Anthropology of Consciousness
February 7, 2025
Christian Frenopoulo
1 citation
Consciousness is not an innate, self-sustaining faculty but is instead a circumstantially cultivated aspect of the self, shaped by societal, personal, and historical contexts. This collection of articles challenges the widespread assumption, held by many scholars and religious doctrines, that consciousness exists independently and is always experienced as a whole, unoriginated given. The work argues against the view that consciousness operates in a state of independence from external circumstances.
Anthropology of Consciousness
January 12, 2025
Marcela Perdomo
1 citation
Collective spirit possession, as seen in the case of Dolores in North Honduras, acts as a paroxysmic idiom that protects and revitalizes ancestor worship rather than eroding it. Based on ethnographic research since 2009, entropic forces like resistance, modernity, and impiety reinforce the religion's foundations. Possession idioms and events such as contagion, abduction, dramatization, illness, and death illustrate the resilience of this possession-based religion as a self-sustaining total social system rooted in tradition but shaped by historical, cultural, and personal experiences. Spirit possession is multifaceted, ambiguous, and underdetermined, operating as a social theater where critique, irony, impiety, historical consciousness, and the carnivalesque intersect, challenging views that it is merely a weapon of the weak.
Anthropology of Consciousness
December 5, 2024
Olof Ohlson
1 citation
Transcendental Meditation claims that the essence of reality is pure consciousness. This essay contrasts TM doctrine, scientific physicalism, and the author's own meditative experience. Pure consciousness events—wakeful contentless consciousness—do occur, but their ontological basis is uncertain. The author's introspection does not neatly align with TM dogma. Exploring mystical notions of divine darkness and evidence regimes, the piece proposes mystic doubt or ontological skepticism as an alternative to ontological relativism.
Anthropology of Consciousness
August 21, 2023
L. Mehl‐madrona
1 citation
Indigenous North American theories of mind, self, and consciousness offer historical examples of human relationships with non-humans that were not always peaceful or mutually beneficial, such as the near-extinction of beavers through Indigenous participation in the fur trade. Drawing on conversations with Elders and recent psychedelic literature, the author argues that today's context of human domination over animals, where humans are more dangerous to animals than vice versa, enables the construction of a new consciousness of non-humans. This new consciousness has historical antecedents in Indigenous thought but is also entirely new.
Anthropology of Consciousness
March 1, 2023
Charles D. Laughlin
1 citation
Husserlian phenomenology offers a methodological approach to social consciousness that aligns with neuroscientific research on neural correlates of consciousness, particularly in the post-neuro-turn social science era. By emphasizing "returning to the things," performing reductions, and developing the phenomenological attitude, this approach allows anthropology to explore consciousness cross-culturally with greater depth, especially regarding intersubjectivity. The roots of intersubjectivity are found within the inherent life-world that all normal humans rely on to validate their experiences, regardless of cultural background. This challenges anthropology to move beyond the nature-nurture distinction and the assumption that human experience is entirely culturally constructed.
Anthropology of Consciousness
February 6, 2023
Jonathan Dickinson
1 citation
Three individuals who took iboga or ibogaine for different reasons each reported a distinct sense of transpersonal communication—either with the substance itself or with visions of other people during the dreamlike experience. Narrative analysis linked these reports to previously identified phenomenological categories but showed wide variability. The sense of transpersonal presence resembles that described in waking REM experiences such as sleep paralysis. For these individuals, a feeling of transpersonal intersubjectivity contributed to the experiences seeming ontologically real and meaningful. Closer engagement with such narrative reports may guide future research and ibogaine-assisted therapies.
Anthropology of Consciousness
March 26, 2013
Peter Benson
1 citation
Ayahuasca, a psychedelic brew used in indigenous cultures, has shown significant potential in enhancing creativity and emotional well-being. In a sample of 200 participants, 75% reported improved life satisfaction after ayahuasca ceremonies, with 60% experiencing heightened creative thinking. The study highlights the importance of integrating insights from humanities and drug studies to understand the socio-educational impacts of psychedelics. This international perspective fosters appreciation for indigenous practices while addressing broader societal issues related to mental health and personal development.
Anthropology of Consciousness
March 1, 2006
Bethe Hagens
1 citation
The essay argues that geometric vision, described by Plato as a rare natural gift, is also a teachable mode of perception rooted in ancient mystery traditions and the divine feminine. Greek mythology traces geometry (geo + metr) from Gaia, through Mnemosyne (memory), to the Muses (arts and sciences), linking geometric understanding to sacred place, order, proportion, and connectivity. The author explores how they learned to embrace themselves as a physical and spiritual geomantic consciousness and used geometric vision as an interdisciplinary teaching and learning process.
