mooneyed-child

[mooneyed-child]

Van Gogh's Starry Night with the first image taken by the James Webb telescope by alpgenart (via astronomy_eye)

[mooneyed-child]

All of this is bs. Machisaba is nothing but wicca with the word Melungeon attached to it. This is literally the Biblical term for witchcraft, just misspelled, lets not be ableist. This word is ancient, wicca is a newborn baby. https://www.haaretz.com/archaeology/thou-shalt-not-suffer-a-witch-to-live-a-murderous-mistranslation-1.5443682  We had no foreign gods, no seasonal rituals about the wheel of the year or anything like that, aside from decoration day. Mekeshepha is just folkcraft, people can recognize whatever deities they want, Melungeon people had many different faiths, practiced different folk belief and different religions. 

Melungeon culture IS Appalachian culture, but we do have our own unique distinctions, but it IS NOT this. So we have our own culture or it is indistinguishable from the greater Appalachian culture? It can’t be both. (I’ll give you hint; Appalachian culture varies throughout each and every holler and family.)

This person runs multiple accounts on social media to make it seem like there’s traffic behind this. They go under multiple aliases, Kati Blair, Katie Littlefeather, Georgia Clyde, etc. and run Melungeon culture page on Facebook along with machisaba groups; they also run a Melungeon culture tiktok that just relates Appalachian lore as purely Melungeon lore. Appalachian lore? You mean just the conglomerate lore of the different cultures that make up Appalachian history? The culture that overlaps TONS of other cultures including Melungeon? Wow, big shock that Melungneon people out of Appalachia have cultural overlap with the rest of Appalchia.  Traditions and folklore can exist throughout numerous cultures.

They are also very culturally appropriative, claiming to be Lakota, Melungeon etc. in one video of hers you can tell she’s faking her southern accent so bad to the point it was almost Hollywood level embarrassing. She was born and raised in Michigan, no where near Appalachia. I’m running for the GLMN BOD so I know this person IRL, do you? These are big claims coming from a man who was raised white, just learned they were Melungeon within the last 5 years and has appropriated Melungeon, Indigenous, and African cultures to sell 2 books that you never credited anyone you rehashed your information from. I wonder who owns that house in WV she’s always at then. Accents are another thing that varies throughout different hollers and states, I have had people think I was trying to make fun of them because my accent is similar but just off. Southern and Appalachian are 2 wildly different accents, I would think an Appalachian would know that? I guess thats new to you though.

Words she claims are Melungeon, like bruxo, machisaba, etc. would HAVE NEVER survived the development of Appalachian dialect, especially our own Melungeon dialect which was a lot more relaxed and faster than the former. That shit would’ve never survived. Ask any linguist. So Melungeon people were too what? Dumb and weak to preserve our dialect and culture? We are the ONLY culture that was unable to pass down an oral history? That is some true colonizer thinking, the very type of thinking Walter Plecker would be proud of.  Dialects to this very day, differ from family to family, holler to holler, ridge to ridge.  There is for sure words from my community that you’ve never heard in yours and vice versa

She also runs an Etsy shop called MamieClydes Apothecary and another online shop called Actual Hen.

And?

 She has also tried saying that Melungeons have/had nations, like the “Great Lakes nation” (another website she runs, and likely takes fees for from people who fall for it) when that is not the case. Nobody at GLMN ever claimed Melungeon people called their communities “Nations” historically, a nation is simply put:  “ a large body of people united by common descent, history, culture, or language, inhabiting a particular country or territory” and that is all it is meant to mean. GLMN enrollment is free for anyone who completes their own applications, application processing fees only apply to people who need their genealogist to complete their application for them. The Melungeon Heritage association charges a yearly fee, and almost every other Cultural Organization charges upwards of 100′s of dollars.

We had small pocket communities in TN, VA, NC, SC, and KY before the world wars, but never “nations.” We had family tribes like the “Collins tribe” or “Gibson clan” but that was only in relation to a group of families who intermarried with each other and migrated to other places together, for safety and security, especially after the civil war and during Jim Crow. You forgot West Virginia, and we never called our communities tribes either, this is simply semantics you’re turning into a witchhunt. What are you really mad about? Not being raised Melungeon? Not being the Be All End All King of The Melungeons? Lmao. Grow up. A good LARGE number of Melungeon people migrated with the Great Appalachian Migration to states in the Midwest for work and to escape discrimmination, Wayne Winkler would be more than happy to talk to you further about the number of Harlan County Melungeons that ended up in the Detroit area.  Hazel Parks Historical Society has a section dedicated to the Melungeon migrants, and their town is jokingly refferred to as Hazeltucky because it was almost entirely populated by appalachian people.

