"We needed something that was ours": On women as witches embracing spells and ceremony for menopause healing and resistance in midlife. A visual ethnography from the UK and Ireland.

Abstract (English)

Often representing and generating conflicting ideas about women’s nature and power, in recent years there has been a modern resurgence of ‘the witch’ in western popular culture and among women openly identifying as witches. Considering women in midlife, I will discuss my ongoing visual ethnography (2021- present) exploring the experience of women witches and healers in the UK and Ireland who use ritual, spells, practices and ceremony to make sense of, heal and cope with perimenopause and menopause (see Jermyn, 2023; Lindenmeyer, A et al. 2011). Using the lens of magical consciousness (Greenwood, 2005) and drawing on Massey (1994) I expand the concept of dwelling (Ingold 2000) to make sense of place as a more-than-human agentic actor, a material source, and having a potent memory and history emotionally and sensorially drawn upon by women participants for their healing practices and embodied in their sense of menopausal identity. I present examples from participants who use ‘supernatural intervention’ to support not only the physical and emotional symptoms of menopause, but to make sense of this identity change as an act of resistance. I explore participants reconceptualization of pain and bodily changes as an embodied being ‘in’ perimenopause, or ‘going through’ menopause bound up in a process of becoming which through it’s magical re-conceiving, channelling with ceremony, and gathering with other women, (as examples) is an important part of the transition to become an elder, and a ‘wise woman’ (Grosz, 1994; Braidotti 2002). In the main this is narrated as a powerful and positive metamorphism. The adoption of indigenous healing treatments and shamanic ritual (particularly from South and Central America) is also popular within participants bricolage practices, and this paper will touch upon the ways in which practitioners have responded to criticism and debates around these as neo-colonialist and culturally appropriating (see for example: Cornish, 2023, Magliocco, 2009; Welch, 2007). In presenting visual documents from my ethnography alongside discussion this paper asks how peri/menopause and magical practices and identities interact and interrelate to promote narratives and experiences of healing, wellbeing and community? As a feminist praxis, how is 'being' a witch creating meaning, solace and relief from peri/menopause and are there negative impacts in seen or unseen ways to consider in relation to both health and women's agency/power within their everyday lives?