What's going on with my thesis.

[wolven7]

So, to be clear, my problem lies in getting people to fully understand what I'm trying to get done. I tell them I want to put forward a theory of magic, they say fine, they do some research, thinking I've not done mine, and bam. "This is too broad."

I narrow the scope. History of the concept of magic and its changes in connotations and implications. "You haven't had enough time to think on this. Still too broad."

I seek other counsel. "Seems like you should be focusing on This One Person." Crowley. Fine. REcast his concepts and theories, get everyone to separate the man from the work, and, in some cases, the work from the Work.

"Holy Crap! Crowley's Horrible! You should spend your time on someone much more worthy!"

.... What did we JUST TALK ABOUT?!

Fine. Here's my coursework. Here's what I've studied, what I've come to understand, here's the fields of knowledge in which I have a base.

"Holy crap. This is Huge stuff, and all of it seems interconnected...."

No shit. Now do you understand?

"Well a theme that seems to keep cropping up, here, is the idea of the academic study versus the practitioner, and who gets to decide the definition."

Cue my talking about Jonathan Z. Smith and Witttgenstein for the next 20 minutes, as I explain what "Theory and Method in the Academic Study of Religion" has come to mean. At the end of which, I sigh internally and, sure. Yes. I can talk about the problem of magic and what has come to be seen and known as "magical practice," and how it is dismissed by a good chunk of prominent academia, spoken of as an apocryphal thing, or in hused tones and whispers, half-joking, because 'That almost looks like magic, doesn't it. Ha. Ha. Ha.'

Yeah. I can find recent scholarship.

Yeah. I can find people who ARe talking about this, one person talking about this, and talk about why they've got it wrong.

Yeah. Magic's too broad. You know what else it's "too?" Easily dismissed. This is the battle I'm trying to fight, and with every FUCKING step of the way, you're showing me why I need to keep fighting it. Why I need to make sure this gets Done.

And you all should probably help.

Comments

[sadistic-apollo.livejournal.com]

frankly, i'm all for magic staying well hidden.

i'm more than a little trepidacious about any old schmo havin access to powers that respond to will and ritual. It's bad enough that I have to worry about girl's b/fs huntnig me down without havin to worry about my head asplodin' mysteriously.

that said, think of the practical applications!

hurry up and placate your paradigm paralysis so i can send pull a pizza outta my pocket.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

Magic[k] is like science. It doesn't JUST happen, because you want it real bad; it takes focus and work, and directed intentionality.

Just because it works doesn't mean everyone can do it. Though everyone Could do it, if they tried.

[unknownbinaries.livejournal.com]

Meh. People don't want to put the work in to get anywhere with it. The amount of people looking simply for books of spells should show you that.

Besides. It's already available to any schmo walking into Border's. Stuff that used to be restricted to such-and-such levels of the OTO are now available at bookstores so the Order can remain as wealthy as it is.

[moonandserpent.livejournal.com]

Whew. That sounds like an easily imagined and really sucky wall to run into.

By the way, have you read/seen "The Place of Enchantment". Excellent academic book about modernity and fin de scicle occultisim. Some brilliant Crowley and modern identity stuff.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

Precisely.

I'll look into that book. Thank you, for that, because it sounds like exactly what I need. Trying to limit the scope to something scholarly done within the last 20 years. We'll see how it goes.