Blogging in the Societas Magica newsletter

Societas Magica headerThe Societas Magica (a scholarly society you should know about if you’re into the academic study of magic, esotericism, and related stuff) has been running a great and informative newsletter for many years. In fact, since the society was founded by Richard Kieckhefer and others back in 1995 (check out the back-issues here). In addition to informing about conferences and publications, it usually comes with a slightly longer essay. The 2013 Spring issue that has just been released runs a nice article by Laura Mitchell on academic blogging in the field of esotericism and magic. I was of course  pleased to see the nice discussion of Heterodoxology there, but more importantly it is excellent that a scholarly society brings the question of blogs to the full attention of its membership. Mitchell discusses some of the advantages and possibilities of research blogging, and classifies different types based on how they are run and what sort of material they include (individual, group-blogs; research, personal experiences, academic life etc.). The blogs mentioned in the essay should all be familiar to readers of Heterodoxology: Invocatio, the Religious Studies Project, Whewell’s Ghost, the Hermetic Library, and the Ritman Library Blog are all old friends and virtual neighbours.

Somehow it is also a bit amusing that the virtues and potentials of these blogs are being discussed in the old medium of a newsletter – one that is digitized and distributed by hyperlink in addition to paper. One gets the feeling of standing somewhat hesitantly in between different forms of media. Thus another great piece of news in this issue is Claire Fanger’s announcement that  the Societas Magica is about to launch a new blog of its own. Damon Lycourinos at the University of Edinburgh is going to take the first shift at running it. It’s something to look forward to (I previously commented on an esoterica blogpost of his here). It promises to be a valuable addition to the slowly growing number of academic blogs in this area.

Thanks to Sarah for bringing this to my attention.

Published in: on May 3, 2013 at 10:31 am  Comments (1)  
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Synthesis: Esotericism & the Sciences

Synthesis conference AmsterdamThere’s a conference in Amsterdam this coming Monday (April 29), on the relationship between esotericism and the sciences. And art, and music, and literature, and other things. “Synthesis: Esotericism & the Sciences” is described as a young scholars conference, which means that it has been organized entirely by a crew of enthusiastic and energetic MA students, and primarily caters to scholars at a very early stage in their careers (i.e. graduate and post-graduate students). Check out the exquisitely looking website for more information on the event, and an overview of the program. In addition to eight papers and several artistic and musical intermezzos, the show starts with a keynote lecture by yours truly. The title of my keynote is “A Nihilist’s View of Scientific Meaning-Making: Analytical Approaches to Synthesizing Minds“. I attach the abstract below:

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Published in: on April 24, 2013 at 5:12 pm  Comments (2)  
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Esotericism in Russia: “Ways of Gnosis” conference, April 10-13, 2013

The Russian Association for the Study of Esotericism and Mysticism are hosting a large international conference in Moscow this week.

The Russian Association for the Study of Esotericism and Mysticism are hosting a large international conference in Moscow this week.

The study of esotericism has been spreading in recent years. One of the often unacknowledged growth areas is eastern Europe, and in particular Russia. With the exception of a few Russian scholars who have attended ESSWE events in recent years, not much contact exists between scholarly communities across this old east-west divide.

This week, a major event takes place in Moscow, which can hopefully start to change all that. The Russian scholarly society, ASEM (Association for the Study of Esotericism and Mysticism), is organizing a major conference at the All-Russia State Library for Foreign Literature (LFL) in collaboration with a number of other educational agencies. The conference is entitled “Ways of Gnosis: Mystical and Esoteric Traditions from Antiquity to the Present Time”, and takes place on 10-13 April. A small number of Western European and North American scholars are participating in this event, which may hopefully lead to more international collaboration and dissemination of research across cultural spheres. An overview of the programme as well as English and Russian summaries of papers to be presented can be found below.

Published in: on April 9, 2013 at 4:03 pm  Comments (1)  
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Launching the ESSWE4 conference website

Esotericism and Health: ESSWE4 Conference, University of Gothenburg, Sweden, June 26-29, 2013.

