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Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of IHeart Radio.

Hi, my name is Robert Lamb, and this is The Monster Fact, a short form series from Stuff to Blow Your Mind focusing on mythical

creatures, ideas, and monsters in time.

Having just returned from another visit to New Orleans, I thought I might consider a creature

from the traditions of French and Creole, Louisiana, the shapesshifting monster known as the Rougarou,

sometimes simplified in modern understanding as a sort of Cajun werewolf.

It's a little more complicated than that, however.

The Rougarou is arguably the most well-known South Louisiana monster,

but as Nathan J. Raboullet discusses in his excellent book,

Folklore Figures of French and Creole, Louisiana,

despite the monster's popularity in literature and pop culture,

there's not much folkloric meat on the bone here.

He points out that primary sources and first-person accounts

are relatively scarce compared to more obscure creatures and figures of the region,

with no common cycles of motifs or specific tail types associated with it.

While a shallow understanding of the rogueroo seems to permeate South Louisiana traditions,

many aspects of the monster were seemingly codified

by the popular 1945 folktale compilation, Gumbo Yaya.

So let's get to know this monster.

First off, is it a werewolf?

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