Feminist Afterlives of the Witch: Popular Culture, Memory, Activism (Palgrave Studies in (Re)Presenting Gender)

The book investigates the witch as a key rhetorical symbol in twentieth- and twenty-first century feminist memory, politics, activism, and popular culture. The witch demonstrates the inheritance of paradoxical pasts, traversing numerous ideological memoryscapes. This book is an examination of the ways that the witch has been deployed by feminist activists and writers in their political efforts in the twentieth century, and how this has indelibly affected cultural memories of the witch and the witch trials, and how this plays out in popular culture representations of the symbol through the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Consequently, this book considers the relationship between popular culture and media, activist politics, and cultural memory. Using hauntological theories of memory and temporality, and literary, screen, and cultural studies methodologies, this book considers how popular culture remembers, misremembers, and forgets usable pasts, and the uses (and misuses) of these memories for feminist politics. Given the ubiquity of the witch in popular culture, politics and activism since 2016, this book is a timely examination of the range of meanings inherent to the figure, and is an important study of how cultural symbols like the witch inherit paradoxical memories, histories, and politics. The book will be valuable for scholars across disciplines, including witchcraft studies, feminist philosophy and history, memory studies, and popular culture studies. Brydie Kosmina is a Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Adelaide, Australia, in Tarndanya/Adelaide. Her research covers feminist memory, politics and popular culture, and the environmental humanities, particularly nuclear studies. She teaches and lectures in literary, screen and cultural studies. Brydie is a Postgraduate and Early Career Researcher Representative to the Cultural Studies Association of Australasia, and works as an editor, writer and reviewer for indie arts and culture website Collage Adelaide Preface: Witches in 2022 6 Acknowledgements 10 Contents 12 About the Author 15 1 Witch: A Feminist Memory 16 Why Witches? Why Now? 19 Witches and the Divine Feminine 24 Witch Manifestos 26 Witches on the Streets (and the ‘Net) 29 Black Witches 31 Capitalist and Anti-capitalist Witches 34 Queer Witches and Trans-Exclusionary Witches 36 The Beginnings of the Witches 38 Notes 41 Bibliography 46 2 Witches and the Past 50 (The Problem with) Understanding the Early Modern European Witch Trials Through Statistics 52 The Church, the State, and the Witch Hunters: Witchcraft Histories of the Powerful 54 Popular Beliefs, Everyday Life, and the Witch Trials: Witchcraft Histories of the Ordinary 57 Feminist Histories of the Witch Trials 60 From Europe to America 65 Race, Colonialism, and the Frontier in Salem 67 Feminist Histories of Salem 69 Nationalism, Paranoia, and the Literary Salem 71 The Inaccuracies of Witchcraft Pasts 72 Re-remembering the European and American Witch Trials 75 Notes 76 Bibliography 84 3 Witches and the Present 90 Memory and the Past 91 Memory and the Present 92 Memory and Feminism 94 Memory and Activism 95 Memory and Prosthetic Pasts 97 The Inaccuracies of Feminist Memories of the Witch 99 Memory and Narrative 102 Memory, Temporality, Spectres 104 Reading (and Re-reading) as Ghostly Memory Practices 108 Re-remembering the Witch 110 Notes 112 Bibliography 116 4 Witches as Monsters 120 Witches and the Monstrous-Feminine Body 123 Witches and Queer Monstrosity 133 Witches as Monstrous Utopians 140 Monstrosity and the Future 147 Notes 148 Bibliography 154 5 Witches as Lovers 158 Witches Within Regimes of Normality 161 Witches and Covens 168 Witches, Soulmates, and Chosen Families 178 The Witch’s Sexual Futures 185 Notes 186 Bibliography 193 6 Witches as Mothers 197 All About Our Mothers 199 Witches as Anti-Mothers 202 Witches as Mother-Goddesses 206 Witches as Deathly Mothers 212 Birthing the Future 216 Notes 218 Bibliography 223 7 Witches as Girls 227 The Child and the Girl 227 Girlhood, Feminism, Postfeminism 229 Girl Witches and Reproductive Futurity 233 Girl Witches and Girl Power 237 Girl Witches and Cool Feminism 241 Girls and the Future 246 Notes 247 Bibliography 252 8 Witches and the Future 256 Remembering Hope 257 Where to From Here? 261 The Witches Are Coming 264 Notes 267 Bibliography 270 Index 272