The 90s Witch

I'm going to dive into a phenomenon that, if you're into witches and 90s movies or TV shows, has probably caught your attention at some point or at the very least made you curious: the remarkable number of witch-centered productions released throughout the 1990s that eventually became iconic.

Practical Magic (1998), Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996–2003), Hocus Pocus (1993), Charmed (1998–2006), The Craft (1996). Even younger audiences had Halloweentown (1998) and The Witches (1990). And then there was The Witches of Eastwick (1987), which had premiered a few years earlier with the incredible trio of Cher, Susan Sarandon, and Michelle Pfeiffer. Wherever you looked, it seemed like witches were everywhere.

Velvet, moon, stars, and sun-shaped jewelry, candles, long wild curly hair, beautiful old houses, child-eaters, man-eaters, lovers of nature, talking black cats, and the power of sisterhood. Witches became an entire aesthetic and spiritual trend.

But when we talk about witches in general, we have to go back hundreds of years, to religion, paganism, and everything that was considered different; everything for which women began to be branded as witches. It was a label meant to get rid of women whose intellect no longer fit the demands of a changing world; women whose knowledge rivaled that of men; women who didn't need men in order to survive.

I'm only going to explore a few corners of the history of witches and honestly, not in too much depth because, after all, what I really want to talk about is a phenomenon in popular culture. I have the feeling that if I dig any deeper (a very tempting idea, because it's a fascinating topic), this post will end up being much longer than I already intend it to be.

It took a long time for the witch to stop being the monster from children's fairy tales, a public enemy, a "servant of Satan," and become a heroine, a teenager, a mother, a neighbor, a student, and even the very symbol of independence for which, under different names, she had originally been condemned.

So what was happening in the United States during the 1990s that allowed such a historically loaded figure, one who embodies so many different facets of womanhood, to return to popular culture with such force?