Category: The Archive

Yuria Celidwen

I am a native of Chiapas (Mexico), where life is ardent, impetuous and fierce; magic abounds and life swells. Yet, despite being such a lush natural area, the conditions of life can be very hard. Fight-or-flight is much of the daily bread, so I grew up aware of the fragility of life, learning to truly enjoy the present moment. This led me to ponder ways to care for myself and all others, through the cultivation of kindness, wisdom and compassion. I aim to improve the quality of life of all beings, starting by acknowledging and taming my own shadow, and then helping others do the same. I know our conditioning can be transformed to one of cooperation and growth. Through the study of mythology and mysticism, it has become evident to me that a tension between opposites is necessary for creation to arise. My aim is to awaken consciousness to the holiness of everyday life, in order to be of conscious service, respecting the natural world and our natural being, for the benefit of the world we share.

Yuria is a Mexican PHD candidate in mythology and depth psychology at Pacifica Graduate Institute.  She is a graduate from the Four Year Program in Sustainable Happiness and the Contemplative Psychotherapy Program  from the Nalanda Institute for Contemplative Sciences.

“To create stories of atonement and empowerment, one has to converge seemingly opposite views of life: suffering and hope, shadow and psychic awareness, abuse and respect.”

Her paper, Tonantzin Coatlicue Guadalupe: Christian Symbolism, Colonization and Social Justice, reconciles these polarizations through the image of the Mexican icon of the Lady of Guadalupe as a symbol of the dispossessed, a shadow of conditioning for colonization, a relation to Aztec goddess Tonantzin Coatlicue, and an emblem for atonement.

Kate Brunner

Kate Brunner is a writer, healer, ritualist, & member of The Sisterhood of Avalon, where she currently serves as Hearthkeeper Matron on the Council of Nine. She is also Project Co-Weaver and a permanent contributor at the Feminism and Religion Blog Project. Her writings appear in Paganism 101: An Introduction to Paganism by 101 Pagans and the forthcoming Goddess in America anthology, both from Moon Books. She holds a BA from Tulane University, where she studied Economics, International Relations, & Religious Traditions.

Kate is a presenter for Red Tents & women’s retreats. She also hosts seasonal women’s gatherings, facilitates labyrinth & rite of passage rituals, and leads workshops on an assortment of women’s spirituality topics. During 2016, in addition to presenting at the Association for the Study of Women and Mythology Conference, she will also be teaching at the inaugural Ninefold Festival in Orange, CT.

She will be bringing two of the Ladies of the Mabinogion to life at ASWM this year with a writing workshop, Becoming Branwen the Peaceweaver and a presentation  “Rhiannon, Great Queen of the Mabinogi” on the panel, Women’s Spirituality, Transformative Scholarship and Personal Quest.
“Goddess myths endure because of their sustainable relevance to our internal & external lives. Paradoxically, understanding the cultural context that birthed Goddess myths actually helps us to better grasp their relevance to us as modern practitioners of Goddess spirituality, feminism, & activism. Threads of the struggle for social justice run through many of our ancient & medieval Goddess mythologies, patiently waiting for us to spin them out and reweave them back into modern context. These are the sacred texts of our collective Goddess traditions. As such, they deserve careful scholastic exegesis followed by mindful modern eisegesis in order to grasp their full power in the modern age.”  

Małgorzata Oleszkiewicz-Peralba, PhD

I was born in Poland, and spent my childhood both in Warsaw and in Montevideo, Uruguay, visiting many other countries in Europe, Africa, and Latin America. During my adult years I lived in Poland, Peru, and New York, with extensive stays in Brazil, Mexico, and Spain, and for the last 20 years I have resided in San Antonio, teaching at the University of Texas. Thus, since childhood I have been exposed to different cultures and languages that became the subject of my cultural and linguistic studies and my passion. My cross-cultural, women-centered interests have been reflected in my numerous presentations and articles around the world in six languages, as well as in my two recent books, The Black Madonna in Latin America and Europe: Tradition and Transformation (UNMP) and Fierce Feminine Divinities of Eurasia and Latin America: Baba Yaga, Kali, Pombagira, and Santa Muerte (Palgrave). I am proud to have been able to bridge the rigors of academia with my research centered on the divine feminine, and to have recently been promoted to Full Professor as the first female faculty member ever at the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures at UTSA.

Malgorzata’s presentation is entitled, Liminality, Transgression, and Feminine Empowerment: The Case of Kali and Pombagira:

“Kali–an Indian goddess—and Pombagira—a female trickster entity from the Brazilian Umbanda religion–are surprisingly similar. They both represent the concepts of liminality, outsiderhood and structural inferiority, embodied in the divine feminine. They are strong, independent, unrestrained, and full of magical powers, including power over sexuality, transformation, and death. In fact, they are the opposite of what has been promoted as the model for western females in the last millennium, with traits such as motherliness, docility, humility, passivity, and obedience.  Conversely, they are untamed feminine divinities that are powerful, fiercely independent, childless, courageous, and wise.”

