Remembering the Work of Judith Anderson

This article recently came to our attention. Judith was a wonderful visionary artist  of archetypes of women and nature, who passed away in 2008. (Our thanks to Lauren Raine and Max Dashu for the reference.) The Encyclopedia of  Women in World Religions: Faith and Culture Across History says that Judith “used womb/vagina imagery explicitly as devotional work dedicated to the goddess.”

In the Dark Speech of Praise and Birth:  The Prints of Judith Anderson 

by Catherine Madsen

“Missa Gaia: This is My Body,” Judith Anderson, etching, 1988

Describing her process of printmaking, Judith said,

“The germ of the idea for a particular print develops over many months or sometimes years. Images from reading, dreams, relationships, pictures, plants and animals will gather and cluster until a beginning form for the print emerges. The main image grows and changes, often in surprising ways, during the long process of working on the plate, which may be several months. Only some time after a print is finished do I come to understand intuitively more about its origins and implications.”  (from Art of the Print website)

Here as well is artist Alicia Blaze Hunsicker’s blog post about Judith.

Virtual Film Festival for Women’s History Month

To commemorate International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month, Women Make Movies (WMM) is hosting a virtual film festival that highlights the new releases in our Transnational Feminist Film collection.

Women Make Movies provides services to filmmakers and educators, and distributes over 700 films by and about women worldwide. WMM has worked with ASWM to bring the best of women’s films to our events and film series.

Throughout March, festival attendees will receive free access to select films about women from around the globe. New films will be added each week and will be available for viewing at no cost for the duration of the festival (March 1 – March 31, 2020).

Our thanks to the women of WMM for bringing us together in this way to celebrate women’s lives this month and every month!

You may sign up here to enjoy the 2020 free films.

Matriarchal Studies Day

facebook.com/ModernMatriarchalStudiesDay

Modern Matriarchal Studies is the “investigation and presentation of non-patriarchal societies”, and matriarchies as “non-hierarchical, horizontal societies of matrilineal kinship”, effectively defining matriarchy as “non-patriarchic matrilineal societies”. Matriarchy is characterized by the sharing of power equally between the two genders, an egalirarian model. – Heide Göttner-Abendroth

Dr. Heide Goettner-Abendroth, the founder of Modern Matriarchal Studies as a branch of feminist anthropology and was a Keynote Speaker at Matriarchal Studies Day 2012, co-sponsored with ASWM.

Matriarchal Studies Day is presented in conjunction with ASWM’s conference, to the benefit of both groups, but registration for this event is not covered by registering for the ASWM Conference. You must register for Matriarchal Studies Day in addition to registration for the ASWM Conference. Early bird registration available, so watch for announcements in January here on the ASWM News blog.

Priestesses of Pele, by Lydia Ruyle

New Bilingual Website:

The Academy HAGIA is pleased to announce its newly created, bilingual website, Matriarchal Studies—Matriarchatsforschung (AHMSM), a unique bibliography of Modern Matriarchal Studies.

matriarchalstudies.com  – Available in English and German (Deutsch)

Read more in ASWM’s News post 8/20/2019

 

Matriarchal Studies Day, Sunday, March 15, 2020

2020 Events were held at the Tamaya Resort and Spa, Santa Ana Pueblo, New Mexico the day immediately following the 2020 ASWM Conference.

Program included

      • an opening welcome by Laura Fragua-Cota
      • video talks by the founding mother of Modern Matriarchal Studies, Heide Gottner-Abendroth, and Gift Economy scholar Genevieve Vaughan

Speakers included

      • Max Dashu
      • Sherri Mitchell
      • Mariam Tazi-Preve
      • Irene Friesen
      • Leilani Birely.

Please visit this page for further additions to our program and watch our Facebook page. For specific questions, contact Joan Cichon, cichon@oakton.edu.

Check out the photos on facebook.com/ModernMatriarchalStudiesDay .

 


Anadolu Twins by Lydia Ruyle
Anadolu Twins by Lydia Ruyle

Anadolu Twins by Lydia Ruyle

Featured Header Image on this page.

A contemporary 36″ x72″ banner based on the gold Twin Goddesses of Alacahuyuk, Turkey, c. 2400 BCE, with Medusa.

Lydia says of this image, “The Anadolu Twins vibrate with the transformational energy of human relationships between parent-child, feminine-masculine, teacher-student, friend-foe, spirit-matter, idea-reality. Nothing in the universe exists in isolation. Everything is in relationship.”

See Lydia’s work at lydiaruyle.com

Matriarchal Studies – Matriarchatsforschung New Bilingual Website

The Academy HAGIA is pleased to announce its newly created, bilingual website, Matriarchal Studies—Matriarchatsforschung (AHMSM), a unique bibliography of Modern Matriarchal Studies.

The Academy HAGIA has been planning the launch of AHMSM for quite some time, and now it is available on internet, in German at: www.matriarchatsforschung.comand in English at: www.matriarchalstudies.com

The Bibliography exhaustively lists all known studies of and commentaries on the subject of matriarchies, from ancient times up to the modern day. Each title mentioned includes a short caption, so that the origin and development of the field of matriarchy can be traced through to the establishment of modern matriarchal studies.

In the first part of AHMSM offers anthropological publications describing matriarchal societies and societies with matriarchal elements worldwide, in Africa, the Americas, Asia, Australia. The second part of the bibliography is dedicated to the history of matriarchal cultures through archaeological publications and the history of cultures, which have contributed to the knowledge about matriarchal societies in history in West Asia and Europe.

 The Oxford University Press (U.S.) first published this comprehensive, English-language bibliography in 2015, with an update published in 2019, the same year that it was translated into German, making this excellent intellectual tool for research on matriarchal societies now accessible in both English and German.

Licensed by Oxford University Press, AHMSM is available, free of charge, as a gift to scholars and people interested in Modern Matriarchal Studies.

Women and Spirituality Conference in Minnesota

38th Annual Women and Spirituality Conference

September 20-22, 2019

Mayo Civic Center, Rochester, MN

The classic women’s spirituality conference.

Keynote: Inanna’s Journey: Letting Ourselves Off the Hook

Presented by Rev. Judith Laxer

Rev. Laxer is the founder of Gaia’s Temple in Seattle, WA, and author of Along the Wheel of Time: Sacred Stories for Nature Lovers [Ravenswood Publishing]

Conference organizers say: “Our purpose is to provide a supportive and nurturing setting for a dialogue of caring and mutual respect between and among people from many spiritual and religious traditions. The conference does not advocate or exclude any view and continues to foster an understanding and celebration of similarities and differences. May we continue to aid one another on our individual and communal spiritual journeys.” Learn more about the conference and register at https://womenandspirituality.org/