Persuasions of the Witch’s Craft

Tanya M. Luhrmann is Associate Professor of Anthropology, University of California, San Diego.

• Acknowledgements PART 1: SPEAKING WITH A DIFFERENT RHYTHM: MAGICIANS IN THE MODREN WORLD 1. What makes Magic Reasonable? 2. Initiation Ritual: My Introduction to the Field 3. Journey to Aquarius: the Sociological Context of Magical Groups 4. The Goat and the Gazelle: Witchcraft 5. Meditations on the Tree of Life: the Western Mysteries 6. Space between the Worlds: ad hoc Ritual Magic 7. The Old Ways: Non-Initiated Paganism 8. The 'child within': a Portrait of the Practitioners PART 2: LISTENING TO THE GODDESS: NEW WAYS TO PAY ATTENTION TO THE WORLD 9. Introduction: the Magician's Changing Intellectual Habits 10. Drinking from Cerridwen's Cauldron: Learning to See the Evidence 11. Astrology and the Tarot: Acquiring Common Knowledge 12. Seeing Patterns in the Jumbled Whole: Becoming Comfortable with New Assumptions PART 3: SUMMONING THE POWERS: THE EXPERIENCE OF INVOLVEMENT 13. Introduction: Working Intuitively 14. New Experiences: Meditation and Visualization 15. 'Knowing of': Language and Imaginative Involvement 16. Ritual: Techniques for Altering the Everyday 17. The Varied Uses of Symbolism PART 4: JUSTIFYING TO THE SCEPTICS 18. Introduction: Coping with the Dissonance 19. The Magical Plane: The Emergence of a Protective Metaphor 20. In Defence of Magic: Philosophical and Theological Rationalization PART 5: BELIEF AND ACTION 21. Interpretice Drift: The Slow Shift Towards Belief 22. Serious Play: The Fantasy of Truth 23. Final Thoughts Bibliography Index

A groundbreaking study that nimbly interweaves Ms. Luhrmann’s own magical adventures with anthropological shoptalk, offering a systematic classification and analysis of modern magic, as well as judicious observations on the nature of belief… A formidable challenge that T. M. Luhrmann’s book implicitly poses [is] a rigorous examination of the tenets of our own faith, ideas, dearest intellectual castles, to find just where the foundations lie. To accomplish that would be magic enough for anyone.