For the Fox Sisters and Spiritualism section, I will use the Fox Sisters as my case example. The Fox Sisters have conducted many demonstrations in their career as mediums. The problem with these demonstrations is the implications and questionable motivations behind them. They were able to trick their believers into believing they could communicate to spirits.
Sources used for this section:
Cyranka, Daniel. “Religious Revolutionaries and Spiritualism in Germany around 1848.” Aries, vol. 16, no. 1, Jan. 2016, pp. 13–48. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1163/15700593-01601002.
Davenport, Reuben Briggs. “The Death-Blow to Spiritualism: Being the True Story of the Fox Sisters.” Project Gutenberg.
Stuart, Nancy Rubin. “The Fox Sisters: Spiritualism’s Unlikely Founders.” HistoryNet, American History Magazine, August 2005,
Underhill, A. Leah (Ann Leah). The Missing Link in Modern Spiritualism. Project Gutenberg.
Walker, David. “The Humbug in American Religion: Ritual Theories of Nineteenth-Century Spiritualism.” Religion and American Culture, vol. 23, no. 1, University of California Press, 2013, pp. 30–74, doi:10.1525/rac.2013.23.1.30.
For the grief section, I will use the psychic Sylvia Browne and Mary Lincoln to demonstrate scammers targetting grief-stricken people. It is known that there are people out there who are willing to target people who recently lost loved ones. Costly funeral services are an example. Sylvia Browne is a well-known psychic who made failed predictions on people and, in one case, scammed a grieving parent. Mary Lincoln lost family members throughout her life and went and consulted to mediums as a way to cope with the loss.
Sources used for this section:
Cholbi, Michael. “Grief’s Rationality, Backward and Forward.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, vol. 94, no. 2, Wiley Subscription Services, Inc, 2017, pp. 255–72, doi:10.1111/phpr.12353.
Kommel, Alexandra. Seances in the red room. (n.d.). Retrieved April 17, 2021, from https://www.whitehousehistory.org/seances-in-the-red-room
Moye, David. “Dead Psychic’s Legacy Included Speaking For Dead People – Who Were Alive.” HuffPost, HuffPost, 22 Nov. 2013, http://www.huffpost.com/entry/sylvia-browne_n_4317470.
Shaffer, Ryan and Agatha Jadwiszczok. Psychic Defective: Sylvia Browne’s History of Failure. Skeptical Inquiry Vol.34, Issue 2. Skeptical Inquirer, April 2010.
Paranormal Spectacle 