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Astrology
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Ancient world
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Ancient world
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Astrology
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Ancient applications
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Ancient applications
Astrology, in its broadest sense, is the search for meaning in the sky. Early evidence for humans making conscious attempts to measure, record, and predict seasonal changes by reference to astronomical cycles, appears as markings on bones and cave walls, which show that lunar cycles were being noted as early as 25,000 years ago. This was a first step towards recording the Moon's influence upon tides and rivers, and towards organising a communal calendar. Farmers addressed agricultural needs with increasing knowledge of the constellations that appear in the different seasons—and used the rising of particular star-groups to herald annual floods or seasonal activities. By the 3rd millennium BCE, civilisations had sophisticated awareness of celestial cycles, and may have oriented temples in alignment with heliacal risings of the stars.
Scattered evidence suggests that the oldest known astrological references are copies of texts made in the ancient world. The Venus tablet of Ammisaduqa is thought to have been compiled in Babylon around 1700 BCE.Russell Hobson, The Exact Transmission of Texts in the First Millennium B.C.E., Published PhD Thesis. Department of Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish Studies. University of Sydney. 2009 PDF File A scroll documenting an early use of electional astrology is doubtfully ascribed to the reign of the Sumerian ruler Gudea of Lagash ( – 2124 BCE). This describes how the gods revealed to him in a dream the constellations that would be most favourable for the planned construction of a temple.From scroll A of the ruler Gudea of Lagash, I 17 – VI 13. O. Kaiser, Texte aus der Umwelt des Alten Testaments, Bd. 2, 1–3. Gütersloh, 1986–1991. Also quoted in A. Falkenstein, 'Wahrsagung in der sumerischen Überlieferung', La divination en Mésopotamie ancienne et dans les régions voisines. Paris, 1966. However, there is controversy about whether these were genuinely recorded at the time or merely ascribed to ancient rulers by posterity. The oldest undisputed evidence of the use of astrology as an integrated system of knowledge is therefore attributed to the records of the first dynasty of Babylon (1950–1651 BCE). This astrology had some parallels with Hellenistic Greek (western) astrology, including the zodiac, a norming point near 9 degrees in Aries, the trine aspect, planetary exaltations, and the dodekatemoria (the twelve divisions of 30 degrees each). The Babylonians viewed celestial events as possible signs rather than as causes of physical events.
The system of Chinese astrology was elaborated during the Zhou dynasty (1046–256 BCE) and flourished during the Han dynasty (2nd century BCE to 2nd century CE), during which all the familiar elements of traditional Chinese culture – the Yin-Yang philosophy, theory of the five elements, Heaven and Earth, Confucian morality – were brought together to formalise the philosophical principles of Chinese medicine and divination, astrology, and alchemy.
The ancient Arabs that inhabited the Arabian Peninsula before the advent of Islam used to profess a widespread belief in fatalism (ḳadar) alongside a fearful consideration for the sky and the stars, which they held to be ultimately responsible for every phenomena that occurs on Earth and for the destiny of humankind. Accordingly, they shaped their entire lives in accordance with their interpretations of astral configurations and phenomena.
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Astrology
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Ancient objections
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Ancient objections
thumb|upright|The Roman orator Cicero objected to astrology.
The Hellenistic schools of philosophical skepticism criticized astrology, alongside all other beliefs.Diogenes Laërtius 9:80–88 Criticism of astrology by academic skeptics such as Carneades, Cicero, and Favorinus; Pyrrhonists such as Sextus Empiricus; and neoplatonists such as Plotinus, has been preserved.
Carneades argued that belief in fate denies free will and morality; that people born at different times can all die in the same accident or battle; and that contrary to uniform influences from the stars, tribes and cultures are all different.
Cicero, in De Divinatione, leveled a critique of astrology that some modern philosophers consider to be the first working definition of pseudoscience and the answer to the demarcation problem. The philosopher of science Massimo Pigliucci, building on the work of the historian of science, Damien Fernandez-Beanato, argues that Cicero outlined a "convincing distinction between astrology and astronomy that remains valid in the twenty-first century." Cicero stated the twins objection (that with close birth times, personal outcomes can be very different), later developed by Augustine. He argued that since the other planets are much more distant from the Earth than the Moon, they could have only very tiny influence compared to the Moon's. He also argued that if astrology explains everything about a person's fate, then it wrongly ignores the visible effect of inherited ability and parenting, changes in health worked by medicine, or the effects of the weather on people. The historian Stefano Rapisarda notes that the text is formally "equally balanced between pro and contra, and no final or definite answer is given."
Favorinus argued that it was absurd to imagine that stars and planets would affect human bodies in the same way as they affect the tides, and equally absurd that small motions in the heavens cause large changes in people's fates.
Sextus Empiricus argued that it was absurd to link human attributes with myths about the signs of the zodiac, and wrote an entire book, Against the Astrologers (Πρὸς ἀστρολόγους, Pros astrologous), compiling arguments against astrology. Against the Astrologers was the fifth section of a larger work arguing against philosophical and scientific inquiry in general, Against the Professors (Πρὸς μαθηματικούς, Pros mathematikous).
Plotinus, a neoplatonist, had a lasting interest in astrology, including the question of how the world of humans could be affected by the stars, and (if so) whether astrology could predict events on Earth. He argued that since the fixed stars are much more distant than the planets, it is laughable to imagine the planets' effect on human affairs should depend on their position with respect to the zodiac. He also argues that the interpretation of the Moon's conjunction with a planet as good when the moon is full, but bad when the moon is waning, is clearly wrong, as from the Moon's point of view, half of its surface is always in sunlight; and from the planet's point of view, waning should be better, as then the planet sees some light from the Moon, but when the Moon is full to us, it is dark, and therefore bad, on the side facing the planet in question.
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Astrology
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Hellenistic Egypt
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Hellenistic Egypt
thumb|upright|1484 copy of first page of Ptolemy's Tetrabiblos, translated into Latin by Plato of Tivoli|alt=Ptolemy's Tetrabiblos, the Hellenistic text that founded Western astrology
In 525 BCE, Egypt was conquered by the Persians. The 1st century BCE Egyptian Dendera Zodiac shares two signs – the Balance and the Scorpion – with Mesopotamian astrology.
With the occupation by Alexander the Great in 332 BCE, Egypt became Hellenistic. The city of Alexandria was founded by Alexander after the conquest, becoming the place where Babylonian astrology was mixed with Egyptian Decanic astrology to create Horoscopic astrology. This contained the Babylonian zodiac with its system of planetary exaltations, the triplicities of the signs and the importance of eclipses. It used the Egyptian concept of dividing the zodiac into thirty-six decans of ten degrees each, with an emphasis on the rising decan, and the Greek system of planetary Gods, sign rulership and four elements. 2nd century BCE texts predict positions of planets in zodiac signs at the time of the rising of certain decans, particularly Sothis. The astrologer and astronomer Ptolemy lived in Alexandria. Ptolemy's work the Tetrabiblos formed the basis of Western astrology, and, "...enjoyed almost the authority of a Bible among the astrological writers of a thousand years or more."
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Astrology
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Greece and Rome
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Greece and Rome
The conquest of Asia by Alexander the Great exposed the Greeks to ideas from Syria, Babylon, Persia and central Asia. Around 280 BCE, Berossus, a priest of Bel from Babylon, moved to the Greek island of Kos, teaching astrology and Babylonian culture. By the 1st century BCE, there were two varieties of astrology, one using horoscopes to describe the past, present and future; the other, theurgic, emphasising the soul's ascent to the stars. Greek influence played a crucial role in the transmission of astrological theory to Rome.
The first definite reference to astrology in Rome comes from the orator Cato, who in 160 BCE warned farm overseers against consulting with Chaldeans, who were described as Babylonian 'star-gazers'. Among both Greeks and Romans, Babylonia (also known as Chaldea) became so identified with astrology that 'Chaldean wisdom' became synonymous with divination using planets and stars. The 2nd-century Roman poet and satirist Juvenal complains about the pervasive influence of Chaldeans, saying, "Still more trusted are the Chaldaeans; every word uttered by the astrologer they will believe has come from Hammon's fountain."
One of the first astrologers to bring Hermetic astrology to Rome was Thrasyllus, astrologer to the emperor Tiberius, the first emperor to have had a court astrologer, though his predecessor Augustus had used astrology to help legitimise his Imperial rights.
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Astrology
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Medieval world
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Medieval world
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Astrology
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Hindu
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Hindu
The main texts upon which classical Indian astrology is based are early medieval compilations, notably the , and Sārāvalī by .
The Horāshastra is a composite work of 71 chapters, of which the first part (chapters 1–51) dates to the 7th to early 8th centuries and the second part (chapters 52–71) to the later 8th century. The Sārāvalī likewise dates to around 800 CE.David Pingree, (J. Gonda (Ed.) A History of Indian Literature, Vol VI Fasc 4), p.81 English translations of these texts were published by N.N. Krishna Rau and V.B. Choudhari in 1963 and 1961, respectively.
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Astrology
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Islamic
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Islamic
thumb|right|alt=Image of a Latin astrological text |Latin translation of Abū Maʿshar's De Magnis Coniunctionibus ('Of the great conjunctions'), Venice, 1515
Astrology was taken up by Islamic scholars following the collapse of Alexandria to the Arabs in the 7th century, and the founding of the Abbasid empire in the 8th. The second Abbasid caliph, Al Mansur (754–775) founded the city of Baghdad to act as a centre of learning, and included in its design a library-translation centre known as Bayt al-Hikma 'House of Wisdom', which continued to receive development from his heirs and was to provide a major impetus for Arabic-Persian translations of Hellenistic astrological texts. The early translators included Mashallah, who helped to elect the time for the foundation of Baghdad, and Sahl ibn Bishr, (a.k.a. Zael), whose texts were directly influential upon later European astrologers such as Guido Bonatti in the 13th century, and William Lilly in the 17th century. Knowledge of Arabic texts started to become imported into Europe during the Latin translations of the 12th century.
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Astrology
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Europe
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Europe
thumb|upright|right|Dante Alighieri meets the Emperor Justinian in the Sphere of Mercury, in Canto 5 of the Paradiso.
thumb|upright|right|The medieval theologian Isidore of Seville criticised the predictive part of astrology.
In the seventh century, Isidore of Seville argued in his Etymologiae that astronomy described the movements of the heavens, while astrology had two parts: one was scientific, describing the movements of the Sun, the Moon and the stars, while the other, making predictions, was theologically erroneous.
The first astrological book published in Europe was the Liber Planetis et Mundi Climatibus ("Book of the Planets and Regions of the World"), which appeared between 1010 and 1027 AD, and may have been authored by Gerbert of Aurillac.. Ptolemy's second century AD Tetrabiblos was translated into Latin by Plato of Tivoli in 1138. The Dominican theologian Thomas Aquinas followed Aristotle in proposing that the stars ruled the imperfect 'sublunary' body, while attempting to reconcile astrology with Christianity by stating that God ruled the soul.. The thirteenth century mathematician Campanus of Novara is said to have devised a system of astrological houses that divides the prime vertical into 'houses' of equal 30° arcs,. though the system was used earlier in the East. The thirteenth century astronomer Guido Bonatti wrote a textbook, the Liber Astronomicus, a copy of which King Henry VII of England owned at the end of the fifteenth century.
In Paradiso, the final part of the Divine Comedy, the Italian poet Dante Alighieri referred "in countless details" to the astrological planets, though he adapted traditional astrology to suit his Christian viewpoint, for example using astrological thinking in his prophecies of the reform of Christendom.
John Gower in the fourteenth century defined astrology as essentially limited to the making of predictions. The influence of the stars was in turn divided into natural astrology, with for example effects on tides and the growth of plants, and judicial astrology, with supposedly predictable effects on people. The fourteenth-century sceptic Nicole Oresme however included astronomy as a part of astrology in his Livre de divinacions. Oresme argued that current approaches to prediction of events such as plagues, wars, and weather were inappropriate, but that such prediction was a valid field of inquiry. However, he attacked the use of astrology to choose the timing of actions (so-called interrogation and election) as wholly false, and rejected the determination of human action by the stars on grounds of free will. The friar Laurens Pignon (c. 1368–1449) similarly rejected all forms of divination and determinism, including by the stars, in his 1411 Contre les Devineurs. This was in opposition to the tradition carried by the Arab astronomer Albumasar (787–886) whose Introductorium in Astronomiam and De Magnis Coniunctionibus argued the view that both individual actions and larger scale history are determined by the stars.
