What is hoodoo?

For one to understand what Hoodoo truly is, he or she has to understand the experience of the Black American. We know that in August of 1619 the White Lion, a privateer ship brought “20 and odd” captive Africans that were seized from a Portuguese slave ship to Jamestown, Virginia. Two hundred and forty six years later, yes 246; Slavery finally ended on June 19, 1865. Which is now the day we commemorate Juneteenth. There is no needed history lesson on how traumatic, horrific, and gruesome slavery was for the African / Black American, but to help paint the picture we will address important details. During the transatlantic slave trade, a system was created. This system stripped the names, identity, culture, language, and most importantly religion from this group of people. The African names, dialect, and African Traditional Religions, were replaced with English and Christianity.

Now, imagine that you’re a slave in 1716. You just stepped of a slave ship and the first thing you see is a land where nothing is recognizable. The languages, the vegetation, the weather. It all seems foreign to you. You remember the ways of your people, but you’ve seen other slaves punished for expressing themselves culturally. Do you put yourself in danger by continuing your cultural ways or do you assimilate as desired by the Slave Masters? This is the exact choice our ancestors had to make. A very big choice that would inspire generations to this day. Slaves never forgot their identity, they just had to find new ways to express themselves. This is how the early years of “Hoodoo” started.

Let’s be more specific….

On Sundays the slave master has began making the slaves attend church services. You're not allowed to read their Bible, you listen to the overseer. You’re not allowed to ask questions, you remain silent. You can’t sing you own songs, you hesitantly sing hymnals. You sing them wrong? You get beaten. This was the religious life of a slave. Fortunately, sometimes slave masters allowed slaves to attend church within their own communities. Not because they felt slaves deserved it but because they didn’t want to mingle with the salves. However, this left room for something to develop. What is this something? It is what we now call hoodoo. On Sundays and in the cover of night, enslaved Africans and enslaved African Americans began to secretly use christianity as a mask to practice their own religions. (I distinguish African from African Americans because some Africans were here prior to slavery and had already lived here for generations and unfortunately been forced into slavery alongside africans).

The Early Years

ATR’s (African Tradition Religions) already included a definitive understanding of morality, the elements, and spirituality. So it was not hard to mask these practices. However there is one missing piece. The Native Americans. During slavery black and native communities often times relied on each other for survival because of a shared enemy. With this partnership came the exchange of informations. Well what did the native Americans provide slaves that helped develop Hoodoo The knowledge of the land. I mention early that America was foreign to a lot of slaves, so that had to learn the different herbs and roots that were native to this land. The knowledge of the Native Americans, the ancient knowledge of African customs and practices, mixed with European religion is how plantation hoodoo developed. This is not to be confused with Louisiana Plantation Voodoo which developed similarly with the exception of the Hatian religion Vodun/Vodoun replacing the African customs aspect.

It is important that I notate that plantation hoodoo and Modern Hoodoo are not one and the same. Outside of the ancestor veneration, plantation hoodoo was used strictly for survival. I highly doubt that there were love spells, glamour magic, and gambling spells being done. During this time practitioners used their abilities to heal injuries, infirmities, survive violence, and to stop their love ones from being sold. In my opinion this was hoodoo at its most simplest, yet most powerful form.

To watch a video on how ATR’s merged with Christianity, watch this video on the ring shout. https://youtu.be/skUsJMKwsfE?si=HdCtvhacQg8eS6ap

Reconstruction Era Hoodoo, Jim Crow, and Commercialization

The Black Church..

Now here’s how I and a lot of practitioners were introduced to Hoodoo. I know you remember the long drawn out gyms the decon or elder use to sing before praying at church on Sunday mornings. “I love the lord, he heard my cry”’ and the crowd goes, “I”…. The wearing of white every first Sunday when ritualist communion was taken. Or maybe you remember this tarry services on Friday night when there would be no sermon and the preacher and church mothers made you call of Jesus for hours and hours until you recede the Holy Ghost and started speaking in tongues? What about those little bottles of anointing oil that the elder of the church made and sent it home with you and told you to anoint your house? Now stop and think about the last time you’ve seen or heard of a white christian doing these things and it didn’t come off as inauthenticity or mockery. Why does the Black church look so different from other churches? The answer is Hoodoo. During its retreat from negative stereotypes, hoodoo once again ran back behind the mask of Christianity. Except this time, it looked completely different. During slavey and afterwards, a lot of black people started to actually devote themselves and become christians. Along with that, the persecution and denouncing of what was now referred to as WITCHCRAFT.

While reception to hoodoo took a major hit, it never went away. Mounting slowly become catching the Holy Ghost, ecstatic utterances becomes speaking in tongues, the ring shout become just shouting, and the words rootwork and conjure became “the lords work”, “fixin”, and “work”.

Unfortunately as the black church developed more and more people turned away from hoodoo. The knowledge of rootwork and the do’s and don’s eventually became superstition, and old wives tales. However the source, it never disappeared. You could find practitioners few and far in between but what once was, turned into secrecy.

The Second Coming….

There is so much I could say in this portion… but i’ll keep it digestible. The popularization or second arrival of hoodoo started with the 2005 movie “The Skeleton Key”. For some reason this movie ignited a flame in the black community. Although the movies was full of misinformation, I’m actually grateful because it really allowed a lot of black people to go back to their roots. Then there’s Sinners. Such a beautiful movie. A lot of us practitioners seen ourselves or someone we knew in those characters but boy didn’t it create a wave of what I like to call ACTitioners, Now I am by no means the gatekeeper of hoodoo, I have no say in who should be recognized as a real or fake practitioner. But i’ll say the work speaks for itself. Social media has allowed scammers to not only take advantage of innocent people who often need real help, but it has also allowed room for misinformation to be spread. Unlike last time, this time it’s from those who claim to be of the practice.