a three-toed footprint belonging to a Jurassi… 10 hours ago
Blog Stats
- 706,034 hits
Snopes.com – Rumour has it…
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Magonia Blog
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Mark Pilkington & John Lundberg – Folklore & Deception in the UFO Age
- Mirage Men in The Guardian August 18, 2014
- Mirage Men Double Disc DVD June 16, 2014
- UFOs and F-14s over Iran May 2, 2014
- We have lift off! March 27, 2014
- Mirage Men revealed by Greenwald? February 25, 2014
Bob Sheaffer’s Bad UFOs
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The Skeptic magazine
- Ooops! TWO errors in previous message! October 1, 2015
- October Spookiness! October 1, 2015
- Empirical Sex Talk on Dacryphilia, tonight October 1, 2015
- Little Atoms 393 – Timothy Snyder & Black Earth September 30, 2015
- Ash Pryce on "How to talk to the dead" @ Greenwich SitP, 7:30 pm, 7/10/15 September 30, 2015
Charles Fort Institute Blog
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Curt Collins on saucers in pop culture
- 40 years and the Cash-Landrum UFO Case December 11, 2020
- Flying Saucer Swindlers: Four Convictions November 6, 2020
- UAP Task Force: The Pentagon Responds to Questions September 2, 2020
- UFO Documents: Provenance and Credibility by Barry Greenwood June 28, 2020
- Pentagon Answers on Navy UAP Investigations May 18, 2020
Andrew May’s Forteana blog
- Pseudoscience and Science Fiction October 9, 2016
- Astronomical debunking October 2, 2016
- Contradiction - the All-Video Murder Mystery September 25, 2016
- Sacred Porn September 18, 2016
- Astronomical computers (old ones) September 11, 2016
Paul Kimball’s The Other Side of Truth: Don’t believe, don’t disbelieve. Think
- Synchronicity, Irish Style September 9, 2019
- Project Blue Book - A Review January 28, 2019
- Stan Friedman Retires March 13, 2018
- Halifax gets Haunted! September 29, 2017
- Haunted Extra, Vol. 1.01 - Queen's County Museum Revisited August 17, 2017
Tag Archives: UAPs
RADAR UAP UPDATE
Two new Cold War era stories concerning mysterious ‘unidentified aerial phenomena’ (UAP) have been added to my RADAR pages. Both form part of my personal archive of interviews, archive documents and FOI materials that cover radar detection of UAPs from … Continue reading
RAF tracked UFO in orbit from Yorkshire early warning base
Britain’s Royal Air Force (RAF) ballistic missile early warning station at Fylingdales in North Yorkshire has detected an ‘unknown object’ that appeared in Earth’s orbit. Top brass at the BMEWS base – that is part of the NORAD missile defence … Continue reading
Radar & UAPs – a new resource
For 2021 I have launched a new resource on my website that is dedicated to Radar, UAPs and other anomalies related to radar detection systems. The case studies range from anomalous ‘angels‘ detected by the earliest RDF sets in the … Continue reading
DRONES AND UFOs: new data reveals rise in close encounters with aircraft in UK airspace
Aircrew have a reported an increase in the numbers of close encounters between ‘unknown objects’ and passenger aircraft since a drone caused chaos at Gatwick Airport. A pattern of disturbing incidents has emerged from data obtained by a team of … Continue reading
Black Projects, UFOs and the mysterious MO D-Notice
Has the Ministry of Defence ever suppressed media stories about Black Project aircraft operating secretly over the British Isles? For many years conspiracy-minded aviation writers and UFOlogists have claimed the government has, on occasions, used its contacts in the Press … Continue reading
The UFO Files: Our Man in Sheffield
I spent two decades on the trail of the UK Ministry of Defence’s cache of secret UFO papers. But little did I know that my FOI campaign triggered off a mole-hunt among the spooks – and a probe to discover … Continue reading
Finding Needles in the MoD Haystack – guest blog
I am pleased to welcome veteran British UFOlogist Jenny Randles for this guest blog reflecting on the release of the Ministry of Defence UFO files: After the furore over the release of the final MoD files the UFO debate may … Continue reading
Seeing Sprites
Six years ago I used the Freedom of Information Act to obtain the release of a secret Ministry of Defence report on ‘Unidentified Aerial Phenomena’ (UAP). The study, codenamed ‘Project Condign‘, concluded that UAPs – as the MoD’s Defence Intelligence … Continue reading