Professor Charles Emmons: at work and play

This is a special guest blog posting by Professor Charles Emmons of Gettysburg College, USA. Charles is a sociologist and has published widely from his research on the sociology of science and spirit, and appeared on numerous TV and radio shows in the US and Hong Kong.

Together with his wife, Penelope – an ordained Spiritualist Minister and healer – Charles wrote Science and Spirit: exploring the limits of consciousness as part of a wider ‘where science meets spirit’ project.

I first met Charles at the Exploring the Extraordinary Conference in York in 2011, where he stuck in my mind as being the first – and only – senior academic I have ever hugged a tree with! In this blog posting Charles reflects on his experiences as an academic and sometimes traveler to worlds beyond the habitual academic gaze. As you will see, it is not always in easy ride, but Charles has stuck with it and I look forward to many more exciting insights in the future from this very special member of our academic community.

Over to you, Charles:

As a sociologist I have studied “normal” topics like politics in Hong Kong, but I especially like to study science, alternate spirituality, and the paranormal.  Some of my books are about Chinese ghosts, UFO researchers, and spirit mediums.  People sometimes ask me what my academic colleagues think of this.

Usually I can’t tell, because the main way people deal with deviance is to ignore it.  Also, I’m not sure I want to know in a lot of cases.  As some wise person said, “What you think of me is none of my business.”  Gradually over the years I have come to appreciate the fact that if I am committed to an open investigation of “extraordinary” things considered taboo subjects in normal, mainstream science, I need to be willing to take the consequences.  Once I was sorely tempted to include the following in my application for a National Science Foundation Grant: “If this application were to receive funding, it would be contrary to my hypothesis.”

Sometimes I do get feedback from colleagues.  A subtle one happened when they had a reception for me at Gettysburg College to celebrate the publication of Chinese Ghosts and ESP: a Study of Paranormal Beliefs and Experiences in 1982.  One professor (from another department) said, “Oh, I’m surprised it’s a hardback! You’d think with a subject like that it would be a paperback.”

Less subtly, a few days before I was to appear in the TV show “Ghosts of Gettysburg” in the 1990s, a faculty member in the natural sciences sent an e-mail to the entire faculty urging them not to watch the show on the grounds that it was going to be a lot of nonsense.  This was an interesting statement considering that nobody could have seen any part of the broadcast ahead of time.  Perhaps he had strong precognitive abilities.  I thought that the true spirit of science was to consider all questions and to keep an open mind before examining the data.

Perhaps the most negative reaction I ever received happened at a sociology conference in the late 1990s at which I gave a talk about UFO researchers from a sociology of science perspective.  One man in the audience complained bitterly that I had labeled his fellow professor at Harvard, John Mack, a “ufologist.”  Perhaps I was embarrassing Harvard, but in fact John Mack had written a book about UFO abductees and had participated in many UFO conferences, thus fitting my operational definition of a ufologist.  Shortly thereafter Harvard University established an ad hoc committee to investigate Mack’s work with abductees, whom he claimed were not crazy but were in fact having some kind of experience worth examining.  His attorney asked me to write a statement to the committee about Mack’s work and the issue of academic freedom.  He had to spend at least $130,000 in legal fees defending himself (successfully).

In 2003 my wife Penelope and I published a book about spirit mediums (Guided by Spirit: A Journey into the Mind of the Medium).  I sent a copy of it to the famous sociologist of religion (and the paranormal etc.), Andrew M. Greeley, who had been on my dissertation committee in 1971.  After reading it he replied that he wanted to thank us for writing such an interesting book.  “I’m glad,” he added, “that you got tenure before you wrote it.”  Greeley wrote the oft-quoted piece, “The Paranormal Is Normal,” meaning that most people have such experiences, even though mainstream science denies the value of studying them.

I really must say, however, that I am fortunate to have gotten tenure (before Chinese Ghosts actually) and to have received financial support for my research (although not as much as I received when studying Hong Kong politics, a “normal” topic).  I am also grateful for the positive reviews and supportive comments I have received from people I respect (like Scott Rogo who called Chinese Ghosts “a refreshing change from the nonsense”).

I’ve come to feel sorry for people who are narrow minded in their view of what science is.  They’re missing out.  As J. Allen Hynek, the founder of modern ufology said, “Science isn’t always what scientists do.”  And I am delighted to see the growing interest in serious study of the paranormal and alternate spirituality, especially in the UK, and especially among many young scholars.

Angels around us?

