James Thurgill
I am a cultural/literary geographer and university lecturer. My teaching and writing span the fields of cultural geography, literary geography, cultural studies, and folklore.
My research is primarily concerned with the cultural and literary geographies of folklore, and affect and the spatial experience. I am particularly interested in the spatial relations that exist between folkloric narratives, memory and place and the experiential qualities of absence.
My work is organised around three core themes:
- Absence, place and memory; especially in the areas of spectral geography, hauntology and the phenomenology of absence;
- Literary, regional and historical geographies of folklore, particularly those associated with the rural counties of East Anglia (and in literary representations of its landscape(s));
- Creative, embodied and experimental geographic research practices; specifically auto-ethnographic, sonic, visual methods, and walking.
A Watkinsian Geography: Memory, mapping and place in the work of Alfred Watkins. xxx James Thurgill, The University of Tokyo
I will use this short talk to introduce my research into Alfred Watkins and the relationship between people, place(s), and time that can be seen to emerge from his writings on alignments in the British landscape. As a cultural geographer, I’m interested in uncovering the ways in which places are made, represented, and, moreover, experienced. For me, Watkins’ writings offer a rich source of practical and theoretical information for mapping our landscapes and, as such, correspond to a geographic method commonly referred to as “deep mapping”. I will discuss the ways in which the practice of “deep mapping” initiated in Watkins’ studies of alignments can be used more broadly to understand how our surrounding geographies are formed through a layering of time, memory, and experience, and, furthermore, how Watkins’ work has come to influence the geographical imagination. I will also show how my research attempts to align Watkins’ theory with the interests of academic geography and will describe the ways in which my own work has been influenced by Watkins’ ideas.
For details of how to join this talk please contact Dave Strang, secretary@malverndowsers.org.uk
Spirituality Special Interest Group
Our last meeting of the SSIG was an open forum that turned out to be a really wide ranging discussion and thank you to everyone that took part and shared their thoughts. We covered lots of subjects including our connection with spirit, each other and nature. We saw the ego at work in recent political struggles ‘across the pond’ and at home. We also touched on some deep issues regarding the ‘light’ and ‘dark’ things in our lives and mental health. Thank you all for participating and offering your own wisdom.
On Wednesday 7th April we will be hearing from Sue Watts-Cutler. Her talk is entitled "What Mithraism was REALLY all about………
The Romano-Persian worship of the god Mithras was practised from one end of the ancient Roman empire to the other. Huge numbers of repeated allegorical images have left us with an extensive pictorial guide to what the Mithraists believed and practised, yet have defied interpretation by archaeologists and researchers.
Sue will be using her own knowledge of the subject matter, of astrology, of classical myth and esoteric symbolism to talk us through the allegory of the Bull Sacrifice scene (once displayed in every Mithraic temple) and the yogic allegory of the Redemption of the imprisoned god, Saturn.
There will also be a guided meditation for participants to free their own inner Saturn. Get in touch. If you’d like to join the group please get in touch with me at kate.tudorhall@gmail.com
Malvern Dowsers offers Zoom tuition to new members
Like most dowsing groups before the pandemic Malvern Dowsers ran events to help new members learn how to dowse. These events were great fun, often outside and always developed a crowd of intrigued people! Over the last few months Malvern Dowsers have been offering Zoom tuition to new and novice dowsers with some success. These sessions are typically for 6 – 8 people and explore pendulum dowsing. We cover simple ways to prepare and the protocols before commencing the training initially. There’s time during the session to apply the basic techniques and practice using ten questions and at the end new dowsers have an opportunity for feedback and questions (and of course to get to know each other a little). Typically the first class takes about 40 minutes. Our last class for beginners involved several houseplants in pots, a potato and an apple and a great deal of mirth!
Kate Smart
The Visit Herefordshire website has announced a week long celebration of Alfred Watkins
It’s 100 years since Alfred Watkins’ discovered leys ! Visit Herefordshire will be marking this 100th anniversary with a county-wide celebration, starting on June 26 2021. Tell us of your own celebrations !
All in the best possible taste !
Hello Ced,
Thank you for your newsletters. I thought I would relate a similar story re. finding lost objects: An elderly friend of mine phoned to say she had lost her hearing aid, so I explained that dowsing for lost objects was not my forte but I would try. Drawing a sketch of her house where she had last seen it...
