Navigating the Academy and Feminist Theory

Abstract: This article explores my journey navigating the implicit and explicit ridicule witchcraft scholars have heaped onto alternative and feminist interpretations of witchcraft histories. It will consider how and why such few models of serious feminist approaches to witchcraft scholarships exist, while examining the roles of peer reviewers, academic gatekeeping, and the fears felt by many untenured, BIPOC, and women scholars. Further, it will question the sanctimonious gulf that scholars have put between themselves and those who call themselves W/witches while proposing that new scholarship regarding the witch trials of the past may actually be able to take modern feminist theories seriously, and point forward to a greater openness, among “serious” scholars, to feminist approaches to the subject.