The shaman and the rave party: social pharmacology of ecstasy.
Substance use & misuse January 1, 2002 Paolo Nencini 17 citations
Current models of drug addiction emphasize how drugs hijack the brain's reward system, focusing on pleasure as a primary cause. By comparing ancient shamanic rituals with modern rave parties, this analysis challenges that assumption. In archaic contexts, drug use served supernatural purposes, not recreation. Only after a fully secular setting for drug use emerged did psychoactive substances fully express their hedonistic potential, a development that occurred gradually.