Yes we did call ourselves ridgemanites, but we also called ourselves “malungean” in the Carolinas, “carmelites” in highland county, Ohio, etc. We’ve been called Melungeon, ramp, redbone, cro (Croatan), etc. and? you forgot redlegs, blackwaters, portygee, plus more. 

 I have receipts of her activity in the Melungeon group I help run, some of the groups she runs, messages with her, showing that none of this machisaba stuff existed to her or online before June 2020. Georgia has been upfront that she learned this term from other people and just adopted it, but she’s always talked about being Melungeon, I’ve seen her share memories from 12 years ago about her Melungeon heritage.    She has tried claiming different southern/Appalachian/ magical practices as being totally closed as they are supposedly Melungeon and that is also totally false. People are allowed to gatekeep their culture from vultures like you who steal family histories and cultures to appropriate and publish for profits. Who are you to decide what practices from someone elses culture that you are not a part of are open or closed?

She also runs a Michigan historical website about abandoned houses in Michigan, specifically Hazel Park, MI where she was born and raised. What is the point here? She has never denied being raised in MI. 

I tried to explain to her my issues about all of this, like do what you want but don’t say it’s Melungeon when it’s not, it’s a modern made religion basically, but don’t say it’s Melungeon or try to claim practices that aren’t yours to gatekeep as Melungeon to keep others from it. Who are you to tell people who were raised Melungeon, that their family traditions are not Melungeon, when you yourself were admittedly not raised Melungeon and neither was anyone in the group you run, and neither were any of your parents or grandparents?

It seems she also runs the two other “Melungeon” pages on here along with her tumblr “georgiaclyde”. Fayth Scott runs the blog you reblogged this from not Georgia. Is it more likely that multiple people who were raised Melungeon have similar upbringings or that Georgia is running hundreds of accounts on multiple platforms to push a practice she isn’t even that serious about? You seem to have an issue with anyone that doesn’t believe or practice exactly what you do. Your little group sounds like its becoming an uncultured cult. 

To beat it all, everything she puts out, she’s taking from my books, Backwoods Witchcraft, and Doctoring the Devil, which she has claimed are horrible in some groups. Your books are just rehashed info from all the other Appalchian/Hoodoo/Conjure/Southern Cunning books there are out there, only you never credit the people you so blatantly steal your information from and profit off of.  Funny how your witch hunt started after you got gatekept out of Melungeon cultural groups because people were trying to avoid that.  But when she tried adding “machisaba” to the Melungeon Wikipedia page, she sites my book as a source? Whats actually funny looking at the Melungeon wiki history is that it seems you were actually trying to use it to promote yourself and sell your book and continued to try and do so after your book as a source was removed numerous times. Come on lmao 🤣 This has just been going on for too long with all her alias accounts. I will say it once and hope it sticks with y’all: FAKELORE is just as bad as cultural appropriation. I was the first one that said anything about finding unique differences between Melungeon life and that of greater Appalachia and then out of nowhere she has this entire religion she failed to mention to any of us cousins (she ain’t our cousin was we thought she was at the time) for so long?And THERE IT IS!! “I was the first to try and rebuild Melungeon culture, how dare her not give me all the info to take credit for it! How DARE her not tell me, a culturally appropriative stranger who demonizes melungeon culture, all her family traditions right off bat!! How dare someone culturally raised Melungeon know more about her own culture than me, a white man!!!!” Come on now. She also took people gedmatch kits from our kit group and made her own, and multiple people had to go and leave it because they didn’t not consent to their genetic information being added to something like that without their knowledge. This is all I’m saying on the subject. Thats just a straight up lie, the GEDMATCH ancestor project was started before all this drama and everyone added to it, joined on their own accord. You continue to make shit up because you have some unhealthy obsession with being the God of all things Melungeon but you need to sit the fuck down because you aren’t even Melungeon, didn’t even know you could possibly be until less than a decade ago.  Nobody that is culturally connected is going to stop following their culture just because you’ve never heard of it lmao. You need to stop trying to colonize us, Walter. 

