'Everybody's creating it along the way': ethical tensions among globalized ayahuasca shamanisms and therapeutic integration practices.
Interdisciplinary science reviews : ISR – January 01, 2023
Source: PubMed
Summary
As traditional Amazonian shamanism meets modern therapy, ayahuasca healing practices are evolving in unexpected ways. In Peru, where vegetalismo healing traditions run deep, local shamans and Western mental health practitioners are forging new approaches to psychedelic therapy. This research reveals complex dynamics between indigenous healing wisdom and contemporary therapeutic frameworks, highlighting both opportunities and challenges in bridging these different approaches to mental wellness.
Abstract
Ayahuasca has a variety of traditional uses, yet there is a growing global interest in its potential therapeutic benefits for mental health conditions. Novel approaches to psychotherapy are emerging to address the needs of ayahuasca users to prepare as well as to guide them in 'integrating' their powerful psychedelic experiences, yet there is little discussion on the ethical frameworks that may structure these therapeutic processes or the social and cultural assumptions that influence the assignment of ayahuasca as a medicine. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in San Martín and Loreto, Peru, I examine the varied social meanings and uses of ayahuasca in the Peruvian vegetalista tradition and the potential ethical tensions among curanderos, mental health practitioners, and ayahuasca retreat centers. Practitioners and ayahuasca centers are left with navigating globalized concepts of mental health and ethics while attempting to remain authentic to local ontologies of healing, care, and safety.