the timboucher experience

I just finished reading The Chalice & the Blade which is a book loaned to me by my older sister. Mostly, the book is concerned with the feminist reinterpretation of religious and cultural history in terms of dominator & partnership models of society. By “dominator”, she basically is referring to patriarchal hierarchic societies where might makes right. Rather than contrast that with matriarchal society, where women are ascendant, she uses the word “partnership” to describe a societal model where no one group is unilaterally in forcible control.

These terms, the chalice and the blade, are used pretty frequently in the best-selling Da Vinci Code, which I hated. The chalice refers to the feminine, and the blade to the masculine. Anyway, this book might make a good introduction for people unfamiliar with feminist & minority-centered interpretations of history, and especially religion. But I’m pretty familiar with it already, and it didn’t especially blow my mind. In fact, I had a running mental list of points which I hoped she would make, but never did. Another better book in this direction is Barbara Walker’s Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets. The only drawback to that one is that it’s an encyclopedia, rather than something you can really sit down and read start to finish. That book really kicked me in the head though, and I recommend it highly.

• Return to traditional family values
• Switching around the point of view
• United States of Archonica, Vol. 3
• Slogging through the Golden Bough
• Cool magic items and crap