As the U.S. election approaches, various groups have mobilized to vote. But witches have taken it a little further, organizing online spellcasting meet-ups to engage in magical resistance.
Academic rigour, journalistic flair
Articles on Magic
Displaying 21 - 40 of 41 articles
Is magic all about spells and hocus pocus, or is it simply another way of looking at how the universe works?
The idea of organized satanic witchcraft was invented in 15th-century Europe by church and state authorities, who at first had a hard time convincing regular folks it was real.
Across the Graeco-Roman Empire, the romantically challenged turned to magic to improve their chances
Leila Waddell entered the world stage as an acclaimed violinist - and left it having influenced magical practice into the 21st century.
Voodoo is often seen as a practice involving magic. In Haiti, Voodoo is a religion born out of the struggle of slaves. And today, it is used as a form of healing and protection.
Hidden forces are always at work in the world, and people always want to control them, a cognitive anthropologist explains. Enter the human universal of shamanism.
Reports of demonic possession are once again on the rise. But during the devil’s last apogee in early modern Europe, demonic afflictions were taken seriously by both priests and physicians.
Tapping into ancient knowledge can help us feel connected to our ancestors – but that doesn’t mean we should take their advice.
This is the real reason you believe in superstitions.
Erotic spells were a popular form of magic in ancient Greece and Rome. Ancient spells were often violent, brutal and without any sense of caution or remorse.
If an alien landed on Earth, how would you decide if it had free will like us, or was a sophisticated automaton?
A scholar of medieval magic discusses the hope in magical techniques for finding love.
Tales of levitation tend to belie stark inequalities and various forms of violence (often upon women).
In the world of Harry Potter, beasts are to be protected, not feared. But this concern for monsters is hardly modern.
These days they are scary, but for the ancients, ghosts could be quite useful.
One of popular music’s most influential artists, Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, turned 80 this year. It is a good time to acknowledge his work as irreducibly complex, deeply layered, subtle and nuanced.
Pretty much all of our perception is an illusion, whether we’re walking down the street or attempting to decode the latest card trick.
Magic plumbs the same questions philosophers have been asking for millennia.
When Kepler was at the very height of his scientific career, his mother was accused of witchcraft.
Top contributors
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PhD Candidate in Classical Studies, The Open University
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Affliated Scholar at the Women's Studies Research Center, Brandeis University
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Senior Lecturer in Media Arts, UNSW Sydney
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Professor of Political Science, Pro Vice Chancellor of the Social Sciences, University of Nottingham
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Professor of Early Modern European History, University of Cambridge
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Senior Lecturer in Classics, Swansea University
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Teaching Fellow in Medieval Studies, University of Leeds
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Associate professor, University of Plymouth
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Reader in Applied Cognitive Psychology, Manchester Metropolitan University
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Lecturer in Modern European History, University of Bristol
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Lecturer in Popular Music, Goldsmiths, University of London
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Senior Lecturer and Researcher in Cognitive and Parapsychology, Manchester Metropolitan University
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Professor of Public Theology in the Department of Beliefs and Practices, Faculty of Theology, at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (Free University of Amsterdam), Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
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Professor of Human Geography, Royal Holloway University of London
