UAC 2026, Fragments & Dispatches from the United Astrology Conference
[Image: Joey Cannizzaro reading Elly Higgins' and Duna Haller's brilliant astrological zine about Sylvester and the queerness of disco juxtaposed with a b&w foggy view of downtown Chicago]
UAC is a truly massive astrology conference that only happens every 4 years and brings every sub-discipline in the field together in one place, for a marathon of brilliant talks. In only a few days, I went to almost 20 lectures, including a 4 hour workshop by Demetra George that I attended as her assistant teacher.
I also want to take a moment to celebrate the fact that Demetra was awarded one of the highest honors that's given to any astrologer in our community: the Regulus Lifetime Achievement Award! She was also the first to win two Regulus awards in one night, since she was also honored with the Regulus Award for Education. Getting to be with my closest teacher in her moment of exaltation was a sublime experience, and I'm so endlessly grateful to her for all she's contributed to the world (and to my own development as an astrologer, teacher, and human being!).
Since my brain has been pulverized by new information, and the new moon has arrived, rather than write something coherent about my experience, I’ve decided to take a couple lines from my notes for each lecture that I attended and string them together: a kind of cut-up poem of dispatches from the world of thoughts I was marinating in this past weekend. Feel free to message me and ask what the hell I’m talking about if something here catches your eye! If I know what I’m on about, I’ll tell you.
First, I’m excited to share the list of talks I attended! Each one was incredibly mentally stimulating and worthwhile, so do check out the speakers if you don’t know them already, and you can even purchase the individual talks if there’s one you’re dying to see based on the description.
TALKS I ATTENDED:
Demetra George — Hellenistic Aspects and Rays of Light
Chani Nicholas — The Future Is Collective: The Pluto in Aquarius Era
Dorian Greenbaum — The Origins of Questions in Astrology
Ryhan Butler — Beneath a Blessed Blade: Surgery and Astrology
Cameron Cassidy — Heliacal Transits: Planet & Star Phases Through the Houses
Demetra George — How Hellenistic Astrology Came to America
Janay Anthony — The Astrology of Disability Justice
Jenn Zahrt — Holographic Progressions
Joli Knott — The Third Day Moon
Demetra George — Hellenistic Astrologer Asteroids
Christopher Warnock — A World Filled with Spirits: Celestial Priests & the Devotional Practice of Astrological Magic
Amy Angelo — Mercury as a Functional Malefic
Nadia Anderson — Drawing Down the Moon: Eclipse Prediction and Astrology’s Lost Histories
Bear Ryver — Another Method of Years from Seuthes, the School of Hermeias
Drew Levanti — Turn by Turn: Eventful Mixtures in Annual Profections
Jose Manuel Redondo — Neoplatonic Astrology: Contemplation and the Metaphysics of Astrology
Dorian Greenbaum — Planetary Lots: Their History and Use
DISPATCHES & FRAGMENTS (a few lines from my notes for each talk in no particular order; message me to ask which talk a line is from if you’re itching to know):
Opsis ray sees, Aktis ray reflects
Hylomorphism! (dual matter)
Al-Kindi: ray-based astral magic
in ancient Babylonia, astrological delineations would be refined through extispicy
slaves were allowed to ask the oracle of Dadona questions
ancient divination tool called a lituus, a crooked wand used by augers
I gotta read Astral Magic in Babylonia by Erica Reiner!
“if/then” format is central to oracles (and ancient katarchic astrology)
Hephaistio uses dodecatemoria for katarche! especially for “thought reading” of client
Full moons can be good for eye surgery
I agree with using the check-in time at the hospital for a surgery election; my logic is that the first breath you take after entering the hospital is the “birth:” of your surgical experience, just like your first breath out of the womb sets your natal chart
“a star dies and a start lives every decade”
Aratus (3rd C. BCE), The Phenomenon was the most read poem in antiquity after The Iliad and The Odyssey (Demetra says I have the asteroid Aratus conjunct my sun)
Homodrome! = planets tethered to the sun (Mercury and Venus)
Bill Johnston was an under-appreciated core member of Project Hindsight
Phase arc morphology!
Dorotheus, Valens, and more evaluated the position of the moon on the third day after birth; “lactogenesis” (transition from colostrum to milk) usually happens around the third day!
