Correspondences third issue and statement on publishing strategy

Game of Thrones addict? No new series yet, but you can read about its representation of paganism in the latest Correspondences.

Game of Thrones addict? No new series yet, but you can read about its representation of paganism in the latest Correspondences.

Those who follow esotericism scholarship online will already know that Correspondences Vol. 2.2 has now been published, and is available for download at the journal’s website. It’s a healthy third issue from the young journal, with three research articles on topics ranging from representations of European paganism in the popular TV shows Game of Thrones and Vikings (Robert A. Saunders), to the question of how modern “modern ritual magic” really is (Christopher Plaisance), to a look at esoteric ideas forged in the context of Fascist Italy (Roberto Bacci). This selection makes it the most distinctly “modern and contemporary” issue to date – although there is certainly stuff in there for those interested in the broad historical lines as well, especially in Plaisance’s article on the continuities in European magical ritual practice.

Besides, there are five substantial book reviews this time, on some important recent volumes that span topics from Gnosticism and Theurgy to Aleister Crowley, Anthroposophy, and modern Satanism.  For a couple of these books, this may even be their first published review.

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Published in: on December 30, 2014 at 1:10 am  Leave a Comment  
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More books for modern heterodoxologists

Inspired by my colleague Asbjørn Dyrendal’s recent spur of book blogging (i.e. this, this and this), I will further bring to the attention three recent collective volumes on themes that should be relevant to many readers of this blog. While some are more groundbreaking than others, they are all important contributions to their fields, namely: NRM studies, Satanism studies, and the academic study of Aleister Crowley.

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Published in: on November 16, 2012 at 12:42 pm  Comments (1)  
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Update: Paganism and European Identity Politics at “Regimes of Religious Pluralism” Conference

The conference on “Regimes of Religious Pluralism” is now only a week away. The final programme has just been released, and you can check it in pdf here: Regimes of Religious Pluralism Conference Programme.

As announced here earlier, we will be having a workshop on “European Identity Politics and the Memory of Paganism” on Friday, April 20. This panel/workshop will take place at 14.30 in the afternoon, and we will be hearing about the “pagan” emphasis of the European New Right, the occultist and pagan-revivalist influences on early-twentieth century Irish nationalism, and, not least, about contemporary New Age Nazism and the Aryan Jesus from outer space.  In short, a perfectly satisfying way to spend an afternoon.

Published in: on April 11, 2012 at 5:52 pm  Leave a Comment  
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European Identity Politics and the Memory of Paganism – a conference panel in Amsterdam, 20 April 2012

Last December I was approached by Markha Valenta, a colleague in the history department of the UvA and an occasional contributor to the OpenDemocracy project, asking if I wanted to organize a panel for the upcoming international conference on “Regimes of Religious Pluralism in 20th-Century Europe”. The invitation was inspired by some of the things I wrote on this blog concerning Behring Breivik and religion last summer, and my role would be to compose a “heterodox” component for the conference. I said yes, and started contacting some people. Now, one month before the conference starts, we have three speakers and a juicy topic: “European Identity Politics and the Memory of Paganism”. Below follows a description of the panel’s theme, and a list of speakers and titles.

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Published in: on March 13, 2012 at 3:11 pm  Comments (6)  
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Counterjihadist Templar Terrorism? Some reflections on the terrorist from Oslo west

Prime Minister's Office, Oslo, Norway, July 22, 2011.

This is not a political blog, but sometimes something happens that gives an urgent feeling to express oneself. The horrible events in Oslo and at Utøya Friday 22 July were of this sort. I happened to have recently returned to Norway for a summer vacation, passing close by the bomb site Friday morning, then to watch the utterly absurd situation unfold on television in Trondheim that afternoon. Like the rest of the country, I have been pretty much glued to the TV screen since then. I have also spent considerable time reading the perpetrator’s 1500 page “manifesto” trying to identify, analyse and dissect motivations and ideological underpinnings, and engaging in long and sometimes heated discussions with friends about all this.

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Published in: on July 26, 2011 at 11:42 pm  Comments (15)  
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