2023 Panel: Water and Arts: Rain Dances, Sirens of the Deep, and the Meter of Water

ASWM Conference May 5-6, Syracuse NY

2023 ASWM Schedule

Registration Links and Conference information here

10:45am  – 12:15 pm Saturday May 6 (schedule subject to change)

Panel 11: Voices of the Rivers: Sacred Traditions 

• Annie Finch, “Opening Hearts with the Meter of Water”
• Laura Shannon, “She Who Brings Rain: Women’s rain dance rituals in the Balkans and beyond” ZOOM
• Liz Andres, “Muses of the Underworld: The Sirens of Ancient Greece”
• Emily Lord-Kambitsch, “A Siren’s Odyssey of Self-Becoming in the Book of Delights”

PRESENTERS

Annie Finch’s books include Spells: New and Selected Poems, A Poet’s Craft, and Among the Goddesses (Sarasvati Award, ASWM). Her poems have appeared onstage at Carnegie Hall and in The Penguin Anthology of Twentieth-Century American Poetry. As Poetry Witch, Annie collaborates on multimedia performances. She holds a Ph.D from Stanford and offers community, classes, and rituals at PoetryWitch.org.

Laura Shannon has been researching traditional women’s dances for 35 years, learning from village grandmothers in Greece and the Balkans. Founding Director of the Athena Institute for Women’s Dance and Culture, she is currently a PhD candidate at the University of Gloucester. In 2021, Carol P. Christ chose Laura to succeed her as Director of the Ariadne Institute for the Study of Myth and Ritual.

Liz Andres is a museum professional and scholar based in Los Angeles, with an emphasis on museum education and exhibition development. She holds degrees in Art History, Classical Archaeology, and Museum Studies from U.C. Berkeley and the University of Leicester, and is currently pursuing a PhD in mythological studies at Pacifica Graduate Institute. Her current research focuses on hybrid and liminal creatures in ancient Greek art and mythology, and museum taxidermy and representations of death and nature in western art. She is a frequent lecturer and teacher with Morbid Anatomy.

Emily Lord-Kambitsch, PhD (University College London), MSt (University of Oxford) is Co-Chair and Associate Core Faculty of Mythological Studies at Pacifica Graduate Institute. Trained in classical philology and reception studies, she is a lifelong student and celebrant of the process of translating and transforming old stories into houses of meaning that give quarter to the ongoing dilemmas and delights of individual and community identity formation.