Your Search Results

      • Trusted Partner
        Humanities & Social Sciences
        January 2025

        Let the dead speak

        Spiritualism in Australia

        by Andrew Singleton, Matt Tomlinson

        This book explores the historical and social dynamics of Spiritualism - a religious movement associated in the popular imagination with nineteenth-century parlour séances and ghost photography. It continues to be practised actively today in Australia, the UK, and USA. The authors draw on their deep fieldwork, interviews, and archival research to analyse Spiritualism's resilience and the enduring popular appeal of mediumship. There are three key contributions of the book: the first is that the scholarly study of "belief" should be rehabilitated. The authors propose a model of belief as a dialogue between claims to truth and commitments to institutions supporting those claims. The second is women's agency in Spiritualism. From the movement's beginnings, strong female leaders have decisively shaped its religious and political profile. The third is the need to analyse Australian Spiritualism as a distinct variant of a transnational Anglophone family of ritual practice.

      • Crime & mystery
        July 2014

        The Cleansing

        by Michael Connor

        The Cleansing: Razor-Sharp Psychological Drama Novel Raises Awareness for Abhorrent African Ritual of ‘Widow Cleansing’. Crafted by Michael Connor, ‘The Cleansing’ takes readers back to the turn of the 21st century, as one young African woman struggles to weigh up life and her culture’s constant conflict between old and new. In a world that is rapidly progressing and modernising, her stagnant culture refuses to end the ritual of ‘widow cleansing’; or forced rape of those who have recently lost their husband.

      • Children's & young adult fiction & true stories
        November 2014

        The Egyptian Princess

        by Jane Waller

        Peter Philips, the time-traveller from 'Saving the Dinosaurs' (also by Jane Waller), now thirteen, is sent back 5,000 years to Ancient Egypt at the time of the Fourth Dynasty. There he finds a world where the wheel has not yet been invented, where the prayers of the Pharaoh alone guarantee that the Nile will provide sufficient water for the crops, and where Ra-Atum, the Sun God, has to travel by boat throughout the Underworld each night in order to rise next morning. Shortly after his arrival he is befriended by the Pharaoh's daughter, Princess Mer-tio-tess, who believes he is a spirit sent to help her. While increasingly attracted towards the Princess he finds himself drawn into a web of power struggle and rivalry. And things get worse when Peter, by accident, brings her back to present-day London, a cold place filled with sad-looking people which, she believes, must be the Underworld.

      • Tribal religions

        Cannibalism is an Acquired Taste

        And Other Notes From Conversations With Anthropologist Omer C. Stewart

        by Carol L Howell

        Omer Stewart is most noted for his career-long study of the Peyote religion. His mentor, A L Kroeber, instilled in him an abiding respect for cultural variation. Applying this fundamental principle to his work in the 1930s, Omer was surprised to find himself at odds with many notable colleagues. With characteristic self-confidence, he was undeterred in his effort to document the religion, defend its practice, and push open the door to applied anthropology. In CANNIBALISM IS AN ACQUIRED TASTE, Carol L Howell weaves together taped interviews with Stewart; excerpts from his letters, notes, and papers; and recollections of family members and others. The result is a fascinating sketch not only of Omer Stewart as a person but also of his contributions to the field of anthropology and the academic and social milieu in which he participated. A must for anthropologists and anyone interested in the art of biography.

      • Archaeology

        Quetzalcoatl and the Irony of Empire

        Myths and Prophecies in the Aztec Tradition, Revised Edition

        by David Carrasco

        David Carrasco draws from the perspectives of the history of religions, anthropology, and urban ecology to explore the nature of the complex symbolic form of Quetzalcoatl in the organisation, legitimation, and subversion of a large segment of the Mexican urban tradition. His new Preface addresses this tradition in the light of the Columbian quincentennial.

