Research Guides: Halloween Resources for Fun and Research: Spiritualism and the Occult

Subject Headings for Spiritualism and Occult Research

Subject headings...

...are words and phrases which constitute a "controlled vocabulary" to categorize books by subject field. Subject headings often indicate the contents of books in terms that their titles do not use, which often may be very general. Subject headings in online databases are often referred to as descriptors, but they serve the same purpose in locating valuable resources. Using a "keyword" search will identify catalog entries that contain those specific terms which can add value to a search; however, the terms can be found anywhere - author, notes, publisher, etc. - therefore there is no indication of the value of the term(s) as content matter of the items in a results list.

Use general subject headings for searching a broad topic or more specific subject headings for a specific text, film, or play. You will find (more) headings specific to the subject category within the left-hand facets in our online catalog. If you want to see the subject headings for a specific title in the library catalog, scroll down in the title record.

Here are some subject headings you may want to try:

Occultism
Occultism -- United States -- History
occult sciences
Spiritualism
Occultism in Art
Spiritualism -- History -- 19th century
Occultism in motion pictures
Occultism -- Religious aspects
Occultism -- History -- 19th century

Resources on Spiritualism and the Occult

The Ashgate Research Companion to Nineteenth-Century Spiritualism and the Occult by Sarah Willburn; Tatiana Kontou
Designed both for those new to the field and for experts, this volume is organized into sections covering the relationship between Victorian spiritualism and science, the occult and politics, and the culture of mystical practices. The Ashgate Research Companion to Nineteenth-Century Spiritualism and the Occult brings together some of the most prominent scholars working in the field to introduce current approaches to the study of nineteenth-century mysticism and to define new areas for research.
Cinema of the occult : new age, satanism, Wicca, and spiritualism in film by Carrol L. Fry
Cinema of the Occult studies filmmakers' adaptation of exiting occult religious approaches, such as New Age, Satanism, Wicca, and Spiritualism, with brief looks at paths less traveled. The occult is of special interest now when religion is so much a part of our national dialogue. While a majority of Americans report themselves to be religious or spiritual, many have deserted traditional Judeo/Christian orthodoxy in favor of new religious movements. Though actual followers are a small percentage of our population, they have a powerful influence on mainstream religious paths and culture.
Haunted Visions: spiritualism and American art by Charles Colbert
In Haunted Visions: Spiritualism and American Art, Charles Colbert focuses on the ways Spiritualism imbued the making and viewing of art with religious meaning and, in doing so, draws fascinating connections between art and faith in the Victorian age. Examining the work of such well-known American artists as James Abbott McNeill Whistler, William Sydney Mount, and Robert Henri, Colbert demonstrates that Spiritualism played a critical role in the evolution of modern attitudes toward creativity. He argues that Spiritualism made a singular contribution to the sanctification of art that occurred in the latter half of the nineteenth century. The faith maintained that spiritual energies could reside in objects, and thus works of art could be appreciated not only for what they illustrated but also as vessels of the psychic vibrations their creators impressed into them. Such beliefs sanctified both the making and collecting of art in an era when Darwinism and Positivism were increasingly disenchanting the world and the efforts to represent it. In this context, Spiritualism endowed the artist's profession with the prestige of a religious calling; in doing so, it sought not to replace religion with art, but to make art a site where religion happened.
Legacies of the Occult: psychoanalysis, religion, and unconscious communication by Marsha Hewitt
Telepathy, thought transference, unconscious communication. While some important early psychological theorists such as William James, Frederic W. H. Myers and Sigmund Freud all agreed that the phenomenon exists, their theoretical approaches to it were very different. Today thought transference is most commonly described as unconscious communication but was largely ignored by subsequent generations of psychoanalysts until most recently. Nonetheless, the recognition of unconscious communication has persisted as a subterranean, quasi-spiritual presence in psychoanalysis to this day. As psychoanalysis becomes more interested in unconscious communication and develops theories of loosely boundaried subjectivities that open up to transcendent dimensions of reality, it begins to assume the features of a religious psychology. Thus, a fuller understanding of how unconscious communication resonates with mystical overtones may be more deeply clarified, articulated and elaborated in contemporary psychoanalysis in an explicit dialogue with psychoanalytically literate scholars of religion.
Mesmerism, Spiritualism, Etc: Historically and Scientifically Considered by William Benjamin Carpenter
William Carpenter (1813-1885) was a leading medical teacher and researcher in London. Although much of his work focused on physiology and the nervous system, he spent a considerable amount of time investigating questions surrounding the relationship between science and religion. He participated in many debates on this issue, and was a member of the prestigious Metaphysical Society, which explored scientific and religious connections. In Mesmerism, Spiritualism, etc. Historically and Scientifically Considered, two of his lectures published in 1877, Carpenter sets out to question on scientific grounds the many spiritualist beliefs that were gaining popularity throughout Britain. His work covers topics such as odylism, electro-biology, thought-reading and clairvoyance. He locates these practices in historical contexts that often stretch back to ancient times, and gives modern scientific explanations for certain phenomena, all with the aim of stifling what he called 'epidemic delusions'.
The Occult, Witchcraft and Magic by Christopher Dell
Our belief in some form of magic runs throughout human history. In fact, in an increasingly rational and scientific world, the idea that occult or arcane knowledge can give us access to another, hidden reality is as strong and widespread as ever. The Occult, Witchcraft and Magic is a lively and fascinating history of all things cryptic, mystic and other-worldly, beginning with the earliest evidence of magical thinking amid the gloom of a Palaeolithic cave, and ending in the bright light of our digital age and its newfound interest in paganism. With hundreds of images drawn from rare and unusual sources, in-depth explorations of cross-cultural themes and profiles of key figures from the history of magic, this is a bewitching and irresistible treasury of esoteric thought that will appeal to believers and sceptics alike.
