I’m a PhD student in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. My dissertation project considers the blurry boundaries around religion, science, and secularism, especially as more and more people identify as “spiritual but not religious” or else eschew religious language entirely in favor of secular identities. I’m conducting a multi-site ethnography of paranormal communities in the United States, as these spaces provide us with a fruitful landscape for considering how Americans are defining and redefining their relationships with both religion and science.

Prior to pursuing a PhD, I worked as a Title I English and history teacher in Charlotte, NC. My experience working with at-risk students deeply shaped my commitments as an educator, and has led me to prioritize public scholarship. I write and speak for general audiences, have published several trade books about magic and contemporary witchcraft, and have also spent more than two decades blogging, creating YouTube videos, and speaking at conferences and festivals about everything from ethnography to Western occultism, American Spiritualism to the history of tarot cards, magic in Victorian literature to the folklore surrounding ghosts and hauntings.

I completed my first B.A. in English with minors in Biology and Music from the College of William & Mary in 2006. As a Wiccan priestess and writer, I decided to return to university life in pursuit of formal academic training in religious studies, expecting that I would eventually pursue ministerial work in my own contemporary Pagan communities (insofar as that’s a thing for Pagans and witches…it’s complicated). Instead, I found myself dissecting my own religious assumptions and traditions, connecting with my communities in new ways, and deeply invested in how this thing we call “religion” comes to shape every facet of contemporary life (even when we don’t realize it, and even when we wish it didn’t).

I completed a second B.A. in Religious Studies at North Carolina State University (2011), and went on to earn my M.A. in Religious Studies from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte (2014). My M.A. project was a multi-year ethnography of a local megachurch, exploring how evangelical Christians create widely accessible and massively appealing spaces that attract young people from varied religious backgrounds.

Instead of pursuing the PhD right away, I entered the classroom, working as a university lecturer and then becoming certified to teach at the secondary level. As part of my teacher training, I completed a second M.A. in English Literature, also from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte (2021). I began my PhD the following year at Chapel Hill, intent on elevating my writing and teaching, and conducting more original research.

Aside from my academic pursuits, I continue to be active in witchcraft and occult communities as a writer, speaker, and coven leader. I have been running a Gardnerian coven for more than a decade, and am also a practitioner of other forms of Western ceremonial magic. My perspectives as a magician and witch augment my work in religious studies, just as my scholarly training informs both my coven leadership and devotional practice.