Violent, Ugly, and Unlovable: The 

Werewolf as a Trans Symbol 

by 
Kieran Lykan Blokhuis 

A thesis accepted and approved in partial fulfillment of the   

requirements for the degree of  

Master of Science   

in Folklore and Public Culture 

Thesis Committee:  

Leah Lowthorp, Chair  

Whitney Phillips, Member  

University of Oregon  

Fall 2025 



© 2025 Kieran Lykan Blokhuis 
This work is openly licensed via CC BY-NC 4.0 

 

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Thesis Abstract 

Kieran Lykan Blokhuis 

Master of Science in Folklore and Public Culture 

Title: Violent, Ugly, and Unlovable: The Werewolf as a Trans Symbol 

	 This thesis explores the significance of the trans werewolf figure in the circulation of art 

on Tumblr in the “#trans werewolf” tag. Based on ethnographic research conducted over a period 

of fourteen months, it approaches this topic through the lens of the discipline of folklore, 

primarily queer folklore and digital folklore. Some of the questions the thesis asks are: who is the 

trans werewolf, and what does trans werewolf art say about its community of creators and those 

who circulate and consume this art? The first chapter  explores  the Tumblr social media 

environment as a site of an established folk group in order to discuss the meaning-making, 

interpretation, and proliferation of trans werewolf art. The second chapter examines the general 

trends in contemporary werewolf media with a primary focus on Western media, and situates the 

werewolf as a symbol of otherness and abjection. It then discusses ways in which the trans 

werewolf aligns with or rejects that perspective. Based on ethnographic interviews, the third 

chapter considers the perspectives of trans werewolf artists on Tumblr, which are defined as the 

active bearers of this folk expression. This thesis finds that the trans werewolf as a figure 

primarily resonates with young adult, white, transmasculine, neurodivergent people living in 

Western countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada. The figure’s 

function on Tumblr as it appears in #trans werewolf art seems to primarily represent community-

building, self-representation, and protest of anti-trans rhetoric.  

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Keywords: digital folklore, queer folklore, werewolf, werewolf art, digital art, queer art, Tumblr, 

social media, trans, transgender, trans folklore 

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Table of Contents 

Violent, Ugly, and Unlovable: The Werewolf as a Trans Symbol	  ........................................1

Thesis Abstract	  ......................................................................................................................3

Table of Contents	  ..................................................................................................................5

Acknowledgments	  .................................................................................................................6

Introduction	  .........................................................................................................................11

Opening Vignette	  ................................................................................................................11

The Werewolf: An Introduction	  ..........................................................................................12

Queering the Werewolf	  .......................................................................................................17

Contributions	  ......................................................................................................................22

Reflexivity	  ...........................................................................................................................31

Methodology	  .......................................................................................................................33

Chapter 1: Tumblr as a Site of Digital Folklore	  ..................................................................36

What is Tumblr?	  ..................................................................................................................36

Chapter 2: Symbolic Significance of the Werewolf	  ............................................................56

The Hegemonic Werewolf	  ..................................................................................................63

The Othered Werewolf	  ........................................................................................................65

Why A Werewolf? Explorations of Shared Themes Across Sources	  ..................................74

The Hegemonic Trans Werewolf	  ........................................................................................82

Marginalization on Tumblr: Antiblackness, Transmisogyny, and Other Blind Spots	  .........90

Chapter 3: The Trans Werewolf Community	  ....................................................................110

Trans Art on Tumblr	  ..........................................................................................................110

Artist Profiles	  ....................................................................................................................119

Portrayals of Trans Lycanthropy: The Artist Perspective	  .................................................127

Conclusion	  ........................................................................................................................133

Closing Vignette	  ................................................................................................................138

References	.........................................................................................................................140

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Acknowledgments 

	 I would like to dedicate this thesis to every queer person who has ever refused to be 

palatable. Everyone who has ever described themselves as a messy queer or a dirty transsexual or  

a puppy or a girlboy (among some other labels that would certainly render this dedication 

unpublishable — you all know what you are), and to everyone who has ever decided that (in the 

words of Silas Denver Melvin) “transsexuals have got to get meaner.” Flash your fangs. 

	 Thank you to the many friends that I left back in New York and those I’ve made in 

Oregon who, for two and a half long years now, have dutifully told me that I’m a genius (and oh-

so-charming) every time I made a public spectacle of my latest thesis-related frustration. A 

special thanks to Charlie, Delphi, Rachel, Harbor, and Alex, who have never failed to respond 

with pictures of Dr. Gregory House every time I texted, “Can someone dig up this really specific 

Tumblr post from 5 years ago for me?” followed shortly by, “Never mind, I found it.” I’m not 

sure my sanity would have survived the research process otherwise. 

	 An extra special thanks to Charlie for an amount of things that would take a whole 

second thesis to cover. Namely, your understanding of identity was one of the very first things 

that made me realize my thesis topic wasn’t a “just me” thing. Your appreciation for queer, 

gentle, sympathetic monstrousness has always been an inspiration. Thank you also for being the 

only friend in the group to be as passionate about school as I am (and for giving me updates on 

my alma mater); it doesn’t make me feel like less of a nerd, but it does make me feel like we 

have strength in numbers here. Thanks for being there for Our Dad in my absence, and for 

	 	 6



reminding me of the best parts of my favourite podcasts that I don’t have time to listen to right 

now, and for sending me photos of your cats (especially Ms. Pickles). 

	 Adrian, I’m keeping this short because I get to tell you in person every day, but thank you 

for your support and understanding in the ugliest parts of this process, and for defending me 

from my own frequent unwillingness to be upset about things. You’re right — this was hard, and 

parts of it did suck, and I should get to fight someone about it. 

	 Nat: You were the first friend I made at the University of Oregon and the best officemate 

I could have ever asked for, and even though you actually graduated on time and have since left 

Oregon, you’re still “my dear, darling officemate Nat” to everyone I meet. Thank you for 

answering every question that I definitely should have known the answer to already, for reading 

through every stilted paragraph I sent, and for standing in solidarity with me as we both juggled 

our theses with the rest of academic life. I loved getting to be your “imaginary friend” and being 

kept abreast of all of the department’s gossip discourse. I’ll never look at The Beatles again 

without thinking of you. Our little office-that-was-probably-a-former-storage-closet would have 

eaten me alive without you there. 

	 Thank you to my mother for answering many of my surprise phone calls wherein I 

complained about countless academic, medical, and veterinary problems. Every time I jokingly 

threatened to drop out, you would always tell me to just do what I can do, because we both know 

that we share an obsession with making things perfect as well as an awareness that we’ll never 

finish our projects at all if we don’t find time to rest, recover, and declare them “good enough.” 

My cohort knows you as “Goth Mom.” Your love of the macabre and unusual along with your 

	 	 7



lifelong encouragement that I fight for fair treatment have both largely shaped my own 

identification with the topic of my study. 

	 Thank you to my father for always trusting that I know what I'm doing. You have always 

pushed me to pursue my passions and forge my own path, and that perspective was what led me 

first to Anthropology, and then to Folklore & Public Culture. You are a wellspring of grace, 

patience, and supportiveness, and have always worked hard to be the very first person to 

understand my perspectives — in coming out as trans as a teenager, in choosing to pursue a 

major of uncertain employability (sorry, folklorists), in pushing back my graduation timeline by 

two entire terms, in scheduling last-minute cross-country visits, and more. 

	 To Leah, my advisor, thank you for never losing patience with me. For every day that I 

had to navigate new disability symptoms, and for every time that I subsequently panicked about 

a deadline that I knew I wouldn’t meet, you were right there with me, finding accommodations 

that neither of us had used before. This thesis is complete because you knew when to check in on 

my progress, when to push me to meet a goal, and when to listen to my concerns and act 

accordingly. Even through difficult conversations, I’ve always felt that you were on my side. You 

believed in my ability to finish this thesis more than I did, always stayed curious and engaged 

(even when I went down a few academic rabbit holes), and allowed me to bring my own process 

to my work in both my thesis and my overall academic career. 

	 Casey and Mercer, I have spent the entire summer treating your house as an office space 

(and a D&D space, and a book club space, and a breakfast and lunch space). Thanks for letting 

me drop by nearly every weekday with 15 minutes’ notice, pile up books in your spare room, 

	 	 8



forget my computer charger at your house, complain about my literature review a truly baffling 

number of times, and spend 3 hours a week pretending to be a maladjusted warlock. 

	 Thank you to Carey and all of the Barn Rats for being a constant community. There were 

a lot of days that I went far above my daily thesis-writing goal just so I could spend the next day 

doing cool things with you all. The times you’ve taken over the evening animal feed even though 

I was scheduled to do it, the times you’ve abandoned our plans for a structured lesson to give me 

more breathing room, and the times you’ve asked how my thesis is going (and responded with 

appropriate pity when I inevitably, cynically said “badly”) have all meant more to me than you 

know. I hope I can ever show up for all of you as well as you’ve shown up for me in the past two 

months alone. 

	 To Rowan: I never expected that I would make a true friend through the research process 

of this thesis. I’m glad you agreed to an interview, and I’m doubly glad that we both meant it 

when we said we should stay in touch afterwards. I have a confession: when I said I was “totally 

normal” about your art, I was lying. You might not have guessed that based on the fact that I’ve 

ordered three separate copies of your book, so I thought I’d tell you the truth here. Every 

drawing you send me and every Puffin (the pigeon) update absolutely makes my day.  

	 Lori: Since my freshman year of college, you’ve been a shining star in my life. Your love 

for humanity bleeds through in everything you do. You set the tone for my entire academic career 

and are the only reason I pursued a master’s degree at all. You have been so foundational to so 

many parts of my life that words seem to fail me here, so in absence of a longer dedication, I 

hope that you will feel me thinking of you and know the depth of it. Wishing you all the best in 

your new home. 