Yesterday we did ‘research speed dating’ at work. It could have been history’s dullest and shortest lived affair, but actually it was fascinating. We each had 5 minutes, strictly timed, to talk about our research passions.

What I am passionate about as a researcher is exploring the worlds of people who live with spirit in their everyday lives. And I mean literally with spirit, not just with pictures of angels or statues of deities, but with spirit itself, in the form of angels, spirit guides, nature elementals crowding into every nook and cranny of their everyday experiences.

So I talked about this, about how people take spirit guides to work with them, have angels they talk to on a regular basis and communicate with the departed by talking to spirit. Most of my colleagues in this research-speed-dating-challenge talked about sensible, tangible research interests, like poverty, care of the elderly, the built environment.

But I chose to speak about angels and spirit guides.

I wouldn’t have done this 12 months ago through fear of ridicule, but I’ve become more confident in speaking openly about my research interests, and about the methods I use to explore these worlds. I find I’m still met with incredulity though. And someone said afterwards to me, ‘You know, I actually know someone who actually believes in all this stuff!’ And he looked at me as if I was meant to say, ‘Yes, crazy isn’t it!?’

But it isn’t crazy – because these angels and spirit guides make a real difference in the lives of people who live with them. They help them cope better with those material and tangible problems of everyday life, like poverty, getting old or a poor built environment. So should they not also be considered a legitimate part of what we explore as social scientists in order to better understand the modern world?

Another colleague came up at the end and told me about an article she had read about angels, and she sent me the link. It’s by Tim Adams in the Observer, and is based on an interview with Lorna Byrne who has seen angels since she was a young child. Tim Adams points out that 31% of British people believe in angels, and 5% of people claim to have actually seen or spoken to an angel. Except in Nottingham. In Nottingham 17% of people have seen or spoken to an angel. So whatever is going on in Nottingham, it’s clearly the place I should go to next on my research quest to understand the real place of angels in modern society!

Of course we’re not alone, people live with spirit around the world, and that leads me neatly to the announcement that the next posting on this blog will be a guest spot by the wonderful Professor Charles Emmons of Gettysburg College, USA. Charles will be writing about his experiences as an academic researching otherworlds… It’s good stuff, don’t miss it!

St Theresa

Today hundreds of people around the world are blogging about a small kindness they have received and what it meant to them. I am joining in this Small Kindnesses Blogsplash!

I thought long and hard about what small kindness I should share, and as often happens I started thinking about it in research terms as well, and I thought about all the people who I have spoken to as part of my research and the small kindnesses they share as a result of their spirituality. And this brought me to a small kindness which I received a couple of years ago, when I was working on the book and also suffering poor health as a result of the ulcerative colitis which had just decided to invite itself into my life. It is a small kindness that meant so much to me, and resonated with something a lot of my research participants talk about…

The small kindness I am going to share arrived through the post one morning, totally unexpected, and it was a letter from a very dear friend, containing a prayer card. My friend is a Catholic and presumably is surrounded by prayer cards, but it was something new to me. I had vague recollections of seeing similar things in my grandmother’s house as a child, but I had never held or read one. With the prayer card my friend had put a note saying the thing about St Theresa is that you don’t have to be Catholic to ask for her strength.

The fact that my friend had given up one of her dearly-held prayer cards to send it to me with a message she felt I needed to hear meant the world to me, and I still have St Teresa by my desk every day. I’m not a Catholic, but in receiving that small kindness, and in taking the time to sit and mindfully read the message it contained, it had a powerful calming effect on a mind and body which at the time were struggling to live in the moment.

So this small kindness sticks in my mind, and that is why I am sharing it with you in this blogging-event. But I also said it linked to my research. That is because one of the common things which participants told me about was the practice of sending ‘bubbles of protection’ to people. If they knew someone was feeling down or were unwell, or if they saw somebody obviously in pain or distress, they would mentally – and spiritually – send them some ‘healing energy’ or a ‘bubble of protection’.

I used a quote from one of my participants saying exactly this at a conference recently and I received a really surprising response during questions afterwards from someone sitting in the audience. She said she felt what they were doing was incredibly unethical. The person in receipt of this bubble, she argued, may not want that bubble, they weren’t asked if they wanted it and so it was unethical of the person to have sent it in the first place. I was totally confused by this response, as were most of the rest of the audience. Surely anybody who shared the beliefs of the person sending the bubble would see it in the spirit it was meant – as a gift of healing energy that could do no hard. And anybody who didn’t share the same beliefs could presumably just laugh it off – not that they would even know that it had been sent in the first place, because in their worldview there is no such thing as ‘healing energy’, and this wasn’t being forced on them in an aggressive sales pitch but simply sent silently, invisibly and without a word.