In the late 15th century, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola forcefully attacked astrology in Disputationes contra Astrologos, arguing that the heavens neither caused, nor heralded earthly events. His contemporary, Pietro Pomponazzi, a "rationalistic and critical thinker", was much more sanguine about astrology and critical of Pico's attack.
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Astrology
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Renaissance and Early Modern
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Renaissance and Early Modern
thumb|right|'An Astrologer Casting a Horoscope' from Robert Fludd's Utriusque Cosmi Historia, 1617
Renaissance scholars commonly practised astrology. Gerolamo Cardano cast the horoscope of king Edward VI of England, while John Dee was the personal astrologer to queen Elizabeth I of England. Catherine de Medici paid Michael Nostradamus in 1566 to verify the prediction of the death of her husband, king Henry II of France, made by her astrologer Lucus Gauricus. Major astronomers who practised as court astrologers included Tycho Brahe in the royal court of Denmark, Johannes Kepler to the Habsburgs, Galileo Galilei to the Medici, and Giordano Bruno who was burnt at the stake for heresy in Rome in 1600.. The distinction between astrology and astronomy was not entirely clear. Advances in astronomy were often motivated by the desire to improve the accuracy of astrology. Kepler, for example, was driven by a belief in harmonies between Earthly and celestial affairs, yet he disparaged the activities of most astrologers as "evil-smelling dung".
Ephemerides with complex astrological calculations, and almanacs interpreting celestial events for use in medicine and for choosing times to plant crops, were popular in Elizabethan England. In 1597, the English mathematician and physician Thomas Hood made a set of paper instruments that used revolving overlays to help students work out relationships between fixed stars or constellations, the midheaven, and the twelve astrological houses. Hood's instruments also illustrated, for pedagogical purposes, the supposed relationships between the signs of the zodiac, the planets, and the parts of the human body adherents believed were governed by the planets and signs. While Hood's presentation was innovative, his astrological information was largely standard and was taken from Gerard Mercator's astrological disc made in 1551, or a source used by Mercator. Despite its popularity, Renaissance astrology had what historian Gabor Almasi calls "elite debate", exemplified by the polemical letters of Swiss physician Thomas Erastus who fought against astrology, calling it "vanity" and "superstition." Then around the time of the new star of 1572 and the comet of 1577 there began what Almasi calls an "extended epistemological reform" which began the process of excluding religion, astrology and anthropocentrism from scientific debate. By 1679, the yearly publication La Connoissance des temps eschewed astrology as a legitimate topic.
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Astrology
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Enlightenment period and onwards
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Enlightenment period and onwards
thumb|Middle-class Chicago women discuss spiritualism (1906).
During the Enlightenment, intellectual sympathy for astrology fell away, leaving only a popular following supported by cheap almanacs. One English almanac compiler, Richard Saunders, followed the spirit of the age by printing a derisive Discourse on the Invalidity of Astrology, while in France Pierre Bayle's Dictionnaire of 1697 stated that the subject was puerile. The Anglo-Irish satirist Jonathan Swift ridiculed the Whig political astrologer John Partridge.
In the second half of the 17th century, the Society of Astrologers (1647–1684), a trade, educational, and social organization, sought to unite London's often fractious astrologers in the task of revitalizing astrology. Following the template of the popular "Feasts of Mathematicians" they endeavored to defend their art in the face of growing religious criticism. The Society hosted banquets, exchanged "instruments and manuscripts", proposed research projects, and funded the publication of sermons that depicted astrology as a legitimate biblical pursuit for Christians. They commissioned sermons that argued Astrology was divine, Hebraic, and scripturally supported by Bible passages about the Magi and the sons of Seth. According to historian Michelle Pfeffer, "The society's public relations campaign ultimately failed." Modern historians have mostly neglected the Society of Astrologers in favor of the still extant Royal Society (1660), even though both organizations initially had some of the same members.
Astrology saw a popular revival starting in the 19th century, as part of a general revival of spiritualism and—later, New Age philosophy, and through the influence of mass media such as newspaper horoscopes. Early in the 20th century the psychiatrist Carl Jung developed some concepts concerning astrology, which led to the development of psychological astrology.: "At the same time, in Switzerland, the psychologist Carl Gustav Jung (1875–1961) was developing sophisticated theories concerning astrology ..."Gieser, Suzanne. The Innermost Kernel, Depth Psychology and Quantum Physics. Wolfgang Pauli's Dialogue with C.G.Jung, (Springer, Berlin, 2005) p. 21 Campion, Nicholas. "Prophecy, Cosmology and the New Age Movement. The Extent and Nature of Contemporary Belief in Astrology."(Bath Spa University College, 2003) via .
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Astrology
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Principles and practice
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Principles and practice
Advocates have defined astrology as a symbolic language, an art form, a science, and a method of divination.The New Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, v.5, 1974, p. 916Dietrich, Thomas: The Origin of Culture and Civilization, Phenix & Phenix Literary Publicists, 2005, p. 305 Though most cultural astrology systems share common roots in ancient philosophies that influenced each other, many use methods that differ from those in the West. These include Hindu astrology (also known as "Indian astrology" and in modern times referred to as "Vedic astrology") and Chinese astrology, both of which have influenced the world's cultural history.
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Astrology
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Western
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Western
Western astrology is a form of divination based on the construction of a horoscope for an exact moment, such as a person's birth. It uses the tropical zodiac, which is aligned to the equinoctial points.James R. Lewis, 2003. The Astrology Book: the Encyclopedia of Heavenly Influences. Visible Ink Press. Online at Google Books.
Western astrology is founded on the movements and relative positions of celestial bodies such as the Sun, Moon and planets, which are analysed by their movement through signs of the zodiac (twelve spatial divisions of the ecliptic) and by their aspects (based on geometric angles) relative to one another. They are also considered by their placement in houses (twelve spatial divisions of the sky). Astrology's modern representation in western popular media is usually reduced to sun sign astrology, which considers only the zodiac sign of the Sun at an individual's date of birth, and represents only 1/12 of the total chart.
The horoscope visually expresses the set of relationships for the time and place of the chosen event. These relationships are between the seven 'planets', signifying tendencies such as war and love; the twelve signs of the zodiac; and the twelve houses. Each planet is in a particular sign and a particular house at the chosen time, when observed from the chosen place, creating two kinds of relationship. A third kind is the aspect of each planet to every other planet, where for example two planets 120° apart (in 'trine') are in a harmonious relationship, but two planets 90° apart ('square') are in a conflicted relationship. Together these relationships and their interpretations are said to form "...the language of the heavens speaking to learned men."
Along with tarot divination, astrology is one of the core studies of Western esotericism, and as such has influenced systems of magical belief not only among Western esotericists and Hermeticists, but also belief systems such as Wicca, which have borrowed from or been influenced by the Western esoteric tradition. Tanya Luhrmann has said that "all magicians know something about astrology," and refers to a table of correspondences in Starhawk's The Spiral Dance, organised by planet, as an example of the astrological lore studied by magicians.
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Astrology
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Hindu
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Hindu
upright|thumb|Page from an Indian astrological treatise, c. 1750
The earliest Vedic text on astronomy is the Vedanga Jyotisha; Vedic thought later came to include astrology as well.
Hindu natal astrology originated with Hellenistic astrology by the 3rd century BCE, though incorporating the Hindu lunar mansions. The names of the signs (e.g. Greek 'Krios' for Aries, Hindi 'Kriya'), the planets (e.g. Greek 'Helios' for Sun, astrological Hindi 'Heli'), and astrological terms (e.g. Greek 'apoklima' and 'sunaphe' for declination and planetary conjunction, Hindi 'apoklima' and 'sunapha' respectively) in Varaha Mihira's texts are considered conclusive evidence of a Greek origin for Hindu astrology. The Indian techniques may also have been augmented with some of the Babylonian techniques.
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Astrology
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Chinese and East Asian
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Chinese and East Asian
Chinese astrology has a close relation with Chinese philosophy (theory of the three harmonies: heaven, earth and man) and uses concepts such as yin and yang, the Five phases, the 10 Celestial stems, the 12 Earthly Branches, and shichen (時辰 a form of timekeeping used for religious purposes). The early use of Chinese astrology was mainly confined to political astrology, the observation of unusual phenomena, identification of portents and the selection of auspicious days for events and decisions.
The constellations of the Zodiac of western Asia and Europe were not used; instead the sky is divided into Three Enclosures (三垣 sān yuán), and Twenty-Eight Mansions (二十八宿 èrshíbā xiù) in twelve Ci (十二次). The Chinese zodiac of twelve animal signs is said to represent twelve different types of personality. It is based on cycles of years, lunar months, and two-hour periods of the day (the shichen). The zodiac traditionally begins with the sign of the Rat, and the cycle proceeds through 11 other animal signs: the Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Goat, Monkey, Rooster, Dog, and Pig.Theodora Lau, The Handbook of Chinese Horoscopes, pp 2–8, 30–5, 60–4, 88–94, 118–24, 148–53, 178–84, 208–13, 238–44, 270–78, 306–12, 338–44, Souvenir Press, New York, 2005 Complex systems of predicting fate and destiny based on one's birthday, birth season, and birth hours, such as ziping and Zi Wei Dou Shu () are still used regularly in modern-day Chinese astrology. They do not rely on direct observations of the stars.
The Korean zodiac is identical to the Chinese one. The Vietnamese zodiac is almost identical to the Chinese, except for second animal being the Water Buffalo instead of the Ox, and the fourth animal the Cat instead of the Rabbit. The Japanese have since 1873 celebrated the beginning of the new year on 1 January as per the Gregorian calendar. The Thai zodiac begins, not at Chinese New Year, but either on the first day of the fifth month in the Thai lunar calendar, or during the Songkran festival (now celebrated every 13–15 April), depending on the purpose of the use. (in Thai)
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Astrology
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Theological viewpoints
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Theological viewpoints
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Astrology
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Ancient
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Ancient
Augustine (354430) believed that the determinism of astrology conflicted with the Christian doctrines of man's free will and responsibility, and God not being the cause of evil, but he also grounded his opposition philosophically, citing the failure of astrology to explain twins who behave differently although conceived at the same moment and born at approximately the same time.
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Astrology
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Medieval
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Medieval
thumb|upright=0.6|A drawing of Avicenna
Some of the practices of astrology were contested on theological grounds by medieval Muslim astronomers such as Al-Farabi (Alpharabius), Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen) and Avicenna. They said that the methods of astrologers conflicted with orthodox religious views of Islamic scholars, by suggesting that the Will of God can be known and predicted. For example, Avicenna's 'Refutation against astrology', Risāla fī ibṭāl aḥkām al-nojūm, argues against the practice of astrology while supporting the principle that planets may act as agents of divine causation. Avicenna considered that the movement of the planets influenced life on earth in a deterministic way, but argued against the possibility of determining the exact influence of the stars. Essentially, Avicenna did not deny the core dogma of astrology, but denied our ability to understand it to the extent that precise and fatalistic predictions could be made from it. Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya (1292–1350), in his Miftah Dar al-SaCadah, also used physical arguments in astronomy to question the practice of judicial astrology. He recognised that the stars are much larger than the planets, and argued: And if you astrologers answer that it is precisely because of this distance and smallness that their influences are negligible, then why is it that you claim a great influence for the smallest heavenly body, Mercury? Why is it that you have given an influence to [the head] and [the tail], which are two imaginary points [ascending and descending nodes]?
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Astrology
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Modern
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Modern
thumb|upright|Martin Luther
Martin Luther denounced astrology in his Table Talk. He asked why twins like Esau and Jacob had two different natures yet were born at the same time. Luther also compared astrologers to those who say their dice will always land on a certain number. Although the dice may roll on the number a couple of times, the predictor is silent for all the times the dice fails to land on that number.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church maintains that divination, including predictive astrology, is incompatible with modern Catholic beliefs such as free will:
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Astrology
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Scientific analysis and criticism
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Scientific analysis and criticism
thumb|upright|Popper proposed falsifiability as something that distinguishes science from non-science, using astrology as the example of an idea that has not dealt with falsification during experiment.
