The Voodoo Encyclopedia

The Voodoo Encyclopedia
Author: Jeffrey E. Anderson
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 493
Release: 2015-08-26
Genre: Religion
ISBN:
GET BOOK

This compelling reference work introduces the religions of Voodoo, a onetime faith of the Mississippi River Valley, and Vodou, a Haitian faith with millions of adherents today. Unlike its fictional depiction in zombie films and popular culture, Voodoo is a full-fledged religion with a pantheon of deities, a priesthood, and communities of believers. Drawing from the expertise of contemporary practitioners, this encyclopedia presents the history, culture, and religion of Haitian Vodou and Mississippi Valley Voodoo. Though based primarily in these two regions, the reference looks at Voodoo across several cultures and delves into related religions, including African Vodu, African Diasporic Religions, and magical practices like hoodoo. Through roughly 150 alphabetical entries, the work describes various aspects of Voodoo in Louisiana and Haiti, covering topics such as important places, traditions, rituals, and items used in ceremonies. Contributions from scholars in the field provide a comprehensive overview of the subject from various perspectives and address the deities and ceremonial acts. The book features an extensive collection of primary sources and a selected, general bibliography of print and electronic resources.

Voodoo: the History of a Racial Slur

Voodoo: the History of a Racial Slur
Author: Associate Professor of Africana Studies Danielle N Boaz
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 209
Release: 2023-08-22
Genre: Law
ISBN: 019768940X
GET BOOK

Coined in the middle of the nineteenth century, the term "voodoo" has been deployed largely by people in the U.S. to refer to spiritual practices--real or imagined--among people of African descent. "Voodoo" is one way that white people have invoked their anxieties and stereotypes about Black people--to call them uncivilized, superstitious, hypersexual, violent, and cannibalistic. In this book, Danielle Boaz explores public perceptions of "voodoo" as they have varied over time, with an emphasis on the intricate connection between stereotypes of "voodoo" and debates about race and human rights. The term has its roots in the U.S. Civil War in the 1860s, especially following the Union takeover of New Orleans, when it was used to propagate the idea that Black Americans held certain "superstitions" that allegedly proved that they were unprepared for freedom, the right to vote, and the ability to hold public office. Similar stereotypes were later extended to Cuba and Haiti in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In the 1930s, Black religious movements like the Moorish Science Temple and the Nation of Islam were derided as "voodoo cults." More recently, ideas about "voodoo" have shaped U.S. policies toward Haitian immigrants in the 1980s, and international responses to rituals to bind Nigerian women to human traffickers in the twenty-first century. Drawing on newspapers, travelogues, magazines, legal documents, and books, Boaz shows that the term "voodoo" has often been a tool of racism, colonialism, and oppression.

Gothic Realities

Gothic Realities
Author: L. Andrew Cooper
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 249
Release: 2014-01-10
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 0786457880
GET BOOK

Eighteenth-century critics believed Gothic fiction would inspire deviant sexuality, instill heretical beliefs, and encourage antisocial violence--this book puts these beliefs to the test. After examining the assumptions behind critics' fears, it considers nineteenth-century concerns about sexual deviance, showing how Frankenstein, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Dorian Gray, and other works helped construct homosexuality as a pathological, dangerous phenomenon. It then turns to television and film, particularly Buffy the Vampire Slayer and David DeCoteau's direct-to-video movies, to trace Gothicized sexuality's lasting impact. Moving to heretical beliefs, Gothic Realities surveys ghost stories from Dickens's A Christmas Carol to Poltergeist, articulating the relationships between fiction and the "real" supernatural. Finally, it considers connections between Gothic horror and real-world violence, especially the tragedies at Columbine and Virginia Tech.

Spinegrinder

Spinegrinder
Author: Clive Davies
Publisher: SCB Distributors
Total Pages: 1368
Release: 2015-03-06
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 1909394068
GET BOOK

First came video and more recently high definition home entertainment, through to the internet with its streaming videos and not strictly legal peer-to-peer capabilities. With so many sources available, today’s fan of horror and exploitation movies isn’t necessarily educated on paths well-trodden — Universal classics, 1950s monster movies, Hammer — as once they were. They may not even be born and bred on DAWN OF THE DEAD. In fact, anyone with a bit of technical savvy (quickly becoming second nature for the born-clicking generation) may be viewing MYSTICS IN BALI and S.S. EXPERIMENT CAMP long before ever hearing of Bela Lugosi or watching a movie directed by Dario Argento. In this world, H.G. Lewis, so-called “godfather of gore,” carries the same stripes as Alfred Hitchcock, “master of suspense.” SPINEGRINDER is one man’s ambitious, exhaustive and utterly obsessive attempt to make sense of over a century of exploitation and cult cinema, of a sort that most critics won’t care to write about. One opinion; 8,000 reviews (or thereabouts.