	 	 9



	 Finally, I know none of you can read, but thank you to my pets for being the only part of 

my life that reliably keep my mind off of my thesis. Clementine and Lillium, you have been my 

constant lap-cats and couch companions over the course of this year. Penelope and Gideon, there 

are no two bunnies that I would rather lay facedown on the floor with for hours. Pearl, Margot, 

Alice, and Hester: every time I’ve felt like I’ve hit a dead end in my writing, getting to make a 

little mousie jungle gym always made me feel more in-touch with the world, and getting to 

watch you all explore it mid-construction was exactly the grounding I needed. Starlight: a month 

ago, you were a feral mustang. Today, I took a break around lunchtime and spent two hours 

walking with you at my side, guided by only my voice and the bond we share (and the occasional 

alfalfa treat). If I didn’t visit you every day, I probably wouldn’t leave my house at all. Thank 

you for keeping me in touch with the world. Thank you for every photo in my camera roll that’s 

blurry and out-of-frame because you love me too much to stand anywhere other than right beside 

me. 

	 	 10



Introduction 

Opening Vignette 
An individual — an older teenager or young adult, unaware of their surroundings and 

ultimately “innocent” — is out late at night. They are taking a walk or going for a jog, and they 

are doing so in the most “natural” area that they have access to, whether it is a secluded campsite 

hours from civilization, a forest at the edge of town, a grove of trees in a suburban park, or the 

lush grass of a school football field (with a convenient arrangement of obstacles nearby to 

obfuscate whatever may be lurking in the darkness). They are alone. The camera cuts away from 

the character for only a moment to show the full moon hanging low in the sky. The audience 

knows what is coming. The character, by the very nature of the story they are in, does not. Shafts 

of silver moonlight slice through the tree canopy or wash over the grass. A rising wind stirs the 

foliage. The eerie quiet is punctuated only by the rhythmic steps of the focus character, crushing 

leaves and twigs underfoot. And then there’s something else — a sound made just out of eyeshot. 

It doesn’t matter what — a branch that shouldn’t have snapped, a guttural growl, a laboured 

breath, the jarring of some abandoned equipment. Dread creeps in. The focus character pauses to 

assess, squinting into the darkness, gingerly calling, “Hello? Is someone there?” for good 

measure. They receive no answer. At once more confident in their safety and more determined to 

find the source of the noise, they press on. Their fate is sealed.  

	 	 11



A shape explodes out of the darkness. The focus character screams. They stumble 

backwards, trip, and fall, or they flee and then they trip and fall, or they just flee. Their response 

doesn’t matter, because they are no match for the monster that has been hunting them. It springs 

forward on digitigrade legs and pins our focus character beneath its weight. This is the moment 

that the audience gets its first proper glimpse of the werewolf. It is a silver-furred man-wolf 

hybrid, complete with chiseled abs, glinting fangs, and night-black claws that catch the light of 

the moon just before tearing into its new victim.  

Then something happens — an interruption. Distant shouting, a blaring car horn, the 

howl of another werewolf, a saviour coming to the rescue. The werewolf is distracted. In short 

order, it is lured away or chased off or killed. Our focus character survives, but not uninjured. 

With the next full moon, they will find themselves transforming into the beast that they nearly 

lost their life to. They are a victim-turned-predator. They are a helpless passenger in their own 

suddenly-foreign body.  

The Werewolf: An Introduction 
With some degree of variation, this is the “basic” werewolf narrative. Maybe our 

character of focus is walking with a friend or relative (as is the case in Ginger Snaps, a film 

released in the year 2000), or the werewolf resembles a normal wolf instead of a wolfman 

(though often larger and with glowing eyes, as in Meyer’s Twilight series), but nearly always, the 

story of the werewolf’s first exposure is one which begins with victimhood and ends with 

monstrousness. 

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Definitions of “werewolf” can be infinitely problematized, but the most surface-level 

definitions hinge on the idea of human and wolf, with differing or nonexistent implications about 

exact transformation method, behaviour, or reason for being. For reasons which will be discussed 

in later chapters, much of werewolf folklore and definition is centered on western contexts, and 

thus this thesis’ examination of lycanthropy is, when not otherwise specified, rooted in western 

(largely British and American tradition, between which I have not found much variance). In The 

Nature of the Beast: Transformations of the Werewolf from the 1970s to the Twenty-First 

Century, Crossen draws upon the following: 

Before I proceed any further, the question must be asked: what is a werewolf? This is at 

first glance a facetious enquiry: a werewolf is a man (or increasingly, a woman) who 

turns into a wolf. Bourgault Du Coudray in The Curse of the Werewolf uses almost this 

exact wording in defining the werewolf: ‘a werewolf is a human being who changes into 

a wolf.’ Charlotte F. Otten offers much the same definition, stating that a werewolf is a 

human being who has being [sic] transformed into a wolf (Crossen 2020). 

Beresford, meanwhile, discusses the werewolf as “Someone who, in stories, changes 

into a wolf at the time of the full moon. In folklore a person who changes for periods of time into 

a wolf, typically when there is a full moon. In folklore and superstition a human being who has 

changed into a wolf, or is capable of assuming the form of a wolf, while retaining human 

intelligence” (Cambridge Dictionary Online via Beresford 2013,  9-10). 

The werewolf as a figure is tethered to the idea of duality: humanity and wolfishness 

sharing one body. Its definition, most straightforwardly, rests upon the idea of this 

	 	 13



transformation, and always it goes in the same direction — not wolf to man, but man to wolf. A 

person may change to a wolf and back again, but they never start as a wolf. Additionally, 

symbolically speaking (if we are to discuss the state of “wolfishness” as a loss of humanity, 

moral uprightness, or hegemonic belonging rather than a purely physical assumption of the form 

of a wolf), it is unclear whether a werewolf does ever turn back into a human. 

In this thesis, “werewolf” will be used to discuss the idea of a human who has the 

ability to physically transform into a wolf, though the method of transformation may differ 

between sources. The symbolic emphasis of this transformation may also vary — the werewolf 

as a victim, the werewolf as a perpetrator, lycanthropy as tragedy and as gift — but this work 

will continue with the assumption that werewolf narratives involve a physical transformation 

from human into at least partial wolf by some means, and that the experience of being a 

werewolf is symbolic of something. I will be examining the werewolf figure using a historical 

basis where needed, but focusing primarily on contemporary media and popular culture 

interpretations of lycanthropy. This ensures that the modern public perception of werewolves can 

be thoroughly examined, while still allowing for an exploration of how and why this figure 

developed into what it is today. 

Werewolves of Western popular culture can be examined aptly through the media 

landscape. I chose to use fan wikis to gather input on the behaviour of werewolves in popular 

media. A wiki is “a Web page that users can modify… the writing style is casual… think of it as 

a moderated list where everyone can be moderator and everything is archived” (Cummings 2008,  

5). The website “Fandom” is a hub for wikis based on fictional universes. “For example, fans 

	 	 14



who visited the Luke Skywalker page on Wikipedia would only learn about Mark Hamill. They 

wanted a place where they could learn more about Luke, the character, as if he were a real person 

(and dig into the rest of the Star Wars Universe while they were at it). If Wikipedia is the 

‘encyclopedia,’ then Fandom is the rest of the library - a deep repository of information about 

every fictional universe.” Its stated goal is “to understand, inform, entertain, and celebrate fans 

by building the best entertainment and gaming communities, content, services, and experiences” 

(Fandom, accessed 2025). It is aimed at fans as well as moderated by them, and thus is an 

effective place to gather information about the topic at hand: the way that recent media has 

portrayed werewolves, and the way that fans have popularly interpreted those portrayals.  

For definitions of the werewolf in popular media, I have examined the wiki pages for 

the film Ginger Snaps (2000), the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003), and the TV 

series Teen Wolf, a supernatural drama airing from 2011-2017 which was adapted from the 

original 1985 film of the same title. These sources are (by nature of being written, edited, and 

moderated by fans) at risk of unreliability and inaccuracy, but they are important to consider for 

many reasons. First, these sources often compile concrete, verifiable information rather than 

stating opinions. The public moderation allows for a degree of “peer review” which, while not 

necessarily reliable, allows for correction of most mistakes or purely subjective interpretations. 

Second, and more to the point: the accuracy of these statements is not a priority in examining the 

way that fans respond to media portrayals. Differing interpretations of werewolves, whether or 

not they are intentional and source-accurate, can reveal a general trend in expectations of the 

werewolf as it currently exists in media. These fan wikis provide a primary source of analysis of 

the werewolf’s motives and behaviours through the eyes of those consuming the media. 

	 	 15



According to fans, werewolves “retain little qualities of the human self. They behave 

aggressively and do not appear to acknowledge humans they may know” (Ginger Snaps Wiki, 

accessed 2024). The werewolf “acts on pure instinct. No conscience, predatory and aggressive” 

(Buffyverse Wiki, accessed 2024). Even in charitable portrayals of the werewolf in contemporary 

popular culture — media in which the werewolf is either not exclusively antagonistic or in which 

a werewolf may even fill a protagonist role — “the full moon will cause their abilities and 

emotions to be so heightened that many lose control of themselves, which can cause death and 

destruction if not handled properly” (Teen Wolf Wiki, accessed 2024). The figure of the modern 

werewolf, as seen in these examples, is a force of nature. It represents a loss of control, a 

succumbing to one’s “primal nature,” and a temporary or permanent forfeiture of humanity. The 

physical shift from human to wolf or wolf-hybrid is fraught with the dangers of undergoing a 

mental and moral shift from human to monster. The werewolf is an Other on every level. The 

newly-turned werewolf character is isolated from other humans as they struggle to cope with this 

change. This character is also now quite literally “of two minds:” until this is later “balanced” by 

either controlling or succumbing to one’s monstrous nature, the “inner wolf” is divorced from the 

human whose body it shares. No being is more discordant than a werewolf which has not come 

to terms with itself.  

To “come to terms” with one’s wolfish nature, in the majority of werewolf narratives 

both ancient and modern, means one of two things: to either control the wolf or to be controlled 

by it. What room is there for dialogue with a monster?  