The scientific community rejects astrology as having no explanatory power for describing the universe, and considers it a pseudoscience. Scientific testing of astrology has been conducted, and no evidence has been found to support any of the premises or purported effects outlined in astrological traditions. There is no proposed mechanism of action by which the positions and motions of stars and planets could affect people and events on Earth that does not contradict basic and well understood aspects of biology and physics.; Those who have faith in astrology have been characterised by scientists including Bart J. Bok as doing so "...in spite of the fact that there is no verified scientific basis for their beliefs, and indeed that there is strong evidence to the contrary".; The Humanist , volume 36, no.5 (1976);
Confirmation bias is a form of cognitive bias, a psychological factor that contributes to belief in astrology. Astrology believers tend to selectively remember predictions that turn out to be true, and do not remember those that turn out false. Another, separate, form of confirmation bias also plays a role, where believers often fail to distinguish between messages that demonstrate special ability and those that do not. Thus there are two distinct forms of confirmation bias that are under study with respect to astrological belief.
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Astrology
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Demarcation
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Demarcation
Under the criterion of falsifiability, first proposed by the philosopher of science Karl Popper, astrology is a pseudoscience. Popper regarded astrology as "pseudo-empirical" in that "it appeals to observation and experiment," but "nevertheless does not come up to scientific standards." The relevant piece is also in In contrast to scientific disciplines, astrology has not responded to falsification through experiment.
In contrast to Popper, the philosopher Thomas Kuhn argued that it was not lack of falsifiability that makes astrology unscientific, but rather that the process and concepts of astrology are non-empirical. Kuhn thought that, though astrologers had, historically, made predictions that categorically failed, this in itself does not make astrology unscientific, nor do attempts by astrologers to explain away failures by saying that creating a horoscope is very difficult. Rather, in Kuhn's eyes, astrology is not science because it was always more akin to medieval medicine; astrologers followed a sequence of rules and guidelines for a seemingly necessary field with known shortcomings, but they did no research because the fields are not amenable to research, and so "they had no puzzles to solve and therefore no science to practise." While an astronomer could correct for failure, an astrologer could not. An astrologer could only explain away failure but could not revise the astrological hypothesis in a meaningful way. As such, to Kuhn, even if the stars could influence the path of humans through life, astrology is not scientific.
The philosopher Paul Thagard asserts that astrology cannot be regarded as falsified in this sense until it has been replaced with a successor. In the case of predicting behaviour, psychology is the alternative. To Thagard a further criterion of demarcation of science from pseudoscience is that the state-of-the-art must progress and that the community of researchers should be attempting to compare the current theory to alternatives, and not be "selective in considering confirmations and disconfirmations." Progress is defined here as explaining new phenomena and solving existing problems, yet astrology has failed to progress having only changed little in nearly 2000 years. To Thagard, astrologers are acting as though engaged in normal science believing that the foundations of astrology were well established despite the "many unsolved problems", and in the face of better alternative theories (psychology). For these reasons Thagard views astrology as pseudoscience.
For the philosopher Edward W. James, astrology is irrational not because of the numerous problems with mechanisms and falsification due to experiments, but because an analysis of the astrological literature shows that it is infused with fallacious logic and poor reasoning.
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Astrology
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Effectiveness
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Effectiveness
Astrology has not demonstrated its effectiveness in controlled studies and has no scientific validity. Where it has made falsifiable predictions under controlled conditions, they have been falsified. One famous experiment included 28 astrologers who were asked to match over a hundred natal charts to psychological profiles generated by the California Psychological Inventory (CPI) questionnaire.My former student Shawn Carlson published in Nature magazine the definitive scientific test of Astrology. "... a perfectly convincing and lasting demonstration." The double-blind experimental protocol used in this study was agreed upon by a group of physicists and a group of astrologers nominated by the National Council for Geocosmic Research, who advised the experimenters, helped ensure that the test was fair and helped draw the central proposition of natal astrology to be tested. They also chose 26 out of the 28 astrologers for the tests (two more volunteered afterwards). The study, published in Nature in 1985, found that predictions based on natal astrology were no better than chance, and that the testing "...clearly refutes the astrological hypothesis."
In 1955, the astrologer and psychologist Michel Gauquelin stated that though he had failed to find evidence that supported indicators like zodiacal signs and planetary aspects in astrology, he did find positive correlations between the diurnal positions of some planets and success in professions that astrology traditionally associates with those planets. The best-known of Gauquelin's findings is based on the positions of Mars in the natal charts of successful athletes and became known as the Mars effect. A study conducted by seven French scientists attempted to replicate the claim, but found no statistical evidence. They attributed the effect to selective bias on Gauquelin's part, accusing him of attempting to persuade them to add or delete names from their study.
Geoffrey Dean has suggested that the effect may be caused by self-reporting of birth dates by parents rather than any issue with the study by Gauquelin. The suggestion is that a small subset of the parents may have had changed birth times to be consistent with better astrological charts for a related profession. The number of births under astrologically undesirable conditions was also lower, indicating that parents choose dates and times to suit their beliefs. The sample group was taken from a time where belief in astrology was more common. Gauquelin had failed to find the Mars effect in more recent populations, where a nurse or doctor recorded the birth information.
Dean, a scientist and former astrologer, and psychologist Ivan Kelly conducted a large scale scientific test that involved more than one hundred cognitive, behavioural, physical, and other variables—but found no support for astrology. Furthermore, a meta-analysis pooled 40 studies that involved 700 astrologers and over 1,000 birth charts. Ten of the tests—which involved 300 participants—had the astrologers pick the correct chart interpretation out of a number of others that were not the astrologically correct chart interpretation (usually three to five others). When date and other obvious clues were removed, no significant results suggested there was any preferred chart.
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Astrology
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Lack of mechanisms and consistency
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Lack of mechanisms and consistency
Testing the validity of astrology can be difficult, because there is no consensus amongst astrologers as to what astrology is or what it can predict. Most professional astrologers are paid to predict the future or describe a person's personality and life, but most horoscopes only make vague untestable statements that can apply to almost anyone.
Many astrologers believe that astrology is scientific, while some have proposed conventional causal agents such as electromagnetism and gravity. Scientists reject these mechanisms as implausible since, for example, the magnetic field, when measured from Earth, of a large but distant planet such as Jupiter is far smaller than that produced by ordinary household appliances.
Western astrology has taken the earth's axial precession (also called precession of the equinoxes) into account since Ptolemy's Almagest, so the "first point of Aries", the start of the astrological year, continually moves against the background of the stars. The tropical zodiac has no connection to the stars; tropical astrologers distinguish the constellations from their historically associated sign, thereby avoiding complications involving precession. Charpak and Broch, noting this, referred to astrology based on the tropical zodiac as being "...empty boxes that have nothing to do with anything and are devoid of any consistency or correspondence with the stars." Sole use of the tropical zodiac is inconsistent with references made, by the same astrologers, to the Age of Aquarius, which depends on when the vernal point enters the constellation of Aquarius.
Astrologers usually have only a small knowledge of astronomy, and often do not take into account basic principles—such as the precession of the equinoxes, which changes the position of the sun with time. They commented on the example of Élizabeth Teissier, who wrote that, "The sun ends up in the same place in the sky on the same date each year", as the basis for the idea that two people with the same birthday, but a number of years apart, should be under the same planetary influence. Charpak and Broch noted that, "There is a difference of about twenty-two thousand miles between Earth's location on any specific date in two successive years", and that thus they should not be under the same influence according to astrology. Over a 40-year period there would be a difference greater than 780,000 miles.
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Astrology
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Reception in the social sciences
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Reception in the social sciences
The general consensus of astronomers and other natural scientists is that astrology is a pseudoscience which carries no predictive capability, with many philosophers of science considering it a "paradigm or prime example of pseudoscience." Some scholars in the social sciences have cautioned against categorizing astrology, especially ancient astrology, as "just" a pseudoscience or projecting the distinction backwards into the past. Thagard, while demarcating it as a pseudoscience, notes that astrology "should be judged as not pseudoscientific in classical or Renaissance times...Only when the historical and social aspects of science are neglected does it become plausible that pseudoscience is an unchanging category." Historians of science such as Tamsyn Barton, Roger Beck, Francesca Rochberg, and Wouter J. Hanegraaff argue that such a wholesale description is anachronistic when applied to historical contexts, stressing that astrology was not pseudoscience before the 18th century and the importance of the discipline to the development of medieval science. R. J. Hakinson writes in the context of Hellenistic astrology that "the belief in the possibility of [astrology] was, at least some of the time, the result of careful reflection on the nature and structure of the universe."
Nicholas Campion, both an astrologer and academic historian of astrology, argues that Indigenous astronomy is largely used as a synonym for astrology in academia, and that modern Indian and Western astrology are better understood as modes of cultural astronomy or ethnoastronomy. Roy Willis and Patrick Curry draw a distinction between propositional episteme and metaphoric metis in the ancient world, identifying astrology with the latter and noting that the central concern of astrology "is not knowledge (factual, let alone scientific) but (ethical, spiritual and pragmatic)". Similarly, historian of science Justin Niermeier-Dohoney writes that astrology was "more than simply a science of prediction using the stars and comprised a vast body of beliefs, knowledge, and practices with the overarching theme of understanding the relationship between humanity and the rest of the cosmos through an interpretation of stellar, solar, lunar, and planetary movement." Scholars such as Assyriologist Matthew Rutz have begun using the term "astral knowledge" rather than astrology "to better describe a category of beliefs and practices much broader than the term 'astrology' can capture."
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Astrology
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Cultural impact
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Cultural impact
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Astrology
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Western politics and society
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Western politics and society
In the West, political leaders have sometimes consulted astrologers. For example, the British intelligence agency MI5 employed Louis de Wohl as an astrologer after it was reported that Adolf Hitler used astrology to time his actions. The War Office was "...interested to know what Hitler's own astrologers would be telling him from week to week." In fact, de Wohl's predictions were so inaccurate that he was soon labelled a "complete charlatan", and later evidence showed that Hitler considered astrology "complete nonsense". After John Hinckley's attempted assassination of US President Ronald Reagan, first lady Nancy Reagan commissioned astrologer Joan Quigley to act as the secret White House astrologer. However, Quigley's role ended in 1988 when it became public through the memoirs of former chief of staff, Donald Regan.
There was a boom in interest in astrology in the late 1960s. The sociologist Marcello Truzzi described three levels of involvement of "Astrology-believers" to account for its revived popularity in the face of scientific discrediting. He found that most astrology-believers did not think that it was a scientific explanation with predictive power. Instead, those superficially involved, knowing "next to nothing" about astrology's 'mechanics', read newspaper astrology columns, and could benefit from "tension-management of anxieties" and "a cognitive belief-system that transcends science." Those at the second level usually had their horoscopes cast and sought advice and predictions. They were much younger than those at the first level, and could benefit from knowledge of the language of astrology and the resulting ability to belong to a coherent and exclusive group. Those at the third level were highly involved and usually cast horoscopes for themselves. Astrology provided this small minority of astrology-believers with a "meaningful view of their universe and [gave] them an understanding of their place in it." This third group took astrology seriously, possibly as an overarching religious worldview (a sacred canopy, in Peter L. Berger's phrase), whereas the other two groups took it playfully and irreverently.
In 1953, the sociologist Theodor W. Adorno conducted a study of the astrology column of a Los Angeles newspaper as part of a project examining mass culture in capitalist society. Adorno believed that popular astrology, as a device, invariably leads to statements that encouraged conformity—and that astrologers who go against conformity, by discouraging performance at work etc., risk losing their jobs. Adorno concluded that astrology is a large-scale manifestation of systematic irrationalism, where individuals are subtly led—through flattery and vague generalisations—to believe that the author of the column is addressing them directly. Adorno drew a parallel with the phrase opium of the people, by Karl Marx, by commenting, "occultism is the metaphysic of the dopes."