It still troubles me, I want to acknowledge that audience member’s concerns, but equally I don’t quite see it as an ethical issue. It is an act of kindness which can do no harm. If you are a believer, it sends good, if you are a non-believer it doesn’t exist, so it doesn’t matter.

When my friend put her prayer card in the post to me I’m glad she didn’t question whether she was doing the ‘right’ or ‘ethical’ thing by sending a non-religious person a Catholic prayer card, because I really benefitted from that small kindness. Whether I benefitted simply by knowing she cared and having that moment of stillness as I read the card, or whether I benefitted because St Teresa heard my ‘prayer’ as I read her message, I will never know. But I don’t think it is ethically problematic, because the intention was harmless, the impact was beneficial and nobody was hurt. If anybody ever gets hurt by having a healing bubble of protection sent to them, perhaps I will change my view. But I think it’s highly unlikely. So for me, these are small kindnesses which, although they might very often go unnoticed by the recipient, spread a little kindness in ways which make sense for those who send them.

And don’t they always say giving is even better than receiving?

Unlikely spiritual leader?

Brand – voted 2011’s Sexiest Vegetarian – is an artist, a creative performer, fan of Transcendental Meditation and yoga. In his Newsnight interview with Jeremy Paxman Brand talked about how his spirituality helps him to expose the illusion of separation that we live under. He said he is seeking a ‘different narrative’ that is in line with our needs as individuals and as a planet.

Unlikely leaders?

Although worlds apart in many respects, these are two men simultaneously on serious spiritual quests for what unites humanity beyond the mere momentary flashes of happiness that materiality seems capable of offering.

It is people like Carr-Gomm and Brand who perhaps between them can come up with that ‘different narrative’, which might speak more meaningfully to people about their relationship with each other and the planet. My research shows they are certainly not alone, and many people today are busy pursuing their own spiritual journeys in an attempt to connect to something deeper, more meaningful and more magical than our often hollow world appears to offer. But these everyday people I speak to don’t necessarily have the influence or leadership opportunities to promote that search more widely. Indeed they very often keep their thoughts and ideas quiet, for fear of being labelled by people who don’t understand.

Russell Brand, of course, has had many labels thrown at him over the years, and would appear to have no fear of them. In an interview with the BBC earlier this year he was quoted as saying ‘I don’t mind having a reputation as a serious and spiritual person. I think that would be a nice reputation to have’.

I think that would be a nice reputation for him to have as well, and I think he is starting to build it – through things like his address to the Home Affairs Select Committee on drug rehabilitation, his role as patron for Focus12, his appearance with the Dalai Lama in Manchester Arena, not to mention his headline-grabbing obsession with yoga. Brand has the potential to step up as one of the twenty-first century’s most unlikely spiritual leaders.

He may have annoyed a lot of people over the years and done many things which might be considered inherently un-spiritual (which he describes with candour in his book). But his is a very high profile story of the way in which many thousands of people today are finding that a turn to the spiritual can fit very comfortably alongside and within the materially obsessed world we now live in. And these are the sorts of stories which have the potential to build momentum towards the unveiling of that ‘different narrative’. But we need credible leaders to build that momentum, leaders like Brand, and Carr-Gomm, who aren’t afraid of labels. Unlikely leaders perhaps, but in an age where traditional authority figures seem to be failing us, leadership has to be found in different places. Russell is passionate, eloquent and witty when he talks about his spirituality; he is also an Essex boy who many people feel they can relate to.

So, back to where I started. I’ve finished ‘My Booky Wook’ and now need to find something to fill the gap which is always left by the conclusion of a good read. Perhaps I will have to buy ‘My Booky Wook 2’ which continues the saga of Brand’s search for the contentment that fame can’t quite grant. Rumour has it ‘My Booky Wook 3’ is underway, which deals with the Katy Perry years. Personally, I look forward to ‘My Booky Wook 4’ which I like to think might start to explore Russell’s ‘different narrative’; and that would turn his autobiographical journey from the more ridiculous side of celebrity, to the sublime possibilities of a more spiritually enlightened world for all.

Waiting for take-off!

Thank you to everyone who came along to the book launch. Professor Charles Emmons and Professor Steve Pile blew me away with their very kind words, we had some lovely wine and I even sold a few books.

