Paper short abstract:

The colloquial usage of the term "witch" often conjures up ideas of the historical witch trials, folkloric archetypes, radical feminists, or individuals who practice Neopagan "nature" religions like Wicca. In my paper, I apply a cultural model framework to add complexity to this understanding.

Paper long abstract:

Historically, being accused of witchcraft meant death (Baker, 2015; Demos, 2008; Ehrenreich & English, 2010). More recently, identifying as a witch means living with an often concealed and stigmatized identity, which can lead to increased subjective anxiety (Reece, 2016). Despite the persistence of and the potential deleterious effects that accompany stigmatization, individuals are increasingly self-identifying as witches (Fearnow, 2018). Motivations for this remain unclear due to the narrower inquiry of extant research in which witches are often styled as white, suburbanite, middle-class, college-educated, “nature worshipping” individuals who are predominately female (Adler, 1986; Berger, 2003; Cyr, 2019; Lewis and Tollefsen, 2013; Magliocco, 2004.). This description stems from concentrated foci on either the sociopolitical underpinnings and psychosocial benefits of witchcraft as a “feminist spirituality” or on more bounded, European-rooted “Neopagan” sects, such as Gardnerian Wicca, that do not represent the majority and, in turn, the diversity of currently practicing witches. While partially accurate, this omnipresent understanding of identity, beliefs, and practices largely excludes the perspectives of witches of color, as well as those from male and gender fluid witches. In the summer of 2020, I conducted exploratory, ethnographic interviews among a diverse group of witches in New Orleans, Louisiana. In this paper, I apply a cultural model framework to my data and incorporate intersectional, practice, and globalization theory in order to both introduce a more temporally appropriate, finer grained understanding of witches as well as a means to explore possible motivations driving the sustained, enigmatic appeal of identifying as such.