The figure of the imposter can stir complicated emotions, from intrigue to suspicion and fear. But what insights can these troublesome figures provide into the social relations and cultural forms from which they emerge? Edited by leading scholars in the field, this volume explores the question through a diverse range of empirical cases, including magicians, spirit possession, fake Instagram followers, fake art and fraudulent scientists. Proposing 'thinking with imposters' as a valuable new tool of analysis in the social sciences and humanities, this revolutionary book shows how the figure of the imposter can help upend social theory.

Thinking With Imposters: The Imposter As Analytic ~ Else Vogel, David Moats, Steve Woolgar and Claes-Fredrik HelgessonThe Desire to Believe and Belong: Wannabes and Their Audience in a North American Cultural Context ~ Caroline Rosenthal
A Menagerie of Imposters and Truth-Tellers: Diederik Stapel and the Crisis in Psychology ~ Maarten Derksen
Learning From Fakes: A Relational Approach ~ Catelijne Coopmans
Imitations of Celebrity ~ Mandy Merck
Natural Imposters?: A Cuckoos View of Social Relations ~ Martin Abbott and Daniel Large
Conjuring Imposters: The Extraordinary Illusions of Mundaneity ~ Brian Rappert
States of Imposture: Scroungerphobia and the Choreography of Suspicion~ James Kaufmann
The Face of 'The Other': Biometric Facial Recognition, Imposters, and the Art of Outplaying Them ~ Kristina Grünenberg
Faking Spirit Possession: Creating 'Epistemic Murk' in Bahian Candomblé ~ Mattijs van de Port
The Guerrilla's ID Card: Flatland Against Fatland in Colombia ~ Olga Restrepo Forero and Malcolm Ashmore
Good Enough Imposters: The Market for Instagram Followers in Indonesia and Beyond ~ Johan Lindquist
Thinking Beyond the Imposter: Gatecrashing Un/Welcoming Borders ~ Fredy Mora-Gamez
Postscript: Thinking With Imposters - What Were They Thinking? ~ Agnes, Forrest Carter, Civet Coffee Bean, Cuckoo, Iansá and Oxum, Sarah Jane, Han Van Meegeren, David Rosenhahn, Diederik Stapel and Jorge Enrique Briceño Suárez