Occult America : the secret history of how mysticism shaped our nation by Mitch Horowitz
It touched lives as disparate as those of Frederick Douglass, Franklin Roosevelt, and Mary Todd Lincoln—who once convinced her husband, Abe, to host a séance in the White House. Americans all, they were among the famous figures whose paths intertwined with the mystical and esoteric movement broadly known as the occult. Brought over from the Old World and spread throughout the New by some of the most obscure but gifted men and women of early U.S. history, this “hidden wisdom” transformed the spiritual life of the still-young nation and, through it, much of the Western world. Yet the story of the American occult has remained largely untold. Now a leading writer on the subject of alternative spirituality brings it out of the shadows. From the meaning of the symbols on the one-dollar bill to the origins of the Ouija board, Occult America briskly sweeps from the nation’s earliest days to the birth of the New Age era and traces many people and episodes. A feast for believers in alternative spirituality, an eye-opener for anyone curious about the unknown byroads of American history,
The occult in modernist art, literature, and cinema by Tessel M. Bauduin; Henrik Johnsson
Many modernist and avant-garde artists and authors were fascinated by the occult movements of their day. This volume explores how Occultism came to shape modernist art, literature, and film. Individual chapters examine the presence and role of Occultism in the work of such modernist luminaries as Rainer Maria Rilke, August Strindberg, W.B. Yeats, Joséphin Péladan and the artist Jan Švankmaier, as well as in avant-garde film, post-war Greek Surrealism, and Scandinavian Retrogardism. Combining the theoretical and methodological foundations of the field of Esotericism Studies with those of Literary Studies, Art History, and Cinema Studies, this volume provides in-depth and nuanced perspectives upon the relationship between Occultism and Modernism in the Western arts from the nineteenth century to the present day.
The Occult Mind by Christopher I. Lehrich
In The Occult Mind, Christopher I. Lehrich explores the history of magic in Western thought, suggesting a bold new understanding of the claims made about the power of various belief systems. In closely interlinked essays on such disparate topics as ley lines, the Tarot, the Corpus Hermeticum, writing and ritual in magical practice, and early attempts to decipher Egyptian hieroglyphics, Lehrich treats magic and its parts as an intellectual object that requires interpretive zeal on the part of readers/observers. Drawing illuminating parallels between the practice of magic and more recent interpretive systems--structuralism, deconstruction, semiotics--Lehrich deftly suggests that the specter of magic haunts all such attempts to grasp the character of knowledge. Offering a radical new approach to the nature and value of occult thought, Lehrich's brilliantly conceived and executed book posits magic as a mode of theory that is intrinsically subversive of normative conceptions of reason and truth.
The Occult Nineteenth Century: roots, developments, and impact on the modern world by Lukas Pokorny; Franz Winter
The nineteenth century witnessed a proliferation of alternative religious currents and practices, appropriating earlier traditions, entangling geographically distinct spiritual discourses, and crafting a repository of mindscapes eminently suitable to be accommodated by later generations of thinkers and practitioners. Penned by specialists in the field, this volume examines important themes and figures pertaining to this occult amalgam and its resonance into the twentieth century and beyond. Global guises of the occult, ranging from the Americas and Europe to India, are variously addressed, with special attention to the crucial role of mesmerism and the origins of modern yoga.
The Rise of Contemporary Spiritualism : concepts and controversies in talking to the dead by Anne Kalvig
Talking to the dead and communication with 'the other side' is often presented as a taboo in an increasingly technological and medically advanced world. However, practices of spiritualism and mediumship continue to remain popular and in high demand within contemporary Western societies. This book analyses the practices of today's mediums, who insist on standing at the threshold between life and death, interpreting signs and passing on communications, and asks how such concepts and practices are perceived by contemporary society. Using first-hand material gathered from alternative fairs, mediumistic congresses, séances, and interviews with both practitioners and clients, as well as thorough textual analysis, Anne Kalvig provides a clear overview of the various forms of consumption of mediumship in Western society and places these within a socio-cultural, religious and historical context. She also raises questions as to the controversies surrounding spiritualism and its representation and relationship with popular culture and the media.
Women Writers and the Occult in Literature and Culture by Miriam Wallraven
Examining the intersection of occult spirituality, text, and gender, this book provides a compelling analysis of the occult revival in literature from the 1880s through the course of the twentieth century. This study analyses literature by women occultists such as Alice Bailey, Dion Fortune, and Starhawk, and revisits texts with occult motifs by canonical authors such as Sylvia Townsend Warner, Leonora Carrington, and Angela Carter. This material, which has never been analysed in a literary context, covers influential movements such as Theosophy, Spiritualism, Golden Dawn, Wicca, and Goddess spirituality. Wallraven engages with the question of how literature functions as the medium for creating occult worlds and powerful identities, particularly the female Lucifer, witch, priestess, and Goddess. Based on the concept of ancient wisdom, the occult in literature also incorporates topical discourses of the twentieth century, including psychoanalysis, feminism, pacifism, and ecology.
A Magician among the Spirits by Harry Houdini
Harry Houdini (1874-1926), whose real name was Erik Weisz, was one of the most famous magicians and escapologists of all time. He was highly sceptical of the many claims made concerning psychic and paranormal phenomena, which were very popular in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He attended hundreds of séances for the purposes of his study, and never experienced one he believed genuine. In this book, published in 1924, he described the mediums and psychics whom he revealed as fraudulent, exposing the tricks which had convinced many notable scientists and academics. These included spirit writing, table rapping, spirit manifestations, and levitation. Among those he revealed as frauds was the famous medium Mina Crandon, and his exposures led to a public split with his former friend Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, a firm believer. The book is a fascinating account of superstition and gullibility.

