Category: Conferences & Symposia

ASWM Conferences, held biennially in even-numbered years, and symposia, held on occasion in odd-numbered years

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We’Moon to Receive 2015 Brigit Award for Excellence in the Arts

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The Association for Study of Women and Mythology Board of Directors is pleased to announce We’Moon as the 2015 recipient of the Brigit Award for the Arts.  In so doing we recognize the artistic accomplishment and leadership of the many women who have contributed to and produced We’Moon and all it stands for through its visionary art, poetry, and prose, offered in the form of empowering multicultural, earth spirited publications and projects.

From the 1980s to the present and with the establishment of Mother Tongue Ink, We’Moon has produced an impressive stream of publications, including day and wall calendars, visually stimulating posters and art cards, and the impressive retrospective volume, In the Spirit of We’Moon: Celebrating Thirty Years (2010). More recently We’Moon has published Starhawk’s inspiring children’s book The Last Wild Witch: An Eco-Fable for Kids and Other Free Spirits! We’Moon has also created the We’Moon Land Communities in Oregon and We’Mooniversity, which trains women and girls to find their earth inspired creativity.

We’Moon’s varied works continue to inspire women and to raise women’s consciousness, giving us the strength to see ourselves, our sisters and daughters as whole, diverse, spiritual beings who can change the world. We honor We’Moon as a vehicle for documenting the aesthetic contributions of visionary feminist artists of our time and thank the women who create it for modeling the gathering of feminist community to bring women’s cutting-edge art into our daily lives.

The Brigit Award for the Arts is granted by ASWM in odd-numbered years at our bi-annual Symposium. It was initiated in 2011 when it was awarded to musician and performance artist Layne Redmond. It was awarded to Lydia Ruyle, creator of the Goddess Banner Project, in 2013.

We are looking forward to presenting the Brigit award to We’Moon representatives in person at the 2015 ASWM Symposium, “Tales and Totems: Myth and Lineage in Goddess Scholarship,” on Saturday, April 11, 2015, in Portland, Oregon.

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Celebrating “Mary: A Life in Verse” by Patricia Monaghan

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On April 10 in Portland OR, we offer “Can the Blessed Virgin hold the hearts of goddess women?” Led by Michael McDermott and friends, the special event includes readings from the late Patricia Monaghan’s Mary: A Life in Verse and first-person accounts of Mary’s influence on women’s lives.  Michael says, “If anyone has tales of the hold of Mary, come prepared to share.”

 

Michael was Patricia’s husband and creative partner in the Black Earth Institute, a think tank dedicated to re-forging the links between art and spirit, earth and society.

 

Reviewer Dennis Daly says Mary: A Life in Verse “magnifies a simple naïve young woman into a goddess of secular goodness and the preternatural hope of mankind.”

 

Annie Finch, American Witch poet and performer, calls Mary: A Life in Verse “A remarkable, absorbing, and quietly revolutionary book” that offers readers

the sweet and sublime fruit of an attentive and courageous spiritual life. It brings us a new Mary, a Mary for the world and for the ages, who stretches beyond the limits of the Christian story and partakes of something far more ancient, larger, and more glorious: Mary as a woman, and a goddess.

 

A celebrated writer and editor, Patricia Monaghan was our beloved co-founder of ASWM. Much of her extensive work focused on mythology and spirituality, especially Irish and women’s spirituality. Her books include The Encyclopedia of Goddesses and Heroines, Wild Girls, The Red-Haired Girl from the Bog. She also edited Goddesses in World Culture and The Encyclopedia of Celtic Myth and Folklore.

 

Join us for this celebration of Patricia’s work and an important reclaiming of Mary in the lives of modern women. The event is held in conjunction with our 2015 symposium.  It begins at 7:30 on April 10 at the Red Lion Hotel on the River in Portland, Oregon. It’s free and open to the public.

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Symposium Features Saga Award Honoree Z Budapest

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Saga Award Winner Z Budapest

The 2015 Saga Award recipient is Dr. Zsuzsanna E. Budapest, author, ritualist, and tireless teacher of feminist goddess spirituality.   Starting with the publication of The Feminist Book of Lights and Shadows (now called The Holy Book of Women’s Mysteries), she has inspired a vision of modern spiritual values. Z’s ideas have influenced women to explore both ancient and modern goddess scholarship and to develop their own connections with the divine feminine.  Presently she is also focusing on Femina Nation, her TV project that focuses on notable women.

The Saga Special Recognition Award in Women’s History was created by the Association for the Study of Women and Mythology (ASWM) in 2012. Named for the Norse goddess of history and prophecy, the Saga Award honors contributions to women’s history and culture. The phrase “women’s history” came into prominence in the Second Wave of Feminism, as a corrective to patriarchal histories that excluded women’s experiences and accomplishments. The ASWM Board recognizes outstanding scholarship that promote a balanced understanding of what is possible for women, and men and children, as we write a new history.

Z will present “Goddess Lineage, Rituals and Community” during the 2015 Symposium in Portland OR.  She will also be on hand immediately following the day’s event to sign books and discuss her recent memoir.

 

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Symposium Weekend Events in Portland

As you plan to join us in Portland for our 2015 Symposium (April 11), be sure to include enough time to join us for special free events before and after our day program.  On Friday night the program begins with a special event held in conjunction with the Black Earth Institute:

7:30 pm at Red Lion Hotel on the River–free and open to the public

““Can the Blessed Virgin hold the heart of goddess women?” A celebration and reading from Patricia Monaghan’s Mary:  A Life in Verse with Michael McDermott.  If anyone has tales of the hold of Mary, come prepared to share.

 

And after the day of presentations, we’re happy to announce a wealth of talents hosted by the Women of We’Moon:

7:30-9:30 pm at Red Lion Hotel on the River–free and open to the public

SACRED SHINDIG: A Sharing Circle

with Goddess play, Goddess stories, songs, jokes and other shenanigans!

  • Including Performance by Bethroot Gwynn (“A Wisdom Goddess Mind Play”)
  • Spoken Word by Lea Bayles (“Wild Wisdom”)
  • Inspirations by SisterSpirit Women’s Spirituality Circle
  • Anthem by Naomi Littlebear Morena and Izetta Smith
  • And surprise interactive offerings

Priestess of Ceremony: Marna Hauk

Priestess of Song: Barbara Dickinson

 Wear your Sacred Garb! Be ready for a Circle of Participatory Power

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Susan Griffin keynote presentation, “Who Is Telling the Story?”

“Who Is Telling the Story? A Few Remarks on the Mythic Imagination”

 

The wondrous events and magic depicted in myth mirror the creative process

of storytelling in countless ways. Using her own experience as a writer as

well as that of other contemporary and classic writers and poets, Griffin

will describe the often mysterious alchemical process by which words and

rhymes, plots, turns of plots, characters, scenes and even whole landscapes

enter the imaginary realm of the tale, a process which challenges many of

the dualities engrained in modern consciousness.