	 	 16



Queering the Werewolf 
	 Against the backdrop of these more hegemonic werewolf narratives and depictions, this 

thesis looks at a significant marginalized werewolf figure today: the trans werewolf figure as 

depicted in art circulating on the social media platform Tumblr. In this thesis, I examine the trans 

werewolf — werewolf figures marked explicitly by their creators as trans, not simply 

werewolves read as trans by audiences or implied to be trans with no confirmation. Some of the 

questions I ask are: Who is the trans werewolf? What does trans werewolf art say about its 

community of creators and those who circulate and consume this art? 

	 I define the trans werewolf as a folk art symbol. Wojcik defines folk art as “rooted in 

collective aesthetics and in the traditions of a particular community or subculture” (Wojcik 2016,  

9). As I will explore in this thesis, the trans werewolf is a figure born of the unique cultural 

expressions, expectations, and experiences of life as trans and disabled/neurodivergent, and as 

such, its aesthetics hold great significance for this intersectional culture. 

	 As introduced by Ana Julia Cooper (SON Council for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, 

accessed 2025) and later coined and defined by Kimberlé Crenshaw, intersectionality indicates 

“the various ways in which race and gender intersect in shaping structural, political, and 

representational aspects of violence” (Crenshaw 1991,  1244). While it was used in Crenshaw’s 

work to examine the discrimination faced by women of colour based on race and gender, 

Crenshaw further states that “While the primary intersections that I explore here are between 

race and gender, the concept can and should be expanded by factoring in issues such as class, 

sexual orientation, age, and color” (1245). Using Crenshaw’s definition of intersectionality and 

her illustration of other important intersections to consider, I will ultimately use 

	 	 17



“intersectionality” in this paper to mean: the various ways in which facets of one’s identity (used 

most often to discuss marginalized facets of identity) intersect in shaping structural, political, and 

representational aspects of one’s experience. My intention in replacing Crenshaw’s use of 

“violence” with “experience” is not to erase the inherent violence of discrimination and 

marginalization, but to posit that facets of one’s identity may also play into positive or neutral 

expressions of selfhood and community. 

	 I have made these distinctions in my definition for multiple reasons. First, as mentioned 

previously, Crenshaw’s discussion of intersectionality focused on “Black women as the starting 

point,” and through this focus, “it becomes more apparent how dominant conceptions of 

discrimination condition us to think about subordination as disadvantage occurring along a single 

categorical axis” (Crenshaw 1989,  140). It is important to emphasize that this concept was used 

originally to voice the ways that Black women experienced marginalization and oppression. In 

discussing trans werewolves through this lens, I am bringing a dominantly white community into 

the conversation, though not without discussion of the ways that people of colour have been 

systemically excluded from the community I focus on. This is in line with more contemporary 

definitions of intersectionality which attempt to expand on Crenshaw’s discussions of the term to 

include further intersections of “some of the major identities that are involved in intersectional 

analysis while also acknowledging the levels of privilege people may hold” to provide “a more 

complex way of approaching intersectionality instead of oversimplifying people’s identities” 

(Bakum and Rufino, accessed 2025; Harris and McLure 2022). I have also broadened the way in 

which I am considering these factors; while Crenshaw focuses on the violence experienced by 

the individuals in her discussion, I will instead look at community members’ experiences, both 

	 	 18



positive and negative, as a result of holding these identities. This will be greatly beneficial in 

discussion of the trans werewolf community for many reasons, chief among them the fact that 

this community’s main demographic has not been defined or explored in any other works to my 

knowledge. As such, the only way to begin speaking about this community is to explore the ways 

in which its most common identities intersect. In exploring a community through the symbol of 

the trans werewolf, strong correlations can be found among the members of this group, revealing 

a culture around the symbol. As folklorist Elliot Oring emphasizes, “The study of folklore is at 

its core an investigation of how people in their everyday lives shape deeply felt values into 

meaningful forms” (Barbara Kirenblatt-Gimblett 1983 via Elliot Oring 1994,  211). Through the 

meaningful form of the trans werewolf, we may explore in greater depth the deeply-felt values 

associated with those surrounding this figure.  This being, presented most commonly through art, 

is a werewolf which is declared transgender by the artists through both written labels and 

through in-group signals present in the art itself. 

	 The transgender werewolf is a figure that I have seen frequently in spaces with a heavy 

concentration of individuals from marginalized communities. Those who are most drawn to this 

art seem to share a number of cultures: transmasculine, neurodivergent, white, and young adult. 

While these are not the only consumers of trans werewolf art, there is significance in this 

correlation. Those who connect with art of the transgender werewolf (through its creation, 

circulation, or “liking” on social media) are overwhelmingly not only transgender themselves, 

but are also commonly neurodivergent and/or otherwise disabled, giving them a unique 

experience in their intersectionality. The transgender werewolf seems to function not as a direct 

expression of being transgender, but instead suggests that those who derive meaning from it most 

	 	 19



strongly are transgender and find themselves separated from hegemonic expectations by at least 

one additional “degree.” There is a tie which will be explored in later chapters between concepts 

of monstrousness or lack of humanity and trans (and specifically transmasculine), neurodivergent 

(with interlocutors having specified autism or anxiety) experiences in western and white-centric 

spaces such as the social media site Tumblr. 

From my research, it seems that werewolves are most often used to represent times of 

personal turbulence. It can be hard for many to imagine finding comfort in a life where one feels 

detached from “normal people,” or even from humanity as a whole. Media made for the widest 

audiences, after all, is meant primarily to address those who exist within the “normal,” and thus 

the typical werewolf is featured to express how difficult it might be to suddenly become so 

fundamentally “abnormal.” However, for individuals who are already severed from hegemonic 

acceptance, the plight of the werewolf may feel less like a thought experiment or a caricature of a 

usually-symbolic problem, and may instead become a straightforward representation of the self.  

In this thesis, I will draw mainly on the disciplines of folklore studies (especially 

digital folklore and folk art literatures), queer studies, women & gender studies, disability 

studies, and monster studies. Disability studies, women & gender studies, and queer studies will 

be utilized to provide background on the concepts of normalcy, othering, power structures, and 

narrative. It will also be used to explore how the attitudes and behaviours of some marginalized 

communities may be reflected in the less-studied trans and autistic communities. I will employ 

monster studies to examine the history and literalization of these struggles — that is, how the 

	 	 20



creation of physical monsters has served as a way of expressing or processing internal and 

cultural factors in the past. 

It is difficult to speak at length about the relevant literature involved in this pursuit 

since, to my knowledge, no literature currently exists specifically about the trans werewolf 

figure. I have also found a dearth of information about symbolic trans storytelling and narrative 

traditions. Because of this, I will be using the aforementioned multidisciplinary theoretical 

frameworks to analyze and contextualize the trans werewolf as it appears on Tumblr. One 

example of this will be Teresa Milbrodt’s book “Sexy Like Us: Disability, Humor, and Sexuality.” 

While this work does not discuss the transgender community or werewolves in any capacity, it 

does provide critical insight on the way that the disabled community navigates power structures 

in daily life. This examination of ways that a marginalized community is treated, why it presents 

an issue, and how that community responds can both be used at face value and can be 

extrapolated to apply to the experiences of the trans community due to both the rate of 

intersection in identities between trans and disabled individuals and because of a similarity in 

treatment of different marginalized groups in a broader cultural context.   

Another text which will be heavily cited is Minjie Su’s “Werewolves in Old Norse-

Icelandic Literature.” To study the trans werewolf, I believe it will be vital that I know at least 

some of the history of werewolf studies, which this book compiles very effectively in the scope 

of at least one culture (Old Norse-Icelandic werewolves), with additional mention of Medieval/

Franco-Latin werewolves. Upon familiarizing myself with these works, I will be able to break 

new ground with this project by drawing a direct connection between the strategies utilized by 

	 	 21



marginalized groups (Milbrodt’s disability research and the ways in which these navigations of 

life, storytelling, and social situations are also used by the “trans werewolf community”) and by 

centering the community surrounding the trans werewolf figure as a unique combination of 

intersectional identities which leads to specific expressions of cultural values. I will define the 

trans werewolf in relation to the hegemonic werewolf (which I define as the werewolf as it 

appears in popular media and folklore over time, beginning with the origins of the werewolf and 

discussing at greater length the film-era portrayals of werewolves). Through this comparison, I 

will discuss norms and values within the trans community, including the ways in which being 

trans comes with its own beauty standards (ex. androgyny, certain forms of medical transition) 

which may not adhere to the same expectations as hegemonic beauty standards, but which can 

still include many similar values of whiteness, fatphobia, and traditional masculinity/femininity. 

Contributions 
	 The field of digital folklore studies is one that has grown as digital spaces have become 

more central to everyday life. “Whenever and wherever individuals and groups deploy and 

communicate with digital media, there will be circulations, reimaginings, magnifications, 

deletions, translations, revisionings, and remakings of a range of cultural representations, 

experiences, and identities” (Coleman 2020,  488). In an age of online interaction, it becomes 

vital to look towards digital spaces as sites of interaction. In this thesis, I will contribute to digital 

folklore research by beginning to catalogue the structures and social expectations of the Tumblr 

social media platform. 

	 	 22



	 In my review of the literature, Tumblr is a site that has been examined far less frequently 

than other social media sites, and for good reason: not as many people know about it as a 

currently-active social site. As Minkel posits in American cultural magazine Wired, “the 

mainstream narrative has declared Tumblr dead for years… Every time I encounter a screenshot 

of a Tumblr post on another site with the caption ‘hey, remember Tumblr’” I prepare myself for 

the moment I stumble upon the post on Tumblr itself and learn it was written two weeks ago, not 

in 2014” (Minkel 2023). Even in a cursory internet search, it becomes apparent that tumblr is an 

understudied platform compared to sites like Facebook and X (formerly Twitter). Looking on 

JSTOR, a popular open source for scholastic journals, there are nearly 28 times more search 

results for Twitter (with 53,232 results) than Tumblr (with 1,972 results) as a keyword without 

filters applied. In an Advanced search on JSTOR with a filter applied to only display folkloric 

journals, only 7 entries included Tumblr, and of these works, none used Tumblr as a primary 

point of investigation, but rather as one of many social media sites or data points. I assert that 

this disparity in these rates of publication demonstrate that scholarly knowledge surrounding 

Tumblr’s use and etiquette is lacking. 