Empedocles was also an ecstatic healer
Al-ʻIjliyyah bint al-ʻIjliyy was a famous maker of astrolabes in 10th century Baghdad
“The world we see is the world that sees through us”
marsupials vs placental mammals: tasmanian wolf fills similar role to other wolves, even though they have no common ancestors… the world of forms is like an ice tray we are poured into
malefic Mercury caused harm to Bruce Lee (back injury) to force him to write
Mars-Mercury contacts make sluts who like Sorcerers (Valens I think lol)
“brain enema”! (award for best Freudian slip goes to Amy)
"in ancient Babylonia, eclipses were an issue of state security”
Agloanice of Thessaly: first documented woman astrologer (maybe as early as 5th C. BCE!)
It's said that she was drawing down the moon! probably eclipse prediction. was seen as a threat to those with power (duh, imagine these witch women who can make a king-killing astral event happen at will!)
Thessaly in northern Greece allied with Persia in the second Persian war, so it’s super likely they learned some astrology and even eclipse prediction from them
Nadia’s grid of eclipse dates reminds me of Babylonian zig-zag astronomy
Plutarch says that the moon is the domain of Hekate (using the word for “domain” that can also be translated as “Lot!”)
Was Valens Orphic? gotta re-read that essay Critodemus, Orphic Astrologer
Passage from Valens that Bear mentions: “Since the Ancient Poet, the wise man devoted to the Muses, has hypothesized two Strifes, one of which is warlike and frightful, delighting in bloodshed, pain, death, battles, hatred, and afflicting crises; the other of which is a hard worker and a lover of beautiful things, peaceful and not unpleasant in her works because she transforms work into pleasure.” (two sides of Mars? he’s talking about Hesiod’s dual Eris)
The technique from Seuthes that Bear is reconstructing can result in a personal clock of two-hours per sign, could work well for personalized elections and horary
It’s possible to do continuous profections, not just discrete jumps from sign to sign! (1° = 12 ⅙ days = 2.5 degrees per month)
WHOA, so in this system, every month becomes a dodecatemoria (2.5 degrees), which means we cycle through our entire chart throughout the year, month-by-month, passing through one dodecatemoria at a time!! I cannot wait to explore this method…can’t find anyone who has done it yet
“Plato’s Laws: The true priest is the mantis” !!! (remember to bring Nadia her mantis omen!)
Mystagogue!
in Plotinus’ commentary on Timaeus he perfectly describes astrology as a language
in Neoplatonism, diánoia (rational discourse) secondary to noesis (intuition) “nous being superior to logos”
I gotta add the 4 levels of matter in Neoplatonism to my work on the different 4-tiered ancient systems that can be grafted onto Zodiacal Releasing (even though the stoic hierarchy of matter is still cooler imo haha):
LVL 1: One-God (hen)
LVL 2: Intellect (nous)
LVL 3: Soul (physis)
LVL 4: Matter (hyle)
The four earliest lots (Dorian calls them the Egyptian Lots) all mirror each other, since their formulae are interdependent: Lot of Fortune, Lot of Daimon, Lot of Eros, Lot of Necessity
TALKS I WANTED TO SEE BUT MISSED (to attend another talk or because they were at capacity):
Rowan Oliver — Queering Synastry: Reading Relationships Beyond the Binary
Gray Crawford — Archetypal Narratives: Transitions and Turning Points in Zodiacal Releasing
Kelly Surtees — Activate Aspects with Ancient Timing: Work with the Minor Years and Ascensional Times
Cameron Cassidy — Uncovering the Stellar Wisdom of Egyptian Temple Ceilings
Camille Michelle Gray — Planets in Debility: The Marginalized Experience
Renn Butler — Archetypal Astrology and Psychedelic Therapy
Jenn Zahrt — Best Practices in Qualitative Astrological Research
Nina Gryphon — Introduction to Astrological Magic
Kira Sutherland — Food: A Journey through the 12 Houses in Medical Astrology
Nina Gryphon — The Philosophy of Theurgy
Jason Holley — The Place of Deepest Night
Jaime Paul Lamb — Introduction to Daimonic Astrology
Leisha Schaim — Chronic Illness & Disability in Client-Centered Practice
Cameron Allen — The Luminaries in Medical Astrology
Christopher Renstrom — Gavin Arthur: Queer Astrology Pioneer
Jason Holley — Living Astrologies: How We Can Play
Patrick Watson — The Babylonian Goal Year
Christopher Warnock — Telesmanica: Advanced Theory and Practice of Astrological Magic
Kyle Pierce — Secret No More: The Essential Role of Antiscia in Astrology