What more does a book launch need!

Magic moments

I love it when a book stops me in my tracks and demands 100% attention from cover to cover. So it was with my unlikely holiday read this year. I stumbled across Philip Carr-Gomm and Richard Heygate’s ‘The Book of English Magic’ at the airport on the way out to a week in the sun. This book became my companion by the pool, on the beach and in the bar for my early evening ice cold beer. For anyone with an interest in not only the history of magic in England, but also the place of the enchanted and magical in our everyday modern world, this is the book for you.

It also reminded me why I started out on this research journey. The leading texts in social science are very dismissive of contemporary alternative spirituality, and have very little time for anything magical or otherworldly which may lie at its heart. My research with a wide range of practitioners suggested this was missing the mark completely, because magic and enchantment are alive and kicking in modern Britain. But also, social science is very dismissive of contemporary expressions of spirituality because they are very eclectic, and this they argue undermines their capacity to serve a useful social function. However as Carr-Gomm and Heygate say in modern witchcraft, for example, we see ‘the way in which a religion can grow from a combination of different influences into a belief system that can sustain communities, nourish them intellectually and spiritually, and offer a satisfying alternative to what is already on offer’ (page 183).

So however eclectic and DIY so many forms of spiritual pursuit may appear to the outsider today, I would urge the critics and the cynics to take a closer look, and maybe even invest in a copy of ‘The Book of English Magic’. It certainly nourished me intellectually and spiritually much more than any other holiday read ever has, and offered a thoroughly satisfying alternative to what else seemed to be on offer this summer – which judging by most of the poolside reading was ’50 Shades of Grey’ in 50 different languages…

So ditch your usual holiday read and try something a little more magical this year instead…!

Sustaining security and wellbeing with good food, wine and company after the conference session

I have recently come back from the Royal Geographical Society Annual International Conference which this year had the theme of ‘Security’. Together with colleagues I organised a session on the role of alternative spiritualities in promoting wellbeing in an age of insecurity. One of our speakers was Sandy Edwards, a volunteer healer at Good Hope Hospital in Birmingham. Sandy carries out healing in a gastroenterology ward, and the impact of healing offered by Sandy and her colleagues is currently being evaluated in a £205,000 controlled trial funded by the National Lottery. The results of the trial will be presented to the NHS at the end of the year to inform their decision around whether to introduce complementary therapy more widely in the management of conditions such as IBS (irritable bowel syndrome) and IBD (inflammatory bowel disease – with Crohn’s Disease and Ulcerative Colitis being the two major IBD conditions).

This is something that Good Hope Hospital and the National Lottery are clearly taking seriously; trust the Daily Mail then to dismiss it as ‘voodoo’.

Alternative treatments are popular amongst people with IBS because it is widely recognised as a condition which is stress related and responds well to dietary changes. IBD however is very different and potentially much more serious.  Whilst dietary changes can bring some relief to some sufferers, this is a disease where the bowel is inflamed, ulcerated and bleeding and it has to be managed with lifelong medication and often surgery. Not only do people living with IBD face a lifetime of very expensive medication and difficult to manage symptoms, they can also experience repeated hospital admissions to deal with acute flare ups requiring intravenous steroids, are highly likely to end up having to have surgery to remove part or all of the bowel, and face an increased risk of colorectal cancer. If they’re very unlucky they might die from toxic megacolon or bowel perforation. You can imagine this costs both the NHS and individual sufferers a lot of money - and can lead to a high degree of insecurity for patients!

And this is something I know about as I live with Ulcerative Colitis. So Sandy’s talk interested me not only from a professional point of view, but a personal one as well. If healing has the potential to provide any form of relief to help maintain remission for people living with Crohn’s and Ulcerative Colitis then surely this is something the NHS is right to take seriously. Longterm conditions are one of the biggest burdens on the NHS and social services in the UK, and spending a lifetime on heavy medications such as steroids and anti-inflammatories is no fun for anyone. I for one am waiting with eager anticipation to hear the results of Good Hope’s trial. Voodoo or not, if healing can help to relieve the pain and distressing symptoms of living with Ulcerative Colitis I’m more than willing to give it a try and it will certainly make me feel less insecure about my future health!

York Festival of Ideas

Join me at the York Festival of Ideas on 11th June where I will be talking about the research for my book and why I think we need to take seriously the place of spirit in the modern world.

I am speaking at 7pm in the Voltiger Suite, Holiday Inn, Tadcaster Road. Tickets are available here.