Research Catalog

Title

Hallucinogens, cross-cultural perspectives / Marlene Dobkin de Rios.

Author

Dobkin de Rios, Marlene

Publication

Albuquerque : University of New Mexico Press, 1984.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

Julio Mario Santo Domingo Collection wid

Description

x, 255 p. : ill.; 24 cm.

Summary

This book surveys the use of mind-altering plants in eleven societies in the Americas, Asia, Australia and New Guinea, ranging from the hunter-gatherers to complex ancient civilizations such as the Inca, the Moche, and the Maya. Those interested in rituals and religions of traditional societies and folk medicine will find a great deal of information in this concise, illustrated volume. Several themes emerge from de Rios's cross-cultural examination of sacred plants. She argues convincingly that plant hallucinogens, which have been used from time immemorial, influenced human evolution. She discusses religious beliefs, including those of shamanism, which may have been influenced by the mind-altering properties of particular plants. She also focuses on the ways in which hallucinogens have influenced ethical and moral systems.

Subject

• Hallucinogenic drugs and religious experience > Cross-cultural studies
• Hallucinogenic plants > Cross-cultural studies
• Cross-Cultural Comparison
• Hallucinogens
• Religion

Genre/Form

Cross-cultural studies

Note

• A duplicate copy of this title was part of the Julio Mario Santo Domingo Collection, but was not retained.
• Includes index.

Bibliography (note)

• Bibliography: p. 221-245.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

pt. Introduction -- pt. 2. Ethnographies -- The Australian aborigines -- The reindeer herdsmen of Siberia -- The plains Indians of North America -- The Nazca fishermen of coastal Peru -- The New Guinea highlanders -- The Mochica of Peru -- The ancient Maya -- The Aztecs of Mexico -- The Inca of Peru -- The Fang of northwestern equatorial Africa -- Urban Amazonian Mestizos of Peru -- pt. 3. Cultural universals and the hallucinogens -- Cross-cultural motifs in the use of hallucinogenic plants -- Summary and conclusions.

ISBN

082630737X :

LCCN

^^^84007244^//r852

OCLC

• 10695084
• SCSB-12265943

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library