This is a post about what I’ve learned from living in the swamps of the south in regards to making magick. I was born and spent most of my life just outside of the Florida Everglades and then lived in Savannah, GA for five years which is bordered largely by swamps. Your land will always inform your practice, the swamps are mine.
I also want to say before I start that I’m mostly traditional in my ways, which is why the land is so important to me. This may not be the case for everybody. So don’t take what I’m saying as a generalization.
For this post I’m going to be talking about Swamp Magick that specifically relates to the Southeast region of the United States.
Swamp Magick isn’t so much like, one specific thing, but really exists as sort of a spiritual paradigm I guess? It’s often also referred to as Folk, Bayou, or Conjure Magick although all three have slight distinctions and connotations (Conjure is very closely tied to Hoodoo but in certain cases I’ve heard other folks describe their practice as conjure as well). I’m going to say that to really understand Swamp Magick, of the southern variety at least, you absolutely have to be willing to acknowledge its ties to Native American practices, Voodoo, Hoodoo, and in many cases the magick of Appalachia. More so than being just a southern thing, a lot of Swamp Magick is regionally specific to Louisiana. Basically, depending on where you live, your rites and traditions are going to be different.
Another thing that I find important to bring up is that there are a lot of aspects of Swamp/Bayou/Conjure Magick that I absolutely will not include in my practice due to their appropriative nature of a closed religion. (Someone posted something once, possibly @witches-ofcolor, that while you can learn Voodoo and Hoodoo as a white person, if you find someone willing to teach you, you should do a shit load of research and think carefully about the reasons behind why you want to.)
I’ve always found that the magick folk I’ve met who are of the swamps tend to be far less, I’m not exactly sure how to put this, less European in their ways of thinking and practicing. Not that it isn’t there but what I mean by that is that there tends to be a lot less Wiccan, Hermetic, Abrahamic etc… influence in most people. This goes back to what I was saying before, even though not all of the influences are drawing exclusively from Root Work and Voodoo, the influence is extraordinarily present. (Note: Hoodoo and Voodoo each have their own western influences, but those have been distilled over the years and are not really what I’m talking about here.)
General characteristics of Swamp Magick (doesn’t really apply to my personal practice so much)
Often geared toward curses (sending & breaking) or healing
Lots of working with spirits and the dead
Comprehensive use of sacrifice (No, not going out and killing a goat…always)
Exists heavily in the oral tradition (If someone’s momma didn’t tell ‘em how to do it, their grandmama did)
There is never just one way to do something (Applies to most paths in some way or another, not just the swampy stuff)
Cross Roads Rituals (The Devil Went Down to Georgia kinda deal, lol deal, get it?)
Items commonly used in Swamp Magick
Swamp Water - Great for cursing and keeping things away from you
Swamp Mud - Kind of the opposite effect of Swamp Water, great for healing and causing change
Red Brick Dust - Super great for protective workings
Goofer Dust - The two essentials for goofer dust in my mind are Graveyard Dirt and Snakeskin, anything else can be added for specificity and potency. Great for hexes and cursing, but can adapt to being protective depending on what’s in it.
Bones - Obvious, you can use them for whatever you want really, the swamp just has a heavy correspondence with death &decay
Resources
I actually don’t have a lot of great scholarly resources for Swamp Magick specifically, at least not the variety that I work in. Everything I know I’ve either taught myself or learned from somebody else. (If anyone does know of any solid resources please please please send them my way)
But for more traditional Southern Folk Magick here are some great ones:
Hoodoo and Conjure Quarterly, Volume 1, Issue 2: A Journal of New Orleans Voodoo, Hoodoo, Southern Folk Magic and Folklore
Conjure in African American Society
Literally any book by Zora Neale Hurston (they’re mostly fiction but like, REAL)
Final Note: If you are racist in any capacity, Swamp Magick isn’t for you so fuck off.
