Aidoneus Åjjveålmáj
Green Colonialism and the Exploitation of Indigenous Peoples
Throughout the history of colonization and the genocide of indigenous peoples, natural resources were exploited for economic gain. Today, the rhetoric has shifted to the narrative of “protecting ecosystems” or promoting “green” initiatives, but the dynamics of control and extraction remain unchanged. In the name of climate control, renewable technologies, and decarbonization, the colonizing world continues the exploitation, displacement, and forced relocation of indigenous peoples. In Sápmi, the Sámi people are facing a crisis as their culture, land, and reindeer are being destroyed at an alarming rate to fuel the “Go Green” agenda of the United States, Norway, Sweden, and Finland. Aidoneus Åjjveålmá is a Pite Sámi wilderness guide, outdoor educator, rite of passage facilitator, co-founder and executive director of WildWise School, and Nåjjde of the Pite Sámi. A trauma-informed educator, father of six, former Boy Scout leader, United States Marine, chef, entrepreneur, restaurateur, information technology executive, and engineer, Aidoneus works with organizations worldwide on social justice issues, sovereignty, treaty rights, indigenous ceremony protection and preservation, cultural appropriation, ancestral studies, entheogenic rituals, indigenous rights and rites, and Sámi and Germanic tribal education and reclamation. He is a Master Swordsman, Wilderness First Responder, certified Northwest Naturalist, and a steward with the Jefferson Land Trust.
Corinne Boyer
Traditional Scandinavian Plants of the Midsummer Tide
Many of the Northern places of the world historically attached great significance to the solar Midsummer time, and this can be seen in different folk practices that come from earlier eras. Midsummer was a time of great power in times past, not merely a time to gather and feast. It was a time when spirits were thought to be more active and information was available that was normally kept hidden. It was also a time to protect the coming harvests for next year’s winter stores. Traditions from Scandinavia believed that plants harvested during this period had more power than at any other time of the year. Learn about the plants that were used during this time frame for protection, divinations and healing, from Swedish and Northern traditions. Corinne Boyer is a folk herbalist, teacher, and writer with a passion for traditions surrounding plants, spirits and folk magic. She has been studying and working with plants since 1998. She has been teaching and writing full time about the history and folklore of plants, folk medicine, and plant traditions of Northern and Western Europe and North America since 2010. She has written over ten books and had many articles published in various occult publications since 2015.
Mathias Nordvig
The Sacred Grove as a Network for Resilience
In Pre-Christian northern Europe, groves were arenas of rituals and sacrality. Trees were held as sacred, and their spaces, the groves, were safe locations for humans. The ancestors gathered there and made important decisions about their future, seated under a sacred tree. For that reason, the cosmos is also envisioned as a sacred tree: Yggdrasill. What lessons can we take from this worldview and apply in our contemporary life? Trees and groves were sacred and special because the northern Europeans were inherently aware of their connectedness with each other, with us, and with other species. If we learn from this connectedness, we can enhance our resilience in today’s world, where the powers that be do everything to isolate us from each other. We must listen to the trees and learn from the grove. Mathias Nordvig is associate teaching professor in Nordic studies at the University of Colorado-Boulder. He is also the creator behind the Sacred Flame podcast.
Eden Blooms
Embracing the Seasons With Persephone
Persephone's journey through the underworld serves as a profound metaphor for how we navigate through the seasons. This plant walk encourages everyone to draw on the magic and wisdom of the plants in our environment as well as of deities like Persephone to deepen our connection to the natural world. We will explore the psychosocial connections between nature, the seasons, and learn how plants can support us along our journeys. Eden Blooms, a Sephardic person of color living in Cascadia, is a passionate ethnobotanist and public health practitioner. Eden connects communities to the land through whimsical and magical learning experiences, inviting people of all ages to discover the joy of playing in the forest. Using the One Health model, which emphasizes the interconnectedness of human, animal, and environmental health, Eden's community learning opportunities are both educational and enchanting. Let's play and learn together in the forest, where every leaf and stone has a story to tell!
