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Posts tagged ‘jottings’

  1. Jottings: Reading like a frog, reading like a lion

    “Every journey begins with a single hop.”
    Kermit the frog

    Occasionally I find myself, when trying to approach a subject for writing & reflection – flitting between many different texts. So a couple of weeks ago for instance, I picked up Catherine Bell’s Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice to browse on my morning train ride, glanced at an online article by Lakoff & Johnson at lunchtime, and took in a gulp or two of Jaideva Singh’s translation of the Spanda-Karikas in the evening – all in relation to wanting to articulate a hazy idea related to ritual practice. Continue reading »

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    September 12th 2012

    Posted by in tantra

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  2. Jottings: on defining tantra

    “Not knowing that the truth is situated within one’s Self, the deluded is confused by looking for it in treatises. One whose judgement is so poor is like the shepherd who sees his goat in a well when it is actually already within the flock.”
    Kulanarva Tantra, 1.96

    “the Tantras are generally mere manuals of mysticism, magic, and superstition of the worst and most silly kind.”
    Monier Monier-Williams

    Sometimes, when I do public lectures on tantra, or just natter on to people in the pub or round a campfire, I’m asked to give a “definition” of tantra. This is something that I’m generally reluctant to do, as tantra is such a wide-ranging field, that it’s well-nigh to sum it up in a one-size-fits-all definition. So for this post, I’m going to explore some of the ways that contemporary scholars have attempted to get to grips with the problem of defining tantra. I’d argue that it’s useful to acquaint oneself with these issues, particularly, if, one is drawing on contemporary scholarship on tantra for inspiration and guidance. Continue reading »

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    August 3rd 2012

    Posted by in tantra

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    3 comments »

  3. Jottings: Queer Pagans or Queering Paganisms?

    I’ve been involved in the UK Queer Pagan scene for a number of years now, but whenever I decide to try and write about this, I find myself reflecting on what for me is a core issue – what happens when “Queer” is placed next to Pagan? Continue reading »

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    March 9th 2012

    Posted by in Gender, Pagan, Queer

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    4 comments »

  4. Jottings: talking “energies”

    “Energy” is one of those words which has to do a great deal of work. It has become something of a generic term that gets used in multiple contexts, sometimes to the extent where any exercise/experience which gives rise to sensations or emotions is attributed to an impersonal ‘energy’ being present, moving, flowing, or being blocked, trapped, or stored. Continue reading »

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    February 23rd 2012

    Posted by in Occult, Pagan

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    8 comments »

  5. Jottings: On queering deity

    “The problem is not to discover in oneself the truth of one’s sex, but, rather, to use one’s sexuality henceforth to arrive at a multiplicity of relationships.”
    Michael Foucault

    I’ve been thinking a lot recently about Queer as a form of resistance to identification – a refusal to be categorised or reified into some kind of essential formation. Continue reading »

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    February 10th 2012

    Posted by in Pagan, Queer

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    3 comments »

  6. Jottings: Possession

    Some further musings on “possession” – nothing really thought through here – just some noodling around with ideas which I may come back to later. Continue reading »

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    January 22nd 2010

    Posted by in Occult

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