(I don't follow Thelemite
politics enough to know if this was a "Caliphate"
lodge or whatnot)
It was a "Caliphate" OTO lodge.
--- Noah Gardiner <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> I lived in New Orleans from '94-'04 (minus a couple
> years in the
> Caribbean) and did my best to learn about the varied
> magical currents
> that were a very strong presence there. Re
> voodoo/hoodoo and Native
> American influences I strongly recommend _Spirit
> World: Pattern in the
> Expressive Folk-Culture of African-American New
> Orleans_ by Michael P.
> Smith. The book contains Mr. Smiths photos and
> journals from the
> 1970-80s as he became involved in the primarily
> African-American
> hoodoo/spiritualist/Mardi Gras Indian subcultures of
> the city. The
> latter group, Mardi Gras Indians are a fascinating
> and, at least until
> the storm last Fall, thriving phenomenon. The
> various
> neighborhood-affiliated tribes seem to have grown
> out of "street gangs"
> which engaged in regular, very competitive displays
> of elaborate
> costumes, brass band music and dancing. In the last
> fifteen or twenty
> years some Native American scholars had found traces
> of actual Native
> American influences in their rituals, based largely
> on
> ethnomusicological studies. Some feel these
> traditions were an authentic
> link back to alliances between escaped slaves and
> native tribes in the
> area. Right before I left tensions had flared up
> again between the
> tribes and the police in yet another example of the
> rough and often
> weird racial and religious politics of that city.
>
> Another author of note is Sallie Ann Glassman. She's
> originally Jewish
> and from Maine and came to New Orleans in the early
> 80s I believe. Her
> involvement in voodoo began there and at some point
> she went to Haiti
> for a year to be initiated before coming back to the
> city to lead her
> own congregation of sorts. Interestingly, she was
> also the head of the
> local Kali Lodge of the O.T.O. for some time (I
> don't follow Thelemite
> politics enough to know if this was a "Caliphate"
> lodge or whatnot) and
> I know their rites combined voodoo with Enochianism.
> From what I could
> gather from vague conversations with members this
> involved the
> substitution of loas for Egyptian god-forms,
> presumably crossing the
> ideas of possession with that of the assumption of
> god-forms. I can say
> from my own encounters with her that she's a very
> warm and interesting
> person. Her _New Orleans Voodoo Tarot_ (co-authored
> with Louis Martine,
> Destiny Books, 1992) is extremely interesting and
> combines Thelemic and
> voodoo models. On the surface the book is a bit
> 'pop-voodoo' (to engage
> another recent topic of this forum) but I think
> deeper investigation
> reveals some incredibly serious thought and
> experimentation behind it.
>
> Re Native American influence on Afro-Caribbean
> cults, I think it's far
> more evident in Santeria and Macumba than in
> Haitian voodoo. How much
> it has to do with actual survivals of indigenous
> traditions vs.
> idealizations of 'Indians' as symbolizing resistance
> to colonial powers
> is very much up for debate. Michael Taussig, an
> anthropologist from
> Columbia Univ., has written some very interesting
> things on this topic.
> His _The Magic of the State_ (Routledge, '97) is a
> fascinating, though
> honestly somewhat bizarre, book which touches on
> these topics.
>
> Hope that's of some use.
>
> Noah Gardiner
>
> Mogg Morgan wrote:
>
> >Try this new one:
> >
> >Voodoo Queen
> >The Spirited Lives of Marie Laveau
> >'The forty-four cemeteries of New Orleans lend
> themselves to mystery, ghost
> >stories and occult tourism. Local citizens call
> them 'cities of the dead'.
> >First time visitors receive a surreal shock -
> ancient ruins, marble
> >monuments and tall crypts celebrate death and
> refuse to sterilize, deny or
> >make it merely a medical fact Against the skyline,
> angels, crosses and
> >statues of grieving mothers make the aura of
> decomposition exquisite. Mile
> >after mile of tombs resemble houses, small mansions
> or places of worship -
> >neighborhoods where another branch of the family
> lives . . . The Creole
> >citizens of New Orleans came to be infatuated with
> tales of open graves,
> >gruesome deaths and skeletons or ghosts who lead
> independent lives along the
> >avenues of the cities of the dead. . . (p. 94)
> >
> >This new biography by Martha Ward is published by
> University of Mississippi
> >Press, at approx 20 UK pounds (ISBN 1-57806-629-8).
> Beneath the dull gray
> >cover lurks a colorful hardback documenting the
> history of the New Orleans
> >Voodoo clan of Marie Laveau and her eponymous
> daughter. Marie I, born in
> >1801 died 1881, is buried in the famous New Orleans
> Tomb which every year is
> >visited by many thousands of pilgrims. She and her
> daughter lived
> >extraordinary lives, spanning the purchase of
> Louisiana by the fledgling
> >USA, the civil war, the decline and suppression of
> Voodoo and the rise of
> >segregation.
> >
> >Its unlikely that any earlier author had as much
> freedom to research the
> >subject, using original documentary material, her
> own intuition and the
> >extensive archive of oral history compiled during
> the years of the
> >depression by the Federal Writer's Project. Marie
> Laveau's magick is clearly
> >neither wholly black nor white - she was
> charismatic enticing her second
> >racially white husband to declare himself black
> despite the vicious race
> >laws of the time. Time and time again her actions
> emerge as not quite what
> >they seem - the accusation that she owned slaves
> changes significance when
> >the author's painstaking research exposes how she
> and her husband
> >manipulated the law to resist slavery and secure a
> kind of freedom to anyone
> >in their orbit.
> >
> >Her daughter (also Marie Laveau) at first resisted
> but later embraced
> >Voodoo. 'she liked parties, she loved the attention
> men paid to her striking
> >good looks. She danced the Bamboula and the Calinda
> in Congo square on
> >Sunday afternoon. There each time she ran into Jim
> Alexander (Dr Jim not Dr
> >John??) a voodoo practitioner and respected
> two-headed doctor of Hoodoo, he
> >confronted her; he told her that she radiated
> power. He offered to initiate
> >her, to be her mentor, to take her through the door
> to the spirits. She
> >turned him down time after time, because "she would
> rather dance than make
> >love". One night however ' a great rattlesnake
> entered her bedroom and spoke
> >to her.' p110.
> >
> >Some say that in 1999 she returned to a St John's
> Eve Voodoo gathering on
> >Bayou St John - hopefully she will return. Highly
> recommended book [Mogg]
> >
> >
> >: ) .....................................: )
> >Mandrake.uk.net
> >Publishers
> >PO Box 250, Oxford, OX1 1AP
> >+44 1865 243671
> >homepage: <http://www.mandrake.uk.net>
> >Blogs =
> >http://mogg-morgan.blogspot.com
> >http://mandox.blogspot.com
> >secure page for credit card
> <http://www.mandrake.uk.net/books.htm>
>
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