A 2005 Gallup poll and a 2009 survey by the Pew Research Center reported that 25% of US adults believe in astrology, while a 2018 Pew survey found a figure of 29%. According to data released in the National Science Foundation's 2014 Science and Engineering Indicators study, "Fewer Americans rejected astrology in 2012 than in recent years." The NSF study noted that in 2012, "slightly more than half of Americans said that astrology was 'not at all scientific,' whereas nearly two-thirds gave this response in 2010. The comparable percentage has not been this low since 1983." Astrology apps became popular in the late 2010s, some receiving millions of dollars in Silicon Valley venture capital.
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Astrology
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India and Japan
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India and Japan
thumb|right|Birth (in blue) and death (in red) rates of Japan since 1950, with the sudden drop in births during hinoeuma year (1966)
In India, there is a long-established and widespread belief in astrology. It is commonly used for daily life, particularly in matters concerning marriage and career, and makes extensive use of electional, horary and karmic astrology. Indian politics have also been influenced by astrology. It is still considered a branch of the Vedanga."In countries such as India, where only a small intellectual elite has been trained in Western physics, astrology manages to retain here and there its position among the sciences." David Pingree and Robert Gilbert, "Astrology; Astrology in India; Astrology in modern times". Encyclopædia Britannica, 2008 In 2001, Indian scientists and politicians debated and critiqued a proposal to use state money to fund research into astrology, resulting in permission for Indian universities to offer courses in Vedic astrology.
In February 2011, the Bombay High Court reaffirmed astrology's standing in India when it dismissed a case that challenged its status as a science.
In Japan, strong belief in astrology has led to dramatic changes in the fertility rate and the number of abortions in the years of Fire Horse. Adherents believe that women born in hinoeuma years are unmarriageable and bring bad luck to their father or husband. In 1966, the number of babies born in Japan dropped by over 25% as parents tried to avoid the stigma of having a daughter born in the hinoeuma year.
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Astrology
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Literature and music
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Literature and music
thumb|upright|left|Title page of John Lyly's astrological play, The Woman in the Moon, 1597
The fourteenth-century English poets John Gower and Geoffrey Chaucer both referred to astrology in their works, including Gower's Confessio Amantis and Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales. Chaucer commented explicitly on astrology in his Treatise on the Astrolabe, demonstrating personal knowledge of one area, judicial astrology, with an account of how to find the ascendant or rising sign.
In the fifteenth century, references to astrology, such as with similes, became "a matter of course" in English literature.
thumb|upright|right|Title page of Calderón de la Barca's Astrologo Fingido, Madrid, 1641
In the sixteenth century, John Lyly's 1597 play, The Woman in the Moon, is wholly motivated by astrology, while Christopher Marlowe makes astrological references in his plays Doctor Faustus and Tamburlaine (both c. 1590), and Sir Philip Sidney refers to astrology at least four times in his romance The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia (c. 1580). Edmund Spenser uses astrology both decoratively and causally in his poetry, revealing "...unmistakably an abiding interest in the art, an interest shared by a large number of his contemporaries." George Chapman's play, Byron's Conspiracy (1608), similarly uses astrology as a causal mechanism in the drama. William Shakespeare's attitude towards astrology is unclear, with contradictory references in plays including King Lear, Antony and Cleopatra, and Richard II. Shakespeare was familiar with astrology and made use of his knowledge of astrology in nearly every play he wrote, assuming a basic familiarity with the subject in his commercial audience. Outside theatre, the physician and mystic Robert Fludd practised astrology, as did the quack doctor Simon Forman. In Elizabethan England, "The usual feeling about astrology ... [was] that it is the most useful of the sciences."
In seventeenth century Spain, Lope de Vega, with a detailed knowledge of astronomy, wrote plays that ridicule astrology. In his pastoral romance La Arcadia (1598), it leads to absurdity; in his novela Guzman el Bravo (1624), he concludes that the stars were made for man, not man for the stars. Calderón de la Barca wrote the 1641 comedy Astrologo Fingido (The Pretended Astrologer); the plot was borrowed by the French playwright Thomas Corneille for his 1651 comedy Feint Astrologue.
The most famous piece of music influenced by astrology is the orchestral suite The Planets. Written by the British composer Gustav Holst (1874–1934), and first performed in 1918, the framework of The Planets is based upon the astrological symbolism of the planets. Each of the seven movements of the suite is based upon a different planet, though the movements are not in the order of the planets from the Sun. The composer Colin Matthews wrote an eighth movement entitled Pluto, the Renewer, first performed in 2000, as the suite was written prior to Pluto's discovery. In 1937, another British composer, Constant Lambert, wrote a ballet on astrological themes, called Horoscope. In 1974, the New Zealand composer Edwin Carr wrote The Twelve Signs: An Astrological Entertainment for orchestra without strings. Camille Paglia acknowledges astrology as an influence on her work of literary criticism Sexual Personae (1990).Paglia, Camille. Sex, Art, and American Culture: Essays. Penguin Books, 1992, p. 114. The American comedian Harvey Sid Fisher is known for his comedic songs about astrology.
Astrology features strongly in Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries, recipient of the 2013 Man Booker Prize.
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Astrology
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See also
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See also
Astrology and science
Astrology software
Barnum effect
Glossary of astrology
List of astrological traditions, types, and systems
List of topics characterised as pseudoscience
Jewish astrology
Scientific skepticism
Worship of heavenly bodies
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Astrology
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Notes
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Notes
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Astrology
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References
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References
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Astrology
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External links
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External links
Digital International Astrology Library (ancient astrological works)
Biblioastrology (www.biblioastrology.com) (specialised bibliography)
Paris Observatory
Category:Pseudoscience
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Astrology
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Table of Content
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short description, Etymology, History, Ancient world, Ancient applications, Ancient objections, Hellenistic Egypt, Greece and Rome, Medieval world, Hindu, Islamic, Europe, Renaissance and Early Modern, Enlightenment period and onwards, Principles and practice, Western, Hindu, Chinese and East Asian, Theological viewpoints, Ancient, Medieval, Modern, Scientific analysis and criticism, Demarcation, Effectiveness, Lack of mechanisms and consistency, Reception in the social sciences, Cultural impact, Western politics and society, India and Japan, Literature and music, See also, Notes, References, External links
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Abyssinia (disambiguation)
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Wiktionary
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Abyssinia is a historical name for the Ethiopian Empire.
Abyssinia may also refer to:
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Abyssinia (disambiguation)
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Arts and media
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Arts and media
Abyssinia, a theatrical show by Bert Williams
Abyssinia (1987 musical), a show first staged in 1987
Abyssinia (1906 musical), 1906 Broadway musical by Will Marion Cook, Bert Williams, Jesse A. Shipp, and Alex Rogers
"Abyssinia", a song by the Patti Smith Group on Radio Ethiopia
Abyssinia, a 2003 novel by Ursula Dubosarsky
"Abyssinia, Henry", an episode of the television series M*A*S*H
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Abyssinia (disambiguation)
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Places
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Places
Abyssinia Lines, a neighbourhood of Jamshed Town in Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan
Apostolic Vicariate of Abyssinia, the former Eastern Catholic missionary
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Abyssinia (disambiguation)
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Vessels
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Vessels
HMS Abyssinia (1870), a British armoured ship
SS Abyssinia, an 1870 Canadian Pacific steamship
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Abyssinia (disambiguation)
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Other uses
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Other uses
Abyssinian languages, family of languages spoken in Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Sudan
Abyssinian peoples, ethnic or pan-ethnic identifier used to refer to Ethiopians and Eritreans
Abyssinia (battle honour)
Abyssinia Creek, The Pilbara, Western Australia
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Abyssinia (disambiguation)
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See also
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See also
Abyssinian (disambiguation)
Habash (disambiguation)
Habishi (disambiguation)
History of Ethiopia
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Abyssinia (disambiguation)
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Table of Content
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Wiktionary, Arts and media, Places, Vessels, Other uses, See also
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Algebraic extension
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Short description
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In mathematics, an algebraic extension is a field extension such that every element of the larger field is algebraic over the smaller field ; that is, every element of is a root of a non-zero polynomial with coefficients in .Fraleigh (2014), Definition 31.1, p. 283.Malik, Mordeson, Sen (1997), Definition 21.1.23, p. 453. A field extension that is not algebraic, is said to be transcendental, and must contain transcendental elements, that is, elements that are not algebraic.Fraleigh (2014), Definition 29.6, p. 267.Malik, Mordeson, Sen (1997), Theorem 21.1.8, p. 447.
The algebraic extensions of the field of the rational numbers are called algebraic number fields and are the main objects of study of algebraic number theory. Another example of a common algebraic extension is the extension of the real numbers by the complex numbers.
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Algebraic extension
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Some properties
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Some properties
All transcendental extensions are of infinite degree. This in turn implies that all finite extensions are algebraic.See also Hazewinkel et al. (2004), p. 3. The converse is not true however: there are infinite extensions which are algebraic.Fraleigh (2014), Theorem 31.18, p. 288. For instance, the field of all algebraic numbers is an infinite algebraic extension of the rational numbers.Fraleigh (2014), Corollary 31.13, p. 287.
Let be an extension field of , and . The smallest subfield of that contains and is commonly denoted If is algebraic over , then the elements of can be expressed as polynomials in with coefficients in K; that is, , the smallest ring containing and . In this case, is a finite extension of and all its elements are algebraic over . In particular, is a -vector space with basis , where d is the degree of the minimal polynomial of .Fraleigh (2014), Theorem 30.23, p. 280. These properties do not hold if is not algebraic. For example, and they are both infinite dimensional vector spaces over Fraleigh (2014), Example 29.8, p. 268.
An algebraically closed field F has no proper algebraic extensions, that is, no algebraic extensions E with F < E.Fraleigh (2014), Corollary 31.16, p. 287. An example is the field of complex numbers. Every field has an algebraic extension which is algebraically closed (called its algebraic closure), but proving this in general requires some form of the axiom of choice.Fraleigh (2014), Theorem 31.22, p. 290.
An extension L/K is algebraic if and only if every sub K-algebra of L is a field.
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Algebraic extension
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Properties
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Properties
The following three properties hold:Lang (2002) p.228
If E is an algebraic extension of F and F is an algebraic extension of K then E is an algebraic extension of K.
If E and F are algebraic extensions of K in a common overfield C, then the compositum EF is an algebraic extension of K.
If E is an algebraic extension of F and E > K > F then E is an algebraic extension of K.
These finitary results can be generalized using transfinite induction:
This fact, together with Zorn's lemma (applied to an appropriately chosen poset), establishes the existence of algebraic closures.
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Algebraic extension
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Generalizations
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Generalizations
Model theory generalizes the notion of algebraic extension to arbitrary theories: an embedding of M into N is called an algebraic extension if for every x in N there is a formula p with parameters in M, such that p(x) is true and the set
is finite. It turns out that applying this definition to the theory of fields gives the usual definition of algebraic extension. The Galois group of N over M can again be defined as the group of automorphisms, and it turns out that most of the theory of Galois groups can be developed for the general case.
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Algebraic extension
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Relative algebraic closures
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Relative algebraic closures
Given a field k and a field K containing k, one defines the relative algebraic closure of k in K to be the subfield of K consisting of all elements of K that are algebraic over k, that is all elements of K that are a root of some nonzero polynomial with coefficients in k.
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Algebraic extension
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See also
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See also
Integral element
Lüroth's theorem
Galois extension
Separable extension
Normal extension
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Algebraic extension
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Notes
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Notes
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Algebraic extension
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References
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References
Category:Field extensions
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Algebraic extension
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Table of Content
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Short description, Some properties, Properties, Generalizations, Relative algebraic closures, See also, Notes, References
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Ani DiFranco
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Short description
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Angela Maria "Ani" DiFranco (; born September 23, 1970) is an American-Canadian singer-songwriter. She has released more than 20 albums. DiFranco's music has been classified as folk rock and alternative rock, although it has additional influences from punk, funk, hip hop and jazz. She has released all her albums on her own record label, Righteous Babe.
DiFranco supports many social and political movements by performing benefit concerts, appearing on benefit albums and speaking at rallies. Through the Righteous Babe Foundation, DiFranco has backed grassroots cultural and political organizations supporting causes including abortion rights and LGBT visibility. She counts American folk singer and songwriter Pete Seeger among her mentors.
