; HTML 1 GENERATOR MSHTML 8.00.6001.18975 Generator Microsoft Word 12 (filtered
medium) DocumentEncoding windows-1252 Dave, just my two cents, but thanks for the vote of confidence. You're right, of course - we all reify "academic", and we shouldn't do that automatically. A From: Society for The Academic Study of Magic [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of David Green Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2010 2:19 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [ACADEMIC-STUDY-MAGIC] Fortean Times Review of Ten Years of Triumph of the Moon Food for thought, thanksa lotJesper. Often there is a criticism of "the academy" in the practitioner literature, which I understand, but there needs to be a general recognition of academies rather than one undifferentiated academic institution using the same procrustean standards. Thanks again.
Dr Dave Green
Senior Lecturer in Sociology, University of the West of England, Bristol, UK
Society for the Academic Study of Magic (SASM):
http://www.sasm.co.uk
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I -
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
From: Society for The Academic Study of Magic [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Jesper Aagaard Petersen Sent: 24 November 2010 10:57 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [ACADEMIC-STUDY-MAGIC] Fortean Times Review of Ten Years of Triumph of the Moon Dave, I know. That is why I mentioned the fear of conclusions. But I do think we should differentiate between knowledge production and knowledge use, and studies aiming at one or the other. Use-based knowledge production often mix two levels of practice that should not be mixed. Of course scholarship can be *applied to* democratic processes (as your poverty facilitation does). But "participatory knowledge" should still be based on "robust knowledge", process or not (as you probably did as well, before facilitating those voices). And I really do mean that applies to all disciplines, if they call themselves academic. I think "public engagement" and "open-ended" research stems from a deep misunderstanding of the value of keeping snot and beard apart. In addition, it opens up the academic field to serious buggery from politicians, journalists and "I'm just regular folk" who wants a piece of the authority still inherent in academic discourse. Why academic knowledge (or indeed any knowledge) should be democratic *in itself* confuses me - why undertake sociological, anthropological or historical (etc) studies if the conclusions were there already or were that easy to comprehend? Best, Jesper. From: Society for The Academic Study of Magic [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of David Green Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2010 11:41 AM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [ACADEMIC-STUDY-MAGIC] Fortean Times Review of Ten Years of Triumph of the Moon Jesper, I agree with you to a point, but it does vary from discipline to discipline. There are fields where the gathering of evidence and opening up the debate to participants is just as valid as constructing arguments for one thing over another. I used to be a poverty researcher and the facilitation of marginal voices was seen as just as much an end as writing policy papers which argued for a particular outcome. Whatever your feelings, the movement towards public engagement in UK university research might mean more of this open-ended research concerning participative voices. Dave
Dr Dave Green
Senior Lecturer in Sociology, University of the West of England, Bristol, UK
Society for the Academic Study of Magic (SASM):
http://www.sasm.co.uk
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I -
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
From: Society for The Academic Study of Magic [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Jesper Aagaard Petersen Sent: 24 November 2010 10:36 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [ACADEMIC-STUDY-MAGIC] Fortean Times Review of Ten Years of Triumph of the Moon Mandrake (and others), I don't thinkthe aim of scholarship is to record "what the participants say" and let "the reader decide where the truth in the foundation myth lies". Scholarship is not a democracy. So I would say we keep that in "practitioner histories", as you say. While I agree that critical scholarship should steer away from "debunking" and reduction, as it often smells rather heavily of dismissive arrogance appropriate for explicitly