Aviva Briefel, "Ghosts and Things: The Material Culture of Nineteenth-Century Spiritualism" (Cornell UP, 2025)
AI Analyze
Overview
Victorian spiritualism used objects and séances to explore labor, consumption, and the uncanny in capitalist modernity.
Takeaways
- •Aviva Briefel reveals that 19th-century spiritualism linked ghosts with material culture, showing how Victorians used objects to communicate with the dead and understand societal changes.
- •Spiritualist séances involved household furniture and apported objects, provoking questions about labor, value, and consumer desires amid industrial and capitalist transformations.
- •The Victorian press and figures like Alfred Russell Wallace debated spiritualism’s authenticity, reflecting tensions between emerging scientific thought and supernatural beliefs.
Mind Map
AI analyze isn’t ready
Get Pro now
Chapters
- This is a chapter‘s title.The Fragility of Society and the Pendulum of ChangeThe Fragility of Society and the Pendulum of ChangeThe Fragility of Society and the Pendulum of ChangeThe Fragility of Society and the Pendulum of Change
- This is a chapter‘s title.The Fragility of Society and the Pendulum of ChangeThe Fragility of Society and the Pendulum of ChangeThe Fragility of Society and the Pendulum of ChangeThe Fragility of Society and the Pendulum of Change
AI analyze isn’t ready
Get Pro now
Want to know more?
Download the app to unlock more exciting content and enjoy a better listening experience.
Powered by
Download Chatpods
