In American films about a person rising above poverty, hardships are often shown as exceptions to life in America. In many Indian films, it is not startling to be poor or to be in the thrall of 2,000-year-old customs. It’s just life and these matters are taken for granted. The story goes from there. In …
I don’t know what director Neil LaBute was going for with a remake of the 1973 British cult classic The Wicker Man, but it went very, very wrong. In LaBute’s remake, traffic cop Edward Malus (Nicolas Cage) is lured to Summersisle, an island off the coast of Washington state. His former fiancee, Willow Woodward, has …
In The Art of Ritual, Renee Beck and Sydney Barbara Metrick explain the power, relevance, and need for ritual. American society has many rituals. We celebrate birthdays and marriages, have presidential inaugurations, and happily suffer through college rush traditions. These all have special meaning to the honouree, but oftentimes rituals become habitual and lose their …
Wicca is one of the most rapidly growing religions in America yet misconceptions, misunderstandings, and untruths about it persist. While many excellent books for beginners have hit the shelves, most have been instruction manuals on the practice of Wicca. Bryan Lankford’s Wicca Demystified: A Guide for Practitioners, Family and Friends is a much needed book for …
Wicca is said to be the only self-contained religion that England has ever given the world. While its mythical history has been established, it’s factual history is shrouded in mystery. Philip Heselton’s Wiccan Roots: Gerald Gardiner* and the Modern Witchcraft Revival represents a major landmark in the recovery of those origins. There are many nagging questions: …
Set in the American South in 1964, the year of the Civil Rights Act and intensifying racial unrest, Sue Monk Kidd’s The Secret Life of Bees is the coming-of-age story of 14-year-old Lily Owens, whose life has been shaped around the blurred memory of the afternoon she accidentally shot and killed her mother when she was …
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