	 This stark contrast between the scholarship on these sites makes Tumblr an arguably 

understudied site of folklore and cultural expression. In this thesis, I will be researching Tumblr 

through the lens of its contributions to queer folklore through folk art and digital culture. While 

the focus of my project is on the transgender werewolf figure, the artists, and the audience as 

they exist in that category, an overview of this site in pursuit of a foundation of understanding for 

my research will double as a primer for the exploration and explanation of Tumblr in future 

scholarship.  

	 	 23



	 It may be noted that prior examinations of the queer and trans community seem to center 

largely on in-person contexts. One important work is David Valentine’s Imagining Transgender, 

an ethnography of transgender individuals. Valentine (who identifies himself as a cisgender gay 

man) problematizes gender identity, sexuality, and community among trans people using the 

example of a transgender support group he had attended as part of his ethnographic research in 

New York City. Valentine emphasizes in his research that “FTMs and female-bodied masculine 

people are elided in the literature on transgender” (Valentine 2007,  24) and that he was unable to 

speak with many of these individuals or conduct participant observation on the community of 

people which, in this thesis, I refer to as “transmasculine.” As such, this thesis will provide 

insight into a community that has been noted by prior research as distinctly lacking, as well as 

providing further exploration of specifically digital communities. 

	 Imagining Transgender also explores trans spaces, focusing on in-person support groups 

and the conversations that happen in and around those groups, rather than delving into cultural 

meaning-making through media and artistic expression as I aim to do in this thesis. Examination 

of the folklore of queer American culture in the form of artistic expression more specifically can 

be found in Joseph Goodwin’s More Man Than You’ll Ever Be!: Gay Folklore and Acculturation 

in Middle America. While the book holds admittedly outdated perspectives (for example, 

asserting that being gay is “an important urban phenomenon”), it offers important insights on the 

act of creation in queer communities through creation — namely jokes and storytelling. 

Goodwin’s presentation of queer culture focuses entirely on cisgender gay men using humour 

and telling either true or at least plausible stories. In the time at which this book was written, it is 

likely that Goodwin would not have had access to more specific niches of the queer community. 

	 	 24



Whatever the reason, this literature revealed another gap in scholarly knowledge which I attempt 

to fill: that of fantastical queer storytelling, or storytelling which is not meant to be taken as 

truth. Through examining not only fictional but indeed explicitly fictional narratives, I hope to 

reveal the symbolic choices made by this facet of the queer community. 

	 In my research, I have found no sources on trans folklore in digital realms. In the study of 

digital folklore more broadly, the primary topic of study at the moment is on digital interaction as 

performance. Anthony Buccitelli finds through study of social media sites Facebook, YouTube, 

forum site FreeRepublic.com, and instant messenger application GoogleTalk,  that “while some 

digital performances show marked similarities to offline performances, they also include 

performative features either unique to digital environments or that generally occur offline in 

different generic modes. Thus, digital folklore performances must be studied on their own terms, 

with a full consideration of the unique contexts in which they are created” (2012,  81). As 

Andrew Peck writes: 

In some respects, social media makes digital folklore look more familiar than ever The 

affordances built into social media platforms encourage performances that look informal 

and everyday while offering significant space to obfuscate backstage behaviors through 

editing and retakes. The result is that expression online becomes increasingly reminiscent 

of traditional forms of face-to-face interaction while also hiding its fundamental 

differences (2020,  6). 

	 This assertion by Peck (and the insights of the rest of the book on topics such as memes 

and conspiracy theories) provides an important perspective on the ways that social media 

	 	 25



functions in settings where interaction "is highly visible not only to other users but also to a 

variety of institutions, including politicians, journalists, advertisers, and the corporate ownership 

of the platforms themselves” (2020, 5). However, I argue that my thesis’ examination of Tumblr 

adds nuance to this by focusing on a social media folk group that considers itself largely 

“unmarketable.” 

	 Leah Lowthorp discusses digital folk groups, finding that X (formerly Twitter) 

“facilitates the creation and/or affirmation of a folk group online that assembles around a hashtag 

for a period of time and then disperses… While the hashtag-centered folk groups mentioned 

above form part of larger group identities that persist over time, folk groups are often created and 

united solely by a hashtag, as we see in the case of #CRISPRfacts” (2018,  483). Tumblr’s 

hashtag functionality works similarly, contributing to a broader understanding of this trend 

across multiple social media sites. My study contributes to the field of digital folklore by both 

bringing a less-commonly-researched social media site (Tumblr) into the existing body of 

literature and by studying specifically the queer community in online spaces.  

	 In the field of folklore, many authors have needed to argue for the legitimacy of their 

studies as folkloristically significant. Buccitelli does so in “Performance 2.0: Observations 

toward a Theory of the Digital Performance of Folklore,” qualifying the utility of digital folklore 

as a means of self-expression and as ethnographically sound. In Folklore and the Internet: 

Vernacular Expression in a Digital World, Trevor Blank calls into question the fact that 

folklorists had been resistant (at least in 2009, at the time of publication) to the idea of digital 

	 	 26



folklore as a legitimate site of study. Contemporary folkloristic research, however, has expanded 

to include digital folklore as a key avenue for exploring community expression. 

	 Queer folklore, too, has had to vie for legitimacy in the field’s history. More Man Than 

You’ll Ever Be!: Gay Folklore and Acculturation in Middle America acts as an early example of 

this, as the author qualifies his research into the gay community as “virtually (virtuously?) 

ignored by folklorists” and argues that “the neglect is no longer justifiable… we have also 

realized that folklore is found among all groups and all social classes, within every culture and 

subculture” (Goodwin 1989,  xi). Of asexuality, Lisa Gilman asserts that “asexuality and asexual 

people are given scant attention in queer scholarship in folklore studies and other disciplines; 

their representations in folklore and the media tend to be either nonexistent or problematic 

because asexuality is often ridiculed, delegitimized, or pathologized” (2023, 197). Overall, Cory 

Thorne and Guillermo de los Reyes find that "past folklore practices, such as the ways in which 

we structure and code our histories and archives, the ways we construct and control knowledge 

that shapes our perceptions of reality, including the colonial lens that shaped our approaches to 

fieldwork and imagined objectivity, have contributed to queer erasure” (2023,  23). 

	 This thesis connects digital and queer folklore, as two disciplines that have argued for 

legitimacy in the larger folkloristic environment, to lend further credence to both by 

demonstrating folkloristic significance. Broader digital folklore acts as an evolution of the 

previously-understood constraints of folkloric pursuits of substance. Queer folklore acts as an 

evolution of the previously-understood constraints of folk groups. In their introduction to a 

special issue of the Journal of Folklore Research titled “Queer Intersectionalities/Queer 

	 	 27



Folkloristics”, Cory Thorne and Guillermo De Los Reyes write that “queer folkloristics is about 

seeing and revealing such narratives. It is about understanding where and how queerness exists 

within tradition, and about collecting, exposing, and translating such narratives in partnership 

with individuals and communities” ( 23). 

	 In this thesis, I also intend to further problematize queer folklore’s understanding of trans 

bodies. In “One Percent on the Burn Chart: Gender, Genitals, and Hermaphrodites with 

Attitude,” Valentine (1997) explores the trans body through terms such as “hermaphrodite,” 

“intersex,” and “transsexual.” While I have no qualms with members of the trans and intersex 

communities claiming these terms, I find it important to indicate that intersexuality and 

transsexuality are gaining a modern understanding as entirely separate experiences. I would also 

like to posit that there remain contexts in which “transsexual” may be considered inaccurate or 

inappropriate. As such, I introduce the term exosexuality.  I use this term to indicate those who 

have medically transitioned in a way that leads them to present as having genitalia that is not 

readable as either traditionally “masculine” or “feminine,” standing as a new sex modality in the 

“intersex-perisex” binary which currently does not appropriately capture an existence as neither 

intersex nor traditionally accepted as perisex (non-intersex). 

	 To explore the intersectional nature of a significant portion of the trans werewolf 

community, we must also examine narrative and storytelling through the lens of disability, as 

many consumers and creators of trans werewolf art consider themselves disabled and/or 

neurodivergent (with a majority of those who consider themselves neurodivergent identifying 

most closely with ADHD, autism, or anxiety). Terese Milbrodt’s (2022) Sexy Like Us: Disability, 

	 	 28



Humor, and Sexuality is an example or a work of recent folklore which integrates Disability 

Studies models into the folkloristic perspective. 

	 In the Journal of American Folklore quarterly publication from summer 2024, Anand 

Prahlad posits that “In the most recent period of disability and folklore studies, authors have 

begun producing works that are more substantially interdisciplinary… These works tend to be by 

authors who identify as disabled or as caretakers of disabled people; to weave together influences 

of DS and folklore study; and to challenge the conventional, academic discursive modes of 

writing…” (2024, 271). Prahlad critiques the separation of terms such as disability, illness, 

neurodiversity, trauma, and health as separate concepts. I separate disability and neurodivergence 

from one another only in the interest of utilizing the language of my interlocutors, some of whom 

would consider themselves neurodivergent but not disabled. In this thesis, I will be further 

engaging contemporary folkloristic and disability studies theories not to address the current 

issues of the disability studies and folklore field (as this thesis focuses more centrally on the trans 

experience, since transness and transmasculinity is shared and explicitly portrayed in the artwork 

while disability/neurodivergence seems to be present, but the specifics are far more dependent on 

the individual artists and audience members), but to provide an additional example of how 

disability and intersectionality can be discussed socially rather than medically. Discussion of 

disability’s role in the trans werewolf identity may not be as central to this thesis as other facets 

of identity such as queerness. This is due to a non-standardized understanding of what constitutes 

disability and how disability manifests differently in members of this community. However, even 

with less focus on disability than on queerness in this figure, it is important to remain conscious 

of the fact that the trans werewolf is largely intertwined with disability and neurodiversity. 