Databases and Digital Collections

Victorian Popular Culture This link opens in a new window
Victorian Popular Culture is an essential resource for the study of popular entertainment in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The resource is divided into four self-contained sections: Moving Pictures, Optical Entertainments and the Advent of Cinema; Music Hall, Theatre and Popular Entertainment; Circuses, Sideshows and Freaks; Spiritualism, Sensation and Magic.

Magic, Monsters and Macabre | University of Manchester
The John Rylands Research Institute and Library holds some 250,000 printed volumes, and well over a million manuscripts and archival items that covers the breadth of human culture and language. Scattered throughout these collections are items that stand out as being curious, unexpected and mysterious.
Magic Posters and Playbills | University of Texas at Austin
The magic posters and playbills digital collection contains selected visual images from the Ransom Center's Harry Houdini collection and Magicians collection pertaining to magicians and the history of magic from 1750 to 1920. Approximately 3,000 magicians are represented in the full collection. This digital collection includes selected posters, playbills, prints, and other ephemera documenting the careers of Harry Houdini, Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin, Harry Kellar, Henry Evanion, and others.
Magic Scrapbooks and Posters | New York Public Library
The Magic scrapbooks collection contains a significant amount of articles, clippings, correspondence, ephemera, photographs and posters pertaining to magicians, mentalists, conjurers and escape artists from the 19th- and early 20th-centuries, particularly during the Golden Age of Magic.
Digital Occult Library | CUNY
Here you will find information on occult studies organized so that academics, practitioners, and a general audience can learn and foster knowledge. While each group has specific interests and needs, all can benefit from the others’ perspectives.