Event Start: May 28, 2026 01:00 PM
Event End: May 28, 2026 02:30 PM
Event Location: ZOOM Webinar (link here)
Event Price: Free
Event Details:
How is global spirituality spread through digital media and pop culture? I trace the varied online and offline routes that link people and places around the world through shared spiritual networks. Spiritual paths can become defined and reinforced through signs found in pop culture references. And in return, pop culture spreads spirituality, through memes shared on social media, spiritual practitioners working as online influencers, and content designed specifically for spiritual audiences. I examine the examples of starseed influencer April Elizabeth and Gaia, the subscription streaming platform for spiritual content. These examples suggest that spirituality is not alternative or countercultural anymore, it is mainstream, connecting geographically and culturally distant places through common symbols, themes, ideas, and references. There is a homogenising influence of global spirituality, but also local variations. These variations can be seen clearly in power spots, sometimes called intersections of leylines or vortexes, in areas where spiritual seekers gather and have created communities that reflect the cultural particularities of the place while also sharing an identifiable spiritual culture. Earth energies link these power spots in a network, a spiritual geography of the world, that is supported and extended by spiritual networks online.
Susannah Crockford is an anthropologist at the University of Exeter in the UK, specialising in environmental and medical anthropology and the anthropology of religion. Her first book, Ripples of the Universe: Spirituality in Sedona, Arizona, was published in May 2021 by the University of Chicago Press. Her second book, A Perturbed System: Religion and Climate Change at the End of a World, is a multi-sited ethnography of climate change examining the role of religion in climate discourse, and will be published in July 2026 by the University of Chicago Press.
This event is co-presented with a grant from the John Templeton Foundation as part of a series of lectures on contemporary metaphysical spirituality.