DiFranco released a memoir, No Walls and the Recurring Dream, on May 7, 2019, via Viking Books and made The New York Times Best Seller list.
On February 9, 2024, DiFranco made her Broadway debut in Hadestown as Persephone, reprising the role she played in the concept album of the same name.
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Ani DiFranco
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Early life and education
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Early life and education
DiFranco was born in Buffalo, New York, on September 23, 1970, the daughter of Elizabeth (Ross) and Dante Americo DiFranco, who had met while attending the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her father was of Italian descent, and her mother was from Montreal. DiFranco started playing Beatles covers at local bars and busking with her guitar teacher, Michael Meldrum, at the age of nine. By 14 she was writing her own songs. She played them at bars and coffee houses throughout her teens. DiFranco graduated from the Buffalo Academy for Visual and Performing Arts high school at 16 and began attending classes at Buffalo State College. She was living by herself, having moved out of her mother's apartment after she became an emancipated minor when she was 15.
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Ani DiFranco
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Career
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Career
DiFranco started her own record company, Righteous Babe Records, in 1989 at age 19. She released her self-titled debut album in the winter of 1990, shortly after relocating to New York City. There, she took poetry classes at The New School, where she met poet Sekou Sundiata, who was to become a friend and mentor. She toured steadily for the next 15 years, pausing only to record albums. Appearances at Canadian folk festivals and increasingly larger venues in the U.S. reflected her increasing popularity on the North American folk and roots scene. Throughout the early and mid-1990s DiFranco toured solo and also as a duo with Canadian drummer Andy Stochansky.
In September 1995, DiFranco participated in a concert at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland Ohio, inaugurating the opening of the Woody Guthrie Archives in New York City. She later released a CD on Righteous Babe of the concert Til We Outnumber Em featuring artists such as DiFranco, Billy Bragg, Ramblin' Jack Elliott, Arlo Guthrie, Indigo Girls, Dave Pirner, Tim Robbins, and Bruce Springsteen with 100 percent of proceeds going to the Woody Guthrie Foundation and Archives and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Museum educational department.Robicheau, Paul. Ellis Paul's got Woody Guthrie under his skin. Boston Globe, September 20, 1996.
In 1996, bassist Sara Lee joined the touring group, whose live rapport is showcased on the 1997 album Living in Clip. DiFranco would later release Lee's solo album Make It Beautiful on Righteous Babe. In 1998, Stochansky left to pursue a solo career as a singer-songwriter. A new touring ensemble consisting of Jason Mercer on bass, Julie Wolf on keyboards, and Daren Hahn on drums, augmented at times by a horn section, accompanied DiFranco on tour between 1998 and 2002.
The 1990s were a period of heightened exposure for DiFranco, as she continued playing ever larger venues around the world and attracted international attention of the press, including cover stories in Spin, Ms., and Magnet, among others, as well as appearances on MTV and VH1. Her playfully ironic cover of the Bacharach/David song "Wishin' and Hopin'" appeared under the opening titles of the film My Best Friend's Wedding.
She guest starred on a 1998 episode of the Fox sitcom King of the Hill, as the voice of Peggy's feminist guitar teacher, Emily.
Beginning in 1999, Righteous Babe Records began releasing albums by other artists including Sara Lee, Sekou Sundiata, Arto Lindsay, Bitch and Animal, That One Guy, Utah Phillips, Hamell on Trial, Andrew Bird, Kurt Swinghammer, Buddy Wakefield, Anaïs Mitchell and Nona Hendryx.
On September 11, 2001, DiFranco was in Manhattan and later penned the poem "Self Evident" about the experience. The poem was featured in the book It's a Free Country: Personal Freedom in America After September 11. The poem's title also became the name of DiFranco's first book of poetry released exclusively in Italy by Minimum Fax. It was later also featured in Verses, a book of her poetry published in the U.S. by Seven Stories press. DiFranco has written and performed many spoken-word pieces throughout her career and was showcased as a poet on the HBO series Def Poetry in 2005.
Since her 2005 release Knuckle Down (co-produced by Joe Henry) DiFranco's touring band and recordings have featured bass player Todd Sickafoose and in turns other musicians such as Allison Miller, Andy Borger, Herlin Riley, and Terence Higgins on drums and Mike Dillon on percussion and vibes. On September 11, 2007, she released the first retrospective of her career, a two-disc compilation entitled Canon and simultaneously a retrospective collection of poetry book Verses. On September 30, 2008, she released Red Letter Year.
thumb|DiFranco performing in 2008
In 2009, DiFranco appeared at Pete Seeger's 90th birthday celebration at Madison Square Garden, debuting her revamped version of the 1930s labor anthem "Which Side Are You On?" in a duet with Bruce Cockburn and also duetting with Kris Kristofferson on the folk classic "There's a Hole in the Bucket". DiFranco released an album on January 17, 2012, ¿Which Side Are You On?. It includes collaborations with Pete Seeger, Ivan Neville, Cyril Neville, Skerik, Adam Levy, Righteous Babe recording artist Anaïs Mitchell, CC Adcock, and a host of New Orleans–based horn players known for their work in such outfits as Galactic, Bonerama, and Rebirth Brass Band. In 2014, she released her eighteenth album, Allergic to Water. In 2017, she released her nineteenth, Binary.
On May 7, 2019, DiFranco released a memoir, No Walls and the Recurring Dream, via Viking Books. It is described as a "coming-of-age story". In 2021, DiFranco released the album Revolutionary Love which was largely inspired by Valarie Kaur's book See No Stranger.
thumb|Ani DiFranco, RZA, and Steve Albini at The New Yorker festival in September 2005.
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Ani DiFranco
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Personal life
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Personal life
DiFranco came out as bisexual in her twenties, and has written songs about love and sex with women and men. She addressed the controversy about her sexuality in the song "In or Out" on the album Imperfectly (1992). However, in 2015 she told the blog GoPride.com that she was "not so queer anymore, but definitely a woman-centered woman and just a human rights-centered artist." In a 2019 interview with Jezebel, she stated that she preferred the term "queer" because "bisexual" "always sounded very medical, like something you do to a frog in 9th grade science or something", and further added that "the irony is I'm pretty fuckin' hetero, which is unfortunate for me because many of my deepest connections are with women. But, naw, I just like what's in boys' pants better." In 1998, she married her sound engineer Andrew Gilchrist in a Unitarian Universalist service in Canada. DiFranco and Gilchrist divorced in 2003.
In 1990, she wrote "Lost Woman Song", inspired by abortions she had at ages eighteen and twenty.
DiFranco's father died in the summer of 2004. In July 2005, DiFranco developed tendinitis and took a nine-month hiatus from touring. In January 2007 DiFranco gave birth to her first child, a daughter, at her Buffalo home. She married the child's father, Mike Napolitano, also her regular producer, in 2009. In an interview on September 13, 2012, DiFranco mentioned that she was pregnant with her second child. In April 2013, she gave birth to her second child, a son.
She has resided in the Bywater, New Orleans, neighborhood since 2008.
DiFranco signed the October 2023 Artists4Ceasefire open letter to Joe Biden calling for a ceasefire during the Israeli bombardment of Gaza.
She has described herself as an atheist. On the subject of religion, DiFranco has stated:
DiFranco has spoken critically of cancel culture, saying it is "just gonna get us nowhere" and "The human family can't divorce each other". DiFranco herself has received criticism for planning a 2013 songwriting retreat at Nottoway, a former slave plantation. She cancelled the retreat three days after the news broke, writing on her website, "I needed a wake-up call and you gave it to me." In a 2019 interview, she said of her choices at the time, "I should have found the ultimate humility to put down my own hurt, and all of the misconceptions or mis-truths out there. You have to make yourself accountable. There's a greater pain that's bigger than me, and it's more important."
She wrote in her memoir that she "[sympathized] with both sides" regarding the controversial trans-exclusionary policies of the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival. In a 2019 interview, she elaborated on this statement, discussing her perception that cisgender women were being "asked again ... to move over and make room for somebody else," and later expressed that she understood the difficulty "for anybody outside of a very specific group to experience it the way that group does," saying that "maybe [women's spaces] should be a little more [inclusive]".
DiFranco is the subject of the 2024 documentary film 1-800-On-Her-Own. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/18/movies/ani-difranco-1-800-on-her-own.html
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Ani DiFranco
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Critical reception
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Critical reception
DiFranco has been a critical success for much of her career, with a career album average of 55 on Metacritic. Living in Clip, DiFranco's 1998 double live album, is the only one to achieve gold record status to date. DiFranco was praised by The Buffalo News in 2006 as "Buffalo's leading lady of rock music".
Starting in 2003, DiFranco was nominated four consecutive times for Best Recording Package at the Grammy Awards, winning in 2004 for Evolve.
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Ani DiFranco
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Music
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Music
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Ani DiFranco
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Style
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Style
DiFranco's guitar playing is often characterized by a signature staccato style, rapid fingerpicking and many alternate tunings. She delivers many of her lines in a speaking style notable for its rhythmic variation. Her lyrics, which often include alliteration, metaphor, word play and a more or less gentle irony, have also received praise for their sophistication.
thumb|DiFranco in concert, 2019
Although DiFranco's music has been classified as both folk rock and alternative rock, she has reached across genres since her earliest albums incorporating first punk, then funk, hiphop, and jazz influences.
While primarily an acoustic guitarist she has used a variety of instruments and styles: brass instrumentation was prevalent in 1998's Little Plastic Castle; a simple walking bass in her 1997 cover of Hal David and Burt Bacharach's "Wishin' and Hopin'; strings on the 1997 live album Living in Clip and 2004's Knuckle Down; and electronics and synthesizers in 1999's To the Teeth and 2006's Reprieve.
DiFranco has stated that "folk music is not an acoustic guitar – that's not where the heart of it is. I use the word 'folk' in reference to punk music and rap music. It's an attitude, it's an awareness of one's heritage, and it's a community. It's subcorporate music that gives voice to different communities and their struggle against authority."
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Ani DiFranco
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Musical collaborations, cover versions, and samples
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Musical collaborations, cover versions, and samples
DiFranco has collaborated with a wide range of artists. In 1997, she appeared on Canadian songwriter Bruce Cockburn's Charity of Night album. In 1998, she produced fellow folksinger Dan Bern's album Fifty Eggs.
She developed a deep association with folksinger and social activist Utah Phillips throughout the mid-1990s, sharing her stage and her audience with the older musician until his death in 2008 and resulting in two collaborative albums: The Past Didn't Go Anywhere (1996) and Fellow Workers (1999, with liner notes by Howard Zinn). The Past is built around Phillips's storytelling, an important part of his art that had not previously been documented on recordings; on the album, DiFranco provides musical settings for his speaking voice. The followup, Fellow Workers, was recorded live in Daniel Lanois's Kingsway Studio in New Orleans and features Phillips fronting DiFranco's touring band for a collection of songs and stories.
Prince recorded two songs with DiFranco in 1999, "Providence" on her To the Teeth album, and "Eye Love U, But Eye Don't Trust U Anymore" on Prince's Rave Un2 the Joy Fantastic album. Funk and soul jazz musician Maceo Parker and rapper Corey Parker have both appeared on DiFranco's albums and featured appearances by her on theirs. Parker and DiFranco toured together in 1999.
She has appeared on several compilations of the songs of Pete Seeger and frequented his Hudson Clearwater Revival Festival. In 2001, she appeared on Brazilian artist Lenine's album Falange Canibal. In 2002, her rendition of Greg Brown's "The Poet Game" appeared on Going Driftless: An Artist's Tribute to Greg Brown. Also in 2002 she recorded a duet with Jackie Chan of the Irving Gordon song "Unforgettable" for a record of unlikely collaborations, When Pigs Fly: Songs You Never Thought You'd Hear.