Is it in the sitting room, Answer Yes, then No; Is it in the kitchen, garden, all initially Yes, then No, so I apologized for not being able to pick up the location.
The next day she phoned to say she had found her hearing aid. The dog had swallowed it!! So I guess I must have been following him around the house and garden!!
It’s a learning curve! Kind regards
Sue
National Dowsing Groupings include...
Professional Dowsers Register : www.professionaldowsersregister.co.uk
International Association of Health Dowsers : www.healthdowsers.org
Water Special Interest Group : dowsing.anglia@gmail.com
Dowsing and Electricity
Hugues Deshayes writes...
The body of a dowser can be likened to a charged gold leaf electroscope. Electroscopes can show the relative charge of an object through the movement of the gold leaves inside. (i) This idea was introduced by John Greenwood of Nottingham-Trent University in his paper “Locating Underground features by dowsing” back in 2001 (ii).
Youtube: How stuff works the electroscope Christopher Pang
The basic mechanism is as follows: The body of the dowser becomes charged by the alternate lifting of his feet when walking. As he approaches an earthed object his body voltage drops and it rises again when he walks away from it. This is subconsciously detected by the brain which, in turn, generates a nervous twitch causing the dowsing tool to move. The same reaction occurs when the dowser approaches a charged object (i.e. a live wire) but, in this case, the body voltage increases further and then decreases.
Youtube: EDS 1 with shoes on
Youtube: EDS 2 with shoes off
Youtube: EDS 3 using EEG
The voltage on the ground is not at 0 volts everywhere, but varies according to the local electrical conductivity. Water beneath the ground rises to the surface, by capillarity and evaporation, causing the ground conductivity to increase. Underground features can also cause variations in the soil’s conductivity and the local electric field as was seen at Cressing Temple Barns, Essex. This investigation was carried out with the participation of John Baker and Barry Hillman- Crouch.
Youtube: IvelSprings North Hertfordshire, England.
This can also be seen when walking on the ground above the head of a river where the voltage there is lower than the surrounding ground, for example at Ivel Springs, North Hertfordshire. The same applies to streams when walking at right angle to them, the banks are charged whereas the middle is not. The air above open water is not electrically charged unless the sun is strong and evaporation is taking place. Evaporation of water generates air ions that are electrically charged and thus can be detected.
Some stones, such as Sarsens, are porous and draw water which renders them conductive and causes them to act as antennas as at Avebury, Wiltshire. This can be verified by bringing the antenna of a detuned receiver close to the stones.
Others, such as puddingstones, are not porous, but they can acquire an electrostatic charge from the sun, e.g. at Littlefield Farm, Hertfordshire. A sample piece of 2.3kg acquired a surface charge of +22V when left in the sun for about 15 minutes. Granite, on the other hand, produces its own charge, being radio-active.
Some voltage variations have also been detected in energy lines with an electrostatic meter with the probe parallel to the ground. This suggests that energy lines may be electrical in essence. These voltages are only detectable along the lines and above ground which excludes earth currents and man-made stray ones as the cause, as at the Bartlow Mounts, South Cambridgeshire.
Localised bands of electromagnetic signals (radio etc.) have also been detected up to 40 cm off the ground at many ancient sites. This was achieved by using a detuned radio receiver of the type used by the late David Tilt.
Conclusion: The human body is sensitive to electric fields and this is evidenced by the correlation between the crossing of the rods and the reaction of the meter.
Locating Underground Features by Dowsing
John Greenwood, Department of Civil and Structural Engineering, Nottingham Trent University, and Robert Price, Castle Rock Geotech, Colwick, Nottingham.
Abstract
A lighthearted look at the ancient art of dowsing during a masters course on site investigation led to some surprising findings, with most of the course participants able to detect underground features with little prior tuition. An explanation of the phenomenon is provided in terms of electrostatic forces. It is considered that the technique may be of considerable value as an initial, cost effective, non-intrusive method for estimating location of certain underground services, water and voids before the use of conventional geophysical and exploratory techniques.
Introduction
The powers of dowsing using divining rods have been observed over the years and have either been dismissed as some sort of black art or trickery or perhaps accepted as being available only to those possessing a special sensitivity. Little credibility has been attached to the results because of lack of scientific explanation. During the part-time MSc module on site investigation at Nottingham Trent University in June 2000, the authors and the delegate group investigated the phenomenon of dowsing and came up with surprising findings. It was confirmed that the use of divining rods can be an effective and low-cost method of detecting the presence of underground services, water and voids.