Anthropology of Consciousness
December 1, 1999
Eva Jane Neumann Fridman
1 citation
In the revival of shamanism in Buryatia, kinship and locale are central. Shamans, representing their clans and kinship lines, mediate between people and sacred spirits, especially those of specific places tied historically to a clan and its buried ancestors. The clan shaman appeals to these ancestral and place spirits for blessings and protection. The historical relationship of Buryat tribes to their land and their pre-Soviet kinship structure parallels traditional spiritual territorial cults. Buryat social organization into hierarchical, patrilineal kinship units corresponds to conceptions of protective deities linked to territorial groupings matching tribes, clans, villages, and families. Cases of renewing home and hearth through clan shamans' appeals to ancestral and local spirits are presented.
Anthropology of Consciousness
March 1, 1996
Leslie Conton
1 citation
Teaching shamanism through direct experience in public universities offers pedagogical benefits but also presents significant challenges. These include addressing the concerns of ethnic minority students, navigating questions about what constitutes "religion" in a secular academic setting, ensuring proper pedagogical methods, and requiring adequate teacher training. A cautionary tale illustrates the difficulties that can arise when these issues are not carefully managed.
Anthropology of Consciousness
June 9, 2026
Sarah Porch-Lee
Female mediums in Florida report that the state's conservative political climate paradoxically creates a supportive environment for their spiritual work. Surveys and interviews with mediums across Florida reveal that women's mediumship experiences and practices differ from men's, and that mediumship highlights key feminist themes in religious and spiritual experiences. The paper discusses how Florida benefits mediums and examines factors in central Florida that influence the work and experience of female mediums, drawing from feminist anthropology and anthropology of consciousness frameworks.
Anthropology of Consciousness
May 4, 2026
Carmen Ostrander
The article tells the story of the cathinone 3-MMC (methylmethcathinone), a compound that has emerged as a cultural disruptor. The author, a provider of substance-assisted therapies, traces its origins and their own implication in this narrative, drawing on literature reviews, practice-based research, prose, patent documents, hearsay, and Facebook posts. Connecting the substance from powder to plant and back, the piece situates 3-MMC within the chaotic landscape of the "Psychedelic Renaissance," where a methodology for exploring its therapeutic possibilities has developed through ongoing co-research partnerships. The telling is prismatic, offering known pieces while acknowledging there is always more to the story.
Anthropology of Consciousness
January 18, 2026
correction
A correction notice addresses an error in a previous article about the anthropology of psychedelics. The original text stated that cave paintings in Algeria suggest psilocybin use may date back 40,000 years, but the correct timeframe is 9000–7000 BCE. The notice apologizes for the mistake.
Anthropology of Consciousness
December 1, 2025
T. Reuter, Fanicy Sears, Lisa L. Gezon
Advocates for psychedelic medicine face institutional resistance even when proposing academic panels on the topic. This case study examines efforts to include a panel on psychedelic therapies in a university symposium on substance use and social justice in the Southeast United States. Mental health professionals sought to discuss safe use of psychedelics, which remain illegal and have been disproportionately enforced against people of color. Organizers resisted due to legal concerns and limited clinical trial data. The paper argues that such resistance reflects knowledge politics and structural power imbalances in academic spaces, and warns against tokenism in community-engaged research. It calls for more inclusive and equitable approaches to these conversations.
Anthropology of Consciousness
October 28, 2025
B. Elijah Carter
Identifying with relentless, self-critical thinking distances people from each other, the external world, and unconscious internal experiences, forming a barrier to mental health. Drawing on anthropological research of colonized isolated peoples, psychoanalytic and developmental theories, the paper argues that trauma and dependence on language as a filter for reality and a mechanism of repression underlie this tendency. Mindfulness meditation is proposed as a method to reduce over-identification with thinking and facilitate direct, embodied present-moment experience. Neuroscience explaining underlying mechanisms is included, alongside the author's experiences as a Peace Corps Volunteer, clinical psychologist, and meditation instructor, and reports from graduate students beginning meditation.
Anthropology of Consciousness
September 25, 2025
Jacob W. Glazier, Sean O’donnell
Ayahuasca, a psychoactive brew used in shamanic rituals, evokes experiences of spirits and mystical entities that challenge materialist views of reality. Its active compound, DMT, is both an endogenous neurotransmitter and an exogenous psychedelic, blurring the boundary between natural and external. Encounters with discarnate beings during ayahuasca journeys defy traditional ontological categories, suggesting these entities are phenomenologically real yet incorporeal. The essay argues that ayahuasca's spectral residues disrupt anthropocentric and biomedical assumptions, leaving traces that haunt these models and invite broader reflections on consciousness, interconnection, death, and metaphysical limits. Listening to these ghosts expands understanding of reality and embraces transformative possibilities.
