Moving on from some of the sources of content for the Otherkin and other like beliefs, this chapter completes the circumambulation of the Otherkin through an exploration of relevant elements of the online world and contemporary popular culture. Here, the focus is upon the context of Otherkin approaches to, and in, the world, rather than the content of these types of beliefs. This chapter tracks a path through the contemporary popular cultures and associated media in order to reveal some of the developments in communication and engagement that may be constitutive of Otherkin-type ontologies. By tracing these various influences, it can be seen that the Otherkin are by no means occupying some sort of obscure cultural cul-de-sac, but rather that they are one particular, if admittedly idiosyncratic, manifestation of significant broader cultural shifts. Arguably the most important of those is the development and mass popularization of the internet and attendant digital cultures.

Digital communications, indeed the very nature of online engagement, attenuate and expand the sense of the self beyond the bounds of the body. Not just online communication forms, but also online participatory forums such as multi-user domains (MUDs), massively multi-user online role-playing games (MMORPGs), and even open digital worlds such as Second Life, provide textually and graphically rich extensions of the self. These spaces, and the behaviours within them, in turn extend and expand upon a long-standing literature of the non-human and the superhuman, simultaneously integrating both the content and providing virtual instance of the veracity of such extensions of the self.