skeptical studies, we should on the other hand not succumb to postmodern or postcolonial fears of *concluding* based on available evidence. Personally I think that is an unsightly tendency in some quarters. I don't careabout Gardner's sourceseither way, but questions of legitimacy, authority and authenticity looms large in any historical study of witchcraft, as it should.Disagreement is welcome, and if it is based on legitimate criteria, I thinkscholars should be attentive. Otherwise,many practitioners seemto decide for themselves *regardless* of what scholars say - as a personalexperience of validity overturns any evidence-based investigation anyway. Best, Jesper. From: Society for The Academic Study of Magic [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of mandrake Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2010 10:20 AM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [ACADEMIC-STUDY-MAGIC] Fortean Times Review of Ten Years of Triumph of the Moon On 22/11/2010 23:43, Caroline Tully wrote: Caroline TOTM is a brilliant piece of work but as I believe you yourself say, there have been _some_ disagreement about its conclusions - both from academic and practitioner perspective - so it would be wrong imo to be too smug about it - the main grumble I hear would be over the issue of Gerald Gardner's account of the origins of his witchcraft practice - TOTM appears to cast some doubt on the existence of GG's teachers but others such as Philip Hesleton et al seem to think GG's account is credible - and if one applied the same standard to evidence of this as elsewhere in same book then it would not be "debunked" - its the "debunking agenda" of the book (and indeed other notable academic histories of the topic) that some practitioners / scholars may object to? So for example see Mike Howard's practitioner history of modern wicca which contents itself with recording what the participants say and lets the reader decide where the truth in the foundation myth lies? Mogg Morgan @font-face { font-family: Calibri; } @font-face { font-family: Tahoma; } @page Section1 {size: 612.0pt 792.0pt; margin: 72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt; } P.MsoNormal { MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 0pt; FONT-FAMILY: "Calibri","sans-serif"; FONT-SIZE: 11pt } LI.MsoNormal { MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 0pt; FONT-FAMILY: "Calibri","sans-serif"; FONT-SIZE: 11pt } DIV.MsoNormal { MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 0pt; FONT-FAMILY: "Calibri","sans-serif"; FONT-SIZE: 11pt } A:link { COLOR: blue; TEXT-DECORATION: underline; mso-style-priority: 99 } SPAN.MsoHyperlink { COLOR: blue; TEXT-DECORATION: underline; mso-style-priority: 99 } A:visited { COLOR: purple; TEXT-DECORATION: underline; mso-style-priority: 99 } SPAN.MsoHyperlinkFollowed { COLOR: purple; TEXT-DECORATION: underline; mso-style-priority: 99 } SPAN.EmailStyle17 { FONT-FAMILY: "Calibri","sans-serif"; COLOR: windowtext; mso-style-type: personal } SPAN.EmailStyle18 { FONT-FAMILY: "Calibri","sans-serif"; COLOR: #1f497d; mso-style-type: personal-reply } P.abstract { TEXT-ALIGN: justify; FONT-FAMILY: "Arial","sans-serif"; COLOR: #00274b; MARGIN-LEFT: 0cm; FONT-SIZE: 9pt; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0cm; mso-style-name: abstract; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto } LI.abstract { TEXT-ALIGN: justify; FONT-FAMILY: "Arial","sans-serif"; COLOR: #00274b; MARGIN-LEFT: 0cm; FONT-SIZE: 9pt; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0cm; mso-style-name: abstract; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto } DIV.abstract { TEXT-ALIGN: justify; FONT-FAMILY: "Arial","sans-serif"; COLOR: #00274b; MARGIN-LEFT: 0cm; FONT-SIZE: 9pt; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0cm; mso-style-name: abstract; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto } .MsoChpDefault { FONT-SIZE: 10pt; mso-style-type: export-only } DIV.Section1 { page: Section1 } <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
<o:shapedefaults v:ext="edit" spidmax="1026" />
</xml><![endif] --> <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
<o:shapelayout v:ext="edit">
<o:idmap v:ext="edit" data="1" />
</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif] -->
Hi Dave E,
Down the back of a radiator eh?
I guess I was just hoping for a more explicit, critical review that would help us contributors in our future thinking and writing about our Post-Hutton topics, as well as promote the book for sale.