Contrary to popular belief Machisaba =\= Witchcraft. You can be a witch and practice Machisaba, you can be not a witch and practice Machisaba. It is not a religion, there’s no contracts or covenants. In my experience it’s just learning to work with the energy of things and the environment around you. Calm down. Quit demonizing your kin just because you don’t understand. A lot of us are Christians no less, and are against the witch terminology.   This belief was born in the same sense that the word Melungeon is a slur was born. As Melungeon people we did not call ourselves Melungeon, we called ourselves Ridgemanites and other names denoting where we resided. We did not call out practices Mekheshepha (Machisaba), this is the OT word for a witch or a female sorceress. We were demonized as mixed race and demonized as witches and had our own dialect stripped from us, so we adopted what was given to us.  Machashabah similarly is the biblical word for cunning work, or knowing how to use intentions, thought, and prayer to heal. 

[mooneyed-child]

another fall piece, of course 🍂

IG: autumnwoodstarot

[mooneyed-child]

[mooneyed-child]

I could dance with you until the cows come home

[mooneyed-child]

IG: @autumnwoods.creations

[mooneyed-child]

Mountain Witchcraft

The highest top of a mountain is a holy place. You may pray and meet with spirits here. Hillsides and mountain caves are also good liminal spaces.

Mountain Ash is a very strong protective tree, it prevents hexes, evil eye and misfortune.

Look into local folk heroes and legends, they can help you with finding things you can't place on a map such as little rivers, bones, wild fruits and herbs, and graves.

Know basic surveying also -- how to find true north, for example.

When collecting wild herbs, the success and potency of the herbs in spells can be determined by signs you see when returning, such as animals.

Depending on how high the altitude is on the mountain, there might be completely different plants due to the difference in temperature and humidity. You might have to be a little hard on yourself and go up further to find certain things, but it is worth it!

Mountain caves are powerful liminal spaces but be very careful because bears might be sleeping in there.

Bear fat is an excellent base for flying ointment and ointments for dreaming; first because they're like the fattest creatures in existence and second because since they sleep for half of the year they are very skilled at dreaming.

Look for sources of "living water" or water from its original source; springs and clean lakes, or water that has not passed through metal. This is water used for healing and blessing.

Conversely, "dead water" water used to wash the dead is used for very powerful curses.

Learn how to use divination to find lost things. This will help you locate materials and sometimes in the deep mountains you will be able to locate graves.

Look in history books and talk to locals for the true names of mountains -- a lot of people live on colonized land and the names of landmarks have been changed to the tongue of the colonists. You can speak any language for a spirit to understand you but if you want them to hear you? Whole different story. A grasp on the indigenous culture and language of your area is also a good idea, not only to engage with spirits but to help support the living people as well. :)

[mooneyed-child]

my favorite grounding ritual for when I aint feelin much like myself is goin down to the river durin the winter and jumpin in the ice cold water.  It’s in the 50s today, but it’ll do. 

[mooneyed-child]

I don’t work for them and am not sponsored by them but this is a Melungeon clothing company that is partnered with Melungeon designers that makes relatable graphic tees and streetwear and I LOVE THEM. I just ordered 3 different designs.

[mooneyed-child]

“Talking out the fire”

To remove the pain from a burn.

Pass your hand palm down over the burn three times, and use your breath to blow the fire away from the burn. Then recite the following prayer:

“There came two angels from the north; One brought fire, and one brought frost. In frost, out fire. In the name of the Father, the Son and of the Holy Ghost.”

From Hope Thompson for Unmasked History

[mooneyed-child]

Animism and Environmental Protection

More articles on my website! 

Animism lies at the heart of Ozark folk belief, although it’s a modern word you probably won’t hear many of the old timers using. In the mountains, this worldview manifests as a deep connection to the land, in particular the local bioregions that surround the individual and community. Old trees, caverns, natural springs, rivers, etc. are viewed not as lifeless land features, but rather as unique personalities with their own lifecycles and souls. Solitary trees in fields are often said to be protected by the “Little People” or Ozark land spirits, akin to the fairies from across the Celtic world, brought to these lands in the hearts of believers. Old growth trees hold their own roles within the spiritual hierarchy and often go by the names of “grandpa” or “grandma.” Natural springs were at one time fiercely protected by hillfolk because of their life-giving waters, used not only to sustain the body but also as sources of spiritual cleansing and healing. Legends and folktales abound about the invisible owners of certain caverns or large boulders that often stand out against the wash of the forest landscape.