Esotericism and Health: ESSWE4 Conference, University of Gothenburg, Sweden, June 26-29, 2013.

The fourth biannual international conference of the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism (ESSWE) is fast approaching. It’s focused on “Esotericism and Health”, takes place in Gothenburg, Sweden, and – it’s just gotten its own website. The website has all you need to know, from online registration and conference accommodation, to a list of all accepted papers and speakers. Do check it out!

The ESSWE conferences are big events in the relatively small community of esotericism scholarship. With  about one hundred accepted papers, plus keynote lectures, roundtable events, and a secret surprise conference concert, this year’s is going to be a major one. So if you’re still on the fence about whether to go or not, take some time to browse the website. You might also want to keep track of developments, as more events might still be added to the programme. Taking on my ESSWE membership secretary hat, I should also remind you that there are substantial fee reductions for Full and Student members of the Society (application forms here)… In any case: Hope to see some readers in Gothenburg in June!

 

Published in: on April 8, 2013 at 5:02 pm  Leave a Comment  
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The esoteric in modern art

Bauduin occultation of surrealismOver the last few years, there appears to have been an increased interest, at least from academics and curators, in the relationship between esotericism and art. A couple of my colleagues have spent considerable research time investigating this relation, and I want to use this post to recommend their work. This seems particularly relevant given certain recent publications, which I will get to in a second.

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Published in: on February 27, 2013 at 11:19 am  Comments (1)  
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Correspondences journal – deadline fast approaching!

As previously mentioned, a new online journal for the academic study of esotericism was launched recently, with the very fitting name Correspondences. If you are a scholar working on esoteric topics, whether you are already established, aspiring, a student, or new to this particular field, and if you happen to have a manuscript that is more or less ready, don’t forget to finish it and have it submitted to the Correspondences editors before February 28! The deadline for the first issue is fast approaching. Please find the call for papers here.

Published in: on February 17, 2013 at 7:16 pm  Leave a Comment  
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A webinar on John Dee and video tour of the BPH

As readers of Heterodoxology will know, the Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica in Amsterdam hosts a webinar series on aspects of Western esotericism in collaboration with lecturers at the UvA. The latest lecture was published last week: This time Peter Forshaw talks about our old favourite John Dee, focusing on his Monas Hieroglyphica. Check it out below!

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Published in: on February 10, 2013 at 12:31 pm  Comments (2)  
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There’s a new doctor in town

On February 5, 2013, I was initiated into the higher mysteries of Academia, after publicly defending my dissertation entitled “The Problem of Disenchantment: Scientific Naturalism and Esoteric Discourse, 1900-1939”. Here’s a recollection of the ceremony in images.

Before it all began

Before it all began

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Published in: on February 9, 2013 at 3:32 pm  Comments (8)  
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Kabbalah and Modernity – more than red strings and pop queens

Kabbalah and ModernityI have made a habit out of making the pre-print versions of some of my book reviews available here at Heterodoxology. I was recently reminded of one that I had completely forgotten about: a review of the excellent volume Kabbalah and Modernity: Interpretations, Transformations, Adaptations (Brill, 2010). It is edited by three good colleagues of mine (Marco Pasi, Boaz Huss, and Kocku von Stuckrad), and features contributions by many other friends and acquaintances, but hopefully my review is not too biased. Moreover, symptomatic of the extreme delay in academic publishing, I should say that this review was written in 2010, and only appeared in print last year. The review was published in Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft (summer 2012).

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Published in: on January 23, 2013 at 1:32 pm  Comments (10)  
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Sarah Veale has done an exquisite job on the recently released website of NSEA (Network for the Study of Esotericism in Antiquity). The network itself, as you can read more about in Sarah’s post at Invocatio and at the website itself, is organised on the initiative of Dr. Dylan Burns, and is another thematic network of the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism. Now that NSEA is up and running, with an excellent online resource database, the ESSWE suddenly has a special-interest network for both of the two historical periods that have most often been neglected by historians of esotericism: antiquity and the present day.

Published in: on January 16, 2013 at 2:59 pm  Leave a Comment  
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