The Speakers.
Dr. Mathias Nordvig
Lecture: Trees and Ancestors: Connecting to Nature through the Nordic Story-World
Bio: Mathias holds a PhD in Old Norse mythology and has a general background in Nordic literature and languages including Old Norse, Danish, Norwegian, and Icelandic. He teaches Nordic and Arctic cultural studies at the University of Colorado-Boulder. Here, he offers courses on Old Norse mythology, the Viking Age, Scandinavian witchcraft, and Arctic cultures.
He is a published author of both academic and popular books, and he has a weekly podcast with the owner of the company Horns of Odin, Daniel Farrand. It is called the Nordic Mythology Podcast and you can find it on your preferred podcast platform.
Mathias has worked on a number of projects with musicians, music festivals, and media producers. He has worked with the bands Wardruna, Faun, and Nebala, the festivals Midgardsblot (Norway) and Fire in the Mountains (Wyoming), and he has contributed to WIRED’s Each and Every God in Marvel and PBS’s Luna and the World (Let’s Go Luna).
He has authored the academic book Volcanoes in Old Norse Mythology, a popular book on Nordic spirituality titled Ásatrú for Beginners, and the children’s book Norse Mythology for Kids. He is currently working on the book Ásatrú Music: The Sound of Nordic Antiquity with assistant professor Ross Hagen of Utah Valley University (USA). When Mathias isn’t writing books, he does freelance writing for, among others, CVLT NATION.
Paul Chiyokten Wagner
Lecture: Co-Creating Paradise: Creating holistic wellness within and around us, a return to the time of paradise
Bio: Paul Chiyokten Wagner is the founder of Protectors of the Salish Sea, an indigenous-led organization dedicated to protecting and restoring our Salish Sea through direct actions. Chiyokten is also a cultural educator, bringing forward the words given by his Coast Salish ancestors which have allowed the First Peoples here to co-create paradise for many thousands of years. Chiyokten and Protectors have stood on the front lines of many places of indigenous led resistance such as Standing Rock, Line 3, Sabal Trail Pipeline, Lelu Island, Mauna Kea, Thacker Pass and Fairy Creek, Olympia State Capitol Climate Change Occupations, Chase Bank divestment campaigns and Salish Sea Prayer Walks. Chiyokten is an award winning Coast Salish Native flutist and storyteller and has performed with a few greats such as Kitaro of Japan and Seattle Symphony Orchestra.
Vex Blóðstjarna
Lecture: Gods Are to Beasts: Devolution of “Enlightenment”
Bio: Vex Blòðstjarna is a self-taught occultist and hermit for over twenty years, focusing his work on living and dead animal spirits, as well as the Northern mysteries. His practice ties animism from his surroundings and from familial roots of Scandinavian hunting rituals. Vex is a mead brewer, distiller, wild crafter and the primitive theurge and skin carver of Fera Aruspex. Vex is an artist of the bones, skins, roots and flowers of the animal and plant spirits that he venerates, as well as a crafter of Neolithic stone tools. Vex likes fire, exploring the forests and enjoying the company of his four-legged companions.
Bree Rose
Lecture: Rights and Ritual in Community Death Tending
Bio: Bree Rose is an end of life doula and sound therapist out of Seattle, Wa. Through her business, Stone Circles, she offers support in ritual, death education, home funerals, grief processing, and sound healing. She has a passion for death rights advocacy and uses her certification in advance care planning and notary license to assist communities in obtaining the legal right to tend to the deaths of those in their chosen families. As an ordained minister she also offers wedding and funeral celebrant services with a focus on creating rituals unique to those being honored. You can learn more about her classes and offerings at https://www.stonecirclescollective.org/breerose
Joseph S. Hopkins
Lecture: We’re All Trees: Plantlore in Ancient European Sources and Beyond
Joseph S. Hopkins is an author, editor, and researcher based out of Olympia, Washington. Hopkins has published several peer-reviewed articles on topics like goddesses and plants in Northern Europe; operates Mimisbrunnr.info, a resource-focused web project that developed out of a student reading group at the Department of Germanic and Slavic Studies at the University of Georgia; and recently founded Hyldyr, a small and experimental publishing company.
Keep up with Joseph's scholarship at https://uga.academia.edu/JosephSHopkins
Kevin Hayes, JD
Lecture: William Morris: Romantic to Revolutionary
Bio: Kevin Hayes is a practicing employment attorney living in Tumwater, WA. He shares his home with his partner and two dogs, and he wallows in his nostalgia for lost futures on the podcast The Regrettable Century. He is inspired by William Morris’ legacy in the arts, literature, and politics, and like Morris, the leading passion of his life, apart from the desire to produce beautiful things, is hatred of modern civilization.
