'Everybody's creating it along the way': ethical tensions among globalized ayahuasca shamanisms and therapeutic integration practices.
Interdisciplinary science reviews : ISR January 1, 2023 Olivia Marcus 29 citations
Ayahuasca has diverse traditional uses, but global interest in its therapeutic potential for mental health is growing. New psychotherapeutic approaches aim to prepare users and guide integration of psychedelic experiences, yet ethical frameworks and cultural assumptions underlying ayahuasca's classification as medicine remain underexamined. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in San Martín and Loreto, Peru, the work explores the varied social meanings of ayahuasca within the Peruvian vegetalista tradition and ethical tensions among curanderos, mental health practitioners, and retreat centers. Practitioners navigate globalized mental health concepts while striving to remain authentic to local ontologies of healing, care, and safety.