Sundays March 12, April 23, May 14, June 11, July 16, and August 13, 2023
1-3 PM ET (NYC TIME)

* Students will be required to purchase Matriarchal Societies: Studies on Indigenous Cultures Across the Globe

Please note: This class will NOT be recorded

We’ve heard tell of matriarchal societies in which there was no war, homelessness, or rape; an inspirited natural world; respect for all individuals; sexual freedom; and true egalitarianism. Are these stories true, or just wishful thinking?

To answer these questions, join this six-session course led by two-time Nobel Peace Prize nominee Dr. Heide Goettner-Abendroth, founder of HAGIA International Academy for Matriarchal Studies and Matriarchal Spirituality.

Dr. Heide Goettner-Abedroth is author of the book Matriarchal Societies: Studies on Indigenous Cultures Across the Globe, which provides a thorough scholarly survey of matriarchal cultures around the world, with an eye towards the commonalities between them with respect to their social, political, economic, and cultural structures. It also investigates traditions relating to death and burial, ancestor rituals, goddess veneration, sexuality, and spirituality; provides a historical overview of matriarchal studies as traced in a variety of disciplines.

Through close reading of selected sections of Matriarchal Societies, along with class discussions, this reading group will sort fact from the fiction to explore what characterizes such societies, where they exist or have existed, why so few remain today, and what we can learn from them.

Sessions will take place once monthly, and each will focus on a particular aspect of Matriarchal society; namely, social order; economy; politics; worldview, spirituality and culture; how and why patriarchy replaced matriarchy. The final session, entitled Matriarchal Politics today, or: How to get rid of Patriarchy? will consolidate what we have learned, and give students the opportunity to generate a vision of a new non-patriarchal or matriarchal society.

SCHEDULE

FREE INTRODUCTORY LECTURE (Click here to sign up)
Sunday, February 12, 2023:

Two questions at the beginning: What is a matriarchy? What are modern Matriarchal Studies?

The research findings of modern Matriarchal Studies contradict the ideology of universal male dominance and universal patriarchy. Modern Matriarchal Studies can provide answers to the problems of war, food insecurity, general and gendered violence, and problems of environment we are worried about today. Answers to these problems or solutions cannot be found within patriarchal patterns which are continuously causing them.

Modern Matriarchal Studies is concerned with investigating and presenting matriarchal societies as egalitarian, life-affirming societies. All over the world today, some indigenous peoples in Asia, Africa, the Americas still live in societies of this kind. Knowledge about them is the basis of modern Matriarchal Studies, which goes far beyond traditional research on matriarchies that is full of prejudices and misinterpretations due to the male, colonial bias of the researchers.

Session One: Sunday, March 12, 2023
Social Order in Matriarchal Societies

The topic of this session is to give a deeper insight in the social order of still existent matriarchal societies. According to this order, mothers are at the center of the society, without ruling. This will be explored through some examples of indigenous societies.

Chapters of the book to be read (obligatory):

• Chapter 2.2.: Social structure of the Khasi people on Northeast India

• Chapter 5.2.: The Mosuo people in Southwest China

Session Two: Sunday, April 23, 2023
Economy in Matriarchal Societies

In this session the economic organization of matriarchal societies will be explored. Ice will see how women manage the economy, which is in their hands, to meet everyone’s needs with the greatest benefit.

Chapters of the book to be read (obligatory):

• Chapter 12.3.: The strong and beautiful women of Juchitán, Mexico

• Chapter 8.3.: ”Darek” and “Rantau”: two ways to keep patriarchy out (the Minagkabu of Sumatra)

Session Three: Sunday, May 14, 2023:
Politics in Matriarchal Societies

The politics of matriarchal societies is based on the consensus principle, which is the root of their true egalitarian character. The topic of this session will be his matriarchal societies practice this principle not only in small but also in large-scale political organizations.