In 2005, she appeared on Dar Williams' record My Better Self, duetting on William's cover of Pink Floyd's "Comfortably Numb". She performed with Cyndi Lauper on "Sisters of Avalon" a track from Lauper's 2005 The Body Acoustic album. In 2006, she produced Hamell on Trial's album Songs for Parents Who Enjoy Drugs. In 2008, she appeared on Todd Sickafoose's album Tiny Resisters. In 2010, she co-produced a track with Margaret Cho called "Captain Cameltoe" for the comedian's Cho Dependant album. In 2011, she appeared on Rob Wasserman's album Note of Hope, an exploration of the writings of Woody Guthrie with musical accompaniment, though the track in which she appeared, "Voice", was actually recorded 13 years earlier. Also in 2011 she duetted with Greg Dulli on the Twilight Singers record Dynamite Steps.
Other artists have covered and sampled DiFranco's work throughout the years. Her spoken word poem "Self Evident" was covered by Public Enemy founder Chuck D's group called Impossebulls. Alana Davis had some commercial success with DiFranco's song "32 Flavors". Samples from the track "Coming Up" were used by DJ Spooky in his album Live Without Dead Time, produced for AdBusters Magazine in 2003. In 2010, DiFranco played Persephone on Anaïs Mitchell's album Hadestown.
DiFranco was approached by Zoe Boekbinder to work on their Prison Music Project, an album of collaborations between incarcerated and formerly incarcerated writers and musicians on the outside. DiFranco co-produced the project with Boekbinder and co-wrote and performed "Nowhere but Barstow and Prison." The album Long Time Gone was released on Righteous Babe Records in 2020 after ten years in the making.
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Ani DiFranco
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Lyrical content
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Lyrical content
Although much of DiFranco's material is autobiographical, it is often also strongly political. Many of her songs are concerned with contemporary social issues such as racism, sexism, sexual abuse, homophobia, reproductive rights, poverty, and war. In 2008, she donated a song to Aid Still Required's CD to assist with the restoration of the devastation done to Southeast Asia from the 2004 tsunami. The combination of personal and political is partially responsible for DiFranco's early popularity among politically active college students, particularly those of the left wing, some of whom set up fan pages on the web to document DiFranco's career as early as 1994. DiFranco's rapid rise in popularity in the mid-1990s was fueled mostly by personal contact and word of mouth rather than mainstream media.
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Ani DiFranco
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Label independence
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Label independence
DiFranco cites her anti-corporate ethos for the main reason she decided to start her own label. This has allowed her a considerable degree of creative freedom over the years, including, for example, providing all instrumentals and vocals and recording the album herself at her home on an analog 8-track reel to reel, and handling much of the artwork and packaging design for her 2004 album Educated Guess. She has referenced this independence from major labels in song more than once, including "The Million You Never Made" (Not a Pretty Girl), which discusses the act of turning down a lucrative contract, "The Next Big Thing" (Not So Soft), which describes an imagined meeting with a label head-hunter who evaluates the singer based on her looks, and "Napoleon" (Dilate), which sympathizes sarcastically with an unnamed friend who did sign with a label.
The business grew organically starting in 1990 with the first cassette tape. Connections were made when women in colleges started duplicating and sharing tapes. Offers to play at colleges started coming in and her popularity grew largely by word of mouth and through women's groups or organizations. Zango and Goldenrod, two music distributors specializing in women's music, started carrying DiFranco's music. They sold music to independent music stores and women's book stores. In 1995, Righteous Babe Records signed with Koch International for DiFranco's release of Not a Pretty Girl. Her records could then be found in large and small record stores alike.
DiFranco has occasionally joined with Prince in discussing publicly the problems associated with major record companies. Righteous Babe Records employs a number of people in her hometown of Buffalo. In a 1997 open letter to Ms. magazine she expressed displeasure that what she considers a way to ensure her own artistic freedom was seen by others solely in terms of its financial success.
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Ani DiFranco
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Activism
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Activism
From the earliest days of her career, DiFranco has lent her voice and her name to a broad range of social movements, performing benefit concerts, appearing on benefit albums, speaking at rallies, and offering info table space to organizations at her concerts and the virtual equivalent on her website, among other methods and actions. In 1999, she created her own not-for-profit organization; as the Buffalo News has reported, "Through the Righteous Babe Foundation, DiFranco has backed various grassroots cultural and political organizations, supporting causes ranging from abortion rights to gay visibility."
During the first Gulf War, DiFranco participated in the anti-war movement. In early 1993 she played Pete Seeger's Clearwater Folk Festival for the first time. In 1998, she was a featured performer in the Dead Man Walking benefit concert series raising money for Sister Helen Prejean's "Not in Our Name" anti-death penalty organization. DiFranco's commitment to opposing the death penalty is longstanding; she has also been a long time supporter of the Southern Center for Human Rights.
During the 2000 U.S. presidential election, she actively supported and voted for Green Party candidate Ralph Nader, though in an open letter she made clear that if she lived in a swing state, she would vote for Al Gore to prevent George W. Bush from being elected.
In 2004, DiFranco visited Burma in order to learn about the Burmese resistance movement and the country's fight for democracy. During her travels she met with then-detained resistance leader Aung San Suu Kyi. Her song "In The Way" was later featured on For the Lady, a benefit CD that donated all proceeds to the United States Campaign for Burma.
During the 2004 presidential primaries, she supported liberal, anti-war Democrat Dennis Kucinich, who appeared on stage with her during several of her concerts. After the primary season ended, and John Kerry was the clear Democratic candidate, DiFranco launched a "Vote Dammit!" tour of swing states encouraging audience members to vote. In 2005, she lobbied Congress against the proliferation of nuclear power in general and the placement of nuclear waste dumps on Indian land in particular. In 2008, she again backed Kucinich in his bid for the presidency.
In 2002, Righteous Babe Records established the "Aiding Buffalo's Children" program in conjunction with members of the local community to raise funds for Buffalo's public school system. To kick off the program, DiFranco donated "a day's pay"—the performance fee from her concert that year at Shea's Performing Arts Center— to ABC and challenged her fans to do the same. Aiding Buffalo's Children has since been folded into the Community Foundation of Greater Buffalo, contributing to a variety of charitable funds.
In 2005, when Hurricane Katrina devastated DiFranco's newly adopted home town of New Orleans, she collected donations from fans around the world through The Righteous Babe Store website for the Katrina Piano Fund, helping musicians replace instruments lost in the hurricane, raising over $47,500 for the cause.
In 2010, after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, she performed at the "For Our Coast" benefit concert joining Marianne Faithfull, C. C. Adcock and others at the Acadiana Center for the Arts Theater in Lafayette, raising money for Gulf Aid Acadiana, and the Gulf Aid show with Lenny Kravitz, Mos Def, and others at Mardi Gras World River City in New Orleans, both shows raising money to help protect the wetlands, clean up the coast and to assist the fishermen and their families affected by the spill.
DiFranco sits on the board for The Roots of Music, founded by Rebirth Brass Band drummer Derrick Tabb. The organization provides free marching band instruction to children in the New Orleans area in addition to academic tutoring and mentoring.
DiFranco joined about 500,000 people at the March for Women's Lives in DC in April 2004. As an honored guest she marched in the front row for the three-mile route, along with Margaret Cho, Janeane Garofalo, Whoopi Goldberg, Gloria Steinem and others. Later in the day, DiFranco played a few songs on the main stage in front of the Capitol, including "Your Next Bold Move".
Scot Fisher, formerly Righteous Babe label president and DiFranco's manager for many years, has been a longtime advocate of the preservation movement in Buffalo. In 1999, he and DiFranco purchased a decaying church on the verge of demolition in downtown Buffalo and began the lengthy process of restoring it. In 2006, the building opened its doors again, first briefly as "The Church" and then as "Babeville," housing two concert venues, the record label's business office, and Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center.
DiFranco is a member of the Toronto-based charity Artists Against Racism for which she participated in a radio PSA.
On July 21, 2006, she received the Woman of Courage Award at the National Organization for Women (NOW) Conference and Young Feminist Summit in Albany, New York. DiFranco was one of the first musicians to receive the award, given each year to a woman who has set herself apart by her contributions to the feminist movement.
In 2009, DiFranco received the Woody Guthrie Award for being a voice of positive social change.
In October 2023, DiFranco signed an open letter to Joe Biden, President of the United States, of artists calling for a ceasefire of the Israeli bombardment of Gaza.
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Ani DiFranco
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Awards and nominations
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Awards and nominations
Year Nominated work Award Result 2017 Ani DiFranco A2IM Lifetime Achievement Award 2021 Ani DiFranco John Lennon Real Love Award 2024 Hadestown Broadway.com Audience Award for Favorite Replacement (Female)
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Ani DiFranco
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Discography{{anchor
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Discography
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Ani DiFranco
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Studio albums
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Studio albums
Ani DiFranco (1990)
Not So Soft (1991)
Imperfectly (1992)
Puddle Dive (1993)
Out of Range (1994)
Not a Pretty Girl (1995)
Dilate (1996)
Little Plastic Castle (1998)
Up Up Up Up Up Up (1999)
To the Teeth (1999)
Revelling/Reckoning (2001)
Evolve (2003)
Educated Guess (2004)
Knuckle Down (2005)
Reprieve (2006)
Red Letter Year (2008)
¿Which Side Are You On? (2012)
Allergic to Water (2014)
Binary (2017)
Revolutionary Love (2021)
Unprecedented Sh!t (2024)
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Ani DiFranco
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with Utah Phillips
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with Utah Phillips
The Past Didn't Go Anywhere (1996)
Fellow Workers (1999)
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Ani DiFranco
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Live albums
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Live albums
1994 – An Acoustic Evening With
1994 – Women in (E)motion (German Release)
1997 – Living in Clip
2002 – So Much Shouting, So Much Laughter
2004 – Atlanta – 10.9.03 (Official Bootleg series #1)
2004 – Sacramento – 10.25.03 (Official Bootleg series #1)
2004 – Portland – 4.7.04 (Official Bootleg series #1)
2005 – Boston – 11.16.03 (Official Bootleg series #1)
2005 – Chicago – 1.17.04 (Official Bootleg series #1)
2005 – Madison – 1.25.04 (Official Bootleg series #1)
2005 – Rome – 11.15.04 (Official Bootleg series #1)
2006 – Carnegie Hall – 4.6.02 (Official Bootleg series No. 1 – available in stores)
2007 – Boston – 11.10.06 (Official Bootleg series #1)
2008 – Hamburg – 10.18.07 (Official Bootleg series #1)
2009 – Saratoga, CA – 9.18.06 (Official Bootleg series #1)
2009 – Chicago – 9.22.07 (Official Bootleg series #1)
2010 – Live at Bull Moose Music (Limited edition)
2012 – Buffalo – April 22, 2012 (Official Bootleg series #2)
2013 – London – October 29, 2008 (Official Bootleg series #2)
2014 – Ridgefield, CT – November 18, 2009 (Official Bootleg series #2)
2014 – Harrisburg, PA – January 23, 2008 (Official Bootleg series #2)
2015 – New York, NY – March 30, 1995 (Official Bootleg series #2)
2016 – Glenside, PA – November 11, 2012 (Official Bootleg series #2)
2016 – Melbourne, FL – January 19, 2016 (Official Bootleg series #2)
2018 – Charlottesville, VA 5.12.18 (Official Bootleg series #3)
2019 – Woodstock, NY Jun 16, 2019 (Official Bootleg series #3)
2020 – Keene, NH Nov 16, 2019 (Official Bootleg series #3)
2021 – Revolutionary Love: Live at Big Blue
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Ani DiFranco
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EPs
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EPs
1996 – More Joy, Less Shame
1999 – Little Plastic Remixes (limited distribution)
2000 – Swing Set
2016 – Play God
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Ani DiFranco
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Videos
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Videos
2002 – Render: Spanning Time with Ani DiFranco
2004 – Trust
2008 – Live at Babeville
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Ani DiFranco
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Compilations
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Compilations
1993 – Like I Said: Songs 1990–91
1995 – Live from Mountain Stage, Vol. 8 – "Buildings & Bridges (live)"
1996 – Women's Work – "Cradle and All (live)"
1996 – Women: Live from Mountain Stage – "Egos Like Hairdos (live)"
1997 – Divine Divas: A World of Women's Voices – "Amazing Grace"
1998 – Live at World Café Vol. 6 – "Buildings & Bridges (live)"
1998 – Modern Day Storytellers – "Buildings & Bridges"
1998 – Rare on Air Vol. 4 (KCRW) – "Gravel (live)"
1998 – Where Have All the Flowers Gone: Songs of Pete Seeger – "My Name is Lisa Kalvelage"
1998 – Women of Spirit – "Done Wrong"
1999 – Respect: A Century of Women in Music – "32 Flavors"
2000 – Badlands: A Tribute to Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska – "Used Cars"
2000 – Best of Hard Rock Café Live – "Little Plastic Castle (live)"
2000 – 'Til We Outnumber 'Em – Performed "Do Re Mi" solo and "Ramblin' Round" with Indigo Girls; Producer
2001 – Live @ The World Café Vol. 10 – "32 Flavors"
2001 – Best of Sessions at West 54th – "32 Flavors"
2002 – Gascd – "Your Next Bold Move"
2002 – Going Driftless: An Artist Tribute to Greg Brown – "The Poet Game"
2002 – When Pigs Fly: Songs You Never Thought You'd Hear – "Unforgettable" w/ Jackie Chan
2003 – Peace Not War – "Self Evident"
2004 – Peace Not War Vol. 2 – "Animal"
2004 – For the Lady – "In the Way"
2005 – Bonnaroo Music Festival 2004 (CD & DVD) – "Evolve (live)"
2006 – Music Is Hope – "Napoleon (remix)"
2006 – Dead Man Walking: Music from and Inspired by the Motion Picture – "Crime for Crime", "Fuel", "Up Up Up Up Up Up"
2007 – Canon
2007 – Sowing the Seed: The 10th Anniversary Appleseed Recordings – "Waist Deep in the Big Muddy"
2007 – Cool as Folk: Cambridge Folk Festival – "Cradle and All (live)"
2009 – Singing Through the Hard Times: A Utah Phillips Celebration – "The International"
2011 – Note of Hope: A Celebration of Woody Guthrie – "Voice"
2011 – Every Mother Counts – "Present/Infant" (Remix)
2012 – Occupy This Album – "Which Side Are You On? (a capella)"
2019 – No Walls Mixtape
2020 – Prison Music Project: Long Time Gone – "Nowhere but Barstow and Prison"
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Ani DiFranco
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As producer
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As producer
1998 – Dan Bern – Fifty Eggs
2010 – Margaret Cho – Cho Dependent – co-producer on "Captain Cameltoe"
2017 – Peter Mulvey – Are You Listening?
