Venus spotted in this year's Swansea Pride March

In ancient times the goddesses Venus and Aphrodite were significantly involved many aspects of life - including politics! Aphrodite was also particularly associated with gender diversity and same-gender sexuality (look at her bearded or phallic iconography, her son with Hermes, Hermaphoditus, and her association with Sappho). 

Shown above is a photo taken at an LGBT+ Pride Parade in Swansea, Wales (UK), where representatives of the local Pagan community march with an image of Venus.

Clearly, her modern devotees are recalling these traditions, calling upon Venus as an ally to LGBT+ people in protest and celebration.

This is something that I discuss in my case study chapter on Aphrodite.

Entering the Fourth & Final Year

This research is now in its fourth and final year and so, as of the 10th January 2023, opportunities for participants to get involved have now closed.

This year will be spent writing up my conclusions, collating data from the questionnaires, and general formatting. I am also working on a chapter for the upcoming edited volume, Persephone in Love, writing about the reception of the Persephone-Hades pairing in Goddess Spirituality. Although Persephone has not been a goddess central to my thesis, much of the content of this chapter has been informed through peripheral study and through the key interpretative lenses of Goddess Spirituality (discussed in my first chapter). So this is what I will be focusing on now, alongside completing the final stage of the thesis.

I am extremely grateful to everyone who has responded to questionnaires and interview questions, shared images with me, and welcomed me to attend online ceremonies for passive participant observation. I hope that you will find the thesis affirming, challenging, and enlightening.

Feminine Power Exhibition

Over the last year or so I have had the honour of working with the British Museum alongside the Children of Artemis as a community consultant for the Feminine Power: divine to the demonic exhibition. Together we met with the curatorial team to provide insights for the section entitled, 'Magic and Malice', which drew specific attention to the fear of women's magic and witches during the Middle Ages.

Olivia Ciaccia standing in front of the exhibit
containing thanks to the CoA consultants

 

 

I plan to incorporate some highlights about the exhibition and receptions from the visiting Goddess devotees into my Tangible Heritage thesis chapter. In the meantime I have written a short blog post about the exhibition for Mainly Museums, which you can read here.

What have I been up to these last months?

As the chaos of the winter holiday and new year draw to a close (hopefully!) I thought it was appropriate to provide some updates about what I have been up to over the Autumn and Winter past.

- Following on from my trip to Greece at the end of September 2021 - where my partner and I consumed as much history 10 days would allow - I spent October finalising my Round 3 questionnaire and passing the ethics review before sharing it with potential respondents (Round 3: https://forms.office.com/r/90jCVUTKMn). 

- In October I submitted an article to the Children of Artemis's Witchcraft & Wicca magazine. Here I outlined my study and invited readers to participate. (At the time of writing I thought I would be unable to include my Sekhmet chapter in the thesis - but since realised that I can!) I also submitted an small advert to the Pagan Federation's Samhain issue of Pagan Dawn magazine.

Article in issue 36 of Witchcraft & Wicca magazine.

- In November I received peer reviewer and editor comments for an article I submitted to the Pomegranate Journal back in December 2020. I spent this month implementing the comments and suggestions, and ended up editing more than I had anticipated.

- Thanks to the Keil Scholarship award, of which I am a recipient, I was able to partake in an online course by GIRES entitled 'Introduction to Digital Humanities'. It is my hope that such courses will upskill me for a future career in the heritage industry.

- December was primarily occupied with personal matters and the winter holidays.

- This January I have been editing the final draft of my chapter for the Women in Classical Video Games edited volume, following peer reviewer and editor comments. Happily, I submitted this today!

This week I am due to submit documentation for my second Annual Progress Monitoring (APM), supporting my continued PhD candidature. As soon as February arrives I will be returning my full attention to the thesis itself. My next steps are:

• Reach out to more Goddess Communities, feminist and organisations, and religious studies organisations, advertising the project and questionnaires.
• Make progress on my reading list for Chapter 6 (Engagement with Heritage & Scholars).
• Start drafting paragraphs into Chapter 6.
  

 

Call for Questionnaire Responses

 

 

 

Round 1: https://forms.office.com/r/s3acd2MvvJ

Round 2: https://forms.office.com/r/wHqrjKRn35

Round 3: https://forms.office.com/r/90jCVUTKMn

Cover reveal for 'Women in Classical Video Games'

I am absolutely thrilled to share the cover for the forthcoming volume, Women in Classical Video Games, edited by Jane Draycott and Kate Cook (published by Bloomsbury Classical Studies & Archaeology).

Every chapter sounds fascinating to me and I cannot wait to read through! It is also where my debut (scholarly) publication will appear, in a chapter entitled: 'Opening Pandora's Box: Aphrodite as the representation of women's sexuality in God of War III'. Once published, I will share details for ordering the book.

