THE ANNOTATED Goddess

~ 

Go HERE to find pithy little synopses of current Goddess books and articles. Backgrounds of authors are even served up. Warning #1: If you actually want to lay your hands on some of these, you'll have to trot to the library for them (or pay highway-robbery fees to online journals like Antiquity that are extorting fifteen British pounds per article). Warning #2: The top of this site is written in a language I can't even identify, let alone read. Scroll halfway down to reach the bibliography section. Warning #3: There are shrill voices in this list -- scaredy-rabbit archaeologists shivering at the thought that gods might have to step aside for Goddess; Ronald Hutton (1997) appears to be one. Also, if you see the phrases "Cult Archaeology" or "Pseudoscientific Beliefs about the Past," you're in their territory, i.e., the Scaredy-Rabbit Swamps.

Stuff synopsized:

Adler, Margot 1997 Drawing Down the Moon
Ana Tours: 1998 Ana Tours "On the Trail of the Great Goddess".
Bachofen, J.J. 1992 Myth, Religion, and Mother Right
Bender, Barbara 1998 Stonehenge
Carson, Anne 1992 Goddesses and Wise Women
Christ, Carol P. 1979 Why Women Need the Goddess:
Conkey, Margaret W., and Ruth E. Tringham 1998 Archaeology and the Goddess
Drews, Robert 1989 The Coming of the Greeks
Eller, Cynthia 1991 Relativizing the Patriarchy
Feder, Kenneth L. 1998 Frauds, Myths, and Mysteries
Finley, Nancy J. 1991 Political Activism and Feminist Spirituality.
Foley, Helene P. 1994 A Question of Origins
Friedl, Ernestine 1998. Society and Sex Roles.
Gimbutas, Marija 1991 The Language of the Goddess
Gimbutas, Marija 1996 [1974] The Goddesses and Gods of Old Europe, 6500-3500 BC: Myths and Cult Images. New and Updated Edition
Guiley, Rosemary Ellen 1989 The Encyclopedia of Witches and Witchcraft.
G'Zell, Morning Glory, and Otter G'Zell 1996 Who on Earth is the Goddess? In Magical Religion and Modern Witchcraft.
Hackett, Jo Ann 1989 Can a Sexist Model Liberate Us? Ancient Near Eastern "Fertility" Goddesses.
Harris, Marvin 1968 The Rise of Anthropological Theory.
Harrold, Francis B., and Raymond A. Eve 1995 Cult Archaeology and Creationism: Understanding Pseudoscientific Beliefs about the Past.
Hutton, Ronald 1997. The Neolithic Great Goddess: A Study in Modern Tradition.
Jordan, Michael 1996 Witches: An Encyclopedia of Paganism and Magic.
Leonard, Joan 1990 Teaching Introductory Feminist Spirituality: Tracing the Trajectory Through Women Writers.
Mallory, J.P. 1989 In Search of the Indo-Europeans: Language, Archaeology, and Myth.
McDermott, LeRoy 1996 Self-Representation in Upper Paleolithic Female Figures.
Morgan, Lynne 1996 Women and the Goddess Today.
Motz, Lotte 1998 The Faces of the Goddess.
Murray, Margaret 1970 [1931] The God of the Witches.
Porterfield, Amanda 1987 Feminist Theology as a Revitalization Movement.
Puhvel, Jaan 1993 Comparative Mythology.
Puttick, Elizabeth 1997 Women in New Religions: In Search of Community, Sexuality, and Spiritual Power.
Rose, Deborah. 1998 The Black Madonna: Primordial Ancestress. Spirit of Change
Ruether, Rosemary Radford 1980 Goddesses and Witches: Liberation and Countercultural Feminism.
Russell, Jeffrey Burton 1984 Witchcraft in the Middle Ages.
Saiving, Valerie 1976 Androcentrism in Religious Studies.
Starhawk 1989 The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess.
Stone, Merlin 1976 When God Was a Woman.
Taylour, Lord William,1994 The Mycenaeans.
Thomas, Keith 1997 [1971] Religion and the Decline of Magic.
Valiente, Doreen 1973 An ABC of Witchcraft.
Weaver, Mary Jo 1989 Who is the Goddess and Where Does She Get Us?

To add to the list: Lucy Goodison and Christine Morris, 1998, Ancient Goddesses: The Myths and the Evidence. Goodison and Morris are British archaeologists trying to survive in a man's world. They seem to be saying the following: (1) We must tread charily with Goddess archaeology, because we are scaring the men, who are now overreacting. Tut, tut. (2) There were Goddess societies in the past, but there's still more to discover about them, so don't ruin our fun by assuming the Goddess is written in stone (no pun intended). (3) Marija Gimbutas' Old Europe may indeed have been a Goddess society but we need to study it more to find out for sure (i.e., don't act so confounded certain as Marija did, or you‘ll scare the men).

I'll also point to Nanno Marinatos, 2000, The Goddess and the Warrior: The Naked Goddess and Mistress of the Animals in Early Greek Religion. I bit the bullet and ordered a copy (very expensive), but my Mail Person has not yet plunked it down into my mailbox. However, I did find this review on Amazon.Com: "In this provocative and arresting book, [archaeologist] Nanno Marinatos explores the role of the naked goddess and mistress of animals in Greek religion. She examines their eastern origins and discusses their dissemination throughout the mainland and Crete."
.
____________
Thnx to Muco at Stock.xchng for the photo