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Ethan Shapiro<\/strong> Describe your project in a few lines<\/strong> What made you interested in this topic?<\/strong> What kind of research did you do for this paper?<\/strong> What advice would you give to students who are beginning their research in WRDS150?<\/strong> What are you working on now?<\/strong>
\nSociology\/Psychology, 3rd year student
\nCONTACT<\/strong>: ethandshapiro@gmail.com
\nKEYWORDS<\/strong>: New Age Spirituality, Colonialism, Intertemporal Connectedness, Symbolic Immortality, Terror Management<\/p>\n
\nColonial injustices are increasingly problematized in mainstream cultural discourses, prompting settler populations to engage in the dissonant process of \u2018historical soul-searching\u2019: coming to terms with the colonial past and one\u2019s complicity in contemporary colonialism. My project examined how settler-descendants use New Age spirituality to resolve these dissonances surrounding identity and purpose in postcolonial society. By identifying with \u2018ancestral\u2019 pre-colonial religions, white New Agers can diminish the existential threats posed by emergent historical understandings while negating the possibility of political <\/p>\n
\nMy upbringing in suburban Toronto was characteristically Canadian, permeated by historical amnesia around questions of land, Indigeneity, and colonialism. Once I learned about my town\u2019s Indigenous history, including the expropriation of Anishinaabe land, I began to question how I benefit from colonial relations. Soon after, I picked up a copy of Ancient Spirit Rising by Pegi Eyers, which argued that white settlers must reclaim ancient European eco-spiritualities to redress colonial and ecological injustices. Dr. Jennifer Cowe\u2019s WRDS 150 section enabled me to view this issue critically, underscoring that how we remember our pasts has grave implications for how we understand and act in the present moment.<\/p>\n
\nMy research combined sociological accounts of New Age spirituality and spiritual commodification with the psychological literature on religion and meaning maintenance. I also examined digital materials published by key figures and organizations within New Age movements, including Reclaiming (a neo-pagan \u2018community\u2019 rooted in feminism, environmentalism, and pre-colonial witchcraft tradition) and one of its founding members, Starhawk.<\/p>\n
\nFind a question that keeps you up at night. My best research questions have come from personal experience, whether by critically investigating seemingly \u2018trivial\u2019 aspects of everyday life or by challenging my taken-for-granted habits and tastes. While many students are often told to remain objective and disinterested in their research, acknowledging research as a profoundly personal endeavour can allow you to be more honest with your findings and generate original, meaningful questions. <\/p>\n
\nRecently, I have been looking at how and why hipster taste emerged in neoliberal global North societies, focusing on occupational shifts from traditional middle-class employment to culture-based self-employment. You can read more about this research in the forthcoming volume of Sojourners Undergraduate Journal of Sociology. I am also in the early stages of designing an honours project that will examine Vancouver\u2019s burgeoning craft beer scene from brewers\u2019 perspectives. <\/p>\nLink to Project<\/strong><\/h6>\n