Representation of witches in literature and popular culture has long been fraught with negative stereotypes and harmful misconceptions. The demonization and vilification of witches throughout history have contributed to their marginalization and the perpetuation of fear and misunderstanding. It is crucial to acknowledge and rectify these harmful portrayals to promote a more accurate and respectful understanding of witchcraft. From medieval Europe's witch trials to modern-day Halloween caricatures, witches have been consistently portrayed as wicked and malevolent figures. These representations often depict witches as old, ugly women with devious intentions, using their powers to harm unsuspecting individuals. This one-dimensional portrayal not only fails to reflect the complexities and diversity of real-life witchcraft practices but also reinforces harmful stereotypes and prejudices.
Eggers gives us this motif of Thomasin alone, stressing her singularity in the family. In the last image above of Thomasin alone facing the forest, we already get her yearning for an escape from her oppressed way of being, seeing in the forest her desire to be “free.” In these next three images, we see how Eggers also codes Thomasin as both self-aware of her oppressed existence and indomitable. In these three images we see yet another facet of Thomasin, her simple desire to have the unconditional love and acceptance of her parents. Instead, because of putting God and their Puritan/Christian belief system before their kids, they too easily come to see Thomasin as Other, yet another deep commentary in the film of the toxic nature of at least the potential for Christianity to be a (self) destructive belief system.
I ll get at the former the value of making the witch real below, but in terms of the later, I still think Eggers makes a compelling crucible scenario despite making the witch real. This is the reading in the film that is getting the most oxygen and with good reason, since it is the most palpable thread in the film and the cleanest one.
This one-dimensional portrayal not only fails to reflect the complexities and diversity of real-life witchcraft practices but also reinforces harmful stereotypes and prejudices. Challenging the stereotype-reinforcing witch representation requires highlighting the diverse and empowering aspects of witchcraft. Witches, throughout history, have been healers, wise women, and source of spiritual guidance.
What’s the Point? An Examination of the Witch Costume
When late October arrives and the air is sweet and thin with falling leaves and winter squash, I am thinking about Samhain. At this time of year, I honor my ancestors. It is a sacred Sabbat, a holiday for deep reflection and a time of quiet. In the evening of October 31st, I light candles and place photographs of my ancestors on my altar. I meditate and hold vigil, waiting for signs from those who have passed beyond the veil. Samhain is the Celtic Pagan new year, which honors the division between light and darkness. As we enter late fall and winter, the cycle moves to the dark phase of the year—the time for rest and reflection.
Meanwhile, most people (myself included) are dressing up to celebrate a different holiday. Cultural sensitivity to the commodification of many religions and cultures has been growing, but the practice of witchcraft and Pagan or Wiccan religions are often forgotten.
Witch costumes are classic in mainstream western culture. They share the ranks with ghosts, goblins, fairies, and vampires. All of these tropes appear to be fun, sweet, and silly. And obviously, they are all characters in storybooks and aren’t real. Right?
But I am a witch. And I am not alone.
It wasn’t until the last five years or so that I began to understand the problem of the witch costume. For a long time I loved the image, and supported those dressing up as witches. I watched disparaging movies about witches such as Hocus Pocus, and The Craft because I was happy to see something like myself represented in the media. It made me feel accepted. These wicked, sultry, and ridiculous depictions of witches are hugely problematic: they perpetuate and normalize a lie about a religion and a culture. They reduce Paganism and witchcraft to a stereotype whose creation was intended to annihilate a group of people that frightened the majority.
The Craft film, 1996
As a female Pagan witch I felt as though these films were feminist. I misunderstood the four lead witch characters in The Craft as powerful females exercising their own agency in an unfair world. In reality, all four characters were distinctly anti-feminist and anti-witch. All four became power hungry (literally casting spells to become more powerful) and dangerous (murdering and injuring several people), as they pursued witchcraft. All of the women were focused on superficial or personal gains (becoming more beautiful, seeking revenge, desire for a male). As they became more powerful, they began to fight amongst each other—maintaining the untruth that women seek power, squander it, and self-destruct.
There is a solid and commonly accepted witch stereotype. It is so familiar, that it might not be necessary to recap. For clarity, I will mention the key points. Witches are normally ugly hooked-nose females wearing a black dress and robes (stripes are often present), with a conical black hat, a broom, and a cauldron. Witches do horrible things to other people, worship the devil, possess unsuspecting victims and eat children. In reality, witches don’t possess other people (or eat them!). We generally don’t wear pointy hats, I have never met a witch that has flown on a broom, and we don’t believe in Satan. There are many male and transgender witches.
