[ecrea] Supernatural Entertainments: Victorian Spiritualism and the Rise of Modern Media Culture

It’s my pleasure to announce the publication of the book/Supernatural
Entertainments//: //Victorian Spiritualism and the Rise of Modern Media
Culture//./

/
/

In /Supernatural Entertainments/, Simone Natale vividly depicts
spiritualism’s rise as a religious and cultural phenomenon and explores
its strong connection to the growth of the media entertainment industry
in the nineteenth century. He frames the spiritualist movement as part
of a new commodity culture that changed how public entertainments were
produced and consumed.


Starting with the story of the Fox sisters, considered the first
spiritualist mediums in history, Natale follows the trajectory of
spiritualism in Great Britain and the United States from its foundation
in 1848 to the beginning of the twentieth century. He demonstrates that
spiritualist mediums and leaders adopted many of the promotional
strategies and spectacular techniques that were being developed for the
broader entertainment industry. Spiritualist mediums were
indistinguishable from other professional performers, as they had
managers and agents, advertised in the press, and used spectacularism to
draw audiences.


Addressing the overlap between spiritualism’s explosion and
nineteenth-century show business, Natale provides an archaeology of how
the supernatural became a powerful force in the media and popular
culture of today.

You can find/Supernatural Entertainments//: //Victorian Spiritualism and
the Rise of Modern Media Culture//./ on the Penn State University Press
web site at this URL:
http://www.psupress.org/books/titles/978-0-271-07104-6.html

Be sure to ask for it at your local library and bookstore!


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