Queer Horror

Queer Horror
Author: Sean Abley
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 494
Release: 2024-08-20
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 1476651515
GET BOOK

From the beginning, horror has been part of the cinema landscape. Despite some of the earliest genre films with gay directors such as F.W. Murnau (Nosferatu) and James Whale (Frankenstein, The Invisible Man, Bride of Frankenstein), LGBTQIA characters have rarely been portrayed in full view. For decades, filmmakers have included "coded" content in their films with the homosexual experience translated into censor-friendly subtext for consumption by general audiences. Gradually, LGBTQIA characters and themes have moved from the background to the foreground as the horror genre has grown along with its audience's tastes and attitudes. Likewise, more and more LGBTQIA writers and directors have begun to offer their queer-centric takes on scary movies and today, "queer horror" is a thriving film genre. With more than 900 entries, this critical filmography is a comprehensive, critical, yet playful examination of the history of LGBTQIA content in horror films. Eight journalistic contributors dig into every era of scary movies, including the early silents, pre- and post-Hays Code content, grindhouse sleaze, LGBTQIA indies, and megaplex studio releases. From Whale's The Old Dark House (1932) to Don Mancini's Chucky films and everything in between, this collection explores what can be found at the intersection of "LGBTQIA" and "horror" in the film industry.

Wild Hunt

Wild Hunt
Author: Theophilus Monroe
Publisher: Theophilus Monroe
Total Pages: 190
Release: 2024-10-30
Genre: Fiction
ISBN:
GET BOOK

The spectral riders are here... ...and the streets of St. Louis echo with the howls of ancient beasts. As a druid and a private investigator of all things supernatural, I've seen some strange things, but this... this takes the cake. The question is, who's leading the hunt? And what exactly are they hunting? The city hangs on the precipice of chaos, and it's up to me to unmask the truth before the Wild Hunt leaves nothing but ashes in its wake. Are you ready to join the chase? Wild Hunt is the sixth book in the new Druid Detective Agency urban fantasy series. Elijah and Emilie already went through one adventure. Now, ten years after The Druid Legacy, they are facing a new challenge, one that will test their limits. The real threat isn't the otherworldly magic, the magic that once birthed life itself in Eden/Annwn. There was a reason why humanity was cast from the garden groves. When the magic of that place comes home, it won't take long to find out why. The real threat was here all along, hidden in human hearts, now made manifest by the power of creation itself. Harry Potter meets Harry Dresden in Druid Detective Agency.

Queer Horror Film and Television

Queer Horror Film and Television
Author: Darren Elliott-Smith
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 283
Release: 2016-09-30
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 1786721376
GET BOOK

In recent years, the representation of alternative sexuality in the horror film and television has "outed" itself from the shadows from which it once lurked, via the embrace of an outrageously queer horror aesthetic where homosexuality is often unequivocally referenced. In this book, Darren Elliott-Smith departs from the analysis of the monster as a symbol of heterosexual anxiety and fear, and moves to focus instead on queer fears and anxieties within gay male subcultures. Furthermore, he examines the works of significant queer horror film, television producers, and directors to reveal gay men's anxieties about: acceptance and assimilation into Western culture, the perpetuation of self-loathing and gay shame, and further anxieties associations shameful femininity. This book focuses mainly on representations of masculinity, and gay male spectatorship in queer horror films and television post-2000. In titling this sub-genre "queer horror," Elliott-Smith designates horror that is crafted by male directors/producers who self-identify as gay, bi, queer, or transgendered and whose work features homoerotic, or explicitly homosexual, narratives with "out" gay characters. In terms of case studies, this book considers a variety of genres and forms from: video art horror; independently distributed exploitation films (A Far Cry from Home, Rowe Kelly, 2012); queer Gothic soap operas (Dante's Cove, 2005-7); satirical horror comedies (such as The Gay Bed and Breakfast of Terror (Thompson, 2008); low-budget slashers (Hellbent, Etheredge-Outzs, 2007); and contemporary representations of gay zombies in film and television from the pornographic LA Zombie (Bruce LaBruce, 2010)) to the melodramatic In the Flesh (BBC Three 2013-15). Moving from the margins to the mainstream, via the application of psychoanalytic theory, critical and cultural interpretation, interviews with key directors and close readings of classic, cult and modern horror, this book will be invaluable to students and researchers of gender and sexuality in horror film and television.

Bloody Merry

Bloody Merry
Author: Theophilus Monroe
Publisher: Theophilus Monroe
Total Pages: 172
Release: 2023-12-07
Genre: Fiction
ISBN:
GET BOOK

A little bite for the holidays... No better time of the year to mend a few fences. If I'm going to win him back, it'll take a grand gesture. Something to prove I'm still the old Mercy he used to love... The gift is priceless. It's one-of-a-kind. He'll love it. At least I thought he would... How was I supposed to know the damn thing contained a freaking djinn?! Time to put the genie back in the bottle. But he won't go easy. Not until he's granted three wishes. The problem? Each wish comes gift-wrapped with something nasty... something deadly... Time to vamp-up and show that djinn that he's messing with the wrong bitch. Bloody Merry is the sixth book in The Fury of a Vampire Witch. You've met Mercy before in The Legacy of a Vampire Witch and The Blood Witch Saga. She's fought against devils and demons, insidious witches, and old-world vampires. When she returns to Exeter, where she grew up as a girl, she'll find enemies even bigger and badder than anything she's ever faced before. A great series for fans of the True Blood / Sookie Stackhouse novels or the Underworld franchise to sink their fangs into. The Fury of a Vampire Witch features a dark and twisty romance, action that could even get a vampire's heart pumping, and a snarky badass heroine.

