http://www.metafilter.com/tags/esoterica Posts tagged with 'esoterica' at MetaFilter. Wed, 10 Jun 2009 21:40:50 -0800 Wed, 10 Jun 2009 21:40:50 -0800 en-us http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss 60 http://www.metafilter.com/82376/Atlas%2DObscura <a href="http://atlasobscura.com/content/karl-junker-house">Karl Junker House</a> is just one of the locations on <a href="http://atlasobscura.com/">Atlas Obscura</a> from <a href="http://curiousexpeditions.org/?p=679">Curious Expeditions</a>. There aren't many pictures of any of the locations but it's only been up for a week. The pictures that are there are too small to see much detail, I'd like to see them change that. In the meantime here is the <a href="http://www.junkerhaus.de/">Junker House</a> website and an <a href="http://www.rawvision.com/environments/popups/junker.html">interior</a> shot. tag:metafilter.com,2009:site.82376 Wed, 10 Jun 2009 21:40:50 -0800 curiosity esoterica germany junker wonder world tellurian http://www.metafilter.com/75537/Paranoia%2Dis%2Da%2Dheightened%2Dstate%2Dof%2Dawareness <a href="http://www.amokbooks.com/links/index.html">The fringes of knowledge</a> <a href="http://www.komabookstore.com/amok.html">Amok publishers</a> specializes in collecting the finest of esoterica. Back before the Internet had everything, people with deviant tastes would have to rely on mail order catalogs such as Amok. It has published a compendium of bizarre books known as Dispatches since the 80s. I managed to bump into this <a href="http://www.amokbooks.com/books/dispatch.html">book</a> at the University library. I also wasted half a day savoring the ridiculous annotations and drawings. Here are some reviews that hype it: "The Amok catalog is required reading for all information junkies, mutants, lunatics and anybody else interested in exploring worlds and ideas never seen... A side effect of reading the Amok catalog is that it could make you reconsider the very nature of imagination, freedom and possibility." – San Francisco Chronicle "Amok is the research guide to all the sordid thoughts you'd never discuss at lunch... the index of all that we hold obscure, perverse, and dear." – Esquire "You think you're postmodern. You give to your local National Public Radio station. You write letters on behalf of prisoners of conscience. Jesse Helms makes your knee go into involuntary spasms. You are primed for First Amendment battles and believe you stand squarely on the side of the purists. Until you start to leaf through the Amok Fourth Dispatch." – Publisher's Weekly "The benchmark sourcebook on deviant literature." – Vanity Fair "An impressive collection, absolutely definitive in many ways – one can almost say that there's no need to read anything that isn't in this catalogue." – J. G. Ballard "A reading list from Hell that is a must for any serious oddball bibliophile." – John Waters tag:metafilter.com,2008:site.75537 Thu, 09 Oct 2008 20:07:16 -0800 amok amokbooks bizarre conspiracytheory counterculture esoterica occult weird bodywithoutorgans http://www.metafilter.com/43099/Esoterica%2DVolume%2DVII%2DSpecial%2DPolitical%2DIssue Select insiders will apppreciate Volume VII of <a href="http://www.esoteric.msu.edu/Contents.html" title="A peer-reviewed academic journal devoted to the transdisciplinary study of Western esotericism: Western esoteric traditions including alchemy, astrology, Gnosticism, gnosis, magic, mysticism, Rosicrucianism, and secret societies, and their ramifications in art history, history, literature, and politics.">Esoterica</a>, this one being a Special Political Issue which leads with <a href="http://www.esoteric.msu.edu/VolumeVII/Secrecy.htm" title="In this article, therefore, I will suggest that we look at the Bush administration through the lenses of three controversial theorists who have had much to say about secrecy in both its religious and political dimensions: the German-born political philosopher, Leo Strauss, the Florentine philosopher, Niccol&#0242; Machiavelli, and the French postmodern theorist, Jean Baudrillard. I have chosen these three, seemingly disparate, theorists because they correspond to and help make sense of three of the most important forces at work in the Bush administration, namely: 1) the Neoconservative movement, which is heavily indebted to Strauss' thought...; 2) the manipulations of Bush's pious public image by advisors like Karl Rove (a reader of Machiavelli) and Vice-President Dick Cheney (often compared to Machiavelli), who have used the President's connections with the Christian Right for political advantage; and 3) an astonishingly uncritical mainstream media, whose celebration of Bush's image as a virtuous man of faith and general silence about his less admirable activities is truly 'hyperreal,' in Baudrillard's sense of the term.">Religion and Secrecy in the Bush Administration: The Gentleman, the Prince, and the Simulacrum</a>. Previous issues have featured articles like <a href="http://www.esoteric.msu.edu/VolumeV/Arkestra.htm" title="In 1952, Down Beat magazine published a special issue honoring Duke Ellington on the twenty-fifth anniversary of his historic Cotton Club debut; four years later, during a period when his band was struggling, he would be featured on the cover of Time. Also punctuating 1952 was the election of President Dwight Eisenhower, the release of Hank Williams’s 'Your Cheatin’ Heart,' the publication of Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man, and the explosion of the first hydrogen bomb by the United States on Eniwetok Atoll. Less than three weeks before the nuclear test, an obscure Chicago jazz musician named Herman Poole Blount changed his name to Le Sony'r Ra, registering the change at the Cooke County Circuit Court. The newly christined Ra developed a new genealogy for himself, refusing to acknowledge any connection to his biological family or his upbringing in Birmingham, Alabama. Long known by the nickname Sonny, the new name was taken from the Egyptian sun god, and the spelling was chosen to give the full name a complement of nine letters, for good luck. In his new genealogy, Ra was a citizen of Saturn, birthdate unknown and irrelevant, sent by the Creator to redeem earthlings with a musical message.">Sun Ra: From Ephrata (F-Ra-Ta) to Arkestra</a>, <a href="http://www.esoteric.msu.edu/VolumeIV/MagicCyber.htm" title="As many Internet enthusiasts have discovered, the world of cyberspace is also a realm where fantasy personas can be created in virtual reality - where human beings can interact with each other in ways limited only by their imagination. Individuals can pose as members of the opposite sex, as fantasy beings - even as dark and evil gods - and this has become a central feature of the development of role-play on the Internet. So in a very specific way the Internet has become an extension of the human psyche, a forum for both its realities and its fantasies. From an esoteric or mystical perspective, though, what is so intriguing about this interplay between technology and the human imagination is that here we are dealing with the equation As I imagine, so I become - and this is the very essence of magic.">Magic and Cyberspace</a> and <a href="http://www.esoteric.msu.edu/VolumeIII/HTML/Oldmeadow.html" title="This article offers a brief sketch of European presences since the arrival of the first missionaries, an account of the Tibetan engagements of several key figures in the 20th century, and reflections on the significance of Tibet in the recent psychological and spiritual history of the West.">The Western Quest for 'Secret Tibet'</a>--to name but a very few. And check out the <a href="http://www.esoteric.msu.edu/Image_Library.html" title="Virtual Tours of Harmony Society, Economy, Pennsylvania, Ephrata, Pennsylvania and Bronson Alcott's Fruitlands and Images from Jacob B&#0246;hme, Theosophia Revelata (1730) among others">Image Library</a>, too. <small><small>Via <a href="http://www.othervoices.org/index2.html" title="The (e)Journal of Cultural Criticism">Other Voices</a></small></small> tag:metafilter.com,2005:site.43099 Mon, 27 Jun 2005 21:44:48 -0800 Alchemy Esoterica Esotericism SunRa y2karl