Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Read This

The Great Witch-Hunt is a major historical event during Early Modern Europe, stretching over three hundred years and spreading from country to country, bringing together members of all classes in hysteria to torture, try, and execute thousands of persons for witchcraft. Feminist writer Silvia Federici, however, notes the lack of knowledge of the witch-hunt in popular culture:

Thus, not only has much been lost concerning our history, but the lesson it could have provided has not been drawn, as has been shown in the current debates concerning the meaning of western civilization, or the conditions of the capitalist take-off in Europe, and finally the relationship between the sexual and the political, or, more precisely, sex, race and class.

Moreover, philosopher Mary Daly points out “except for a few specialists who have made it their field of ‘expertise,’ there has been a policy of almost total erasure, wiping out the witches again and again through subterfuge of silence.” Noted historian Brian Levack stands as perhaps the most recognized voice on the witch-hunt. His book The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe offers an interesting examination of the intersection between history and anthropology, as well as addressing the cumulative concept of witchcraft, pre-conditions of witch hysteria, and the the deep underlying implications of the relationship between class, sex, and religion. In addressing these points, the following themes arise: the Reformation, the Counter-Reformation, the Inquisition, the use of judicial torture, the wars of religion, the religious zeal of the clergy, the rise of the modern state, the development of capitalism, the widespread use of narcotics, changes in medical thought, social and cultural conflict, an attempt to wipe out paganism, the need of the ruling class to distract the masses, and the hatred of women.

P.S. I'm not a witch.

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