	 	 29



	 In discussing storytelling in a folkloric context, we must, of course, turn to folk tales. The 

book Unsettling Assumptions: Tradition, Gender, and Drag (2014) includes an essay by Pauline 

Greenhill and Emilie Anderson-Gregoire  titled “‘If Thou Woman, Be Now Man!’ ‘The Shift of 

Sex’ as Transsexual Imagination.” This chapter, penned by Pauline Greenhill and Emilie 

Anderson-Gregoire, finds a limited number of representation of narratives which may be read as 

trans in fairy tales. The authors describe the idea of the “transsexual imagination — the textual 

representation of a bodily change of sex/gender” (2014, 57). They analyze representations of the 

transsexual imagination through fairy tales, but find few examples of this occurrence, finding it 

to be localized to ATU 363 (“The Corpse Eater”) and ATU 514 (“The Shift of Sex”), with even 

“The Corpse Eater” featuring a transformation that is “limited, entirely temporary, and 

contingent” (57). This leaves only ATU 514 as a site of examination for trans imagination. This 

tale type, according to Marilena Papachristophorou, “is always about a desire to transgress 

natural laws, to change the human condition; it is about a woman who, having become other, 

begins a new life cycle” (Papachristophorou via Greenhill and Anderson-Grégoire 64). This 

narrative structure strongly mirrors the scenes depicted in art of the trans werewolf, and thus 

mirror transness in itself: an individual becomes Other (that is to say, realizes they are 

transgender — represented in the trans werewolf narrative as becoming a werewolf) and begins a 

new life cycle (living as trans or, in the trans werewolf narrative, living as a werewolf). The trans 

werewolf figure, largely represented as roughly half-human and half-wolf, is an exemplification 

of what this “new life cycle” is. I aim to continue the conversation on narratives that may be read 

as trans through this thesis. While Greenhill and Anderson-Grégoire situate ATU 514 as the most 

arguably trans tale type due to the literal narrative of being trans, this tale type was not made 

	 	 30



specifically by or for trans individuals as an expression of the trans experience. This thesis, then, 

will cover new ground in folklore by discussing a figure that can be identified as explicitly trans. 

	 While scholars have discussed representations of the werewolf in contemporary Western 

cinema, I have found no record of a comprehensive compilation of werewolf representations — 

lycanthropy is only discussed as representing one feature at a time, or else is vaguely nodded to 

as “representing otherness.” The werewolf has been discussed as representing femininity 

(O’Leary-Davidson via Bro et al 2018), disability (Golding via Bro et al 2018), queerness 

(Phillip A. Bernhardt-House 2008), and “deviant identity” (Forceville 2014). However, while 

these discussions in the fields of cinema studies and queer studies provide a strong foundation 

for an understanding of the werewolf, folklorists have not examined the modern werewolf’s 

symbolic versatility to my knowledge. In this thesis, I aim to expand the folkloric body of 

knowledge on werewolf symbolism by exploring why and how the werewolf has been used to 

represent “deviant identity” in various ways.  

Reflexivity 
	 I am approaching this project as someone who is deeply embedded in the community 

involved. I have been an active user of Tumblr as a primary social media site since 2017. 

Demographically, I am aligned with the majority of the consumers of trans werewolf content — 

white, transmasculine, a young adult, and disabled. While I agree with Prahlad’s indication that 

terms such as “neurodivergent” and “disabled” may benefit from further integration with each 

other and with the broader concept of “health,” I find it important for the sake of clarity to 

specify that I am both neurodivergent and physically disabled, and define myself as disabled on 

	 	 31



both accounts while a large portion of the larger Tumblr community prefers to define physical 

disability but not neurodivergence as warranting a personal identification with the Disabled 

community or label. I will be speaking in this thesis about these identities, the ways they 

intersect, and why they are so prevalent in trans werewolf creators and audiences.  

	 I have also had a lifelong interest in werewolf narratives, and encountered my first trans 

werewolf art in 2015 on the website Pinterest. While I have never been an active follower of this 

art, I have been exposed to a considerable amount of it through my time on Tumblr, and have 

taken an interest in both the amount that I have found without actively seeking it and the 

resonance that it holds for myself and friends who are also white, transmasculine, disabled young 

adults. 

	 I was familiar with the work of trans werewolf artist pansylair at the beginning of this 

project, and it was the popularity of this artist’s work that drove me to consider the trans 

werewolf as a viable site of study on the trans Tumblr community. As I delved further into this 

topic, I found many other patterns shared between members of this culture, and have gained an 

understanding of the trans werewolf as a meaningful expression of a community that may have 

been previously considered “too small” to have shared folklore among community members. 

Through this process, I have also made connections in this community, and consider trans 

werewolf artist ruddykite in particular a dear friend. 

	 The conclusions in this work are based on the research that I have done through 

ethnography and interdisciplinary readings and analysis of prior scholarship. As communities are 

multifaceted and ever-changing, perspectives on the trans werewolf, on Tumblr as a site, and on 

	 	 32



the trans community will vary under different lenses, through different approaches, and when 

viewed by different people. This work is incomplete and contestable, and I would encourage 

further scholarship to pursue these topics for a more complete understanding of the importance 

of digital folklore and intersectional community culture. 

Methodology 
In this project, I have employed a combination of literature review (in order to give 

context on how and why the trans werewolf came to be) and digital ethnographic fieldwork. 

My ethnographic fieldwork took place on the public social media website Tumblr from 

the spring of 2024 to the fall of 2025. As defined in Handbook for Folklore and Ethnomusicology 

Fieldwork, this will be “encompassing those research strategies based on direct involvement with 

the individuals and communities studied. The goal of fieldwork is to try to understand how 

people experience the world from their perspective—doing and experiencing similar activities in 

similar spaces with them…” (Gilman and Fenn 2019,  8). I have engaged in this practice in 

multiple ways: scrolling through the “trans werewolf” category of Tumblr and engaging with the 

commenting and sharing systems has allowed me to observe the way audience members (non-

artists who consume this art) interact with the art, with the artist, and with each other. I have also 

reached out to 3 trans werewolf artists to interview them in order to gain insight on the creators’ 

perspectives on the community. 

	 When referring to “the trans werewolf community,” it is to address creators and 

consumers as unified through their mutual interest in and proliferation of the trans werewolf. 

When referring to “the trans werewolf” as a figure, symbol, or artifact, my definition of this is as 

	 	 33



follows: art or discussion of werewolves who are explicitly defined and portrayed as trans. One 

of my major goals in this thesis is to interrogate the specific physical and symbolic features of 

the trans werewolf, so while the definition of “trans werewolf” may later reveal itself to occupy 

more specific niches or to embody certain community trends, the exact nature of this figure’s 

portrayal as trans, how, and by whom is left purposefully broad. For example, one community 

trend that I have noticed in my work was that the majority of art pieces featured double-incision 

mastectomy scars, reflecting the expectations of medical transition and the prevalence of that 

specific scarring pattern within parts of the trans community. The trans werewolf does not always 

have these scars, and my definition of the trans werewolf is not contingent on the presence of 

certain features which are hegemonic within the scope of the trans community. Rather, the trans 

werewolf was identified only by the artists’ identification of their art as being a trans werewolf, 

regardless of physical features or where they fell on the human-hybrid-wolf spectrum. 

 I chose this website due to its high concentration of openly queer and disabled users, 

and its resultant (relative) tolerance of these communities by the userbase as a whole. Using 

Tumblr’s “tagging” organization system, I have explored posts labelled by their creators as “trans 

werewolf” to ensure that the art I examine is being both presented and interpreted as explicitly 

featuring the trans werewolf, which will avoid any errant personal interpretation of non-trans or 

non-werewolf figures as such. I will focus on trans werewolf art rather than written posts due to 

differing intentions between the two (with trans werewolf art often symbolizing one’s own 

experience of being trans and neurodivergent, while text posts about trans werewolves frequently 

discuss the werewolf as an outside force and carry sexual connotations). I find that this choice of 

	 	 34



platform elevates the potential contributions of my project — not only do I aim to use the symbol 

of the trans werewolf to illuminate certain features of trans and disabled culture, but I will also 

be completing this work using a social media website that is “non-standard” as compared to the 

more commonly-researched Facebook and Twitter. I hope that providing information about 

Tumblr and the way that it is navigated and approached may both give insight into the platform’s 

culture as well as why it isn’t as well-understood as others. Additionally, through an exploration 

of the trans werewolf on Tumblr, I hope to illuminate the extent to which the platform dynamics 

of Tumblr help facilitate the specific figure of the trans werewolf. While the trans werewolf 

exists on other social media sites, its niche on Tumblr becomes part of a larger discussion of 

Tumblr’s user makeup and community interactions. 

Using the art that I find on Tumblr as a guideline, I have conducted interviews with 

three trans werewolf artists to gain a qualitative understanding of the trans werewolf community 

from the perspectives of the creators. These artists, profiled further in Chapter 3, are all white, 

transmasculine young adults (ages 20 - 29) living in Western countries (the United States, the 

United Kingdom, and Canada). All three also at least suspect that they are neurodivergent, and 

maintain active Tumblr accounts where they post art of trans werewolves, among other topics. In 

my interviews with these artists, I have analyzed responses in order to build a cohesive picture of 

the trans werewolf and the community that surrounds this symbol. 

	 	 35



Chapter 1: Tumblr as a Site of Digital 

Folklore 

	 In this chapter, I aim to explore the function of the social media site Tumblr in order to 

establish it as a site of folkloric significance and provide background for how the community 

functions and why this is the case. After determining broader demographics on Tumblr, I will 

discuss how it presents itself commercially in comparison to how it is regarded by users. In this 

discussion, I will utilize digital folklore theory in combination with primary sources from Tumblr 

users and staff.  

What is Tumblr?  

	 Tumblr is a social media application founded in 2007, boasting 613.3 million blogs (user 

account pages, although this number may be inflated due to the ability of users to manage 

multiple blogs under a single email address and password) and 8.9 million posts per day 

(Tumblr, “Press Information,” accessed 2025). While the method used to find this information is 

not stated, the Tumblr staff page reports that 48% of active users are Gen Z — born between the 

1990’s and early 2010’s, and frequently but not conclusively specified as 1997-2012 (Eldridge 

2022). Tumblr has cultivated an image as an “alternative” social media website, utilizing the 

	 	 36



aesthetics of “outsider-ness” in its advertising. The top of the Tumblr staff page’s “About” 

section reads as follows:  

 

Image #1: The description seen on Tumblr’s “About” page, accessed 2024. 