Harmony Cronin and Sarah Bellum
Blood and Bone: An Ancestrally Informed, Animistically Principled, Woman-Led Approach to Animal Slaughter
This workshop is a prayer — a marriage of the practical, material skills of ethical animal slaughter and the deeper, magickal explorations of how to be in service to those that die so that we can live. Using a blend of ancestral traditions, emergent collaborative ritual, professional butchering techniques, and wyrd experimentations, this class is rooted in reverence for our animal kin. We exalt the spirit of our food to its proper place as divine by learning how to kill, skin, butcher, and cook in sacred etiquette of indebtedness and reciprocity. Every gift of the animal is celebrated by transmutation into practical, magickal items. Blood and Bone will be an ongoing, three-day workshop, with the slaughter itself taking place on Friday, June 20th. Please note that a three- to four-hour time commitment is required to participate in the slaughter. All festival attendees are welcome to drop in throughout the day on Saturday and Sunday as Harmony and Sarah lead a hands-on exploration of how to use all parts of the animal. Harmony and Sarah have been tending animal death together for over a decade, carefully crafting practices from the collision of ancestral customs, folk magick, and the industrial complex of dominant culture. Harmony is a Rainforest Elf Peasant Viking, reinvigorating the technologies of animal transformations. Sarah is a fierce and feral hobbit goblin mystic reanimating the archetype of Holy Caregiver through her skills as a chef, trauma informed herbalist, and radical community Mother. Together they run Gathering Ways, a magickal folk school.
Randiah Camille Green
Kundalini to Meet Your Spirit Guides
Kundalini is the divine feminine energy that exists in us all regardless of gender. When we access this wildly creative energy, the body becomes a vessel to reach higher realms of consciousness. This class begins with light somatic movement and breathwork to awaken the energetic body before settling in for a guided meditation into the dimension of light where we can meet our spirit guides, accompanied by singing bowls and other instruments. Randiah Camille Green is a writer, performance artist, Pagan mystic, RYT-200, certified kundalini yoga instructor, sound healer, energy worker, and spirit having a human experience from Detroit, Michigan. She teaches yoga as a spiritual practice extending far beyond the physical body that allows us to connect to the divine within. She is honored to guide you on the journey home to your true self.
Timm Kennedy
Recovery From Drug and Alcohol Addiction: Another Way to Live Is Possible
Through work on a program of recovery, Timm has found that living in isolation is not the answer. Community is, accountability is. Letting go over control of people and outcomes and living in the present moment is the way forward. The plan is to have a nonspecific recovery meeting for all that wish to attend, with a speaker for each day followed by discussion. Growing up on the west coast in punk and metal communities, Timm spent much of his youth riding freight trains, touring with bands and searching for a meaningful life. In the spring of 2017, a series of seemingly unfortunate events led to the beginning of his journey in recovery from drug and alcohol addiction.
Leah Kiczula
Little Witch's Poster Printing Party!
Join us for Little Witch's Poster Printing Party! This interactive community workshop invites you to design and print your own unique posters using a variety of pre-made blocks. Ink up a block, press it onto paper, and repeat until you create a masterpiece! With eco-friendly inks and repurposed paper, this event is as sustainable as it is fun. Want to get even more creative? Bring your own materials, like a wood panel or a bandana! No experience is needed—just a little elbow grease and creativity. Come get inky and cast a little magic with us. Leah Kiczula is a printmaker, crafter, and artist based in Portland, Oregon. Passionate about hands-on creativity, she loves sharing her skills and seeing what new works emerge through collaboration and experimentation. Her work often incorporates sustainable materials, reflecting her commitment to eco-friendly art practices. When she’s not covered in *something* , Leah can be found headbanging at a heavy metal show, floating down a river, or getting lost in a spicy audiobook. Whether teaching, creating, or exploring new techniques, she’s always chasing the next best new thing.