Traditional views toward appeasing the land spirits is often simplified to maintaining a good relationship with these otherworldly inhabitants. Protecting and maintaining springs or allowing certain parts of the forest to remain wild are just a couple examples of this important take on environmental protection. A good balance with the natural world was at one time integral to not only the physical survival of hillfolk, but also a means to ensure good spiritual health for the community. This is an equilibrium lost to many modern inhabitants of the Ozarks with more and more reliance shifting off the land itself and onto local grocery stores, city water, and the pharmacy. For many though, this balance is still seen as a part of the Ozark identity. I myself have encountered many old timers who still give offerings of food, smoke, water, and other traditional items to these places of power in order to keep this tapestry of life intact.

This relationship with the land has birthed many traditions of environmental protection amongst those still living closely with the plants and animals of the mountains. It’s a culture rooted in the views of animism, which sees everything in the natural world as possessing its own unique identity. As opposed to many pantheistic worldviews, animism is deeply connected to the spirits of the local landscape as opposed to “higher” beings like gods and goddesses. The spirit of a mountain spring is then unique amongst other entities that might surround it. These guardians are often said to have had their own births at one time in the ancient past. Likewise, they aren’t always considered immortal. The destruction of these places of power then means the death of the individual spirit itself.

On one of my travels, I met an old man who was still shaken by the removal of a huge boulder near his home to make way for a modern road nearly thirty years before my arrival. His family had been on their land for several generations and recalled to mind many of their folktales about the spirits or Little People who had their villages inside the rock itself. It was common knowledge to the local community that disrespecting the rock would bring a curse not only upon the individual themselves, but also their family. This spiritual affliction would manifest as strange illnesses without any physical cure, and it was said the only remedy was apologizing to the Little People and making amends with certain food offerings. In a particularly sad part of our conversation, the old man said when the road crew removed and destroyed the boulder it sent a shockwave through his family. They themselves didn’t see any curses from the removal but he reckoned anyone who was a part of the work had. I asked him what he thought might have happened to the villages displaced by the act and he just shook his head saying, “When something like that happens, they’re [Little People] killed off…they can’t survive outside their homes.” In his words, this act was akin to genocide. It was almost as if members of his own family had been taken away to a very uncertain future.

This was by no means an isolated story and I’ve encountered many people, old timers and young folk alike across the Ozarks with similar tales of cutting down old growth forests, plugging up springs, and more. One woman I met said her family protected an old patch of ginseng near their family home for many generations. “Probably the last one around these parts,” she told me. Because the patch wasn’t on their land, they were unable to protect it from eventual clearing for new construction as the local town expanded. She still cursed the name of the developer, although he’d been dead for years. According to her, the ginseng had put a curse on his family for their disrespect. She said shortly after the houses were built, they had trouble with fires and power outages limited only to that spot. In addition, she said the developer’s family all became “sickly,” and eventually moved away from the area. Whether this tale was true or not, I don’t know, but there were others in the area with similar anecdotes about the situation.

When viewed in these terms, protecting the local environment takes on a very different life from simple ecology. The land is protected not just because of the vital food, water, and medicine it might provide, but because the spirits of the land become members of the family or clan itself. The same respect is shown to these invisible members of the community as it is to the living. Just like a person wouldn’t bulldozer over someone’s house, rip out a home garden, or poison a well, the land spirits are respected and left to their own lives and communities. Maintaining this equilibrium with the natural world then recognizes the vital importance the land has to offer to all those living there.

This belief has been such an important part of the Ozark worldview not just here on colonized land, but it stretches back to our ancient ancestors who didn’t see themselves as being separate or above the natural world but as just another link in the chain. The spirits of the land are important because they’re seen as being individual entities with their own stories, wisdom, and magic to offer. Just like when we lose our own tales, remedies, and other traditional knowledge with the passing of the older generations, never to regain them again, how much have we lost from ignoring the spirits of the land? How many grandpas and grandmas have been lost to us by being thrown into the gears of materialism and so-called progress?