	 Aside from the explicit text, this message also makes use of demonstrated Tumblr in-

jokes and community trends. Phrases like “Tumblr is a website,” “mycelial network,” 

“wholesome chaos,” “the gay people in your phone, and “your angel”/”devil” draw upon popular 

user and community text posts, decontextualizing these phrases but remaining recognizable to 

many Tumblr users and to those who have seen screenshots of Tumblr posts on other social 

media applications. Straightforward mention of queerness and the phrase “welcome to weird” 

also capitalize on the idea of Tumblr’s primary culture being divorced from the cultural 

hegemony as a general concept, but specifically from the patterns reinforced by other western 

social media apps such as X (formerly known as Twitter), Snapchat, Facebook, YouTube, 

	 	 37



Instagram, or TikTok. This can be seen in the phrase, “Oh, and influencers? Don’t even go here. 

This is your space.”  

	 As detailed by Influencer Marketing Hub, a Denmark-based advertising service, “An 

influencer is someone who has the power to affect the purchasing decisions of others because of 

his or her authority, knowledge, position, or relationship with his or her audience… Typically, 

each influencer is known for a specific niche—be it fashion, travel, gaming, beauty, cooking, 

fitness, or any other interest area” (Kasumovic 2025)). With this definition in mind, it can be 

posited that the Tumblr “About” page is suggesting to users that its use as a space comes from a 

lack of popular users influencing content and advertising products unless the user curates their 

blog specifically to show this content through “following.” 

	 BigCommerce defines following as an act in which “a user… chooses to see all of 

another user's posts in their content feed… Twitter, Instagram and Facebook all have a form of 

news feed that delivers content to their user. The content of news feeds vary by platform, but 

they consist mainly of the posts, articles and images from other people whom the user has chosen 

to follow” (Bigcommerce Essentials, accessed 02/05/2025). On Tumblr, this “news feed” is 

known as a dashboard. On a user’s dashboard, they mainly see the content of the blogs that they 

follow — however, unlike other social media sites, Tumblr contains far fewer “suggested” 

(algorithm-based) posts. 

	 Tumblr has introduced algorithmic features in recent years. One of these features presents 

blogs that are “in your orbit,” allowing users to see “friends of friends,” so to speak (Novak 

2018). Another algorithmic feature present on Tumblr involves posts that are “liked by [someone 

that the user follows].” Third, the “For You page” is an alternate dashboard which “comes from a 

	 	 38



mix of posts created or reblogged by blogs the user already follows, and posts from sources 

(either blogs or topics) the user might not know yet” (Tumblr, “How Tumblr Recommends 

Content,” accessed 2025). Finally, “based on your likes” provides posts which are judged as 

similar to those that a user has “liked.” This feature functions by surfacing “posts that are 

‘similar’ to those recently liked by the user. Our definition of similarity is based on engagement: 

two posts are considered similar if they have been engaged with by the same users” (Tumblr, 

“How Tumblr Recommends Content,” accessed 2025). As one Tumblr user illustrates, the “in 

your orbit” feature is “hilariously bad because if you like a post for something you don’t 

normally like or follow (e.g., when I watched a new movie and liked one post about it), you’ll 

suddenly get a dozen posts about that thing and only that thing” (Phynali 2022). Many users are 

opposed to algorithmic dictation of their feed, and many guides circulate to show other users 

how to turn those features off. Given the distaste for algorithms, the “classic” method of curating 

one’s own experience seems to be generally preferred by a large body of Tumblr users. 

	  

Image #2: Remarks made by Tumblr users concerning the curation of user experience. 

	 Without an algorithm as the primary method of proliferating content, the popularization 

of posts on Tumblr happens through one of two methods. The first is through “Blaze,” a 

monetized function that essentially turns one’s post into an “ad” — it is guaranteed to reach a 

	 	 39



certain number of blogs, including those that do not follow the user who made the post. This 

function is often rejected by long-time Tumblr users unless under certain circumstances, such as 

the post’s popularization becoming a joke in itself or for donation-based causes and community 

support. The Blaze function is, of course, not without its limitations. To Blaze a post, staff must 

approve the request and process the payment. 

	 The second and more central way that posts become popular on Tumblr is through 

“reblogging.” Through the reblog mechanism, another user’s post becomes visible on one’s own 

page, thereby exposing all of the latter’s followers to this post. The followers who enjoy that post 

may, in turn, reblog it. This creates “webs” which can be visualized as shown below, with the 

gold node as the original creator of the post: 

 

Image #3: Figure of a “reblog web” cataloguing the spread of the post among 600 people. 

	 Through this system, it is fairly easy for posts to become common knowledge among the 

bulk of active Tumblr users with any overlap, with exceedingly popular posts boasting hundreds 

of thousands of notes and, on rare occasion, over one million notes. Gimmick blog “A Million 

	 	 40



Notes” posts screenshots of posts that have reached or exceeded one million notes for the 

purpose of, as their bio states, dedicating itself to “that rare and beautiful thing we sometimes see 

on Tumblr — a post with a million notes” (A Million Notes, accessed 02/21/2025).Gimmick blog 

1000000noteclub provides a further example of million-note posts (with the occasional 

deviation) with exact quantities, sometimes reaching upwards of 3 million notes. Though 

relatively small when compared to the total blog number of 613.3 million, one must factor in 

gimmick blogs (which may refuse to like or reblog content that does not fit with their chosen 

theme), inconsistent algorithm (many users elect to turn algorithmic features off, or simply 

ignore them in absence of an “off switch”), accounts that are no longer active but which have not 

been officially deactivated, and the amount of posts made on the site (Tumblr, “Press 

Information,” accessed 2025), which in combination lead to posts with tens of thousands to 

hundreds of thousands of notes being safely considered “popular” in this context despite being 

relatively small in comparison to the total amount of Tumblr users. 

	 The nature of reblogging posts and of any given post’s popularization is explained by 

user phynali in their post which has been optionally titled “Tumblr Tip Sheet for Twitter 

Refugees.” As an excerpt states: 

 

Image #4: Excerpt of a post made by user phynali in 2022, titled “Tumblr Tip Sheet for Twitter Refugees” 

	 	 41



	 This user’s explanations reinforce both the idea of popular in-jokes as being considered 

“Tumblr-wide” as well as the nature of reblogging. Additionally, this explanation reinforces the 

idea of algorithm and advertising as a secondary force on Tumblr, with curation of one’s own 

experience being a key “selling point.” In this sense, Tumblr users as a whole may be considered 

a folk group with their own jokes and a certain distinctive “weird” identity. While I choose in 

this thesis to examine the trans werewolf community on Tumblr specifically, I would encourage 

future authors to consider Tumblr as a site for potential ethnographic research to examine both 

the folk group of Tumblr users more broadly and through smaller groups on Tumblr with their 

own narrower, distinct identities. 

	 It is also important to discuss the structure of the “tip sheet” itself. In the idea of the “tip 

sheet,” we can find indicators of the community values present on Tumblr. The first is the 

reference to “Twitter refugees.” In this context, “refugees” are individuals who have fled one 

social media site for another one due to a widespread upset on their original platform. On 

Tumblr, there was an exodus of users following Tumblr’s colloquially-named 2018 “porn ban,” 

which removed content that was considered sexually explicit from the site in ways that many 

users would argue were ineffective and bigoted. Likewise, other sites have seen new waves of 

“refugees” creating new blogs, such as those fleeing the “Reddit Blackout” of 2023 

(OOTLMods, 2023). 

	 The existence of Tumblr as a “backup site” for these “social media refugees” despite 

having its own semi-recent mass departure has been expressed as follows: 

	 	 42



 

Image #5: A Tumblr post illustrating Tumblr’s “victory” over other social media sites 
	 This perspective illustrates the role of Tumblr by utilizing a semi-popular image format 

which is employed to communicate that one “contestant” (Tumblr) is succeeding seemingly only 

because all of the others have “fallen” (enacted more disagreeable policies), rather than because 

of any amount of skill or virtue. This idea has been expanded upon by other users, and another 

example of this sentiment is shown below: 

   

Image #6: A Tumblr post illustrating an opinion on Tumblr’s standing as an only relatively favourable website 

	 With a demonstrated awareness of “refugees” established, we can now begin to examine 

the etiquette of the existence of the “Tumblr tip sheet” genre of post. In keeping with what I 

perceive to be a popular awareness of the concepts of community care and solidarity on Tumblr, 

many users make guides to assist those who may feel unprepared to navigate a new social media 

site and the ways that it deviates from their “home site.” In these tip sheets, many users provide 

	 	 43



very thorough and honest explanations of different features for the benefit of new accounts, from 

general advice on how to use Tumblr as a curated experience to more specific unofficial “rules” 

such as profile pictures (icons), self-censoring practices, and the use of reblogging and tags. In 

this thesis, I refer to the demonstrated effort to accommodate for others’ needs and understand 

unfamiliar perspectives as “compassion culture.” This is not to imply that all Tumblr users make 

this effort, or that they always succeed in this endeavour (later, I will discuss the ways in which 

Tumblr users may intentionally and unintentionally uphold oppressive structures such as racism 

and transmisogyny), but it is important to recognize the ways in which Tumblr’s site and user 

dynamics are conducive to the behaviours that I deem compassion culture.