2020 – Prison Music Project: Long Time Gone
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Ani DiFranco
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Other contributions
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Other contributions
1989 – Demo tape (unreleased)
2001 – John Gorka – The Company You Keep – backing vocals on "Oh Abraham"
2006 – Jason Karaban – Doomed to Make Choices
2006 – Twilight Singers – Powder Burns – Featured on "Bonnie Brae," "Candy Cane Crawl," and "Powder Burns"
2008 – Dr. John – The City That Care Forgot – Contributed backing vocals to the title track.
2009 – Jason Karaban – Sobriety Kills
2010 – Anaïs Mitchell – Hadestown
2010 – Preservation Hall Jazz Band – Preservation: An Album to Benefit Preservation Hall & The Preservation Hall Music Outreach Program – Featured on "Freight Train"
2011 – Twilight Singers – Dynamite Steps – Featured on "Blackbird and the Fox"
2016 – Ryan Harvey – Featured on "Old Man Trump"
2019 – Rising Appalachia – Leylines – Featured on "Speak Out"
2021 – Pieta Brown – Featured on "We Are Not Machines"
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Ani DiFranco
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Poetry
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Poetry
2004 – Self-evident: poesie e disegni
2007 – Verses
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Ani DiFranco
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References
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References
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Ani DiFranco
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External links
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External links
The Righteous Babe homepage
Ani DiFranco at Rolling Stone
Category:1970 births
Category:Living people
Category:American activists
Category:20th-century American women guitarists
Category:20th-century American guitarists
Category:20th-century atheists
Category:20th-century American LGBTQ people
Category:21st-century American bass guitarists
Category:21st-century American singer-songwriters
Category:21st-century American women guitarists
Category:21st-century American women singers
Category:21st-century atheists
Category:21st-century American LGBTQ people
Category:21st-century American women composers
Category:Activists from New York (state)
Category:American abortion-rights activists
Category:American acoustic guitarists
Category:American anti–death penalty activists
Category:American atheists
Category:American contraltos
Category:American folk guitarists
Category:American folk rock musicians
Category:American folk singers
Category:American gun control activists
Category:American people of Canadian descent
Category:American people of Italian descent
Category:American rock songwriters
Category:American street performers
Category:American women rock singers
Category:American women singer-songwriters
Category:Anti-corporate activists
Category:Atheist feminists
Category:Bisexual feminists
Category:Bisexual singers
Category:Bisexual composers
Category:Bisexual songwriters
Category:Bisexual women musicians
Category:Buffalo State College alumni
Category:American feminist musicians
Category:Grammy Award winners
Category:Guitarists from New York (state)
Category:LGBTQ people from New York (state)
Category:American LGBTQ rights activists
Category:American LGBTQ singers
Category:American LGBTQ songwriters
Category:American LGBTQ composers
Category:Musicians from Buffalo, New York
Category:The New School alumni
Category:Righteous Babe Records artists
Category:Singer-songwriters from New York (state)
Category:American women bass guitarists
Category:American bisexual women
Category:American bisexual musicians
Category:American bisexual writers
Category:LGBTQ women singers
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Ani DiFranco
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Table of Content
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Short description, Early life and education, Career, Personal life, Critical reception, Music, Style, Musical collaborations, cover versions, and samples, Lyrical content, Label independence, Activism, Awards and nominations, Discography{{anchor, Studio albums, with Utah Phillips, Live albums, EPs, Videos, Compilations, As producer, Other contributions, Poetry, References, External links
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Arene (disambiguation)
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An
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An Arene, or aromatic hydrocarbon, is a hydrocarbon with alternating double and single bonds between carbon atoms forming rings.
Arene may also refer to:
Arene (gastropod), a genus of marine snails in the family Areneidae
Arene (mythology), the wife of Aphareus and mother of Idas and Lynceus in Greek mythology
Arene, Elis, an ancient town in Elis, Greece, also known as Samiko
Jean Arènes (1898–1960), French botanist who described many new species of the genus Dombeya
Paul Arène (1843–1896), Provençal poet and French writer
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Arene (disambiguation)
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See also
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See also
Arena (disambiguation)
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Arene (disambiguation)
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Table of Content
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An, See also
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Short description
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The Arizona Diamondbacks are an American professional baseball team based in Phoenix, Arizona. The Diamondbacks compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (NL) West Division. The franchise was established on March 9, 1995, and began play in 1998 as an expansion team. The team plays its home games at Chase Field. Along with the Tampa Bay Rays, the Diamondbacks are one of the newest teams in the MLB and are the youngest team to win a World Series, doing so in only their fourth season of existence in 2001.
After a fifth-place finish in their inaugural season, the Diamondbacks made several off-season acquisitions, including future Hall of Fame pitcher Randy Johnson, who won four consecutive Cy Young Awards in his first four seasons with the team. In 1999, Arizona won 100 games and their first division championship. In 2001, they won the World Series over the three-time defending champion New York Yankees, becoming the fastest expansion team in major league history to win the World Series and the first and only men's major professional sports team in the State of Arizona to win a championship. 22 years later, they would return to the World Series, only to lose to the Texas Rangers in five games, thus earning the Diamondbacks their first World Series loss in team history.
From 1998 to 2024, the Diamondbacks had an overall record of ().
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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History
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History
On March 9, 1995, Phoenix was awarded an expansion franchise to begin play for the season. A $130 million franchise fee was paid to Major League Baseball and on January 16, 1997, the Diamondbacks were voted into the National League. The Diamondbacks' first major league game was played against the Colorado Rockies on March 31, 1998, at Bank One Ballpark. The ballpark was renamed Chase Field in 2005, as a result of Bank One Corporation's merger with JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Since their debut, the Diamondbacks have won two Wild Card Series, five NL West division titles, two NL pennants, and the 2001 World Series.
They later became the fastest expansion franchise in baseball history to win a World Series. The Diamondbacks defeated the Yankees in Game 7 during the 2001 postseason.
After beating the Philadelphia Phillies 4–2 in Game 7 of the 2023 NLCS at Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia, the Arizona Diamondbacks returned to the World Series for the first time since 2001 – against the Texas Rangers on October 27, 2023.
They lost the series 4–1 at home in Arizona on November 1, 2023.
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Logos and uniforms
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Logos and uniforms
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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1998–2006
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1998–2006
thumb|upright|Uniform design from late 1990s through mid-2000s
The Diamondbacks' original colors were purple, black, teal and copper. Their logo was an italicized block letter "A" with a diamond pattern, with the crossbar represented by a snake's tongue. This period saw the Diamondbacks wear several uniform combinations.
At home, the Diamondbacks wore cream uniforms with purple pinstripes. The primary sleeved uniform, worn from 1998 to 2000, featured the full team name ("Diamond" and "Backs" stacked together) in front and chest numbers. The alternate sleeveless version contained the "A" logo on the right chest, and was paired with purple undershirts. Before the 2001 season, the sleeved uniform was changed to feature the "A" logo. In all three uniforms, player names were teal with purple trim, and numbers were purple with white with teal trim.
The Diamondbacks' primary road gray uniform also had purple pinstripes. The first version featured "Arizona" in purple with white and teal trim along with black drop shadows, with chest numbers added. Player names were in purple with white trim, and numbers were teal with white and purple trim. In 2001, the uniform became sleeveless with black undershirts, and the lettering scheme was changed to purple with white, copper and black accents.
The alternate home purple uniform featured "Arizona" in teal with white and copper trim and black drop shadows. The letters were rendered in teal with copper and white trim, but were changed to copper with teal and white trim after only one season. This set was worn until 2002.
The alternate road black uniform featured the "A" logo on the right chest, while letters were purple with white trim and numbers were teal with white and purple trim. A zigzag pattern of teal, copper and purple was featured on the sleeves. In 2001, the uniform was changed to feature "Arizona" in front. The letters became purple with white and copper trim.
The Diamondbacks initially wore four different cap versions. The primary home cap is all-purple, while the road cap is black with a teal brim. They also wore a cream cap with purple brim, and a teal cap with purple brim. All designs featured the primary "A" logo. In 1999, the road cap became all-black and contained the alternate "D-snake" logo rendered in copper. Also, the teal and cream alternate caps were dropped.
The left sleeve of all four uniforms contained the snake logo with the full team name until the 2004 season, when it became exclusive to the road black uniform.
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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2007–2015
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2007–2015
The franchise unveiled new uniforms and colors of Sedona red, Sonoran sand and black on November 8, 2006. The red shade is named for the sandstone canyon at Red Rock State Park near Sedona, while the beige (sand) shade is named for the Sonoran Desert. A sleeve patch was added featuring a lowercase "d" and "b" configured to look like a snake's head. The team also kept the "D" logo, which was slightly altered and put on an all-red cap to be used as their game cap. They kept the "A" logo with the new colors applied to it, with a solid black cap used as the alternate cap. Arizona's updated color scheme bore a striking resemblance to the Houston Astros' color scheme (brick red, sand and black) that the Astros used until 2012, as well as the NHL's Phoenix Coyotes, whose adoption of those colors predated the Diamondbacks by four years.
The white home uniform featured "D-Backs" in red with sand and black trim. The road gray uniform featured "Arizona" in red with sand and black trim. Player names were red with black trim while numbers were black with red trim.
The alternate red uniform contained "D-Backs" in sand with red and black trim, with player names in sand with black trim and numbers in black with sand trim.
There were two versions of the alternate black uniform. One design has the alternate "A" logo on the right chest, while the other has "Arizona" written in red with black and sand trim. The latter was introduced in 2013 as a tribute to the victims of the Yarnell Hill Fire. On both uniforms, player names were sand with red trim, and numbers in red with sand trim.