Buffy Marie
Wu Xing Quigong — Five Phases Qigong
A powerful and easy-to-learn set of longevity exercises that integrate movement, breath and intention to bring healing energy to each of the body’s five solid organs. Buffy Marie is a lifelong walker of the healing path with a deep dedication to her studies in the teachings of the internal alchemy of the spiritual, martial and healing arts.
Christopher Nejtek
The Past and Present of Fascism
In his talk, Christopher will explore the origins of fascism, its defining characteristics, and the potential it may or may not have to pose a threat once again. The word fascism is a confusing word that has been all but stripped of any meaning through overuse. Christopher will attempt to provide the phenomenon with a minimum definition and explain the unfolding of the fascist process historically with some comparison to contemporary right-wing movements. Christopher Nejtek is a PhD candidate in history at Texas Tech University. He specializes in fascism in interwar Europe, with a particular focus on Weimar Germany. His previous work has focused on the radicalization of demobilized World War One soldiers and their visions of reactionary collectivism. He is also the host of The Regrettable Century, a podcast that discusses history and political theory.
Mackenzie Ní Flainn
Community Defense Continuum
In this two-hour class we will build our skills in de-escalation, crisis/bystander intervention, and self-defense together from an explicitly abolitionist and empowerment-based perspective. Through discussion, skills drills, and role play we will empower one another to intervene in violence and assist community members who are in crisis directly. We will discuss skills, tactics, and the ethics of intervention on behalf of ourselves and others. Mackenzie Ní Flainn (she/they) is a Mama, health justice activist, health abolitionist, harm reductionist, full spectrum birth advocate, student midwife, community herbalist, street medic, and self-defense instructor living in Oregon on the occupied territory of the Kalapuya ilahi. As a teenager, her experience of harm in the American medical complex radicalized her toward bodily autonomy, abolition and anti-racism in healing spaces. Mackenzie has served as a clinical massage therapist and doula, is a founding member of Black Thistle Street Aid, and offers community training in de-escalation, bystander intervention, and self-defense with Warrior Sisters. Currently a PhD candidate in medical anthropology, Mackenzie studies health disparity in unhoused communities, health justice systems, health justice history, and liberatory movements. She also studies the Irish language, Gaelic re-existence, healing and resistance magics, and Gaelic animist folkways.
K. Nyberg
Reclaiming the Commons: The Many Trees Project and the Legacy of Collective Harvests
This presentation explores the revival of communal food systems through the Many Trees Project, which has planted over 8,000 fruit and nut trees to establish publicly accessible groves. Drawing from historical practices in Europe and Turtle Island, we examine how indigenous and medieval communities managed oak and nut groves through cooperative stewardship and reciprocal economies. By creating modern food commons, we restore ecosystems and challenge notions of land ownership and individualism. Through urban orchards, education, and guerrilla reforestation, we rebuild sacred groves as spaces for resilience and connection. As we stare down climate collapse, join us in reviving ancient wisdom for a livable future. K. Nyberg is an environmental educator and activist with over a decade of experience in environmental justice and anti-fascist organizing. He earned a bachelor's in environmental science from the University of Minnesota, where he co-facilitated a course on Indigenous food systems taught by Winona LaDuke, and later obtained a master’s in education from the City University of Seattle. In 2020, he co-founded the Many Trees Project. Through the reforestation, education, and global solidarity efforts, Nyberg promotes food sovereignty, ecological resilience, and grassroots organizing for a just and livable future.