 

	 	 44



 

Image #7: Tumblr posts referring to ways in which the site is navigated 

	 The points covered in this particular tip sheet as well as the many others that exist can 

help new users transition smoothly onto the platform as well as minimize social missteps. As X 

describes, “That culture is partly due to Tumblr’s core functionality: With its chains of iterative 

reblogs, it’s long been a sort of ‘yes, and’ improv space, with each addition building on what 

came before it” (Minkel, accessed 2025). In addition to increasing the “interactability” of the site 

(with more respect for Tumblr’s social conventions leading to less breaches of etiquette overall), 

this guide is an apt demonstration of the principle of Tumblr’s “compassion culture.” While this 

principle is not universally present on Tumblr or wholly absent on other social media sites, 

Tumblr’s relatively small size as a social media platform has been perceived by some users as a 

contributor to personable attitudes on the part of users. As one of my interlocutors, pansylair, 

stated:  

	 	 45



“I also found the site to be more queer/trans friendly during that time frame [the early 

2010’s] compared to others as it was much more of a niche site with generally less 

mainstream appeal so it was easier to connect with others and talk openly about things 

commonly stigmatized… With Tumblr also being a smaller site, I find you can also avoid 

aggressively bigoted happenings on other sites in this present day, like transphobic 

dogpiling on viral posts. With that being said, the communication system on Tumblr has 

led to many pleasant interactions…” (pansylair, 04/23/2025).  

	 The “Tumblr tip sheet” genre often assumes basic familiarity with site-specific terms and 

contexts. In this post, the user references but does not define “bot,” meaning “robot,” to 

reference an account run by an automated program with the purpose of scamming users; 

“reblog,” to mean “sharing another user’s post to one’s own account;” and “tag,” to mean 

“hashtag.” As defined on the website Digital Marketing Institute, “A hashtag is a word or 

keyword phrase preceded by a hash symbol (#). It’s used within a post on social media to help 

those who may be interested in your topic to be able to find it when they search for a keyword or 

particular hashtag” (O’Brien 2023). Ultimately, hashtags (colloquially shortened to “tags”) are a 

categorization, filtering, and retrieval function. 

	 Despite the lack of definition of these terms in the post, users seemed to find this 

information helpful overall, as demonstrated in the comments section and in the tags (which, as 

the original poster stated, are often used to share a user’s thoughts as if in a comment). 

	 Many of Tumblr’s communities pride themselves on an advanced understanding of bias 

and intersectionality. Through self-selection of “followed” blogs based on similar interests and 

perspectives, many of Tumblr’s social circles end up sharing specific stances on a variety of 

	 	 46



outlooks that inform their approaches to topics of identity and their interactions with other users 

through greater circulation of posts or through the generation of discourse when one disagrees on 

a seemingly fundamental matter. Many blogging circles — especially those with members who 

belong to marginalized communities — demonstrate similar forms of Tumblr’s compassion 

culture, in which there is an approach to accessibility and stigma that encourages considerable 

self-reflection and interrogation of personal, even unconscious, bias. This is significant because it 

means that the majority of Tumblr users will have similar site values and etiquette practices, even 

if there is little crossover in interest. 

	 Tumblr users seem to have an awareness of their site of choice as a “less popular” or 

“alternative” social media site. It is considered relatively common knowledge among users that 

non-Tumblr-users consider Tumblr to be “dead,” which has become an in-joke in itself for those 

who continue to use Tumblr, especially as a primary social media site. Tumblr’s basic system of 

content consumption and proliferation is made up of reblogging the posts made by other people. 

This means that every Tumblr user’s page is, in some ways, a method of identifying with what 

they have shared. Comparisons are frequently made which allude to a curated and arranged 

space: “my Tumblr blog is like my house;” “my Tumblr blog is like a museum;” “my Tumblr 

blog is like a crow collecting shiny objects;” and so on. There is a delicate interplay, differing 

between each user but maintaining the same basic sentiment, of a blog being publicly accessible 

but ultimately curated for oneself. 

	 	 47



 

Image #8: Tumblr posts comparing Tumblr to various physical locations 

	 The above images demonstrate this perspective, utilizing the comparison of a Tumblr 

blog to one’s own home, car, a small town, and other spaces. Different spaces are referenced in 

these examples, but all contain the suggestion of Tumblr as an almost physical space with certain 

“rules” for presentation, interaction, and selfhood.  

	 Tumblr as a “car in a parking lot,” as “pastures,” and as a space where one might write 

their grocery list all imply a degree of designated space for oneself despite being viewable by 

	 	 48



others. The reference to “mall culture” draws upon the perception of malls as “third places.” 

According to Finlay et al, “third places are, specifically, physical locations outside of the home 

(first place) or workplace (second place) that facilitate social interaction, community building, 

and social support” (Finlay et al 2019,  2). According to American culture magazine Vox, the 

mall is (or was) regarded as a third place primarily in America until the early 2000’s (Waters 

2018). With the disappearance of such a widespread physical third place, online spaces 

approximate the same function. To suggest that a social media site is a third place despite the fact 

that third places are markedly physical likely draws on the criteria of third places as follows: 

1. Neutral Ground. There is no obligation, whether financial or political, to be present. 

One attends the place whenever they want. 

2. A Leveling Place. There are no requirements regarding socio-economic status; anyone in 

that place is equal. 

3. Conversation as the Main Activity. It’s not required per se; it could be drawing, playing 

an instrument, and more. However, it should unite occupants in the space. 

4. Accessibility and Accommodation. It must be accessible for everyone, not expensive, 

with free entrance and departure. 

5. Regulars. frequently occupy the space and create a welcoming atmosphere. 

6. Low Profile. They are not fancy facilities that intimidate people; they are supposed to be 

cozy and accepting. 

7. Playful Mood. It’s the place where conversation flows freely, with no restrictions on 

topics unless they promote hostile behavior. 

	 	 49



8. A Home Away from Home. Attendees often experience a sense of comfort and 

belonging, like at home. 

(Ray Oldenburg viaYeskhozhina 2024). 

	 As much as any social media site can be a third place, it seems that Tumblr fits the 

definition aptly in the opinions of its users. Performativity is certainly an extant force on Tumblr, 

but presents differently in that space as compared to other social media sites in ways that make it, 

as stated above: neutral, levelling, conversational, accessible, welcoming, cozy, accepting, 

playful, and home-like. Of course, not every subculture and space on Tumblr will feel this way, 

but the frequent comparisons made to Tumblr as a personal space indicate that it is not difficult 

for users to find themselves occupying Tumblr as a “digital third place.” 

	 Research on the topic of the digital third place has been conducted by (among others) 

Thornton in “The Emergence of Digital Third Place & the Waning Role of Physical Third Place,”  

Pennington in “Social media as third spaces? Exploring Muslim identity and connection in 

Tumblr,” and Markiewicz in “Third Places in the Era of Virtual Communities.” This research has 

made significant contributions to collective understanding of social media’s potential as a third 

place and the catalyst for that shift. In examining Tumblr’s culture through another lens, I hope 

in part to add to and contextualize scholarly understanding of social media’s potential as a digital 

third space. Using a folkloric lens, it becomes possible to analyze the site layout, user interaction, 

and how these factors influence our understanding of a community. 

	 Coleman, in exploring the utility of digital ethnography as a practice, objects that “the 

evidence remains unconvincing that digital media are the sole or even the most important 

grounds for producing a shared subjectivity or a wholly new sensorium, still less a life world that 

	 	 50



might characterize a vast population, such as an entire generation of young people in North 

America — the very thing that the term ‘native’ connotes” (Coleman 2010,  490). This, I would 

argue, makes analysis of more specific digital cultural groups doubly important. Coleman 

critiques the broadness of the study of digital natives, or “those who have grown up in a digital 

world. They have grown up in a world where the use of information and communications 

technology is pervasive and ubiquitous and where information and communication technologies 

(ICT) are used in organizational and nonorganizational contexts” (Vodanovich, Sundaram, and 

Myers 2010,  711).  

	 Digital ethnography becomes more achievable as the scope of the community narrows to 

instead explore the digital culture of specific groups — not “an entire generation of young people 

in North America,” but (as is the case in this project) the digital personas of trans Tumblr users 

who may lack the option to connect with other members of the trans community in person, or 

who may have access to those communities but desire a greater number of connections. Mary 

Gray’s Out in the Country: Youth, Media, and Queer Visibility in Rural America (2009) examines 

the interactions of a queer identity with digital spaces in young people living in rural areas. She 

writes, “Performances of identities require tools. What tools are out there for rural youth to pick 

up if they seek to express a sense of self that doesn’t square up with the heteronormative 

expectations around them? What allows for an iteration of a sexual or gender identity that is 

constructed in popular culture as antithetical to their rural communities?” (Gray 2009,  14). In 

seeking the answers to these questions, Gray finds that  "without question, then, new media 

operate as a critical node of queer realness in the lives of rural young people" (2009, 141). As is 

seen with queer youth in rural America, social media can provide an accessible site for queer 

	 	 51



community-building to those who are unable to form community as effectively in offline 

formats. In the #trans werewolf tag on Tumblr, I explore a culture of primarily transmasculine, 

white, neurodivergent young adults. Through this lens, I will discuss the way that the symbols 

these individuals use to shape identity (with many members of this community having a lifelong 

interest in wolves and the idea of the non-human) become community symbols when social 

media environments expose them to others who share what may otherwise be considered a niche 

interest. 

	 Another aspect of Tumblr’s unique functionality is its non-chronological popularization 

of posts, which contributes to the creation of folklore and the identity of its users as a folk group. 

Referring back to the following section of the “Tumblr tip sheet” post shown earlier: 

Image #9: Excerpt of a post made by user phynali in 2022, titled “Tumblr Tip Sheet for Twitter Refugees” 

	 While Tumblr’s content on a user’s dashboard is shown chronologically by the time that 

it was reblogged, the post that was reblogged may be months or years old, and can gain or regain 

popularity through a repeated cycle of sending to friends, reblogging to and from one another, re-

posting (posting a screenshot or copy-paste of a popular post, sometimes done on posts that no 

longer have the ability to be reblogged as a result of user settings), or scheduling a reblog for a 

later time (at the time of writing — April 29, 2025 — a post can be scheduled as far out as 

January 5th, 2039). 

	 	 52



	 This form of media-sharing emulates forms of storytelling and knowledge-sharing also 

found in offline contexts by recalling and rehashing old information, stories, and jokes. It also 

builds off of this form of folklore by allowing users to schedule these posts for a later date, 

meaning that these posts will recirculate even after users have forgotten or stopped actively using 

the platform. 