The divining rods and their use
Traditionally, dowsers have used forked rods cut from hazel or other wood which deflect when the dowser's body reacts to a particular underground feature. However most dowsers today use simple bent metal rods which cross when a reaction occurs. A historical review of the application of dowsing was presented by Grounds (1996).
The authors made their rods from 4mm brass rods, obtained from a local DIY store for about £3, bent to the approximate dimensions (Figure 1).The rods are simply held, not too tightly, with the long arm horizontal. Figure 1 illustrates the holding of the rods, the walking action and the crossed position of the rods when a reaction occurs. Experience has shown that many people have a strong reaction in only one rod - often the right-hand - and therefore a single rod is often adequate.
Dowsing demonstration
During the site investigation course, Robert Price was able to demonstrate his dowsing ability to a group of 15 delegates by locating the position of a service duct running from a manhole in the university grounds. The group was initially sceptical but, after 'having a go' for themselves, discovered that two-thirds of them experienced a similar reaction in the divining rods at the same location (Figure 2).
Each delegate was then invited to walk along a 15m tape laid on the ground and record any reactions in the rods. The location of a reaction was taken to be the position of the delegate's toes at the point of strongest reaction. The results are plotted in Figure 3.The locations detected by the inexperienced delegates who did have a reaction compared well with the locations picked up by Price (participant 16). It is of interest to note that the four females (participants 5,7,8 and 10) all had positive reactions at very similar locations along the tape. All were satisfied that dowsing had some merit as an aid to site investigation.
Other evidence of the value of dowsing
While there is some documented evidence of dowsing success (Killip,1984 and Wilcock,1994), the method has tended to be regarded as a gift of special individuals. It is encouraging that a high proportion of people, perhaps 60% to 80% of those introduced to the technique, have a measure of success. The National Coal Board's in-house guidance notes The treatment of disused mine shafts and adits (1982) refer to the use of the services of water diviners and the success of some NCB engineers in detecting underground discontinuities with purpose-made rods. It is believed that many water company workers carry divining rods to help locate positions of pipes and leaks but there is perhaps a slight embarrassment for such staff who seem to possess this mystical power.
Possible causes
Once the existence of the dowsing phenomenon is accepted, the next question has to be 'what is causing it?' Wilcock lists the various force fields which might affect the sensitivity of the human body and rods: gravitational, magnetic, electric, electromagnetic, radioactive, seismic (the stress field around fractures, fissures and faults), geothermal, and geochemical. Of these, he considered the electric, magnetic and electromagnetic fields to be the most probable candidates with the skin conductivity of the dowser playing a part.
An explanation
While working with the divining rods, the joint author John Greenwood became overheated and on removing his acrylic pullover discovered that the rods were particularly sensitive to the electrostatic field that surrounded it. When the pullover was placed on the ground, the rods responded very positively as his body passed over it. The effect was even more pronounced when the rods were rubbed on the acrylic pullover prior to dowsing. A similar response in the rods was found when dowsing over a bowl of water placed on the ground.
The electrostatic explanation ties in with the likely presence of varying electrostatic fields around pipes, cables, voids and bodies of water. It may be that forward motion will also play a part in the response of the rods to the fields that are present.
The divining rod is performing a similar function to the gold leaf electroscope used during school physics to demonstrate electrostatic effects. The charges on the rods cause a response in relation to the charges on the object. Like charges repel and opposite charges attract to influence the alignment that the rods are trying to take up. It was noted that if the dowser removed his or her shoes, their sensitivity often increased, indicating the importance of electrical continuity with the ground.
References
Grounds AC (1996). Dowsing as a tool for location of underground services.BEng Dissertation, Ref ES/96, Boots Library, Nottingham Trent University.
Hansen GP (1982). Dowsing - a review of experimental research.J Soc Psychical Research 51 (792) 343- 367.
Killip I (1984). Detecting geophysical anomalies at construction sites by dowsing.Land and mineral surveying 2 (12),633-644.
Wilcock J (1994). Royal Forest of Dean caving symposium. www-sop.inria.fr/agos-sophia/sis/dowsing/dowsdean.html