Daniel Wojcik

Daniel Wojcik profile picture
  • Title: Professor
  • Phone: 541-346-3946
  • Office: 463 PLC
  • Office Hours: Fall term: T: 7:00-7:30 pm; R: 12:00-2:30 pm
  • Affiliated Departments: Religious Studies

Publications

 

Books:

Outsider Art: Visionary Worlds and Trauma.  University Press of Mississippi (2016). 

Link: https://www.amazon.com/Outsider-Art-Visionary-Worlds-Trauma/dp/1496808061

The End of the World As We Know It: Faith, Fatalism, and Apocalypse in America.  New York University Press (1997).

Punk and Neo-Tribal Body Art.  University Press of Mississippi (1995).

 

Selected Essays:
 

"Inside the Art of Outsiders" (Chapter 1) from Outsider Art:  Visionary Worlds and Trauma, University Press of Mississippi (2016), pp. 3-37.   (Click here to read).

"Art and Trauma." Raw Vision: International Journal of Intuitive and Visionary Art, Outsider Art, Art Brut, Contemporary Folk Art, Marginal Arts, no. 91 (Fall 2016): 48-55.  Click here to read article: https://blogs.uoregon.edu/folklore/files/2017/01/RV.Fall2016-1h9a845.pdf

"John Coltrane Church (Saint John Will-I-Am Coltrane African Orthodox Church)" (co-author Peter Jan Margry).  World Religions & Spirituality Project, 2016.  Link: http://wrldrels.org/profiles/Coltrane.htm.   

"Avertive Apocalypticism."  In the Oxford Handbook of Millennialism, ed. Catherine Wessinger, pp. 66-88.  Oxford University Press, 2011.  (Click here to read article)

"Spirits, Apparitions, and Traditions of Supernatural Photography."Visual Resources: An International Journal of Documentation 25, no. 1-2 (March-June 2009): 109-136.  Special Issue, Visualizing the Invisible: Visionary Technologies in Religious and Cultural Contexts.  (Click here to read article)

"Pre's Rock: Pilgrimage, Ritual, and Runners' Traditions at the Roadside Shrine for Steve Prefontaine."  In Shrines and Pilgrimage in Contemporary Society: New Itineraries into the Sacred, ed. Peter Jan Margry.  University of Amsterdam Press (2008).  (Click here to read article)   (Click here for photos of Pre’s Rock)

"Outsider Art, Vernacular Traditions, Trauma, and Creativity." Western Folklore, no. 2 & 3 (Winter 2008): 179-198.

"Apocalyptic and Millenarian Aspects of American UFOism." In UFO Religions, ed. Christopher Partridge, pp. 274-300.  Routledge (2003).

"Polaroids from Heaven: Photography, Folk Religion, and the Miraculous Image Tradition at a Marian Apparition Site,” Journal of American Folklore 109 (1996): 129-48. 

Statement

Ph.D. University of California, Los Angeles, 1992

My interests include contemporary folklore studies, urban ethnology, and cultural theory; apocalyptic beliefs and millenarian movements; visionary cultures; death and mourning rituals; trauma and creativity; subcultural movements; alternative spiritualities; popular eschatology; and vernacular artistic expression. 

Professional Memberships:

  • American Academy of Religion
  • American Folklore Society
  • American Studies Association
  • Communal Studies Association
  • Société Internationale d’Ethnologie et de Folklore (SIEF)
  • Western States Folklore Society

Teaching

  • Apocalypse Now and Then: The End of the World in American Culture and Consciousness
  • Folk Art, Visionary Art, and Material Culture
  • Folklore and Popular Culture
  • Folklore and Religion
  • Folklore and the Supernatural
  • Folklore of Subcultures
  • History and Theory of Folklore Research
  • Introduction to Folklore
  • Visionary Experiences and Otherworldly Encounters: Traditions, Theories, and Contexts

Research

  • Apocalyptic Beliefs, Millenarianism, and Popular Eschatology
  • Visionary and "Outsider Art"
  • Contemporary Folklore Studies, Cultural Theory, and Urban Ethnology
  • Death, Mourning Rituals, Memory, and Memorialization
  • Alternative Religion and Healing Traditions
  • Visionary and Apparitional Cultures
  • Vernacular Artistic Expression
  • Subculture Studies
  • Pilgrimage and Spiritual Tourism

Publications

Outsider Art: Visionary Worlds and Trauma

Daniel Wojcik’s book Outsider Art: Visionary Worlds and Trauma provides a comprehensive guide through the contested terrain of outsider art, art brut, visionary art, "art of the insane," and folk art. Wojcik situates such art in broader vernacular traditions, while also analyzing the ways that trauma and adversity have inspired the art-making process in potentially therapeutic ways.... Read more

Punk and Neo-Tribal Body Art

Punk and Neo-Tribal Body Art

Daniel Wojcik’s book, Punk and Neo-Tribal Body Art (University Press of Mississippi) explores the shock aesthetics and oppositional style of the punk subculture, and the meanings of contemporary body modification.

The End of the World As We Know It

Book cover for "The End of the World As We Know It"

Daniel Wojcik’s book, The End of the World As We Know It (New York University Press) analyzes the enduring appeal of apocalyptic and millennialist traditions in American culture.

Fields of Focus

Cultural Studies
Folklore