Oral History

“Nothing is ever over, nothing is ever ended, and worlds open up within the world we know.” 
― Lee Smith, Oral History

Poem found in my Mamaw's bible

Oral history is defined as "a field of study and a method of gathering, preserving and interpreting the voices and memories of people, communities, and participants in past events. Oral history is both the oldest type of historical inquiry, predating the written word, and one of the most modern, initiated with tape recorders in the 1940s and now using 21st-century digital technologies." (Source)

The importance of collecting oral history can not be stressed enough. Without collecting oral history we will lose the knowledge, the stories, and lessons that the previous generations have gathered and learned. Oral history is a collaborative interview between a source and the collector. It does not include things such as wire tappings, recorded historical events or speeches, etc. It is a specific experience of collecting usually through recording the interview a person's personal stories, ideas, and opinions. 

The idea of collecting oral history may not seem to be terribly exciting or even beneficial. I used to think that as well. Growing up in the Appalachian Mountains during the 1980s and the 1990s I wanted nothing more than to escape the area that seemed to want to smother and oppress me. The future was "out there" in the big cities and other countries. That is where the important things were happening and the important people were doing things (important things, or famous things, you know the thoughts that teenagers have about how anything not of their place of origin is better than what they have always known.) And so I was determined to distance myself from my home place and land. 

Cue my freshmen or sophomore year at the local college (University of Virginia's College at Wise). Like all college freshmen I had to take english composition, but my professor had a different assignment for the class. We had to collect oral history from someone either in our family or someone from the community, and transcribe the recording. All of the oral histories were then bound in a small booklet, and we were all given a copy. This assignment changed my life. 

Louisa Hall Nash
Matriarch of the Nash Clan of Wise County, Virginia
My G-G-Great Grandmother

I interviewed my Great Aunt Fern about anything and everything she wanted to share. I started with ghost stories, witch stories, and then just allowed the conversation to flow to the memories and thoughts as Fern wanted to tell them. As I transcribed the interview I started to realize how important this assignment truly was to me, the community, and to society at large. Aunt Fern shared a history that normal history books would never gather or know or report. A history of family and community, a history that included beliefs of the supernatural, the natural, the spiritual, and beyond. She shared funny stories about teachers coming to school in sleds, and mournful stories about infant mortality. 

"Perhaps any life is such: different stories like different strands, each distinct in itself, each true, yet wound together to form one rope, one life.” 
― Lee Smith, Guests on Earth

By gathering these stories I not only learned about a silent history, but I learned about family and myself. I also fell in love with my Appalachian Mountain home. 

Poem found in Mamaw's bible

It is vital that the information from our elders is gathered, collected, and remembered. There is so many vital skills, knowledge, memories, and music among others that are at a risk for being lost to time. Once the elders die that is it for their memories. Their stories, their memories, their skills, etc will fade away never again to be gathered. 

I encourage everyone to start collecting their family's oral histories, and transcribe them. Save the digital copies on multiple devices so that they are not lost. 

You will not be sorry that you spent the time and energy doing this. I can say once your grandparents and parents pass away you will be sorry that you did not collect their stories. Because once they are gone they are gone. 

Part 1: A contemporary Appalachian Working Perspective

Appalachian practices can be applied to your life wherever you live. You do not need to be present and living in Appalachia to benefit from the earth based practices that were taught, shared, and lived by the Appalachian people.  Just as you do not have to be living in Norway or Sweden to benefit from working with the Norse Gods, nor do you have to be living in Scotland or Ireland to benefit from working with Brigid or Caileach, etc. 

I have been contemplating the idea of teaching some of the practices that I follow. I have had no qualms about offering history of Appalachian practices, and the folklore of the many nationalities of people who settled within these hills. However, the idea of offering up parts of my own practice has been at times a battle in my head. I feel there is a great need to dispel a lot of beliefs and myths that are connected with witches, and some of these ideas are more recent inventions than some writers and practitioners would have you believe.

So with all that said I am not going to set down and write a long wordy lengthy essay on how my way of practicing is better than any one else's way of practicing. What I am going to say is my path and practices work for me, and I have tweaked them and thrown some out in order to better connect with the way of Wyrd, and the earth in a meaningful exchange.

The first thing you should do is begin a conversation with nature, the old gods, and the land spirits (spiritus loci). It doesn't have to be some great lengthy dialogue filled with thee's and thou's. Just talk normally.

Introduce yourself to the air and wind, to the rain and water, to the sun and flame, to the earth and trees. Let them know that you are desiring to work with them.

It is still al title cold here in the mountains cold, but there is just enough warmth for the next step. Slip your socks and shoes off, and plant your feet into the ground. Press down into the dirt allowing the grass and dirt to push back into your arches and between your toes. Feel the coolness and possibly coldness of the earth as it is beginning its awakening for the Spring. Speak your introduction out and into the wind.

Make it sincere

Make it heartfelt

Make it honest

When you start to speak your introduction allow the spirits to know your name. Let them know you seek and desire a working a relationship with them.

The next step is to begin to walk. Take a short trip through the land. It can be a local park, your own property, a cemetery (my personal favorite), the woods, the desert, just some quiet place where you can be alone with nature.

