This month’s guest is Dr. Phil Legard. Phil is senior lecturer in music production at Leeds Beckett University. His research interests lie at the intersection of esotericism, music, and politics. His doctoral work explored autoethnography as a research method for esotericism studies, from which he developed a theory of ‘creative seekership’. With Dr. Alexander Cummins, he is co-author of An Excellent Booke of the Arte of Magicke (Scarlet Imprint 2020), which transcribes and analyses the 16th-century grimoire and magical record of Sir Humphrey Gilbert. He is also the author of various popular and academic articles on esotericism, magick, and creativity. He is one-half of the musical duo Hawthonn, who currently have two LP releases on Brooklyn’s Ba Da Bing records.

In this interview, Phil talks about the tricky area of methodology when it comes to scholars who are also magickal practitioners, and the reasons why he chose autoethnography as his primary research method. He also explains the background of the term and how the method has developed from a narrative-only approach to one where analysis is also utilized. Phil then talks about some important points and insights that arose while he was doing field recordings, and more about his developmental process as a magickal practitioner throughout the years as a “creative seeker”, which relates to how paths of practice develop as a consequence of experience and appraisals of those experiences. This also includes identity construction and performance, and how experiences shape one’s sense of identity.

Note: The full interview with Phil is available on Patreon, with a 7-day free trial, should you be interested. If you enjoy my content and would like to support my work, please consider checking out my Patreon page (as there is much more content to come over there) and consider subscribing. 
Rejected Religion | Illuminating the Obscure | Patreon

PROGRAM NOTES

Dr. Phil Legard
The Occultural Orpheus: Exploring Creative Seekership through Analytic Autoethnography (leedsbeckett.ac.uk)
(99+) Phil Legard | Leeds Beckett University - Academia.edu
(99+) Imaginative Listening and Porous Practices: Expanding the Boundaries of Esoteric Musicology | Phil Legard - Academia.edu
(99+) Inner-Sense and Experience: Drone Music, Esotericism and the Hieroeidetic Field | Phil Legard - Academia.edu
(99+) The Bright Sound Behind the Sound: Real-World Music, Symbolic Discourse and the Foregrounding of Imagination | Phil Legard - Academia.edu
Music | Hawthonn (bandcamp.com)
𝖕𝔥𝔦𝔩 𝖑𝔢𝔤𝔞𝔯𝔡 (@larkfall) / X (twitter.com)
Hawthonn (@hawthonn) • Instagram photos and videos

Works Referenced:
Esotericism and Criticism: A Platonic Response to Arthur Versluis (wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.com)
1887_3160767-What is wrong with Pagan Studies_.pdf
A-Methodology-of-the-Imagination.pdf (mythcosmologysacred.com)
Writing the self into research: Using grounded theory analytic strategies in autoethnography | Published in TEXT (scholasticahq.com)
Hildegard Westerkamp - Kits Beach Soundwalk (1989) (youtube.com)

Works by Hawthonn used in the interview:
32:15 - Dream Cairn from the album Earth Mirror

Rejected Religion Theme: Daniel P. Shea

Additional music: Stephanie Shea