Chapters of the book to be read (obligatory):

• Chapter 2.3.: Political patterns of the Khasi people on Northeast India

• Chapter 14.3.: The Constitution and political structures of the Iroquois (North America, USA)

Session Four: Sunday, June 11, 2023
Worldview, spirituality and culture in Matriarchal Societies

Matriarchal societies function as a whole with a deep, life-supporting and all-permeating spirituality. They are sacred societies and cultures of the feminine divine, because they are based on an all permeating spiritual attitude that regards the whole world is divine. They have very different attitudes towards sexuality and eroticism, and, freed from constraints of ownership and jealousy, much freer structures.

These and other basic principles of matriarchal spirituality will be explored in this session.

Chapters of the book to be read (obligatory):

• Chapter 9.2.: Ancestor children in Trobriand Islands society (Melanesia)

• Chapter 12.2(p. 247-251): Kuna beliefs and religious ceremony (Kuna Yala, Panama)

1. Chapter 13.2.: Life-cycle feasts and agricultural ceremonies with the Hopi (Arizona, USA)

Session Five: Sunday, July 16, 2023
Matriarchal Societies of the Past and the Rise of Patriarchy

In this session, archaeological finds are used in a new interpretation to reconstruct matriarchal societies of the past and the chain of causes and effects that led to patriarchal patterns (in the vast cultural area of West-Asia and Europe).

Chapters of the new book with the same title will be given later. The book is forthcoming in 2022 or at the beginning of 2023, New York, Peter Lang.

Session Six: Sunday, August 13, 2023
Matriarchal Politics today, or: How to get rid of Patriarchy?

In this session the question, will be see what we can do with this knowledge gained from matriarchal societies. A vision of a non-patriarchal or new matriarchal society will be given, and some practical ways will be explored how to get there.

Reading material: Booklet: “The Vision of an Egalitarian Society” and
“Matriarchal Manifesta” (available at Academy HAGIA)

Dr. Heide Goettner-Abendroth is a mother and a grandmother. She earned her Ph.D. in philosophy of science at the University of Munich where she lectured for ten years (1973-1983). She has published on philosophy of science, and extensively on matriarchal society and culture, and through her lifelong research on matriarchal societies has become the founder of Modern Matriarchal Studies. Her magnum opus: Matriarchal Societies: Studies on Indigenous Cultures across the Globe (Lang 2013, New York) defines scientifically this new field of knowledge and provides a world tour of examples of contemporary matriarchal cultures.

She has been visiting professor at the University of Montreal in Canada, and the University of Innsbruck in Austria. She lectured extensively at home and abroad. In 1986, she founded the The International Academy for Modern Matriarchal Studies and Matriarchal Spirituality in Germany, and since then has been its director. In 2003, 2005 and 2011 she guided three World Congresses on Matriarchal Studies in Europe and the U.S.A. She was twice a nominee for the Nobel Peace Prize, in 2005 by a Swiss initiative, in 2008 by a finish initiative.

www.goettner-abendroth.de

International Academy HAGIA for Matriarchal Studies

The International ACADEMY HAGIA for Matriarchal Studies was founded in 1986 by Dr. Heide Goettner-Abendroth, and since then she has been its director. She collaborates since 20 years with co-director Cécile Keller.

The Academy HAGIA is the one and only institute in the world which is explicitly dedicated to the discipline of Modern Matriarchal Studies as a new social science. It includes scholarly research and high level education as well as spiritual events.

The program includes:

• seminars/webinars and study courses online in German and English,

• world congresses of several days and one-day conferences on the topic of Modern Matriarchal Studies,

• the seasonal celebration of Matriarchal Mystery Festivals,

• spiritual healing circles,

• exploring travels and study trips on every continent to make anthropological and archaeological studies in situ.

The Academy HAGIA is completely independent. It is supported by the “Association of the Academy HAGIA” which makes the work of the academy possible by membership fees and donations.

www.hagia.de