      • Tribal religions

        Representing Aztec Ritual

        Performance, Text, and Image in the Work of Sahagun

        by Eloise Quinones Keber

        Arriving in Mexico less than a decade after the Spanish conquest of 1521, the Franciscan missionary Bernardino de Sahagún not only laboured to supplant native religion with Christianity, he also gathered voluminous information on virtually every aspect of Aztec (Nahua) life in contact-period Mexico. His pioneering ethnographic work relied on interviews with Nahua elders and the assistance of a younger generation of bicultural, missionary-trained Nahuas. Sahagún's remarkably detailed descriptions of Aztec ceremonial life offer the most extensive account of a non-Western ritual system recorded before modern times. This book uses Sahagún's corpus as a starting point to focus on ritual performance, a key element in the functioning of the Aztec world. With topics ranging from the ritual use of sand and paper to the sacrifice of women, contributors explore how Aztec rites were represented in the images and texts of documents compiled under colonial rule and the implications of this European filter for our understanding of these ceremonies. Incorporating diverse disciplinary perspectives, contributors include Davíd Carrasco, Philip P. Arnold, Kay Read, H. B. Nicholson, Eduardo Matos Moctezuma, Guilhem Olivier, Doris Heyden, and Eloise Quiñones Keber.

      • Tribal religions

        They Sang for Horses

        The Impact of the Horse on Navajo and Apache Folklore

        by LaVerne Harrell Clark

        First published in 1966 and now considered a classic, THEY SANG FOR HORSES remains the only comprehensive treatment of the profound mystical influence that the horse has exerted for more than three hundred years. In this completely redesigned and expanded edition, LaVerne Harrell Clark examines how storytellers, singers, medicine men, and painters created the animal's evolving symbolic significance by adapting existing folklore and cultural symbols. Exploring the horse's importance in ceremonies, songs, prayers, customs, and beliefs, she investigates the period of the horse's most pronounced cultural impact on the Navajo and the Apache, starting from the time of its acquisition from the Spanish in the seventeenth century and continuing to the mid-1960s, when the pickup truck began to replace it as the favoured means of transportation. In addition, she presents a look at how Navajos and Apaches today continue to redefine the horse's important role in their spiritual as well as material lives.

      • Literature: history & criticism

        Interpreting the Legacy

        John Neihardt and Black Elk Speaks

        by Brian Holloway

        Neihardt's work has recently been critiqued by scholars who maintain that the author filtered and corrupted Black Elk's teachings through a European spiritual and political lens. In this book, Brian Holloway offers a rather different view, making a convincing case that Neihardt quite consciously attempted to use his literary craftsmanship to provide the reader with direct and immediate access to the teachings of the Oglala elder. Using Neihardt's original hand written notes and early manuscript drafts, Holloway demonstrates the poet's careful and deliberate re-creation of Black Elk's spiritual world in order to induce a transcendent experience in the reader. Through exhaustive research into Neihardt's biographical materials, published philosophical and metaphysical writings, and volumes of taped lectures, Holloway examines the sources of the book's production as well as the reactions to and the implications of his literary portrayal of the spiritual world of the Oglala.

      • Fiction
        November 2011

        Code Blood

        by Kurt Kamm

        Colt Lewis, a rookie fire paramedic, is obsessed with finding the severed foot of his first victim after she dies in his arms. His search takes him into the connected lives of a graduate research student, with the rarest blood in the world and the vampire fetishist who is stalking her. Within the corridors of high-stakes medical research laboratories, the shadow world of body parts dealers, and the underground Goth clubs of Los Angeles, Lewis uncovers a tangled maze of needles, drugs and maniacal ritual, all of which lead to death. But whose death? An unusual and fast-paced LA Noir thriller.

      • Mind, Body, Spirit
        October 2012

        Master Within

        Passion for Life

        by Master Chen

        Trained in temples of Wudang Mountain as a child, for over 20 years now Master Chen has learned the way to communicate the little understood Taoist wisdom of the Eastern world to people in the West. During this time Master Chen has taught and befriended many of thousands of students. Master Chen’s journey relates to all life journeys. Master Chen guides you in learning an ancient wisdom to live passionately with self and others. Through over 38 years of personal experiences of Master Chen, you learn the Taoist philosophy of living in a very easy and approachable manner without having to travel to the remote temples of Wudang Mountain.www.WuDangTao.com

      • Humanities & Social Sciences
        February 2022

        The Definitive Guide to Norse Mythology

        The Gods, Heroes, Monsters, and Legends of Viking Culture

        by Finn D. Moore

        Immerse yourself in the spectacular and magical mythology of the Old Norse religion. The legend of the vikings–the warriors who ravaged the lands of Western Europe–has made them infamous, but many aspects of their religious beliefs have been overlooked. Norse mythology has its roots in Proto-Germanic folklore with some key concepts originating as far back as the Bronze Age–some 5000 years ago. In one comprensive volume, this book is the definitive guide to the spectacular mythology of the Old Norse religion.

      Subscribe to our

      newsletter