1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910827241403321

Autore

McGarry Molly

Titolo

Ghosts of futures past [[electronic resource] ] : spiritualism and the cultural politics of nineteenth-century America / / Molly McGarry

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Berkeley, : University of California Press, 2008

ISBN

9786612359309

1-282-35930-4

0-520-93406-7

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (285 p.)

Disciplina

133.90973/09034

Soggetti

Spiritualism - United States - History - 19th century

Religion and culture - United States - History - 19th century

United States Religion 19th century

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

"Simpson, imprint in humanities"--P. facing t.p.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Mourning, media, and the cultural politics of conjuring the dead -- Indian guides : haunted subjects and the politics of vanishing -- Spectral sexualities : free love, moral panic, and the making of U.S. obscenity law -- Mediomania : the spirit of science in a culture of belief and doubt -- Secular subjects : a queer genealogy of untimely sexualities.

Sommario/riassunto

Ghosts of Futures Past guides readers through the uncanny world of nineteenth-century American spiritualism. More than an occult parlor game, this was a new religion, which channeled the voices of the dead, linked present with past, and conjured new worldly and otherworldly futures. Tracing the persistence of magic in an emergent culture of secularism, Molly McGarry brings a once marginalized practice to the center of American cultural history. Spiritualism provided an alchemical combination of science and magic that called into question the very categories of male and female, material and immaterial, self and other, living and dead. Dissolving the boundaries between them opened Spiritualist practitioners to other voices and, in turn, allowed them to imagine new social worlds and forge diverse political affinities.