Speaking of post-Hutton things. actually, I should really say post-Triumph of the Moon rather than post-Hutton, as he s not post at all, have you seen this new book, Trials of the Moon (you can practically get the whole thing for free as a pdf) http://goodgame.org.nz/trialsofthemoon.html in which the author attempts to critique Hutton s TOTM in regards to him not paying enough attention to Carlo Ginzburg s theory of a shamanic basis for witchcraft
Which then reminds me of Witchcraft and Deep Time a debate at Harvard http://www.antiquity.ac.uk/Ant/084/ant0840864.htm Here s the blurb:
Archaeology, consistently warned off religion by wise old heads, here rushes deeper into the thicket to tackle the thorny topic of ancient witchcraft. The occasion was a seminar at Harvard organised by Stephen Mitchell and Neil Price to mark the twentieth anniversary of Carlo Ginzburg's influential book on the connections between witches and shamanism and by implication the possible connections with prehistoric ritual and belief. Archaeology was by no means the only voice at the meeting, which was attended by scholars active in history, literature, divinity and anthropology. The discussions revealed much that was entangled in the modern psyche: don't let's tame strangeness was one leitmotiv of this stimulating colloquium. A romantic attachment to the irrational is a feature of our time, especially among academics. But maybe taming strangeness is an archaeologist's real job.
which looks exciting and which I haven t read yet, am awaiting a copy
~Caroline.
From: Society for The Academic Study of Magic [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of D E Sent: Tuesday, 23 November 2010 10:22 AM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [ACADEMIC-STUDY-MAGIC] Fortean Times Review of Ten Years of Triumph of the Moon
hi Caroline
sadly the book was cursed in many ways- they actually lost it down the back of a radiator at FT, hence the lateness of the review....
Dave E
----- Original Message -----
From: Caroline Tully
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Monday, November 22, 2010 11:15 PM
Subject: [ACADEMIC-STUDY-MAGIC] Fortean Times Review of Ten Years of Triumph of the Moon
Salutations.
I ve only just seen the review in Fortean Times magazine of the Ten Years of Triumph of the Moon anthology. However, the reviewer says so little about the book, if I didn t already have it because I m a contributor to it I wouldn t have a clue as to whether I should now go out and get it. Could they have at least mentioned some content?
~Caroline.
http://www.forteantimes.com/reviews/books/4423/ten_years_of_triumph_of_the_moon.html
Ten Years of Triumph of the Moon
Author: Eds Dave Evans and Dave Green Publisher: Hidden Publishing, 2009 Price: £14.99 (paperback) Isbn: 9780955523755
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars.
Esoteric in every sense but progressive and rewarding
By Kai Roberts
September 2010
In the introduction to this collection, Dave Evans reveals that its inception lay in his wonder that Ronald Hutton s seminal hist­ory of modern pagan witchcraft was already 10 years old. In many ways, Triumph of the Moon has been so influential in academic and neo-pagan circles that for those of us whose interest in such matters burgeoned only in the years after its publication, it is difficult to conceive of an intell­ectual landscape in which it did not exist.
Thus, a volume celebrating Hutton s achievement makes sense both as a tribute to the work itself and as a mark of how far the field has progressed since then. It s an unashamedly academic assemblage, something evinced not only in terms of the depth of study but also its preoccupation with methodology. Since it seeks to further cement the idea of neo-paganism as a respectable area of scholarly research, this is inevitable.
Sadly, few papers here can match the lucidity and structural dexterity which allows Hutton himself to bridge the gulf between academic and popular history writing. Some occasionally succumb to the worst excesses of academic literature, such as an abstruse style which obscures more than it illuminates and a hyper-deflationary attitude as doctrinaire as any neo-pagan mythologising. Yet on the whole the book is a successful and valuable contribut­ion to an emerging specialism, with essays drawn from a satisfyingly diverse, multi-disciplinary field which includes history, socio­logy, anthropology and folklore. Moreover, the contributors are not content merely to celebrate Triumph of the Moon, but pursue avenues it left open and broaden the territory in appropriate direct­ions. Some even tentatively take issue with Hutton s own conclus­ions and such fertile debate is surely the greatest tribute they could pay his work.