As you walk begin a dialogue with the spirits again. Acknowledge them by speaking your name again, and reminding of the precious introduction. Continue walking, and ask the old gods and the Spiritus Loci to give you an amulet to show that they are willing to work with you. Gently sweep the landscape with your eyes and heart open. The gift could be as simple as a stone, a feather, a branch or limb of a tree. It could even be more than that; you may stumble upon a bone from an animal or a wing from a bird.

Once you find this gift pick it up, and hold it close to your heart. Offer your thanks to the Spirits and the old gods. Tuck it away somewhere safe until you can get it home.

The most important part of this ritual is to give thanks to the old gods and the spiritus loci. The gift and acknowledgment must match the amulet. If you were gifted a bird's wing or feather then an offering of bird seed may suffice. If it was a bone perhaps offering some of your own blood back to the earth would be the most appropriate. Whatever gift you receive you need to think long about the appropriate offering to give back in exchange for the gift that you were given.

This amulet will be very powerful and useful throughout your walk along this crooked path of traditional witchcraft. It is the old gods and spiritus loci's acknowledgment that they are willing to work with you, and they are accepting of you as you presently are to walk the path with them.

Once you have the amulet/gift home once a day take at least 10-15 minutes to mediate with the item. As you meditate with the item visualize a protective color emanating from around the item and surrounding you in a sphere of color. Allow this light energy to fill your space. You are creating a protective shield around yourself with the Old Gods' power.  

Practice this mediation daily for at least a month. 

Now what if you don't feel that you have found your amulet on this first go around?

Do not be disheartened. Perhaps you just need to spend some more time talking with nature, the spiritus loci, and the old gods before they feel ready to begin a relationship with you. Think about it like any other relationship that you will have or have had in your life. You like to take some time to get to know a new person before taking them into your house, and showing them your possessions and telling them your secrets, right? It is the same with the old gods and the local land spirits.

Give offerings to both the local land spirits and to the old gods. Talk with them daily. Sit in quiet contemplation outdoors, and when it gets too cold to be outdoors; sit quietly near a window or with pieces from nature surrounding you concentrating on these spirits.

Then after a moon cycle of these practices take another stroll through a place of power out in nature, and talk to the spirits again.

Allow the magic of the land to guide you.

Next Month I will post

Part 2: How to use the gift as a protective amulet, and how to use it to connect to the Old Gods' wisdom. 

Table Walking - an Appalachian divination technique

There are many ways to divine the future and speak with the spirit world, and every culture has their own unique and shared ways to do so. There is the spirit board or the ouija board that has become a popular method worldwide. The ouija board has an unfortunate reputation due to movies such as the Exorcist, Ouija, etc... However, the board itself is not just an open door invitation to "evil and demonic" forces. Which that topic could be its own entire blog post (stay tuned for that. I'll get to it eventually.) But this blog post is about an Appalachian technique that my Great Aunt Fern told me about when I interviewed her back in October 2001. 

"Now I've seen a table walk. I sure have. I was present; I guess I admit it. I was involved in it. I'm no witch, don't get me wrong. But I did. I sure That's true. That table would stand up on one leg, it's stand up on two legs. You had to talk to it. Which is a terrible, terrible sin. I know I was just a teenager, and stuff that I shouldn't have been involved in. 'Course mommy about beat me to death when she found out that I was present in it..."

"...You could ask that table how old you were, and it could peck out the age. Ask how may people was in the room, and it would peck out the numbers in that room."(as recorded in October 2001).

Very similar to the beliefs about ouija boards a lot of people in Appalachia felt the same way about Table Walking; as my Great Aunt Fern described her mommy's reaction to finding out about Fern being part of it. It is advisable to remember that any time you take part in a conjuring of a spirit to communicate through an object that you set up strict rules about who/what can communicate through the object, how long it can communicate, and that it is not allowed to stay after the communication has ended. 

Before you begin it is important to say a prayer or incantation of protection. A simple prayer would be something similar to:

"Mother Appalachia and Father Allegheny watch and protect us while we open ourselves to receive the communication from the spirit world. Only allow those spirits which have our best interest at heart to communicate and use this table. Fill us with your Divine light and protect us.

-Amen "

(you can pray to whichever deity you worship. Or if you do not worship any deity then just say a focused intention of protection and intention)

So how does one get a table to walk and talk?

1.  The table needs to have four legs. It can't be one that has a large base that looks like the letter T. It has to have a leg in each corner. 

A natural wood table preferably oak as its the strongest and heaviest. Also, I think this goes back into the scot/Irish roots of oak being a Holy tree, but that wasn't mentioned. 

2.  A quiet room. 

3.  It can be done alone, but results are better with a group. 

Then it's really similar to any other sort of spirit communication:

1.  Make your desire known to the spirit world or to the universe. 

2.  Tell it the table is its vessel fr communication. And it is to be communicated through tapping of the leg or rising up on its legs. 

6. Sit around the table, and begin to ask questions. One question at a time and allow the spirit a few minutes to answer each question. Do not bombard the spirit/table with questions like a machine gun

3.  When you are finished thank the spirit and the table. Dismiss the entities and close off the portal that was opened.

Stay tuned for more blog posts! 

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