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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2016–2023
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2016–2023
thumb|Alternate road uniform design from 2016 to 2019
Before the 2016 season, the Diamondbacks reincorporated teal into its color scheme while keeping Sedona Red, Sonoran Sand and black. They also unveiled eight different uniform combinations, including two separate home white and away grey uniforms. One major difference between the two sets is that the non-teal uniforms feature a snakeskin pattern on the shoulders, while the teal-trimmed uniforms include a charcoal/grey snakeskin pattern on the back. Arizona also kept the throwback pinstriped sleeveless uniforms from their 2001 championship season for use during Thursday home games.
Starting with the 2020 season, the Diamondbacks made slight redesigns to their uniforms. The snakeskin patterns were removed while the teal-trimmed grey uniforms were retired. The team also reverted to a standard grey uniform after wearing a darker shade on the previous set. Two home white uniforms remain in use: the primary Sedona Red and the alternate teal. They would also wear two black uniforms: one with the primary "A" logo on the left chest and the other with "Los D-Backs" trimmed in teal. Three cap designs were also unveiled, all with a black base: the primary "A" cap, the teal-trimmed "snake" cap (paired exclusively on the teal alternates), and the sand-trimmed "snake" cap with red brim (paired exclusively on the Sedona Red alternates). The Nike swoosh logo is also placed on the right chest near the shoulder. In 2022, the Diamondbacks introduced a red "A" cap with black brim.
In 2021, the Diamondbacks were one of seven teams to wear Nike "City Connect" uniforms. The design is primarily sand and has "Serpientes" in black script lettering emblazoned in front. The first "S" in "Serpientes" was shaped to resemble a rattlesnake. The right sleeve has the flag of Arizona patch recolored to the Diamondbacks' red, sand and black scheme, and the left sleeve has the "A" logo recolored to black and sand. Numerals are in red. The cap is primarily sand with black brim and has the "A" logo in black and sand; the regular batting helmet is used with the uniform. Initially, the Diamondbacks wore white pants with this uniform, but has since switched to sand pants.
Before the 2023 season, the Diamondbacks promoted the alternate white uniform with teal accents to its primary home uniform and retired the previous Sedona Red white uniform. This is due to a new Nike rule that limits teams to four regular uniforms plus the "City Connect" uniform.
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Since 2024
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Since 2024
Coming off their second World Series appearance in , the Diamondbacks unveiled refreshed uniform designs starting in 2024. Turquoise returned full-time as an accent color on all uniforms along with Sedona red and black, but sand was removed except on the "City Connect" uniform. The home uniform is now a cream base with black piping, featuring the "A" logo on the left chest. The road grey uniform with black piping featured "Arizona" in Sedona red with teal and black outlines. The alternate black uniform with teal piping shared the same features as the home uniform. The alternate Sedona red uniform incorporated the full "Diamondbacks" wordmark in black with teal and Sedona red outlines, along with teal numbers trimmed in black on the left chest. All uniforms featured the snake head alternate logo on either sleeve, with the sponsor logo (Avnet since 2023) on the other sleeve. The home cap is Sedona red with black brim and featured the "A" logo, and its all-black counterpart is worn with both the home and black alternate uniform. The road cap is black with Sedona red trim and featured the return of the "D-snake" logo and is worn with both the road and alternate Sedona red uniform. The all-Sedona red alternate cap shared the same features as the road cap and is worn with the Sedona red uniform.
In 2025, the Diamondbacks released a second "City Connect" uniform, updating the "Serpientes" wordmark but recolored to the original purple and teal colors. The uniforms take designs from all their different uniform combinations since they became a franchise in 1998. The jersey pays tribute to the original jersey with the Heritage Pinstripes worn from 1998−2006 as well as its “evolutionary jersey” from 2016−19 by blending pinstripes with a snakeskin pattern. The jersey still features the word "Serpientes" with the S remaining the same from their previous version of their city connect, with the rest being a new design. The faux sleeves pay tribute to the 2001 World Series-winning team, which featured sleeveless jerseys that had a different colored sleeve. The Sleeves also feature the Flag of Arizona on one sleeve, the State outline with a baseball silhouette and the year 1998, the founding year of the club, plus features a light color of teal in the shape of 48, as Arizona is the 48th State in the Union. The trim on the sleeve is in teal and was used on the team uniform from 1998−2006, which is in the shape of a Diamondback Rattlesnake skin. The collar features the phrase "Arizona Born", pays tribute to the legacy of Arizona, rooted in the State of Arizona. The cap is in the original purple and has a teal brim that features the "S" serpientes logo.
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Regular season home attendance
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Regular season home attendance
thumb|upright=1.1|Chase Field
Home Attendance Year Total attendance Game average League rank 1998 3,610,290 44,571 2nd 1999 3,019,654 37,280 5th 2000 2,942,251 36,324 6th 2001 2,736,451 33,783 9th 2002 3,198,977 39,494 2nd 2003 2,805,542 34,636 5th 2004 2,519,560 31,106 8th 2005 2,059,424 25,425 12th 2006 2,091,685 25,823 14th 2007 2,325,249 28,707 12th 2008 2,509,924 30,987 11th 2009 2,128,765 26,281 11th 2010 2,056,697 25,391 13th 2011 2,105,432 25,993 12th 2012 2,177,617 26,884 13th 2013 2,134,895 26,357 14th 2014 2,073,730 25,602 14th 2015 2,080,145 25,681 12th 2016 2,036,216 25,138 11th 2017 2,134,375 26,350 11th 2018 2,242,695 27,688 9th 2019 2,135,510 26,364 12th 2020 0 0 N/A 2021 1,043,010 12,877 13th 2022 1,605,199 19,817 12th 2023 1,961,182 24,212 12th 2024 2,341,876 28,912 11th
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Radio and television
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Radio and television
On July 18, 2023, a federal bankruptcy court granted Bally Sports' parent company Diamond Sports Group a motion to decline its contract with the Diamondbacks as part of its chapter 11 bankruptcy. As a result, Major League Baseball's local media division assumed production of the Diamondbacks' regional telecasts (maintaining staff such as commentators) and distributed them via local television providers and MLB.tv. As of 2024, these games are branded as DBacks.TV. Games air on the following cable providers and networks:
Cox (Phoenix) (CH. 34)
Cox (Tucson) (CH. 26)
Cox (Las Vegas) (YurView Las Vegas)
DirecTV/DirecTV Stream (CH. 686)
Charter (CH. 304 or CH. 444)
Xfinity/Comcast (CH. 1261)
FuboTV
The primary television play-by-play voice for the team's first nine seasons of play was Thom Brennaman, who also broadcast baseball and college football games nationally for Fox Television. Brennaman was the TV announcer for the Chicago Cubs and Cincinnati Reds (along with his father Marty Brennaman) before being hired by Diamondbacks founder Jerry Colangelo in 1996, two years before the team would begin play.
In October 2006, Brennaman left the Diamondbacks to call games with his father for the Reds beginning in 2007, signing a four-year deal.
On November 1, 2006, the team announced that the TV voice of the Milwaukee Brewers since 2002, Daron Sutton, would be hired as the Diamondbacks primary TV play-by-play voice. Sutton was signed to a five-year contract with a team option for three more years. Sutton's signature chants included "let's get some runs" when the D-backs trail in late innings.
Former Diamondbacks and Chicago Cubs first baseman Mark Grace and knuckleballer Tom Candiotti were the Diamondbacks primary color analysts for the 2006 and 2007 seasons. Former Diamondbacks third baseman Matt Williams also did color commentary on occasion, as did Cardinals and NBC broadcast legend Joe Garagiola, a longtime Phoenix-area resident and father of Joe Garagiola Jr., the first GM of the Diamondbacks.
The Diamondbacks announced in July 2007 that for the 2008 season, all regionally broadcast Diamondbacks TV games would be shown exclusively on Fox Sports Arizona (now Bally Sports Arizona) and a few could possibly be shown on the national MLB on Fox telecasts. Bally Sports Arizona is seen in 2.8 million households in Arizona and New Mexico. The previous flagship station since the inaugural 1998 season was KTVK (Channel 3), a popular over-the-air independent station (and former longtime ABC affiliate) in Phoenix.
From 2009 to 2012, Grace and Sutton were tagged as the main broadcasters of the Diamondbacks with pre-game and postgame shows on Fox Sports Arizona, being hosted by Joe Borowski.
On June 21, 2012, Sutton was suspended indefinitely amid rumors of insubordination. On August 24, the team announced that Grace had requested an indefinite leave of absence after being arrested for his second DUI in less than two years. Grace was later indicted on four DUI counts.) For the remainder of the 2012 season, Sutton was replaced by Greg Schulte (Jeff Munn replaced Schulte on the radio broadcast) and Grace was replaced by Luis Gonzalez. At the end of the 2012 season, the team announced that neither Sutton nor Grace would return for the 2013 season.
On October 18, 2012, the team announced that Bob Brenly would return as a broadcaster to replace Grace and that he would be joined by then-ESPN personality Steve Berthiaume.
The English language flagship radio station is KTAR. Greg Schulte was the regular radio play-by-play voice, a 25-year veteran of sports radio in the Phoenix market, also well known for his previous work on Phoenix Suns, Arizona Cardinals and Arizona State University (ASU) broadcasts. It was announced in February 2023 that he would be retiring after the 2023 MLB season. He would call games with analyst Tom Candiotti.
Jeff Munn served as a backup radio play-by-play announcer until 2016; he served as the regular public address announcer at Chase Field in the early days of the franchise. He previously served as the public address announcer for the Suns in the 1990s at what became Footprint Center. He is also the play-by-play radio voice for ASU women's basketball. Mike Ferrin served in the same role for six years before parting ways with the team, and he was replaced by Chris Garagiola in December 2021.
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Spanish broadcasts
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Spanish broadcasts
The flagship Spanish language radio station is KHOV-FM 105.1 with Oscar Soria, Rodrigo López, and Richard Saenz.
Games were televised in Spanish on KPHE-LP—with Oscar Soria and Jerry Romo as the announcers, but this arrangement ended prior to the 2009 season due to the team switching fully to Fox Sports Arizona and the lack of carriage of KPHE-LP on the Cox cable system.
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Achievements
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Achievements
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Baseball Hall of Famers
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Baseball Hall of Famers
thumb|upright=1.1|Randy Johnson (Hall of Famer) pitching for the Arizona Diamondbacks.
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Ford C. Frick Award recipients
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Ford C. Frick Award recipients
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Arizona Sports Hall of Fame
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Arizona Sports Hall of Fame
thumb|upright|OF Luis Gonzalez (1999–2006)
Diamondbacks in the Arizona Sports Hall of FameNo.NamePositionTenureNotes — Jerry Colangelo Owner 1998–2004 20 Luis Gonzalez LF 1999–2006 38 Curt Schilling P 2000–2003 Grew up in Phoenix, attended Yavapai College 51 Randy Johnson P 1999–20042007–2008 17 Mark Grace 1B 2001–2003 Diamondbacks Broadcaster from 2004 – 2012 — Derrick Hall Executive 2005–present Attended Arizona State University — Roland Hemond Executive 1996–20002007–2017
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Arizona Diamondbacks Hall of Fame
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Arizona Diamondbacks Hall of Fame
+KeyYearYear inducted BoldMember of the Baseball Hall of Fame Member of the Baseball Hall of Fame as a Diamondback BoldRecipient of the Hall of Fame's Ford C. Frick Award
Arizona Diamondbacks Hall of FameYearNo. Name Position(s) Tenure2024 20 Luis Gonzalez LF 1999–2006 51 Randy Johnson P 1999–20042007–2008
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Award Winners
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Award Winners
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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[[Cy Young Award]]
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Cy Young Award
Randy Johnson – 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002
Brandon Webb – 2006
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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[[Major League Baseball Rookie of the Year Award
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NL Rookie of the Year Award
Corbin Carroll – 2023
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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[[Major League Baseball Manager of the Year Award
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NL Manager of the Year Award
Bob Melvin – 2007
Kirk Gibson – 2011
Torey Lovullo – 2017
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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[[Hank Aaron Award]]
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Hank Aaron Award
Paul Goldschmidt – 2013
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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[[Roberto Clemente Award]]
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Roberto Clemente Award
Curt Schilling – 2001
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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[[Gold Glove Award]]
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Gold Glove Award
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Arizona Diamondbacks
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Pitcher
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Pitcher
Zack Greinke – 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019
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Subsets and Splits
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