	 Tumblr is also rich with storytelling opportunities. “Someone tells a story; someone else 

appends it with art and the caption ‘I just had to draw this.’ Someone writes a paragraph with 

advice on a situation, and half a dozen others chime in with different perspectives in reblogs. 

Someone invents a fake movie and the entire site goes absolutely wild with it... the joke doesn’t 

work out of context. Tumblr isn’t about a screenshotted post that goes viral on other sites, but 

about the interchange within the space… just to be a part of the creative experiment” (Minkel 

2023). This collaborative atmosphere has resulted in the development of what many users 

consider to be folktales and folk stories by name. 

Image #10: A Tumblr post describing various “Tumblr folk tales” 

	 	 53

https://variety.com/2022/film/news/martin-scorsese-addresses-fake-film-goncharov-tumblr-1235442497/
https://www.polygon.com/23471749/goncharov-1973-explained-tumblr-meme
https://berkeleybeacon.com/from-a-biological-perspective-tumblrs-goncharov-is-a-masterpiece/


	 Through its interactions as a cohesive community, with opportunities for collaboration, 

Tumblr practices folk storytelling, as defined in The Storyteller in Context: Storyteller Identity 

and Storytelling Experience:  

Genuine storytellers learn by listening and interacting with all individuals in their 

immediate, native culture's surroundings, which should include far more non-storytellers 

than other tellers… communities of artists coalesce to become a social elite of 

professionals who inform, teach, inspire, and compete with each other. This social 

situation creates its own separate reality, distancing artists from their roots and true real 

communities, affecting the art form and artists in negative ways (Ryan 2008,  65). 

	 While I would argue that this quote suggests an elitism or “ivory tower effect” within 

artist communities which requires far more nuance to discuss accurately, I maintain that 

storytelling which involves the contributions of non-storytellers is an important form of folk 

meaning-making. In the field of folkloristics, storytellers may be called “active bearers” — those 

who transmit stories and traditions to others — and “passive bearers,” who are exposed to these 

traditions and retain knowledge of them, but do not spread these traditions to others (Goldstein 

1971,  63). In the trans werewolf community, separation of active and passive bearers is 

complicated by what I assert is a level of subjectivity in the meaning of “transmitting stories and 

traditions” for the trans werewolf community. To separate the trans werewolf community into 

active and passive bearers using Goldstein’s definitions would place both trans werewolf artists 

and those who reblog the art as “active bearers” and those who like or comment on the posts 

without reblogging as “passive bearers.” However, I believe that a more meaningful distinction 

to make in this culture is between artists and audience — those who develop and add onto the 

	 	 54



lore of this community figure and those who receive and support it. Especially in the realm of 

digital folklore, the meaning of “active” and “passive” bearer may be difficult to place, as those 

who do not intentionally spread the tradition further (passive bearers) may also help circulate the 

story through media functionality. Algorithmic features such as “top posts” and “liked by people 

you follow” mean that any interaction with a post may contribute to its visibility. 

	 Being digital, Tumblr’s method of folk storytelling occurs on a different timeframe as 

compared to traditional storytelling methods, and may thus be considered “asynchronous 

storytelling.” However, through the reblogging “web,” the ultimate effect is that a post is started, 

contributed to by a number of people, and the most popular versions are spread widely 

throughout certain communities (with different versions sometimes becoming “localized” to 

certain user groups) and occasionally built upon, making this a comparable digital equivalent to 

traditional storytelling contexts. 

	 It has now been established that Tumblr acts as a site of unique folkloric expression, with 

storytelling, knowledge-sharing, and collective meaning-making. In order to examine how the 

trans werewolf figure fits into this culture, we will next discuss the history of the werewolf more 

broadly in folktale and contemporary media, then explore the ways in which the trans werewolf 

subverts or reinforces those portrayals both physically and symbolically. 

	 	 55



Chapter 2: Symbolic Significance of the 

Werewolf 

	 The history of the werewolf as it has been imagined more traditionally is one that has 

proliferated throughout many areas of the world where wolves are to be found. In locations 

where wolves are considered less of a nuisance, the concept of human-animal shapeshifter 

persists, but may instead utilize other predatory animals more commonly encountered by 

humans. This can include, according to an essay by Caroline Taylor Stewart: hyenas, leopards, 

and lions in Africa; tigers and snakes in India; bears in Russia and in some Indigenous American 

cultures; tigers, jaguars, snakes, and fish in South America (Stewart 1909,  3). It can be posited 

that, while werewolves are the most common of the “werebeasts” in western culture, the ultimate 

indicator of a culture’s werebeast is a combination of geographic proximity and degree of 

interaction. 

	 To define “werebeast” more broadly would be a task that requires analysis of cultural and 

regional factors, folklores, and histories that may detract from the purpose of this paper, so while 

I encourage future researchers to look into the cross-cultural consistencies of werebeasts given 

the vastness of their transformation methods and other non-werebeast shapeshifters in the 

cultures in question, this thesis will be regarding only the werewolf figure without delving into 

its place as a part of the larger “werebeast” tapestry.  

	 	 56



	 The werewolf is most broadly considered an individual that is both man and wolf, and the 

complexities of the werewolf as a figure only benefit from the broadness of this definition. It is 

“a creature in which the man and the wolf encounter and interact with each other… 

simultaneously a man and a wolf… neither man nor wolf… from man to wolf and then, if they 

are fortunate, from wolf to man… The werewolf is always something in between” (Su 2022,  

15). 

In Franco-Latin traditions of the werewolf, the existence of the wolf-self could come 

about in one of two methods, or models: the “overlay model” or the “fusion model” (Small 2013,  

83). As Su summarizes, in “the ‘overlay model‘ ’…metamorphoses’ are merely a covering-over of 

identity.” (Su 2022,  35). Through this tradition, donning a wolf pelt is the extent of the process 

by which a human becomes a wolf. One example of the overlay model comes from the Old 

Norse Volsunga Saga, specifically in Chapter VIII. One translation of this tale titles the chapter 

“The Death of King Siggeir and of Signy,” and reads as follows: 

Two men with great gold rings asleep therein: now these twain were spell-bound skin-

changers, and wolf-skins were hanging up over them in the house; and every tenth day 

might they come out of those skins; and they were kings' sons: so Sigmund and Sinfjofli 

do the wolf-skins on them, and then might they nowise come out of them… when they 

were parted, Sigmund meets certain men, and gives forth a wolf's howl; and when 

Sinfjotli heard it, he went straightway thereto, and slew them all… Then Sigmund rushed 

at him [Sinfjotl] so hard that he staggered and fell, and Sigmund bit him in the throat.

(Anonymous, trans. William Morris and Eirikr Magnusson, 1888). 

	 	 57



	 This story has also been translated by a former professor at the University of Pittsburgh. 

In Chapter VIII, titled “Magic Wolf Skins” in this translation: 

One time Sigmund and Sinfjotli came to a house where two men were asleep under a 

spell. A wolf skin hung over each man which could be shed only every tenth day. 

Sigmund and Sinfjotli put on the skins, and they could not get them off. Now they 

howled like wolves and ran off into the forest, killing many men. One time they quarreled 

with each other, and Sigmund bit Sinfjotli in the windpipe, nearly killing him… When 

they were next able to remover [sic] the wolf skins, they burned them in a fire (Ashliman, 

revised 2012). 

	 While the translations do not clarify whether the men have truly turned into wolves, 

“skin-changers” is said in a footnote in the former translation to hold the cultural connotation of 

“men possessing the power of becoming wolves at intervals” (Anonymous, trans. William Morris 

and Eirikr Magnusson, 1888). This provides an apt example of the overlay model because it 

illustrates the process of transforming from human to wolf by donning a wolf pelt. The wolf’s 

aspect can be separated from the human simply by removing the skin. While there may be 

conditions to this removal (as seen in the Volsunga Saga, this condition is that the pelts can only 

be removed every tenth day), complete separation of human and wolf is possible. The wolf does 

not lurk within these individuals, but rather is donned and shed (almost) at will. Stories of the 

overlay model that I have found tend not to linger on the psychological effects of wolfishness. As 

wolves, Sigmund bites Sinfjotl, possibly overtaken by animalistic violence. Once the two are 

separated from the wolf skins, however, there is no mention of their apparent struggles with 

	 	 58



identity; they do not feel that they have lost or gained anything at all, and once the wolf skins 

have been disposed of, so too do the ramifications of having been wolves fade altogether. This 

may be a matter of translation or the storytelling methods, but nevertheless, it represents another 

point of separation between the overlay and fusion models. Not only does the transformation 

method differ, but so too does the degree to which this transformation affects the shapeshifter 

mentally. 

As Su continues, “In the ‘fusion model,’ however, there is always only one skin… 

when the metamorphosis happens, one side turns into the other.” Under the ‘fusion model,’ 

lycanthropy intertwines the self (human) with the other (wolf), which “enables a discussion 

about the werewolf experience’s impact on the psyche” (2022,  35).	  

While werewolf transformation narratives from across various cultures employ the 

overlay model, the contemporary western werewolf media that I primarily discuss in this thesis 

seems to favour the fusion model. This is reflected in portrayals of the trans werewolf as well; all 

instances of the trans werewolf figure that I have found in my research have either explicitly 

adhered to the fusion model, or the transformation method is unspecified, but in many cases still 

implied to adhere to the fusion model through lack of depiction of a wolfskin, through contextual 

clues (such as a caption framing werewolf transformation in terms that reflect the fusion model), 

and through portrayals of the werewolf which would be incompatible with the overlay method 

(such as a “hybrid form”). 

The werewolf’s origins are uncertain, but one story regarded as among the first 

werewolf stories comes from the Mesopotamian epic, The Epic of Gilgamesh. As translated by 

	 	 59



N.K. Sandars, the titular hero addresses the goddess Ishtar by saying, “You have loved the 

shepherd of the flock; he made meal-cake for you day after day, he killed kids for your sake. You 

struck and turned him into a wolf; now his own herd-boys chase him away, his own hounds 

worry his flanks” (Anonymous, trans. Sandars 14). This transformed shepherd represents an 

early example of the fusion model — the human and wolf as one. It cannot be ascertained (at 

least from this version of the literature) whether Ishtar inflicted lycan