The Mandela Effect is a phenomenon where large groups of people remember an event or detail differently from how it actually happened. It was named after Nelson Mandela, the former South African president, because many people falsely remembered him dying in prison in the 1980s — even recalling televised funerals. In reality, Mandela was released in 1990 and passed away in 2013. The term was coined in 2009 by researcher Fiona Broome, who discovered others shared her false memory. This sparked the idea that collective false memories could be widespread. The Mandela Effect is often linked to: False memory psychology Confabulation (brain filling in gaps) Misinformation Or, more wildly, alternate realities or parallel timelines Since then, it’s been connected to many examples — like the Berenstain Bears, the Monopoly Man’s monocle, and “Luke, I am your father.” The Mandela Effect continues to intrigue people across the internet, blurring the line between memory, reality, and imagination.