Vampires Today: The Truth About Modern Vampirism
By Joseph Laycock

Publisher: Praeger Publishers (May 30, 2009)
List Price: $39.95
Format: Hardcover
Trim Size: 6 1/8 x 9 1/4
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0313364729
ISBN-13: 978-0313364723

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http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0313364729/sanguinarius


Description: Vampires are not just the stuff of folklore and fiction.
This book explores the modern world of vampirism in all its variety.
Based upon extensive interviews with members of the Atlanta Vampire
Alliance and others within vampire communities throughout the United
States, Vampires Today looks at the many expressions of vampirism:
"lifestyle vampires," those who adopt a culture and a gothic ascetic
associated with the vampires of art and legend; "real vampires," those
who believe they must actually consume blood and/or psychic energy for
their well being; or others who self-identify in some way as vampires.
Is vampirism a religion? Is it a fantasy? Is it a medical condition?
Is it a little bit of each?

Throughout the world, untold numbers of people are self-identifying as
"vampires" and following the ways of "vampirism." Over the years, but
particularly in the past decade or so, vampirism has come under
increased study, yet most scholarship has portrayed the vampire
community at best as a cultural phenomenon and at worst as a religious
cult. In this book, author Laycock explores the modern world of
vampirism in all its variety. Having interviewed many vampires across
the country, both "lifestylers" and "real," even those "reluctants"
who try not to be vampires, he argues that today's vampires are best
understood as an identity group and that vampirism has caused a
profound change in how individuals choose to define themselves. As
vampires come "out of the closet," either as followers of a "religion"
or "lifestyle" or as people biologically distinct from other humans,
their confrontation with mainstream society will raise questions about
the definition of "normal" and what it means to be human. In this book
the reader will meet "lifestyle" vampires, who adopt a culture and a
gothic ascetic associated with the vampires of art and legend; and
"real" vampires, who believe that they must actually consume blood
and/or psychic energy for their well being. The reader will hear from
members of the Atlanta Vampire Alliance and will learn about the Order
of the Vampyre, the Ordo Strigoi Vii, and the Temple of the Vampire.
Even before Dracula and Bella Lugosi, people have been fascinated with
vampires, and this interest has continued, through Buffy the Vampire
Slayer and Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire and other novels, to
HBO's new series True Blood and the recent big-screen hit Twilight.
Readers will find the details of real vampire life--including vampire
role-playing games, grimoires, "vampyre" balls, vampire houses like
House Sahjaza and House Kheperu, the vampire "caste" system, and other
details--utterly fascinating.


Additional Notes: The author holds a Masters of Divinity from Harvard
University, a recipient of a grant from the Pluralism Project, and
currently enrolled in the Division of Religious and Theological
Studies at Boston University where he's working on his PhD. He has
presented on the topic of vampirism at the American Academy of
Religion Conference in San Diego where he argued that "vampirism"
should not be classified as a new religious movement (NRM), to faculty
at the University of Michigan and other institutional bodies on the
sociological and emergent scientific aspects of vampirism, and has a
paper in queue for publication with Nova Religio concerning the
Vampirism & Energy Work Research Study conducted by Suscitatio
Enterprises, LLC. He is very well versed in the structure of the
vampire community, has interviewed many individuals from diverse
paths, and attended multiple gatherings.