Brandon Weston - Ozark Folk Magic: Plants, Prayers & Healing

Llewellyn Publications

Woodbury, Minnesota

Copyright Information

Ozark Folk Magic: Plants, Prayers & Healing 2021 by Brandon Weston.

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First e-book edition 2021

E-book ISBN: 9780738767253

Book design by Donna Burch-Brown

Cover design by Kevin R. Brown

Zodiac Man Mary Ann Zapalac, other interior art by the Llewellyn Art Department

Llewellyn Publications is an imprint of Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data (Pending)

ISBN: 978-0-7387-6725-3

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Llewellyn Publications

Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

2143 Wooddale Drive

Woodbury, MN 55125

www.llewellyn.com

Manufactured in the United States of America

Dedicated to my family,

who first told me tales of the Ozarks.

Disclaimer

The old-fashioned remedies in this book are historical references used for teaching purposes only. The recipes are not for commercial use or profit. The contents are not meant to diagnose, treat, prescribe, or substitute consultation with a licensed healthcare professional. New herbal recipes should be taken in small amounts to allow the body to adjust.

Please note that the information in this book is not meant to diagnose, treat, prescribe, or substitute consultation with a licensed healthcare professional. This book is not intended to provide medical advice or to take the place of medical advice and treatment from your personal physician. Readers are advised to consult their doctors or other qualified healthcare professionals regarding the treatment of their medical problems. Neither the publisher nor the author take any responsibility for any possible consequences from any treatment, action, or application of medicine, supplement, herb, or preparation to any person reading or following the information in this book.

Contents

. Mountain Heritage

. Ozark Traditional Healing

. The Healer and Their Work

. Gaining the Power

. Basics in Ozark Healing

. Herbal Healing Methods

. Magical Healing Methods

. Healing Plants and Magical Ingredients: An Introduction

. Healing Plants

. Animals, Tools, and Magical Supplies

: Modernizing Folk Magic

Foreword

If you take away one message from this book, it should be Brandon Westons assertation that Ozark folklore is not static. Folklore is a term that carries a lot of baggage, including the assumption that our nations folklore is outdated, untrue, and backward. This is especially true for the Ozarks and its regional cousin, Appalachia. However, folklore, at its most basic, is defined as traditions shared and learned within a community. It is those practices we learn from our neighbors, friends, and fellowsnot in the classroom, but from observation and imitation. It is our food, stories, art, holidays, rituals, music, and so on. It is our traditional belief systems. It is traditional, yes, but traditions are created and changed every day.

Through Ozark Folk Magic , Weston is following in the footsteps of a long history of folklore collecting in the United States and in the Ozarks in particular. Collectors have ranged from amateur collectors and community scholars to professional folklorists working in a discipline over a hundred years old. The American Folklore Society, as an example, is one of the nations oldest academic societies and was founded in 1888 by scholars situated at the confluence of anthropological and literary studies. It is important to note that Weston falls into the former category of community scholar, which often includes tradition-bearers with an interest in their own communities. Westons terminology and methods might differ from a professional folklorist today, but the role of community scholar and/or amateur folklorist is no less important. Our nations archives owe a great to deal to community scholars collecting personal histories and traditions from the communities to which they belong. As Weston beautifully demonstrates, often it is only the community members themselves who can access a communitys deepest layers of tradition.

As a professional folklorist myself, and an outsider to native Ozark culture, I find Ozark Folk Magic to be a deeply fascinating and personal work. Part personal memoir and part folklore collection, this volume contributes to an important and timely conversation about cultural pride and cultural appropriation in an increasingly globalized nation and world. Ozark Folk Magic is a book that needed to come from an insider like Brandon Weston. As a member of the Ozarks community himself, Weston is not only privy to knowledge that might not have been accessible to outsiders, but he also has access to the language and vocabulary used by the communities within which he works. As a folklorist born outside the Ozarks community, I can attest to the strength, smarts, and resiliency of Ozarks cultures, but I would not feel comfortable using the term hillbilly. As an outsider, I would fear this term would imply my derision and condescension. Weston, however, is an insider to this culture and has access and entitlements that I do not have.

Weston straddles an interesting divide between older methods of research and a more postmodern approach to his role as researcher. His collecting methods harken back to older forms of folklore collecting, where large swaths of folklore content were distilled into compilation books that did not necessarily highlight the biographies of the informants. Diverging from contemporary professional folklore practice, Weston does not give overt details about the identities and situations in which he collected his content, likely with the intent to protect the identities of practitioners operating within stigmatized traditions. Professional folklorists today would be more likely to include a great deal of context for each instance of folklore collectedthe who, what, where, when. Folklorists stress context to reinforce the role individuals have in shaping their communitys folkloretraditions are tweaked depending on teller, audience, time, and place. What you see written down in Ozark Folk Magic is the culmination of Westons conversations with many folks, and his methods are important where traditions have been historically shunned and feared. However, I caution you to remember that it does not make it the final and official account of Ozark folk belief. Taking Ozark Folk Magic as the definitive and final account risks cementing, and stagnating, what Weston stresses is a live, growing, and changing tradition. Folklore is alive and well in the Ozarks, and Ozark Folk Magic is a snapshot of a moment in time.