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File:Bagged -Evening Express cartoon 1898.png
Cartoon of the would-be explorer Louis de Rougemont, who claimed to have had adventures in Australasia

An impostor (also spelled imposter)<ref name=":2">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> is a person who pretends to be somebody else, often through means of disguise, deceiving others by knowingly falsifying one or more aspects of their identity.<ref name=":2" /> This is in contrast to someone that honestly believes their false identity due to psychosis (break from reality), mistake (e.g. mistakenly switched at birth, or memory problems), or having been lied to about their identity by another (e.g. by a parent, or kidnapper).

They may lie about their name, rank or title, profession, education, identity of family members or friends, social class, notoriety or influence, life experiences, abilities or achievements, their health history or disability (or that of their family members), citizenship or club membership, racial or ethnic background, religious or political affiliation, wealth or property ownership, tenancy or residency, past or current employment, charitable contributions, criminal or civil court history.

Reasons for impostureEdit

Many impostors try to gain financial or social advantages through social engineering or through means of identity theft, but also often for purposes of espionage or undercover law enforcement. Their objective may be one of sexual gratification, giving a false name, false claim of being single or unwed, and/or false age in order to hide adultery, bigamy, or to catfish (e.g. a pedophile pretending to be a youth online<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>).

Those in witness protection, those fleeing abusers or persecution, and criminals evading arrest may also assume a false identity.

Economic migrants may pose as tourists (visitor visas) or as international students (international student visas with a non-accredited university or college).<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> As countries, like Canada, decrease their international student quotas, international students may imposture as asylum claimants.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Some impostors may do it for pathological reasons, such as having a personality disorder that involves an excessive need for attention and emotional reactions from others (be it praise and/or sympathy), an excessive sense of self-importance or being special, an excessive sense of entitlement, an excessive need to control others, a lack of remorse or emotional empathy, chronic and frequent exaggeration or lying about one’s abilities or life events, and exploitativeness. These psychological conditions may include narcissistic personality disorder (NPD), antisocial personality disorder (psychopathy and sociopathy), Munchausen syndrome (factitious disorder imposed on self) and Munchausen-by-proxy (factitious disorder imposed on another).<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

As part of humorous stunts and media pranks, protesters have also engaged in imposture, often revealing their true identity at a later time.<ref name=":1">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Many women in history have presented themselves as men in order to advance in typically male-dominated fields. There are many documented cases of this in the military during the American Civil War.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> However, their purpose was rarely for fraudulent gain. They are listed in the List of wartime cross-dressers.

Spies have often pretended to be people other than they were. One famous case was that of Chevalier d'Eon (1728–1810), a French diplomat who successfully infiltrated the court of Empress Elizabeth of Russia by presenting as a woman.

Historically, when military record-keeping was less accurate than today, some persons—primarily men—falsely claimed to be war veterans to obtain military pensions. Most did not make extravagant claims, because they were seeking money, not public attention that might expose their fraud. In the modern world, reasons for posing as a member of the military or exaggerating one's service record vary, but the intent is almost always to gain the respect and admiration of others.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Scientists and filmmakers may also engage in imposture for the purposes of conducting a social experiment or public education. Revealing the deception to participants and/or public being a key part of the experiment. For instance, James Randi’s Project Alpha; Derren Brown’s Messiah, and Fear & Faith; or Vikram Gandhi’s Kumaré.

Notable impostorsEdit

False nationality claimsEdit

  • Princess Caraboo (1791–1864), Englishwoman who pretended to be a princess from a fictional island
  • Korla Pandit (1921–1998), African-American pianist/organist who pretended to be from India
  • George Psalmanazar (1679–1763), who claimed to be from Taiwan
  • Micheál Mac Liammóir (1899–1978), notable actor in Ireland, born in England as Alfred Willmore but falsified an Irish birth and identity

False minority national identity claimsEdit

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  • Grey Owl (1888–1938), born Archibald Belaney, an Englishman who took on the identity of an Ojibwe
  • Jamake Highwater (1931–2001), writer and journalist, born Jackie Marks into an Ashkenazi family who later claimed he was a Cherokee American Indian
  • Daniel Lewis James (1911–1988), novelist who wrote under the name Danny Santiago
  • Jessica A. Krug (aka Jess La Bombalera, born 1982), former associate professor at George Washington University who falsely claimed African, African-American, and Caribbean-American heritage throughout her career, despite being born to Jewish parents<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
  • Sacheen Littlefeather (Marie Louise Cruz, 1946–2022), model and activist who rejected Marlon Brando's Academy Award at the 1973 Oscars out of protest. Her Apache Indian impersonation was not made public until her funeral, when her sisters asserted their Mexican descent.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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False royal heritage claimsEdit

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File:Frits Vilhelm Holm 1916.jpg
Frits Holm (1881–1930), Danish adventurer and self-styled "Duke of Colachine"

FraudstersEdit

  • Frank Abagnale (born 1948), who passed bad checks as a fake pilot, doctor, and lawyer<ref name="usnews">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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Military impostorsEdit

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  • Joseph McCarthy (1908–1957), U.S. senator who served in the Marine Corps during World War II as a Douglas SBD Dauntless tail gunner; broadly embellished his military accomplishments, notably by exaggerating his number of combat missions flown, falsifying official records to reflect these claims, obtaining combat decorations based on the falsified documents, and claiming that he broke his leg in action when the injury was sustained in a non-combat stairwell fall<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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  • Eric von Stroheim, film director (The Merry Widow, 1925) and actor (Sunset Boulevard, 1950), who claimed to have been an Austrian imperial military officer, but never served in the military. He did portray German officers on-screen.
  • Friedrich Wilhelm Voigt (1849–1922), German impostor who masqueraded as a Prussian officer in 1906 and became famous as "The Captain of Köpenick"
  • Micah Wright (born 1974), anti-war activist who claimed to have been an Army Ranger involved in the United States invasion of Panama and several special operations; he was a Reserve Officers' Training Corps student in college, but never served in the military<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Multiple impostorsEdit

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  • Nicolai Lilin (born 1980), an Italian-Moldovan writer who claimed to be the descendent of a Siberian ethnic group deported by the Soviet Union to Bender, Moldova in the 1930s, despite being of Polish origin and Bender having not been in the USSR at that time,<ref name=armano>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

|CitationClass=web }}</ref> as well as claiming to be a veteran of the Second Chechen War, despite his name not appearing in any sources close to the Russian Ministry of Defence.<ref name=bullough>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name=chernenko>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

OthersEdit

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  • James Frey (born 1969) American writer who presented himself as a reformed convict and drug addict, who in actuality had no criminal record
  • Martin Gray (1921–2016), Polish Jew who falsely claimed to have been imprisoned in Treblinka extermination camp
  • Kaspar Hauser (1812–1833), German youth who claimed to have grown up in the total isolation of a darkened cell
  • Robert Hendy-Freegard (born 1971), English barman, car salesman and conman who masqueraded as a MI5 agent<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
  • James Hogue (born 1959), who entered Princeton University by posing as a self-taught orphan
  • Paul Jordan-Smith (1885–1971), father of the hoax art movement called Disumbrationism
  • Rahul Ligma, who pretended to be a fired Twitter employee, pranking major media outlets in 2022
  • Enric Marco (1921–2022), Spaniard who claimed to have been a prisoner in the Nazi German concentration camps Mauthausen and Flossenburg in World War II<ref name="news.bbc">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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In fictionEdit

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See alsoEdit

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ReferencesEdit

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External linksEdit

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