 

Ingrid Kincaid

Ingrid is an “irreverent wise woman.” Her work as an author, teacher and ritualist is deeply rooted in the wisdom traditions of pre-Christian, Northern Europe. Ingrid is dedicated to reawakening connection with our ancestors and the neglected myths of indigenous Norse and Germanic tribes. Her latest book, The Runes Revealed – an (un) familiar journey, challenges its readers to remove the distorted lens of patriarchal interpretation and start viewing history, archeology and mythology with new eyes.

In order to find refuge in our histories we need to hear our stories told in our own voices, not in the voices of men. In order to find safe harbor in our stories they must be meaningful and relevant to the lives we live today.

Ingrid’s presentation for the 2016 conference is entitled “Playing By Your Own Rules When The Gods Cheat:  The Saga Of Skadi  – How A Strong-willed, Independent Norse Giantess Found Safe Harbor By Claiming What Was Rightfully Hers”

“The saga of Skadi is both ancient and modern. It’s the tale of a giantess who was willing to rebel against the system, demand retribution for injustice and lay claim to her rightful inheritance.  She made choices that were strategic and far-sighted and choose divorce rather than settling for anything less than her own happiness.  Skadi is an example of freedom and independence, and yet there are parts of her story that beg to be reexamined and retold. ”  

 

Meagan Miller

A few years ago a doctor friend mentioned to me that 90% of all women are unhappy with their breasts. Although I knew I was part of that percentage, the magnitude of the number stunned me.  My thoughts immediately went to the women in my life who were struggling with their breasts.  

Some had body image issues, others grappled with breastfeeding woes, and still others had cysts or cancer.  Suddenly I realized that what I had been thinking of as strictly personal was actually a large-scale issue. It was therefore essential that the women feel they had nothing to hide, and that they feel connected to their bodies.

My goal for The Breast Archives was to invoke women’s wisdom regarding their breasts, to invite it out of hiding.  

 

https://youtu.be/oinueiSa2RY

Meagan Murphy is a firm believer that social transformation can be achieved through courageous storytelling. With 25+ years of experience in film and broadcast, Meagan has earned a Communicator’s Award for her work with teens and a Medical Journalism Fellowship through Blue Cross Blue Shield. While at PBS-WGBY, she contributed to and oversaw several award-winning series. Her film repertoire includes Night Deposit, Fathers & Sons, and Victor’s Big Score. She also completed a 2-year women’s spirituality program and is trained as a girls’ mentor. In 2012, Meagan formed Deliberate Healing Productions LLC in order to The Breast Archives, a film about body-based wisdom and the complex, un-discussed relationship women have with their breasts. Ms. Murphy is a member of the Easthampton Arts Council, Women in Film & Video, The Independent Documentary Association, eWomen and Women Business Owners Alliance.

 

Meagan will participate in our Film and Filmmakers Roundtable at the conference, bringing the trailer for The Breast Archives. You will also see her videotaping the keynote presentations and authors’ panel.

Grief is a universal human condition, frequently dismissed or avoided in modern culture. Yet, when confronted, grief can lead to wisdom and strength. In the spirit of shamanic scholarship, this panel explores the passage through sacred suffering, a shared human and divine experience that fosters intimate compassion and hope as safe harbor in turbulent waters. From the wellspring of emotion where mothers’ tears gather, wisdom is drawn. The rapture of an embodied, wholehearted encounter with grief is captured in ritual, re-imagination, and remembering.

Stephanie Zajchowski:

Birthing my sons was the beginning and end of me. As I poured all that I was into the child within my arms, the light of new life intertwined with the darkness of postpartum depression. Maternity, for me, was an erasure, the shattering of an empty vessel, an utter loss of self. In my search for understanding, mythology allowed me to integrate these experiences, ultimately containing the “mother” without letting her consume me.

Jaffa Frank:

For me, motherhood and loss are as inextricably linked as motherhood and joy. My first pregnancy ended in the stillbirths of my twin sons and my own near death due to complications of endometriosis. My life—the mothering of my living children, service to the dying and bereaved through hospice, therapeutic work, and doctoral work—are dedicated to making space for the truth of loss as inherent to and formative of a life of joy.

Angelina Avedano:

Mothering three sons for thirty years, I’ve learned that grieving is natural and necessary. The cycles of loss associated with my son’s schizophrenia and bipolar disorder have become a part of the rhythm of my life. As I tread the path of the grieving mother, I am not defined by grief; I am however, forever changed. This ongoing spiral brings unexpected connections, deeper wisdom, and an awareness that I can truly embrace joy and sorrow.