The Filmmaker's Book of the Dead

The Filmmaker's Book of the Dead
Author: Danny Draven
Publisher: CRC Press
Total Pages: 831
Release: 2015-12-08
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 1317439082
GET BOOK

Produce, direct, promote and sell your own chilling horror film with real-world advice from award-winning producer/director/writer Danny Draven! The second edition is completely updated with information on new technology, new exclusive interviews with industry pros, new photos and samples from the production of recent horror movies, new behind-the-scenes video, information on modern distribution methods and delivery and more! From the history of horror and the technique of the scare to pre-production and distribution, this complete, full-color guide to filmmaking uncovers all the insider secrets for creating your own spine-tingling horror film from start to finish. The 2nd Edition features all NEW interviews from industry professionals such as: Mick Garris (Sleepwalkers, Bag of Bones, Desperation, The Stand) John Ottman (Composer/Editor of X:Men: Days of Future Past, The Usual Suspects) Mark Ordesky & Jane Fleming (Producers of Lovely Molly, Exists) Kane Hodder (Jason from the Friday the 13th, part 7 to 10, Hatchet) Tibor Takacs (Director of The Gate, Spiders 3D, Megasnake) John Debney (Composer of Predators, Sin City, End of Days) Jojo Draven (Composer of Ghost Month, Reel Evil) Michael Berryman (The Hills Have Eyes, Weird Science) Mike Mendez (Director of The Gravedancers, Big Ass Spider!) Neal Marshall Stevens (Screenwriter of Thir13en Ghosts, Hellraiser: Deader) Chris Alexander (Editor in Chief of Fangoria Magazine) Jessica Cameron (Actress/Director of Truth or Dare) Denise Gossett (Founder of Shriekfest Film Festival) A newly updated companion website that features: *Behind the scenes videos for films films such as Puppet Master, Blood Dolls, Trancers, Subspecies, Reel Evil, Ghost Month and more! *A revised collection of horror movie trailers! * Sample scripts, schedules, storyboards, agreements and more! Other featured interviews include: James Wan (Saw, Insidious, The Conjuring) Robert Englund (Freddy from Nightmare on Elm Street) Robert Kurtzman (From Dusk Til Dawn) Stuart Gordon (Re-Animator, From Beyond, Dagon) Tom Savini (Night of the Living Dead) Lloyd Kaufman (Toxic Avenger) Charles Band (Parasite, Metalstorm, Ghoulies) John D. LeMay (Friday the 13th: The Series) David DeCoteau (Puppet Master 3, Sorority Babes in the Slimball Bowl-O-Rama) Debbie Rochon (Tromeo & Juliet) Reggie Bannister (Phantasm) Sam McCurdy (Director of Photography of Dog Soldiers, The Decent, The Hills Have Eyes 2) Nathan Barr (Composer of Hostel,True Blood, Hemlock Grove) Jim Dooley (Composer of When A Stranger Calls) Chuck Williams (Bubba Ho-Tep) Herschell Gordon Lewis (Blood Feast, Wizard of Gore) H.P. Lovecraft’s Notes on Writing Weird Fiction And many more...

Shadow Witch

Shadow Witch
Author: Veronica Shade
Publisher: Evershade Publishing
Total Pages: 325
Release: 2022-02-15
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1949112519
GET BOOK

So...Verika’s parents run a Voodoo Academy. When, exactly, were they planning on telling her? Apparently not until she almost kills half her school. When Verika’s shadow magic nearly takes out the cast of her school play, her parents send her to a voodoo academy they run in New Orlean’s mirror world to get her powers under control. It’s there, at Académie de Marie Laveau, that Verika learns the hot man from her dreams isn’t just a figment of her imagination...but the most feared student ever to walk the academy’s halls. So when things start to go missing from her teachers’ classrooms, and it appears someone is aiming to pin it on Mr. Dark and Dreamy himself, Verika knows no one is going to step in to save him. No one but Verika, anyway. Except, Tobias isn’t looking for a hero, and Verika’s not cut out to be a detective. Considering she’s been shadow walking in her sleep and can’t account for her own whereabouts after the lights go out, it seems she’s better suited as a suspect instead. Fans of the Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead and the Harley Merlin series from Bella Forrest will love this new adult, slow-burn paranormal academy romance from Veronica Shade. Scroll up and one-click to see if Verika can find a way to make life at Voodoo Academy work...all while dealing with bullies, would-be boyfriends, and worse...herself. Voodoo Academy is a spin-off series of Academy of the Damned but can still be enjoyed by readers who haven’t read Academy of the Damned.