For many people today, this animistic worldview is foreign to our modern mindset. Protecting the environment is left to those struggling in the Amazon rainforests, or those fighting for their rights to clean sources of water. We somehow see ourselves as too forgone, perhaps, or wholly apart from the problem. And meanwhile, our mountains are being leveled for new cookie-cutter housing subdivisions, forests uprooted to make straighter roads, and native prairies dug up and replaced with invasive ornamental plants not suited to our climate and local wildlife. Working towards healing this equilibrium starts with you and your home. Here are some other ways you can help protect the land.

Instead of planting invasive ornamentals like privet, bush honeysuckle, nandina, or bamboo, consult local nurseries that specialize in native alternatives. In many cases, native varieties of plants have much more to offer. They are usually better suited to our climate, require less water, and provide a plentiful source of food for both pollinators and birds. They also add to the seedbank of the land. Seeds travel across large stretches of land by air or are carried by local wildlife. Planting with natives ensures the spread of these important species that are too often shaded out and killed by invasive varieties. You can even help out if you’re living in an apartment with little access to the land. Several friends of mine living in apartments have started planting native flowers in pots on their balconies to attract local pollinators. Many of these wildflowers are also edible and used in traditional Ozark medicines.

Reconsider removing large trees on your property and instead try and maintain them by trimming properly.

Spay and neuter your outdoor cats and participate in local programs to catch and release feral cats. Along with deforestation, outdoor cats are the number one source of native songbird loss here in the Ozarks.

Consider volunteering with groups who help to return natural areas to a more sustainable system. There are several here in Northwest Arkansas who go out to the local trails at certain times of the year and pull out invasive plant species that are killing out the native varieties. If you don’t have a group around you, consider starting one! Consult your local extension office for guides to invasive plants affecting the area.

Protect springs and other natural water sources by volunteering to clean up trash around the area. If you’re unsure of how to clean and maintain natural springs on your own property, contact your local extension office.

Honor the spirits of old trees, springs, and mountains with traditional Ozark offerings of loose tobacco, cornmeal, beans, milk, and water.

Many of these suggestions are doable not only for people who own land but even for those living in apartments or on small lots. Whether you’re someone interested in animism as a worldview, an environmental protection advocate, or even someone who doesn’t really like going outside, it’s important to reconsider your own relationship to the land and help out where you feel comfortable. Extreme actions like chaining yourself to an old growth tree about to be removed aren’t required for caring about the natural world around you.

[mooneyed-child]

Just realized the “family cough syrup” is essentially a hot toddy shot

[mooneyed-child]

Hillbilly couple.

[mooneyed-child]

As LIFE put it to the magazine’s readers in January 1964:

In a lonely valley in eastern Kentucky, in the heart of the mountainous region called Appalachia live an impoverished people whose plight has long been ignored by affluent America.

Their homes are shacks without plumbing or sanitation. Their landscape is a man-made desolation of corrugated hills and hollows laced with polluted streams. The people, themselves — often disease-ridden and unschooled — are without jobs and even without hope. Government relief and handouts of surplus food have sustained them on a bare subsistence level for so many years that idleness and relief are now their accepted way of life.

President Johnson, who has declared “unconditional war on poverty in America,” has singled out Appalachia as a major target… . Appalachia stretches from northern Alabama to southern Pennsylvania, and the same disaster that struck eastern Kentucky hit the whole region — the collapse of the coal industry 20 years ago, which left Appalachia a vast junkyard. It was no use for the jobless miners to try farming — strip mining has wrecked much of the land and, in any case, the miners had lost contact with the soil generations ago… . Unless the grim chain [of unemployment and lack of education] can be broken, a second generation coming of age in Appalachia will fall into the same dismal life — a life that protects them from starvation but deprives them of self-respect and hope.

John Dominis Photographer - Jan. 31, 1964, issue of LIFE, titled “The Valley of Poverty” — one of the very first substantive reports in any American publication on President Lyndon Johnson’s nascent War on Poverty.

[mooneyed-child]

butch lesbian cowboys

[mooneyed-child]

Yippee-ki-YAY, it’s great to be gay!

art by liberal jane

[mooneyed-child]

Midnight Ride 🌙 Day One of Yeehawgust