When I meet with my coven, we share news. We talk about things that we are struggling with and bounce solutions off one another. We usually do a ritual together that may or may not include spellwork. Sometimes we simply honor the full moon. Sometimes we celebrate a specific goddess or god. Sometimes we make charms for sick pets or protection. And then we say goodnight and go home. A witch’s everyday religious practices are widely diverse (much like Christians or Muslims). For example, I do not have a static altar; I create altars every day and take them apart. They are usually very simple and involve no more than a candle and a special object. Others might spend hours meditating at their elaborate and beautiful altar each morning and night. I pray every day, but my prayers don’t involve kneeling, and I don’t have specific prayers that I recite—but some pagans might. I am a witch and I have a deep, nurturing, spiritual, and powerful connection to the Earth and all her energy. My religion helps guide me every day, and I take comfort in it and satisfaction in my craft as I learn more and more with time.
There aren’t many Pagans around. As a small group (0.4% of the world’s population identifies as Pagan vs Christians at 23%), there are are less voices to speak against stereotypes and negative portrayals in pop culture. We are often villainized, ridiculed, or romanticized. In the media, witches are either the epitome of good, evil, or simply silly. Rarely are we taken seriously or treated with respect.
The Wizard of Oz film, 1939
One of the most iconic witches in the modern world is Margaret Hamilton’s portrayal of The Wicked Witch of the West. The imagery that W. W. Denslow (the original artist who illustrated The Wonderful Wizard of Oz), and Adrian Adolph Greenberg’s costume design from the seminal 1939 film are not the inventors of the pointy hat and black robes. Christian leaders may have used this visual representation of witches while murdering more than eighty thousand women and men in the 1500 and 1600s. In fact, there is a theory that the witch hat was inspired by the hat that Jews were forced to wear during this time. Jews were severely persecuted and were commonly associated with the devil—so the witch hat is antisemitic and anti-witch.
To continue the connection with antisemitism, the depiction of the hooked nose commonly associated with witches is actually another example of medieval bigotry. Jewish people were often illustrated as having a hooked nose, and when paired with the conical hat, the similarity between the traditional witch costume and this antisemitic representation is striking. It is likely that the witch costume of today is a leftover and shifted antisemitic representation from the middle ages.
12th Century German Jews with hats. From Herrad von Landsperg, Hortus deliciarum.
1341 Jews and King Henry VII. From Codex Trevirensi
During the 1400-1600s, Jewish peoples endured similar persecution to that of thousands of European people—mostly women—who were placed on trial and executed for witchcraft. Were these people witches? Likely not, but murdering these people frightened and scattered witches and forced many into hiding. Thus, the idea of the “bad witch” becomes larger than the witch themselves. What does this mean? The innocent and classic costume of a witch is actually a weapon used against a minority group of people to systemically annihilate their religion and culture.
If we look back through history, we see witches depicted as antagonists in both literature and in history. In Germany a book called Malleus Maleficarum (Hammer of Witches) was published by a Catholic clergyman in 1487. This book was intended to give reasons and directions for exterminating witches. Malleus Maleficarum sold widely for several hundred years and is largely responsible for the most recognizable witch murder: burning at the stake.
In 1692 in America, Salem Witch Trials took place and two hundred accusations led to twenty deaths of innocent people, both men and women. To this day, scholars still cannot agree on a completely satisfactory reason for the derangement and cruelty that the people of coastal Massachusetts engaged in, but the result remains the same: negative imagery and fear surrounding witchcraft.
It is about this time—the 1700s—that the witch as we know her was solidified. The black hat (pointy like devil horns) was used as a sign of wickedness. The Brothers Grimm published their first collection in 1812 filling it with female antagonist witches. For example, Hansel and Gretel’s witch eats children; Snow White’s witch is power hungry, attempting to murder Snow White and eat her heart; and Rapunzel’s sorceress deprives her of all human contact and blinds her true love. In 1844 Hans Christian Anderson gave us The Snow Queen witch character and the Sea Witch (“The Little Mermaid”), offering children and adults more reasons to be horrified.