 

Sekhmet chapter re-introduced into the main thesis

A few months back I reluctantly decided to remove my Sekhmet chapter from the main thesis, owing to word count, resigning myself to publish it separately. However, this week my partner and fellow PhD student Thomas Husøy sat down with me and realised that I had miscounted and had plenty of room remaining! (I don't know how I had got it so wrong...). So, Sekhmet is back in the thesis and I am now plotting the course of my final chapter: Engagement with Heritage & Scholars. The discussions on tensions and mutually beneficial relationships will be partly featured here and in the thesis conclusions.

My revised thesis plan is now thus:

     1. Introduction (part-drafted)
     2. The Reception of Ancient Goddesses ✔
     3. Case Study: Aset-Isis ✔
     4. Case Study: Aphrodite (case study)✔
     5. Case Study: Sekhmet ✔
     6. Engagement with Heritage & Scholars (in process)
                                                                        7. Conclusions (not started)

Today I also officially sent off my final questionnaire for ethics review. Once it is accepted all 3 questionnaires will be available to participants, and I have created nice adverts for the occasion!

Updates so far

I have now submitted three/four thesis chapter drafts to my supervisors, with one more to write before I tackle my introduction and conclusion!

• 1. Introduction (part-drafted)
• 2. The Reception of Ancient Goddesses ✔
• 3. Isis (case study) ✔
• 4. Aphrodite (case study)✔
• 5. Towards a Mutually Beneficial Relationship (in process)
• 6. Conclusions (not started)
  

I have one more questionnaire to release for my upcoming section 5, where I am going to delve deeper into the sources of tension between Goddess devotees, scholars, and heritage professionals, and suggestions from each community for moving towards a more mutually beneficial relationship. This questionnaire will be focused on devotee engagement with heritage sites and museums.

My previous two questionnaires will remain open until the start of my final editing process (expected January 2023), so please do continue sharing them!

So far I have had the privilege to interview 21 devotees through video call and email, and have had around 200 questionnaire responses. I still welcome more interviewees, as well as photographic submissions of altars and GS material culture.

Isis at Marathon, Greece

 

Some of you may be wondering what has happened with my third case study on Sekhmet: owing to a limited word count, however, this will need to be published in the eventual thesis monograph (fingers crossed) and/or edited for submission to an academic journal. I very much enjoyed writing that chapter, and had some great responses from Sekhmet devotees - so I promise, this will still be published, though separate to the thesis.

In other news, I have just returned from a week in Greece, spent with my partner exploring as many heritage sites and museums as we could! I will endeavour to share some of my highlights on this blog in due course - especially those relating to Greek goddesses.

I have also signed for a training course this November, focused on Digital Heritage, which I am sure will be of benefit to my ethnographic research, as well as future career prospects.

For now, onto the next chapter!

Seeking Goddess Questionnaire Respondents

My name is Olivia and I am a PhD student at the University of Bristol, researching how adherents of Goddess Spirituality revive ancient Mediterranean and Egyptian goddesses in the 21st century. My goal is to determine ways that we can build a mutually beneficial dialogue between Goddess devotees and scholars of the ancient world. With this, I aim to include different perspectives and experiences within Anglo-American Goddess Spirituality, from people of various ethnicities, sexual orientations, genders, and physical abilities.

If you,

1. Identify with Goddess Spirituality, 
2. Engage in Goddess communities in the UK or US
3. And engage with ancient Mediterranean Goddesses

then I invite you to respond to my thesis questionnaires!

Round 1 is about your spiritual path (in Goddess Spirituality) and how you came to learn about ancient Goddesses: https://forms.office.com/r/s3acd2MvvJ

Round 2 is for those who engage with Aphrodite, Aset-Isis, and/or Sekhmet: https://forms.office.com/r/wHqrjKRn35

You can also request a posted hard copy or a digital download by emailing me at: hg19310@bristol.ac.uk .

Modern altar featuring a replica figurine of a statue of Isis
found in Pompeii

Round 2 Questionnaire available!

The time has come for Round 2 of my thesis research on Anglo-American Goddess Spirituality in the 21st Century! This time it focuses on the modern veneration of APHRODITE, ASET-ISIS, and SEKHMET. You can respond to it through this link:

https://forms.office.com/r/wHqrjKRn35 

Or you can also request a downloadable digital copy / a paper copy in the post by emailing me: hg19310@bristol.ac.uk

You can also still respond to the Round 1 questionnaire here (the more the merrier!).

To participate in this research, you should fulfil the following:

You are based in the UK or the US (regardless of your nationality), OR you frequently engage with a Goddess Spirituality community in these locations.
You identify with ‘Goddess Spirituality’

And your spiritual path involves the goddesses, Aphrodite (and Venus), Aset-Isis, or Sekhmet.

There are other ways to get involved with my research too! Check on this blog page.

 

Pagan Federation 50th Anniversary

This is just a quick message to say that I will be speaking for the Academic Conference part of the Pagan Federation's 50th Anniversary, on the 24th July 2021!

For information about the event please check here: https://www.paganfed.org/50th-anniversary-celebrations/

Event trailer