{"id":10799,"date":"2019-08-19T12:47:09","date_gmt":"2019-08-19T18:47:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=10799"},"modified":"2019-08-19T12:47:51","modified_gmt":"2019-08-19T18:47:51","slug":"a-new-study-of-solitary-pagans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=10799","title":{"rendered":"A New Study of Solitary Pagans"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Solitary Pagans: Contemporary Witches, Wiccans, and Others Who Practice Alone<\/em><\/a> i<\/em>s a new study from Helen A. Berger, a sociologist of religion who has been studying contemporary Paganism for decades. Her body of work is large enough now that future scholars will be returning to it again and again for its depth.<\/p>\n

It is published by the University of South Carolina Press<\/a>, which says,<\/p>\n

Solitary Pagans<\/em><\/a> is the first book to explore the growing phenomenon of contemporary Pagans who practice alone. Although the majority of Pagans in the United States have abandoned the tradition of practicing in groups, little is known about these individuals or their way of practice. Helen A. Berger fills that gap by building on a massive survey of contemporary practitioners. By examining the data, Berger describes solitary practitioners demographically and explores their spiritual practices, level of social engagement, and political activities. Contrasting the solitary Pagans with those who practice in groups and more generally with other non-Pagan Americans, she also compares contemporary U.S. Pagans with those in the United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada.<\/p>\n

Berger brings to light the new face of contemporary paganism by analyzing those who learn about the religion from books or the Internet and conduct rituals alone in their gardens, the woods, or their homes. Some observers believe this social isolation and political withdrawal has resulted in an increase in narcissism and a decline in morality, while others argue to the contrary that it has produced a new form of social integration and political activity. Berger posits the implications of her findings to reveal a better understanding of other metaphysical religions and those who shun traditional religious organizations.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Prof. Berger has authored or co-authored a number of books on contemporary Paganism, including A Community of Witches: Contemporary Neo-Paganism and Witchcraft in the United States<\/a><\/em> (1999),\u00a0 Voices from the Pagan Census: A National Survey of Witches and Neo-Pagans in the United State<\/em>s<\/a> (2003), Teenage Witches: Magical Youth and the Search for Self<\/a><\/em> (2007), Witchcraft and Magic: Contemporary North America <\/em><\/a>(2005).<\/p>\n

In addition, she has mentored a number of younger social scientists studying contemporary Paganism (and other things) as well as having served on the steering committee for Contemporary Pagan Studies<\/a> within the American Academy of Religion.<\/p>\n

I will be looking to find this book at the AAR-SBL book show in November and will probably come home with a copy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Solitary Pagans: Contemporary Witches, Wiccans, and Others Who Practice Alone is a new study from Helen A. Berger, a sociologist of religion who has been studying contemporary Paganism for decades. Her body of work is large enough now that future scholars will be returning to it again and again for its depth. It is published […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[137,299,5,7,4,6],"class_list":["post-10799","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-academia","tag-pagan-studies","tag-paganism","tag-publishing","tag-scholarship","tag-wicca"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-2Ob","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":10197,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=10197","url_meta":{"origin":10799,"position":0},"title":"“Solitary Pagans,” a New Academic Study","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"February 4, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Back in the mid-1990s, Nancy Mostad, then the acquisitions editor at Llewellyn, told me that they estimated that 70 percent of purchasers of books on Paganism were solitaries.Hence the immense success -- by their standards -- of Scott Cunningham's Wicca: A Guide for the Solitary Practitioner. Meanwhile, sociologist of religion\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"American religion\"","block_context":{"text":"American religion","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=american-religion"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12836,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12836","url_meta":{"origin":10799,"position":1},"title":"CFP: Pagan Studies Conference at Masaryk University","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"April 11, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"Paganism and its Others 13-14 June 2022 Masaryk University, Faculty of Arts, Brno, Czechia The Department for the Study of Religions at Masaryk University invites your participation in a conference on the overall theme of \u201cPaganism and its Others\u201d to be held in Brno, Czechia, 13-14 June, 2022, with in-person\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"academia\"","block_context":{"text":"academia","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=academia"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12603,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12603","url_meta":{"origin":10799,"position":2},"title":"Interview with Helen Berger, Leading Scholar of Paganism","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"November 19, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"At his blog, now called On New and Alternative Religions, Ethan Doyle While interviews Helen Berger, one of the leading American scholars of contemporary Paganism. Since completing her PhD research on the early modern witch trials in the 1980s, Berger has devoted her career to the sociological analysis of modern-day\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"academia\"","block_context":{"text":"academia","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=academia"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/helen-berger.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":8262,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8262","url_meta":{"origin":10799,"position":3},"title":"Call for Papers: Family, Home, and Ways of Life: Living Paganisms in a Globalized World","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"September 19, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Information on the upcoming Family, Home, and Ways of Life: Living Paganisms in a Globalized World conference in Krakow, Poland, 24-25 March 2017, may be found at this link. Presentations may address various issues within the following (suggested) topics: Everyday life of contemporary Pagans Understanding human relationships: from till death\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Paganism\"","block_context":{"text":"Paganism","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=paganism"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7277,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=7277","url_meta":{"origin":10799,"position":4},"title":"TV Pagans Looking Good \u2013 or at Least Better","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"June 13, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"From the abstract to Robert A. Saunder's paper \"Primetime Paganism: Popular-Culture Representations of Europhilic Polytheism in Game of Thrones and Vikings,\" reprinted at Medievalists.net, in which he argues two points: First, that traditional filmic treatments of pagans [sic] qua villains is shifting, with contemporary popular culture allowing for more nuanced\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Paganism\"","block_context":{"text":"Paganism","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=paganism"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2988,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=2988","url_meta":{"origin":10799,"position":5},"title":"The Wanton Green\u2014Both Book and Blog","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 4, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Adrian Harris describes a new Pagans-and-place publishing project, The Wanton Green. For many contemporary Pagans the relationship between bodymind and place is fundamental, but that\u00a0relationship has\u00a0rarely been explored in any depth. Paganism is often\u00a0described\u00a0as being\u00a0polytheistic, animist or about \u2018nature\u00a0worship\u2019, and while that\u2019s all true in a vague and\u00a0anodyne way, it\u2019s\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"animism\"","block_context":{"text":"animism","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=animism"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10799","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10799"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10799\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10805,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10799\/revisions\/10805"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10799"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10799"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10799"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}