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There are many ways of understanding and documenting the remains of past material presence in contemporary society. One is archaeology. We understand and document remains through contextual excavations. Another is anthropology, accomplished by our participation-observation practices when we immerse ourselves in other cultures. Still another is performance studies. The past is revealed through a "theatrical ghosting" and fictive memory practices. In a "ghost excavation", I use all three disciplinary approaches to unearth interactive past presence. The recovery process of this "dead presence" is achieved through a "P.O.P." (Participate-Observe-Perform) methodology, organized around "immediate ...
All battlefields are haunted by the memory of what occurred there. Some, however, are haunted by more than remembrance, memorialization, and heritage events. There are American Civil War battlefields that remain “active” with the ongoing manifestations of past military behaviors. A theory of American Civil War battlefield hauntings is presented here, tied to mid-19th c. concepts of (and belief in) a “good death” and the importance of home and family. Fieldwork exploring these ideas shows, in many battlefield manifestations, a direct relationship between these concepts and battlefield interactive hauntings.
Using an innovative auto-ethnographic approach to investigate the otherness of the places that make up the childhood home and its neighbourhood in relation to memory-derived and memory-imbued cultural geographies, Remembering the Cultural Geographies of a Childhood Home is concerned with childhood spaces and children's perspectives of those spaces and, consequentially, with the personalised locations that make up the childhood family home and its immediate surroundings (such as the garden, the street, etc.). Whilst this book is primarily structured by the author's memories of living in his own Welsh childhood home during the 1970s - that is, the auto-ethnographic framework - it is as much ab...
"Digging-Deep" is an excavation of the archaeological site called "John Sabol". It is an unearthing of the author's memory of experiences ofpast presences that cuts across space, time, and culture. Water, mining operations, dust and dirt, dogs and wolves, and ghosts are seen as important features that are re-covered from these memory excavations. Some of the re-called practices that are unearthed include an alternative remembrance of "trick or treat", the multiple symmetrical worlds of history, myth, and ghosts in Winchester, England, the haunting nature of archaeological excavations and field surveys, the actor's encounters with more than a filmed "death scene", and a search for a legendary monster in Arkansas. All of these memories are perceived as symetrically-interrelated though they originate in different places. They are viewed as a form of "theatrical ghosting", a resonating element that unfolds time, as events and activities are framed by their contemporary significance in the author's life. In this process of excavation, a re-curring haunting drama manifests in the life of this archaeologist, who also happens to be a cultural anthropologist, actor, and "ghost excavator".
Ghost Research is archaeological work that requires specific field practices. This book introduces the investigative techniques of a "ghost archaeology". This is defined as a scientific discipline of the "ordinary", a search for the repetitive patterns of cultural behavior that can be unearthed during an field investigation. Six case studies of cultural hauntings are presented which illustrate the usefulness of archaeological methodology and techniques in field research. The investigation of ghostly presence at Gettysburg, in the anthracite coal region, at Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia, and a Civil War haunting in Petersburg, Virginia are cited. These investigations show how potential evidential data can be uncovered, if only the investigators would maintain an archaeological sensibility in their fieldwork operations.
The production of space is a view of landscape as a process of creating and negotiating social interactions within particular spaces. What remains of past productions are the traces and vestiges, as cultural expressions or “signs” of these productions. A “ghost excavation” works with what remains of these past productions. This is achieved through an analysis of the structure and process of past social construction. Fieldwork involves the recovery of an “afterlife semiotic system” (or “haunting”) of what remains from those past productions. The “ghost excavation” is an alternative, non-paranormal, analysis of haunted space.
With the paranormal becoming so mainstream in the last decade between television, books, and movies, is the craze actually brand new? Before there was the entertainment industry that we know of today, plays and musicals were one of the primary forms of expression and reflections of societys beliefs of their time. This book will cover an analysis of the belief in the supernatural throughout the course of humanitys existence and showing that in a way, the paranormal has always been normal. Using elements of theatre as the research vehicle, as well as establishing the relationship between acting and the unknown, this book examines the rich relationship between theatre and the paranormal. Finally, this book will challenge the reader to consider the possibility of using theatre as a method for researching and investigating the paranormal. Readers will be asked to consider what would happen if investigators and ghost hunters took on the role of an actor and the haunted location becomes a performance space, thus welcoming communication and activity from the other side.
A blend of traditional and non-traditional approaches toward client-centered paranomal investigation. The methodology provides a solid structure as compared to random methods used by ghost investigators.
This book is a history lesson. It is about “ghost excavations” at four haunted sites and what we learned from the experience. The objective is pure and simple. It is to show how, by questioning basic tenets of a “ghost hunting” paradigm, we can go beyond the contemporary reality of a field that is entertainment, and entertaining, and arrive at an investigative position of constructive research. In the process of this “excavation”, we learn what it was (is) to be and remain human.