An ethnographic study of Irish Neo-Pagan culture

Abstract

The idea that Witches and Druids are real people who follow spiritual traditions with serious intent is a hard one to fathom for many people in contemporary society. The neo-pagan movement is strange and unfamiliar to the general public. Similarly, the research topic of neo-paganism is a relatively new one in academia. The primary aim of my research is to document neo-pagan culture from an ethnographic perspective. There have been very few academic works written on modern or “neo” (new) paganism and, as far as the author is aware at the time of writing, there has been no large-scale ethnographic work at all carried out exclusively on neo-paganism in Ireland, and in this respect the area of research is virgin territory for ethnographic analysis. Ethnography is the documentation and analysis of the culture of a specific group of people in regard to their beliefs, oral traditions (stories, songs and ways ...