Kayden Baker-McInnis:

After losing my toddler in a car accident, I still grieve thirty years later. That tragedy continues to mold me. The thawing of my grief brings me to a fierce compassion and curiosity for how sorrow informs the soul. I find engaging mythic story a way through these dark passages. When I finally brought my grief to the Utah desert canyons, nature responded. Today, mothering the soul is at the heart of everything I do.

Betsy Crane

Betsy Crane leads workshops that are interactive and enlightening.  She is Professor, Center for Human Sexuality Studies, Widener University, Chester, PA. She was Director of Graduate Programs in Human Sexuality at Widener from 2007-2012.  Previously she worked for 17 years as a sexuality educator, first as a public health family planning outreach worker, then as Education Director and later Executive Director for Planned Parenthood in Ithaca, NY. She is co-editor of Sexual Lives: A Reader on the Theories and Realities of Human Sexualities (Heasley & Crane, McGraw-Hill, 2003). Her research interests include history of gendered sexuality and shifting gender and sexual identities.

Designated as Distinguished University Professor, 2014-17 by Widener University for outstanding teaching, scholarship, and service, she is past president of the Foundation for the Scientific Study of Sexuality and of the Eastern Region of the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality.

Today’s gender norms emerged from the last 7,000 to 10,000 years of patriarchal social arrangements that legitimated sexual and physical violence against women and subverted women’s ability to support themselves without men. But what about the time before gender relations pivoted so heavily toward male dominance? Based on the work of goddess history scholars, e.g. Eisler & Gimbutas, participants in this workshop will experience a trip to a “pre-history” where our ancestors conceptualized the supreme power in the universe as a female.

During this time girls would have seen their bodies and social roles in relation to a creative, powerful, and deeply mystical feminine creator. Boys saw themselves in terms of the ‘horned god,’ a passionate and embodied force of nature who was lover and ally to the goddess. What might all this mean for us today? Join the conversation.

Betsy’s 2016 conference workshop is Implications of the Goddess for Gendered Sexuality: Then and Now

 

Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum

Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum, Professor Emerita, Women’s Spirituality, CIIS, joins ASWM’s 2016 conference to deliver Saturday’s keynote address, “Women as Visionaries and Healers.”

Known to her students as LuLu Nanna (grandma) and Strega Nonna (witch grandmother), Lucia’s groundbreaking research in Black Madonnas: Feminism, Religion, and Politics in Italy was followed by She is Everywhere: Anthology of Writings in Womanist/Feminist Spirituality, edited with Annette Williams, Karen Villanueva, and The Future has an Ancient Heart: Caring, Sharing, Healing from the African Mediterranean to Occupy Everywhere.

“In a time of unprecedented peril (global heating, perpetual war, nuclear danger, moral disarray) I am a great grandmother who can not afford to be hopeless.”

“ My research, books, and life suggest that even when there is no evidence for hope, there may be possibilities we can not see. These possibilities are related to every human’s origin in Africa—we are all ultimately sisters and brothers, a legacy of human migrations after 60,000 BCE to all continents out of Africa—caring, sharing, healing—otherwise we would not have survived to now. A kaleidoscopic dance of our genes in loving encounters creating a highly multicultural world in an open-ended universe.”

Lucia is dedicating her offerings this year to ASWM sister scholar, artist, and dear friend, Lydia Ruyle, who is, today, critically ill.

Citing Lydia’s inspiration, Lucia explains, “Lydia has been significant in my life, personally and professionally. She helped me through the searing time when I was unable to present to the ASWM 2012 conference because my husband Wally was dying. In my conflict with my publisher over the cover of The Future Has an Ancient Heart, Lydia saved the book with her banner of Cybele, African and West Asian dark mother for the front cover. Recently she honored me by dedicating her banner, La Befana, to me, depicting me as witch grandmother (strega nonna) who brings gifts to all children, whether they’re naughty or nice. She called her banners, “my girls,” suggesting the reflexive nurturing she conveyed in the banners she painted and sewed. And showed all over the world, touching thousands, if not millions of women while conveying her early aphorism, “Better Homes and Goddesses”. . . in all the wonderful diversity of the world’s women and their homes.”

All of us in ASWM share in Lucia’s love and concern for Lydia, who is a dear mentor and friend to many of us on the board.

The Friday networking luncheon features an opportunity for conversation with Lucia at her table: “Strega Nonna – Witch Grandmother.”

Additionally, Lucia will present at our sister gathering, the Matriarchal Studies Day, on Thursday night, March 31: Modern Matriarchies, where she is the keynote and closing speaker, discussing her newest manuscript, “Black Bird and a Pear Tree.”