I’ve got another series of virtual classes coming up at Catland Books NYC! For more information and to purchase tickets, follow the links below.
January 8 - Ozark Folk Magic 101 @ Catland Books (Virtual)
Time: 6-8pm (Central) 7-9pm (Eastern)
A general overview of folk magic rites, rituals, and spells, from an Ozark point of view. A great class for beginner witches and folk magicians as well as seasoned practitioners wanting to brush up on their foundational practices and considerations. Specific areas that this class will cover include:
Foundational Ozark worldview and the relationship between humans and magic.
Interactions between the Human Realm and the Otherworld.
Magical considerations that form the basis for Ozark rituals e.g. auspicious timing, locations, and repurposing household objects for magic and healing.
Materia of Ozark folk magic with a focus on plants and non-plant-based ingredients, tools, and other items.
Each topic will include practical guidance as well as rites and rituals specially formulated for this class.
All classes are recorded. A link to the recording is sent out to the ticketholders the day after each event. These links stay active for 30 days.
January 15 - Ozark Bible Magic @ Catland Books (Virtual)
Time: 6-8pm (Central) 7-9pm (Eastern)
Along with the almanac, the Bible was often the only book owned by Ozark hillfolk until the modern era. At one point in our past, the Bible was the source not only of spiritual teachings, but also a combination reading primer, divinatory system, and spell book.
We will be looking at the position the Bible has held in Ozark traditions of healing and folk magic. In many cases, hillfolk families might not have had a spiritual connection to the Bible but still recognized the text as a valuable text for working magic in the world. We will be looking at verses and passages that have long histories of use in the Ozarks for specific purposes like healing, protection, retribution (or cursing), as well as love and money magic. We’ll also look at rituals that have developed amongst hillfolk using these biblical texts as well as using the Bible itself as a divinatory tool as well as a protective amulet.
All classes are recorded. A link to the recording is sent out to the ticketholders the day after each event. These links stay active for 30 days.
January 22 - Twelve Houses of Healing @ Catland Books (Virtual)
Time: 6-8pm (Central) 7-9pm (Eastern)
The figure of the “Man of Signs” or “Zodiac Man” serves as a foundational guide for most traditions of Ozark healing and magic. This figure was often committed to memory, but could also be found in the home almanac (and it is still printed in the major farmers’ almanacs today.) In Ozark healing theory, the primary effect of illnesses (physical or magical) is that they force the Twelve Houses of the body and their associated signs out of balance. This creates disharmony and manifests as bodily symptoms. Bringing the body back to equilibrium is therefore the main goal of the traditional healer. The main tools in their satchel are divinatory methods aimed at finding the exact location (Zodiac House) where the illness or hex is rooted in the body. Knowing this then provides a plethora of correspondences that can be “countered” as part of the healing process.
We will be looking specifically at the role of the twelve bodily houses in the healing process, how healers and magical practitioners diagnose these houses, and methods for correcting imbalances in the houses using elemental and zodiac correspondences.
All classes are recorded. A link to the recording is sent out to the ticketholders the day after each event. These links stay active for 30 days.
January 29 - Ozark Plant Magic @ Catland Books (Virtual)
Time: 6-8pm (Central) 7-9pm (Eastern)
The Ozark region is prized for its biodiversity and at times throughout history has even been targeted by researchers and herbalists alike because of its many healing plants. In this class, we will look at the most important plants for Ozark practitioners, both for their medicinal and magical values. We’ll examine how the relationship between practitioner and plant spirits have developed into the modern area. And of course, we’ll take a look at specific traditional herbal remedy recipes from the region as well as a few spells using amazing mountain botanicals like the “Holy Trinity” of Ozark plants: red cedar (Juniperus virginiana), sassafras (Sassafras albidum), and tobacco (Nicotiana spp.).
All classes are recorded. A link to the recording is sent out to the ticketholders the day after each event. These links stay active for 30 days.
February 5 - Ozark Love Magic @ Catland Books (Virtual)
Time: 6-8pm (Central) 7-9pm (Eastern)
A controversial area of magic, even amongst traditional folk healers and magicians. In the Ozarks, love magic was once as necessary as work for healing and fortune. Today, love magic continues to pique the interest of those looking to folk magic practitioners for help. Ozark hillfolk have both inherited as well as developed a rich relationship with magical practices aimed at the heart. Everything from divination rituals to locate your true love, to fashioning love-drawing (or sex-drawing) amulets, to ritual methods of healing, binding, and breaking relationships.
We will look at Ozark love magic divided into three main categories of 1) divination 2) amulets, and 3) ritual work. We will be looking at specific spells and methods from both the much older folk record as well as how modern practitioners have approached and evolved love magic today.
All classes are recorded. A link to the recording is sent out to the ticketholders the day after each event. These links stay active for 30 days.
February 12 - Ozark Witches: Fact & Fiction @ Catland Books (Virtual)
Time: 6-8pm (Central) 7-9pm (Eastern)
Witchcraft has occupied a controversial position in the Ozarks since the first white settlers came to the region in the early 1800s. For many, there is a firm separation between the role of the witch, who is said to always do harm, and the healer, who is said to always do good. Many other magical practitioners of the past and present have occupied a much more neutral area and have used their gifts to both give and take away. For these individuals, the role of the healer or gifted individual in the community is likened to nature itself, which exists outside our human conceptualizations of “good” and “evil.”
We will examine the many sides of this complicated story, from the point of view of proud witches themselves to the old tall tales and legends about broom-riding grannies and child-stealing hags. We'll try and separate some facts from the fiction and even throw in a spell or two you can use at home.
All classes are recorded. A link to the recording is sent out to the ticketholders the day after each event. These links stay active for 30 days.
February 19 - Ozark Graveyard Magic @ Catland Books (Virtual)
Time: 6-8pm (Central) 7-9pm (Eastern)
The graveyard has always been an important part of Ozark folk magic traditions. In the old days, this was where a witch could be born from an ordinary human and where the “veil” between worlds was constantly thin. Graveyards aren’t just for the spooky ritualist, however, and have traditionally been a site for the work of Ozark healers as well. For many mountain practitioners, historic and modern, healing work includes not just serving the living but also the dead. These shades often figure as guides, guardians, patrons, and ancestral helpers in many healer stories as well as aids in the process of healing or “elevating” the restless dead as well.
We will be examining Ozark folklore situated in the graveyard as well as look at some of the many ways healers and other magical practitioners have incorporated this all-important work with the dead into their own lives and rituals.
All classes are recorded. A link to the recording is sent out to the ticketholders the day after each event. These links stay active for 30 days.
February 26 - Ozark Spirit Archetypes @ Catland Books (Virtual)
Time: 6-8pm (Central) 7-9pm (Eastern)
Ozark verbal charms and prayers often invoke archetypal figures as helping spirits in the work at hand. These archetypes are seen as being far more predictable in their correspondences than individual spirit entities, who often have their own goals and desires that might not align with the magical practitioner’s. Some of these spirits are metaphorical individuals, for example, invoking the figure of Prosperity in a ritual seeking aid for the success of a business or job. Others are figures found throughout Ozark folklore like the character of Clever Jack (of beanstalk fame.) And it is these folkloric archetypes that we will be examining in this class, seven in particular: The Fortunate One, Clever Jack, Green Thumb, The Aunty, Mother Mary, Silver Eye, and Old Scratch.
All classes are recorded. A link to the recording is sent out to the ticketholders the day after each event. These links stay active for 30 days.
