Course starts on October 20, 2011
(Subscribe via green link just below)
Spiritual Heritages of Ancient Europe
What are the authentic spiritual traditions of Europe--and what happened to them? What can we reconstruct of women's spiritual leadership and practice from historical and archaeological sources? We'll look at reverence for goddesses, ancestors, and land spirits; pagan priestesses, oracles, healers, herbalists, divination; folk ritual, sexual politics, state and church repression, and the faery faiths.
2011-12 session topics include: The Tribe of Danu. Celtic goddesses, priestesses, and wisewomen. Italian sibyls. Etruscans. Patria Potestas. Women's Mysteries. Slaves and Witches. Priestesses Under the Empire. The Magna Mater. (See Vol. I book contents.) This course offers more than will be possible to publish in the print edition! There's nothing quite like it out there.
... We'll cover the second half described in this video
HOW THE COURSE WORKS:
It is conducted through the Veleda listserv, a private yahoogroup for subscribers only. Articles, images, discussion, commentary, questions, and other resources such as links to video clips are sent to you by email, which you can access at your own pace, at any time convenient for you. Don't worry about schedules or meeting times: there aren't any, except for the occasional live-cast webinars.
The webinars are like live slideshows on your computer screen; I show images and comment on them; you are invited to ask questions or add your comments in real time, or close to it. You can either speak via mic or phone-in, or type in questions via the Gotowebinar interface we use. You don't need to download any software. All course webcasts will be announced on the Veleda listserv. Two or three of each webinar will be offered to accommodate all the participants' time zones.
You have access to the course discussion logs and files for as long as you are subscribed. There are no grades or required papers and no credits for this course. You are invited to contribute your insights, experience, and relevant resources (web pages, books, articles, videos, etc.) but this is up to you.
One month's subscription is $31. Subs prepaid for three months or more are $25./month. Low-income scholarship subs are available. If you would like to be a Sustainer, supporting the Suppressed Histories Archives, you can contribute any amount above the monthly subscription. Benefactors (anyone who contributes $50. or more a month) will receive two signed posters or print of your choice.)
You can subscribe month to month or get a discount for subbing three or four months in advance. You are not required to sign up for the whole course, which is projected to run through March.
When it's time to renew, use the Subscription link on this page. I'll post it periodically. Looking forward to having you join us.
Woman Shaman
Course now closed
See video intro
Drummers, dreamers, diviners. Oracles, seers, and prophets. Medicine women, healers, curanderas, and herbalists.
Women who invoke spirit. Rainmakers. Ecstatic dancers, shapeshifters, sky-goers. A global view of female shamans, from chant and sacramental dance to shamanic flight and animal spirits.
Donate toward production of Woman Shaman dvd
"Woman is by nature a shaman," says a Chukchee proverb of northeast Asia. Many ethnic traditions say that the first shaman was female. Experience this expansive visual record of female shamans worldwide, from ancient times to the present. We'll look at Saharan and South African rock art, Greek ceramic paintings, Aztec manuscripts, Chinese bronzes, clay sculptures from ancient Ecuador and Iraq, soapstone sculptures from Alaska and ivory from Greenland, and modern photos from around the world. We'll discuss articles, books, incantations, psychic technologies, cosmologies, and video clips about holy women and curanderas. We'll talk about broad patterns and local specifics, about repression by patriarchal lords and colonial masters, cultural resistance and resurgence. More.
The information in this course is based on decades of study and practice,
with profound respect and a desire to foreground the authentic guardians
of the ancient cultural traditions.