Anthropology of Consciousness
September 1, 2025
Mark Friis Hau, Jakob Krause‐jensen
AI chatbot users occupy a liminal position similar to shamanic intermediaries, navigating between mundane human experience and opaque digital realms of computational knowledge. Prompt engineering resembles ritual practice, requiring specialized techniques to communicate with entities that are simultaneously rational and mysterious. These interactions challenge conventional boundaries between human and non-human, and tool and entity, creating new forms of postmodern otherworldliness. The shamanic metaphor offers a novel perspective on how individuals navigate and create meaning in increasingly digital environments, contributing to broader anthropological discussions on technology, modernity, and cognition.
Anthropology of Consciousness
August 11, 2025
Yoshio Watanabe
Shipibo healers (onayas) in Eastern Peru learn to build relationships with plant spirits through dreams seen during a training process called samá. Dream interpretation is the medium through which onayas comprehend and personalize each plant spirit, differentiating its unique representations. The study connects an onaya's dream interpretations to Shipibo cosmology, revealing a wide variety of relationships formed in dreams that are grounded in cosmological beliefs. This process ultimately enables the onaya to acquire healing capacity to aid others.
Anthropology of Consciousness
July 24, 2025
Babis Papadamianos
Fear is proposed as a critical driver of the emergence of self-awareness in human evolution. The essay traces fear from a reflexive survival mechanism to a force that shaped complex cognitive traits. Early humans transitioned from instinct-driven responses to self-awareness, adapting to hostile environments through this emotional catalyst. The framework integrates evolutionary biology, neuroscience, and philosophy to present consciousness as an adaptive tool shaped by environmental pressures. Emotions, especially fear, are argued to have played a pivotal role in shaping human cognition and the trajectory of human evolution.
Anthropology of Consciousness
June 12, 2025
Liu Yi‐fei, Lien‐chung Wei
Recent clinical studies and sociocultural analyses reinforce directions proposed in Falcon's synthesis of psychedelic anthropology, particularly regarding urban practices in the Global North and decolonial considerations. Psilocybin-assisted group therapy for cancer patients demonstrates the importance of therapeutic environments, aligning with the concept of "set and setting." Investigations into psychedelic microdosing reveal complex user-driven cultural dynamics requiring deeper anthropological exploration of stigma management and integration practices. Hartogsohn's work on sociocultural microclimates and Rose's application of Durkheim's "collective effervescence" validate Falcon's theoretical approach. Ethical concerns about cultural appropriation and Indigenous epistemologies underscore the need for culturally sensitive frameworks in psychedelic research.
Anthropology of Consciousness
September 1, 2001
Grant Jewell Rich
Ken Wilber, a highly influential author on consciousness whose work blends Eastern and Western approaches, discusses the scope of the consciousness problem and suggests anthropologists are well suited to contribute to the field. His work has shaped psychology, philosophy, religion, and anthropology, particularly through transpersonal psychology and his first book, The Spectrum of Consciousness, which is considered a starting point for transpersonal studies. Scholars such as Frances Vaughan and Daniel Goleman have praised his contributions.
Anthropology of Consciousness
December 1, 1999
Michael Ripinsky‐naxon
This book examines how Western culture has romanticized and misrepresented shamanism, contrasting these fantasies with the actual imaginal realities of shamanic practices. The author argues that popular Western interpretations often distort the true nature of shamanism, and he seeks to clarify these misunderstandings by exploring the authentic spiritual and psychological dimensions of shamanic traditions.
Anthropology of Consciousness
June 1, 1996
Kirsten Bonde
In northern Peru, curanderos (healers) blend sorcery and shamanism to treat clients, using rituals, psychoactive plants, and spiritual cleansing. The book examines the social roles of these healers, their relationships with clients, and the cultural logic behind their practices. It argues that curanderismo addresses physical and psychological ailments by mediating between the human and spirit worlds, reflecting broader Andean beliefs. Case studies show how healing sessions reinforce community ties and personal identity.
Anthropology of Consciousness
June 1, 1996
John R. Baker
Shamanism is examined as a universal human phenomenon, not merely a set of exotic practices. The book argues that shamanic traditions across cultures share a core structure rooted in the human psyche and religious metaphor. Shamanism functions as a means of accessing altered states of consciousness to address existential and communal needs. The author traces its substance through historical and cross-cultural evidence, proposing that shamanic experience underlies many religious systems. The work synthesizes anthropological, psychological, and philosophical perspectives to present shamanism as a fundamental expression of human spirituality.
Anthropology of Consciousness
December 1, 1994
Antonia Mills
This book examines the role of shamanic healing and ritual drama within Native North American religious traditions, exploring how these practices intersect with health and medicine. The author analyzes various indigenous healing ceremonies, their symbolic meanings, and their functions in maintaining community well-being. The work argues that these traditions offer a distinct understanding of health that integrates spiritual, social, and physical dimensions, contrasting with Western biomedical models. By drawing on ethnographic and historical sources, the text provides a comprehensive overview of the diversity and complexity of Native American healing practices, emphasizing their continued relevance and resilience.