Altered States: Sex, Nation, Drugs, and Self-Transformation in Victorian Spiritualism

SUNY Series: Studies in the Long Nineteenth Century

by Marlene Tromp

Altered States examines the rise of Spiritualism--the religion of seances, mediums, and ghostly encounters--in the Victorian period and the role it played in undermining both traditional female roles and the rhetoric of imperialism. Focusing on a particular kind of seance event--the full-form materialization--and the bodies of the young, female mediums who performed it, Marlene Tromp argues that in the altered state of the seance new ways of understanding identity and relationships became possible. This not only demonstrably shaped the thinking of the Spiritualists, but also the popular consciousness of the period. In diaries, letters, newspaper accounts, scientific reports, and popular fiction, Tromp uncovers evidence that the radical views presented in the faith permeated and influenced mainstream Victorian thought.

Genres: History, Research, Nonfiction

Hardcover

First published July 1, 2006

About the author

Dr. Marlene Tromp Was John and Christine Warner Professor of English and Director of Women's Studies at Denison University in Granville, Ohio. She is currently the President of Boise State University in Boise, Idaho.