Hansel and Gretel in The Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm illustration by Arthur Rackham, 1909
In the Western world today, witch-hunts are things of the past. This is not true of all parts of the world. In Tanzania, hundreds of women are still being murdered for witchcraft. These women are blamed for sickness, death, crops failing, and famine. They are scapegoats for their community, and the killings are led by vigilantes. The phrase “witch-hunt” means just that: looking for someone to blame when nothing is there. Even this phrase, used to describe horrendous crimes against innocents, is anti-witch; it is essentially saying that witches do not exist.
Women and men both have been burned at the stake, drowned, tortured, and exiled for witchcraft (real and imagined), and unfortunately, it does still happen. Evil is a scary idea for us humans. It is an idea that can terrify and paralyze and transform regular people into a mob. Fear makes us monsters, and witches still, for many, incite this type of intense and irrational fear: nearly 1500 children were abused (even murdered) in the UK just last year because of misguided beliefs about witchcraft or possession.
Does that make you uncomfortable and defensive? I understand the reaction, and you have my support. But instead of putting up your fists and trying to punch me with your excuses about storybook characters, positive examples, and freedom of speech, I challenge you to examine your morals. What do you want to see in the world, and what kind of world do you want for yourself? For your children? What simple, every day things can you do to bring that dream into fruition?
The modern witch image is recognized by many children and adults. However, this representation was—and continues to be—a tool for murdering thousands of people. It is an antisemitic representation that has been shifted onto and shared with the now classic image of the witch, culminating into a hugely bigoted cliché. It is an image that brings certain witches anger and fear—anger for being reduced to a stereotype, and anger at the attempted extermination of their culture and religion by such simplification; fear of being mistreated or possibly harmed because of the misrepresentation this stereotype has created. Let’s ditch the witch costume and all that it stands for: hatred, scapegoating, murder, and bigotry.
If you are interested in the topic:
They have played a crucial role in communities, dispelling illnesses and providing emotional support. By emphasizing these positive aspects of witchcraft, we can counterbalance the negative image perpetuated by popular culture. Additionally, incorporating authentic and varied representations of witches in literature, film, and other media forms can promote a more accurate understanding and appreciation for witchcraft. Including narratives that explore the complexities and struggles faced by witches can humanize them, making their experiences relatable and challenging biases. Furthermore, education plays a pivotal role in dismantling misconceptions surrounding witchcraft. Incorporating accurate historical information about witch trials, the origins of witchcraft practices, and the complexities of different traditions helps dispel stereotypes and fosters a more informed perspective. By engaging in conversations and sharing resources that promote understanding and empathy, we can work towards combating the harmful representations of witches. In conclusion, annihilating the witch representation requires addressing the negative stereotypes and misconceptions that have plagued witchcraft for centuries. By highlighting the diverse and empowering aspects of real-life witchcraft practices, promoting accurate and varied representations, and educating others, we can challenge the harmful portrayal of witches and ultimately foster a more respectful and accurate understanding of this unique and ancient tradition..
Reviews for "Reclaiming the Witch: Defying Cultural Depictions"
1. John - 1 star
I found "Annihilate the Witch Representation" to be incredibly problematic and offensive. The show perpetuates harmful stereotypes and fails to offer any nuanced or positive representation of witches. Instead, it presents them as evil, demonic creatures to be eradicated. This type of portrayal only adds to the long history of witch-hunting and discrimination against women or individuals who are perceived as "other." It is disappointing to see a show that has the potential to break stereotypes and promote inclusivity instead reinforce harmful narratives.
2. Emily - 2 stars
While I appreciate the effort to explore the portrayal of witches in "Annihilate the Witch Representation," I found it to be a missed opportunity. The show attempts to delve into the complexities of witchcraft but falls short by relying on tired tropes and clichés. The witches are either overly sexualized or depicted as monstrous, perpetuating harmful stereotypes. Furthermore, the plot lacks depth and fails to provide any real thought-provoking commentary on the representation of witches. Overall, I was left disappointed and wanting more from this show.
3. Sarah - 1 star
"Annihilate the Witch Representation" was an unfortunate disappointment. The show had the potential to challenge preconceived notions about witches, but instead, it further perpetuated harmful stereotypes. The witches are portrayed as solely vengeful and sinister, without any exploration of their rich histories or motivations. Furthermore, the lack of diversity among the witches reinforces the idea that witchcraft is a monolithic concept, ignoring the rich cultural diversity that exists in actual witch communities. This show does a disservice to witches everywhere by failing to provide proper representation and falling into tired stereotypes.