Asatru & Odinism in the academy

A friend pointed me to an article that was very interesting, and that I wanted to share with some of you here. It was published in the most recent number of the Old English Newletter, a scholarly journal, and concerns the neo-pagan reactions to a new film version of Beowulf. Apparently, the filmmakers were making a version whose proceeds would go solely to the American Cancer Society, and they were enlisting volunteers for all of the various roles of production--actors, director, cinematographers, etc. In the end, they cast a young black actor in the role of Beowulf.

They had no idea what they were folkin' in for.

Neo-pagans came out of the woodwork with emails and webpages denouncing the casting of a "Negro" (and trust me, that is the nicest word they used) for one of their European ancestors. Asatru web pages and Odinist web pages were simply wigging out that there should be a black Beowulf.

The piece in the Old English Newsletter then explores the racist consciousness in Asatru and Odinism and explores the way that such people have tried to appropriate Beowulf and other medieval texts as a kind of "folk-racist" scripture. The author quotes several Asatru web pages to explore the notion of a religion of the "blood undimmed by the generations," a kind of DNA of white spirituality.

Deeply creepy, yes. But it was awesome to see the academy taking these neo-pagan racists to task.

Go Beowulf!

It's good, actually, to see this kind of thing getting some sunshine on it. Asatru websites that I've seen tend to be adept at the "We're not racist, but" kind of language. Seems they were finally pushed to a point of frothing out the truth. :twisted:

at their racism. Oh I agree that Beowolf was probably Nordic but who cares.

I would love to see that article

How convenient is that! http://www.oenewsletter.org/OEN/essays.php/nokes41_3/

Warning: the author quotes the racist screeds of Asatruans and Odinists verbatim, and they're deeply repugnant.

Obviously the producers of this version of Berwolf struck a nerve. I think the casting an African American in the lead role was probably intentionally done to stir the pot. Do you really think the creator of this film didn't research this first? I know what the article said, "It wasn't a big deal in Norway", I am not buying it.

I was fascinated by the way these groups have taken on the text as holy scripture, comparing it to the Bible, etc..

And they want to mock Christians for the way we read Biblical texts? LOL.

rears it's ugly head.

that anyone would care about Beowulf. It's not exactly the kind of text that gets students exercised. Trust me.