List of practices appropriated by Wicca

As I spoke about here, Wicca* has a massive problem with cultural appropriation and that’s what I’m exploring today. I want to make a master list of practices (and maybe later beliefs) that Wicca incorporates (both open and closed, but for the time being I’m focusing on the closed practices).  This will be an ongoing process, which I intend to turn into its own page. Please get in touch and let me know if there’s a specific practice you would like me to add or cover in more depth.

*I’ve been contacted by a British Traditional Wiccan and asked to re-confirm (as I have in the linked article above) that I’m not initiated into an Alexandrian or Gardnerian tradition. I’m talking about mainstream bastardised Wicca. Apparently BTW doesn’t use any of the practices listed here (as of Jan 2021) so that’s cool.

Smudging

Native American.
Let’s start with the obvious one. Lots of new agers like me rock up to a health food shop, buy a bundle of dried white sage and when we burn it we consider that to be smudging. It’s not.
Smudging is so much more than this. I’m not qualified to detail exactly what smudging is or how it’s done (I’m very white and on the other side of the earth, y’all) but I am qualified to say that this is a practice that doesn’t belong to modern Wicca. 
If you’re not Indigenous to the Americas you can still cleanse with smoke. Just call it that. Replace “smudge stick” with “smoke stick” and go on your merry way, or consider one of these other options that don’t continue the oppression of minority peoples:
Sensing
Saining

Om

Indian.
New agers love this sacred sound and spiritual icon, we get tattoos of it all the time (yep, I narrowly missed having one done myself!) I love it because I love yoga. But this symbol means so much more than “yoga is cool and I’m totally zen now”.
White yoga is an appropriation topic all of its own outside (or perhaps alongside) Wicca, and if I get into it here this post will be unimaginably long, so I’ll drop a quote and leave you with the knowledge that yes, colonization still hurts Indian cultures and every time we buy some cute water bottle or a magazine with a white yogi on the front we are contributing to that problem.

As we live in an increasingly globalised and hybrid world which sees a borrowing, exchange and profiteering of cultures and identities, it’s important these exchanges are celebratory and not exploitative and do not take advantage of power disparities between the global north and south. 
Culture, just like diamonds and oil, is a resource, and to take it without respect, appreciation and acknowledgement furthers a problematic neo-colonial dynamic that needs to interrogated, or at least meditated upon.

sbs / Healing from white yoga

Chakras

Indian.
To a lot of Wiccans “chakra” is a fancy word for “energy centre” and that’s as far as it goes. All the history, learning, and the actual religious/spiritual connotations are being tossed in the trash. Wicca doesn’t teach that we have four different bodies (spiritual, mental, astral, and physical) but these chakras are supposed to tie them together. To put it more plainly “chakra” is not a word, it’s a whole concept. Wiccans need to stop treating it like an adjective.
“But but I can feel them. My chakra meditations work. It means a lot to meeee.”
Yeah cool, Bro. Keep your meditation. Cleanse your energy centres. Be spiritual. Just stop pretending it’s something that it isn’t. Stop validating the western idea of what these concepts mean and give Indian people the chance to step up and tell the real story.
“Energy centre” or “spiritual vortex” or “aura hotspot” are ways to describe how we’re actually relating to them that (to the best of my research) don’t already belong to someone else. They don’t have a pre-established meaning that you’re erasing. Or you can make up your own cool word.

Spirit animals

Native American
Gods, this one is huge. The concept of a spirit animal is sacred and largely secret to some Native American cultures. If you’re not Native American I guarantee you do not have a spirit animal. Also, that chocolate cookie/ sleeping cat/ small child isn’t your spirit animal and every time we make that “such-and-such is my spirit animal” joke we cheapen a real culture that is already struggling.
Again, you don’t have a spirit animal. Don’t go up to an Indigenous person and ask them what your spirit animal is!
Now, you very well might have a spirit guide that is an animal, or something similar. And “Spirit Animal” is such a lovely fitting term. But here’s the thing: if someone is hurting and you can fix it with very little effort (or at least not contribute to their pain) you do so. Harm None. Language is an easy thing to change. Some suggestions include:
Familiar spirit
Spirit guide
Animal guide
Servitor (If it’s a spiritual/magickal construct)

Black salt

African American.
Still researching. A couple of sources have mentioned the practice of making black salt belongs to hoodoo witches, but I’m still chasing that up.

Gypsy witches

Romani.
Have you ever exclaimed “what a gip!” after you’ve been ripped off? That price is too much, you’re being robbed! What a jip / gip / gyp. We even have this saying in Australia where there are believed to be between 5,000 and 25,000 Romani. If we’re not slandering Gypsies as thieves, we’re using the word as a trendy way to say “free-spirited”, but Gypsies are real people. They aren’t like faires.
Occasionally you’ll meet someone who believes they have fairy or dragon blood, or that they were unicorns in a past life, and you do that smile say “oh cool,” and you let it go. So “I’m a unicorn Wiccan” is fine, Fairy witch? Cool, Gypsy witch? No, unless you’re Romani. And if you were, you probably wouldn’t call yourself a Gypsy because it’s a slur.
Be free and wild and barefoot all you want, but find another way to describe your brand of magick. There are whole communities of Travellers (nomadic people, generally Irish) and Gypsies living their lives off the grid right now. They aren’t some myth half-lost in history, they are real people, and they’re right there.

Tarot

Romani.
Despite what Wikipedia will tell you, Tarot originated with the Romani and they were vilified for it. Because they are not a monolith, there is debate over how “open” tarot is, but there seems to be a consensus that if you’re not Romani you shouldn’t be profiting off the tarot, in particular the major arcana, nor should you be making hilariously irreverent mockery decks.

Egg limpa cleanse/divination

Vodou / Hoodoo.
Please stop, you’re doing it wrong. For starters, you’re supposed to have this done for you – even if it’s your life’s work – you don’t do it for yourself. Secondly, so many of these traditions were born as a direct result of slavery and oppression by white people. If you’re white, these spirits don’t want to hang with you. Leave it alone, and stop posting your egg in a glass on Facebook asking “what does it mean?” If you have to ask, you obviously don’t have the skills and shouldn’t be dicking around with this practice.

Going forward… Some things within Wicca are taken and re-appropriated. Like, they’re second-hand stolen undies, and one can’t quite detect the origins at first glance. It’s going to take me a while to study this topic, so welcome to my Crisis of Faith. I hope you enjoy the ride.

Miriam Cumming is a tired mum who’s just trying to raise her kids to do the right thing by setting a good example and also yelling a lot. When she’s not cooking meals that no one eats, Miriam writes fantasy novels and casts circles on her balcony to honour the source of all life.