Amina Otto
Giving, Receiving, and Gratitude: Practicing Reciprocity in a Transactional World
This talk aims to illuminate the difference between reciprocal and transactional relationships; demonstrate the rich history of reciprocal networks within communities and between people and the land; and explore ways of cultivating reciprocity in our own personal interactions. Transactional ways of fulfilling needs often lead to the exploitation of individuals and resources, disintegrations of communal ties, and separation from the natural world. Reciprocity is a system of giving and receiving that both relies on and cultivates integrity, trust, generosity, and gratitude. Together, we will explore how to incorporate reciprocity within our immediate communities in a world driven by transactions. Amina has been involved in ritual storytelling events in the US, UK, and Scandinavia since 2018. She enjoyed an unorthodox and rather nomadic upbringing in a family that values stories, adventure, and curiosity. This primed her for a career studying Norse and Celtic mythology, literature, language, and culture. After earning her bachelor’s degree at CU Boulder where she studied under Dr. Mathias Nordvig, Amina earned a master’s in Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic from the University of Cambridge, followed by a second master’s in Celtic Studies from the University of Glasgow where she is currently a PhD researcher in Celtic and Gaelic.
Stuart Reeder
Grunts Growls Howls Rattles Shrieks and Screams: The science of sound waves and vocal distortions
A no-experience-necessary deep dive into how the human voice produces screams and how they differ sonically from clean singing. The first half of the session will explore vocal anatomy, soundwaves, and the overtone series that allows the human ear to distinguish the dulcet tones of George Fisher (Cannibal Corpse) from a Violin. The second half will be a hands-on instructional to get the whole audience finding their first screams and understanding how to grow and practice those screams in the future. Participation encouraged but of course not required! Stuart is a lifelong vocalist who spent ten years chained in a lab using his bachelor’s in molecular and cell biology before he realized all he really cares about is making weird noises, scary noises, and pretty noises, and teaching other people how to do the same. Recently certified by New York Vocal Coaching in their 50 Hour Voice Teacher Training as well as their Vocal Distortion Teacher Training, Stuart has the book knowledge, as well as the touring knowledge from fronting Southern California black metal outfit Woods Witch, to talk to you for a very long time about screaming.
Erica Skadsen of Cascadian Botany and Leuc Winslow
Sylvan Encounters: Finding Community with the Plants of the Forest
We gather under the canopy of tall trees to build relationships with those plants which dwell in the forest. We will use all of our senses to mindfully experience the local flora and practice our skills of discernment and recognition. As we draw upon our observational skills and pooled knowledge to dive deeper into the mysteries of the forest, we will learn to feel more comfortable and at home within the Sacred Grove. Let’s introduce ourselves to who grows here. Erica Skadsen of Cascadian Botany is a plant nerd and budding botanist easily excited by nature. She enjoys sharing her enthusiasm through random acts of biophilia, plant identification, and low/no budget gardening. She wants to catalyze folks to develop relationships with nature, interact and care for plants, and discover what they tell us about the land, ourselves, and each other. Leuc has lived in the Duwamish River Watershed of the Salish Sea for ten years. Since completing a cultural studies degree exploring ethnobotanical contrasts between colonial and indigenous relationships with land, Leuc enjoys working in restoration ecology and connecting ancestral heritage with decolonial solidarity.
Meghan Threínfhir
Witch Science in the Sacred Grove
Meghan Thréinfhir’s performance lecture Witch Science in the Sacred Grove traces the speculative history of Witch Science, from ancient logic to modern computing. She examines how the appearance of formal logic in the Sacred Grove disrupted ritual and severed access to the moon, propelling witches toward scientific and technological reclamation. Blending historical fact with myth, she weaves a narrative of Katharina and Johannes Kepler, Mary Shelley, Ada Lovelace, the witches of Bletchley Park, and the women behind NASA’s Apollo code. Using hand-drawn puppets and storytelling, she reveals a hidden lineage of diviners, oracles, spies, and alchemists in the history of computing and space travel. Meghan Thréinfhir is a digital hedgewitch, artist, and technologist exploring the speculative history of witch technology from ancient times to the digital age. Her work interweaves storytelling, historical research, and hands-on practice across sculpture, electronics, and sound art. She has exhibited and performed nationally and internationally, including her solo exhibition Bog Memory / Computer Memory at Captive Portal in Denmark. She is the founder of Meghan Trainor Witch Tech, a series of online courses teaching computer programming through divination.