Meet Dr. Alice Tarbuck

Alice Tarbuck is an academic, writer, and practising witch, based in Edinburgh. Through her work, she is able to combine her academic background with her longstanding personal interest in the craft.

“It is really wonderful to feel inspired to blend those two interests together and essentially use the lens of witchcraft and its history as a way of looking at the natural world,” she says. Tarbuck has written two books: A Spell in the Wild, in which she explores what it means to be a witch today, and The Modern Craft, about ethics in witchcraft, which she co-wrote with Dr Claire Askew.

During the pandemic, Askew and Tarbuck noticed a rising interest in witchcraft from many people who wanted to learn more but didn’t know where to start. “There were very expensive courses offered by these amazing spiritual leaders, and we’re definitely not that,” Tarbuck says. “We’re just some people who’ve done a lot of research, so we wanted to offer really affordable courses.”

Their course, Toil and Trouble, covered some of the basics of witchcraft and the history behind it, including the witch trials of centuries past. The attendees varied from those interested in personal witchcraft practice, to scholars, and even people researching for their own art and novels. “We had a really strong cohort of people who ranged from practitioners and believers who already had a lot of experience all the way to people who just had an academic or personal interest in witchcraft.”

While Tarbuck is not currently teaching the course anymore, she won’t rule out the possibility of it returning. In the meantime, she likes to keep educating people and encouraging them to be open to discovering a connection with the natural world. “Nobody is in charge of your relationship with the natural world, apart from you. You can just start noticing things, noticing what changes, and how it changes, like a tree that you like the look of. You don't have to make a great show of yourself; you can just give it a little nod in greeting as you walk past on your commute. You can start building relationships with the natural world at any point for zero amount of money, with zero amount of information. It doesn't have to be some great journey; everybody is allowed to connect themselves back to the earth.”