Program on Psychedelics, Spirituality, and Religion (2021-2026)

Are psychedelics going to save religion? What ethical and moral questions surround psychedelic use, especially for substances which have roots in ancient or indigenous traditions? Who gets to decide what is real vs. hallucination—and how do psychedelics challenge our answers?  

Organized and facilitated by Jeffrey Breau and Paul Gillis-Smith, then 3rd-year Master of Divinity students. 

Fall 2023

1) Introduction to “Psychedelics: Sacred and Subversive” 

Christopher Partridge, “Technologies of Transcendence,” in High Culture: Drugs, Mysticism, and the Pursuit of Transcendence in the Modern World (Oxford, 2018).

Nese Devenot et. al., “Dark Side of the Shroom: Erasing Indigenous and Counterculture Wisdoms with Psychedelic Capitalism, and the Open Source Alternative,” Anthropology of Consciousness 33, no. 2 (2022): 476-505.

Ron Cole-Turner, “Psychedelic Mystical Experience: A New Agenda for Theology,” Religions 13, no. 5 (2022): 385.

Optional:

• Partridge, “Revolution in the Head,” in High Culture.
• Mat Keel, “Neuro-plastic Shamanism? Towards a Political Ontology of Whiteness and the Psychedelic Zeitgeist,” Anthropology of Consciousness 33, no. 2 (2022): 412-442. 

2) Psychedelic Underground: New Religious Movement?

Damon R. Bach, “Vibrations across the Nation: The Expansion of the Counterculture, 1967 to 1970,” in The American Counterculture: A History of Hippies and Cultural Dissidents (University Press of Kansas, 2020).

Amanda Lucia, “Introduction,” in White Utopias: The Religious Exoticism of Transformational Festivals
(University of California Press, 2020).

Arun Saldanha, “Freaking Whiteness, The Molecular Revolution,” in Psychedelic White: Goa Trance and the Viscosity of Race (University of Minnesota Press, 2007). 

Optional:

• Mike Marinacci, “Native American Church: Trouble and Triumph on the Long Peyote Road,” “Psychedelic Venus Church: Sex, Drugs, and the Goddess of Ecstasy,” in Psychedelic Cults and Outlaw Churches: LSD, Cannabis, and Spiritual Sacraments in Underground America (Park Street Press, 2023).
• Bach, “Introduction,“ in The American Counterculture.
• Graham St. John, Global Tribe: Technology, Spirituality and Psytrance (Equinox, 2012).

3) Psychedelics and metaphysics

Peter Sjöstedt-Hughes, “On the need for metaphysics in psychedelic therapy and research,” Frontiers in Psychiatry 14 (2023). 

Sjöstedt-Hughes, “White Sun of Substance: Spinozism and the Psychedelic amor dei intellectualis,” in Philosophy and Psychedelics: Frameworks for Exceptional Experience ed. Christine Hauskeller and Peter Sjöstedt-Hughes (Bloomsbury, 2022). 

Michael Halewood, “Making Your Soul Visible,” Philosophy and Psychedelics.

4) Psychedelic Spirituality as Drug Spirituality

Mike Jay, “Twice Born” and “Epilogue: After Drugs,” in Psychonauts: Drugs and the Making of the Modern Mind (Yale, 2023).  

Carl Hart, “Psychedelics: We are One,” in Drug Use for Grown-Ups: Chasing Liberty in the Land of Fear (Penguin Random House, 2022). 

Optional:

• Elizabeth Kelly Gray, “Federal Regulation Begins, 1875-1914,” in Habit Forming: Drug Addiction in America, 1776-1914 (Oxford, 2022).
• Chris Elcock, “Building Utopia: Nina Graboi, the East Village, and the Psychedelic Counterculture,” in Psychedelic New York: A History of LSD in the City (McGill Queen's University Press, 2023).

• “Talking to PCP Advocate Timothy Wyllie,” Hamilton's Pharmacopeia (Vice, 2016). 

5) Psychedelics and Healing

Hil Malatino, “After Negativity: On Whiteness and Healing,” in Side Affects: On Being Trans and Feeling Bad (University of Minnesota Press, 2022).

Christine Hauskeller, “Individualization and Alienation in Psychedelic Psychotherapy,” in Philosophy and Psychedelics.  

Nicolas Langlitz et al, “Moral psychopharmacology needs moral inquiry: the case of psychedelics,” Frontiers in Psychiatry 12 (2021).

6) Global Histories

Expanding Mindscapes: A Global History of Psychedelics ed. Erika Dyck and Chris Elcock (MIT Press, 2023), pick any chapter!

Spring 2024

For this semester, readings were provided as "choose your own adventure." Discussion was based on the theme of the week and informed by the material selected by participants.

1) Decolonizing psychedelic research and practice

Christine Hauskeller et al, “Decolonization is a metaphor towards a different ethic. The case from psychedelic studies,” Interdisciplinary Science Reviews 48, no. 5 (2023).

Yuria Celidwen et al, “Ethical principles of traditional Indigenous medicine to guide western psychedelic research and practice,” The Lancet Regional Health 18 (2023). 

Timothy Vilgiate, “From Rubber Adulterant to Ceremonial Psychedelic: Voacanga Africana in the transnational imagination, 1894-2018,” in Expanding Mindscapes: A Global History of Psychedelics ed. Erika Dyck and Chris Elcock (MIT Press, 2024).  

Keith Williams et al, “Indigenous Philosophies and the ‘Psychedelic Renaissance,’” Anthropology of Consciousness 33, no. 2 (2022): 506-527.

2) God dons a labcoat: measuring mysticism, quantifying the divine, and the "problem" of subjective experience in clinical research

Yvan Beaussant and Kabir Nigam, “Expanding Perspectives on the Potential for Psychedelic-Assisted Therapies to Improve the Experience of Aging,” The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry 31, no. 1 (2023): 54-57.

William Richards, “Introduction,” in Sacred Knowledge: Psychedelics and Religious Experiences (Columbia University Press, 2016).

Rick Strassman, “The psychedelic religion of mystical consciousness [book review of Sacred Knowledge],” Journal of Psychedelic Studies 2, no. 1 (2018).

Jeffrey Breau and Paul Gillis-Smith, “Psychometric Brahman, Psychedelic Science: Walter Stace, transnational Vedanta, and the Mystical Experience Questionnaire,” Interdisciplinary Science Reviews 48 (2023).

3) Whither integration? What are we integrating, where did this post-experience category come from, and how are we even supposed to do it?

Janis Phelps, “Developing Guidelines and Competencies for the Training of Psychedelic Therapists,” Journal of Humanistic Psychology 57, no. 5 (2017).

Alex Belser et al, “Patient Experiences of Psilocybin-Assisted Psychotherapy: An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis,” Journal of Humanistic Psychology 57, no. 4 (2017).

Rachel Harris, “What the hell is integration anyway?” in Swimming in the Sacred: Wisdom from the Psychedelic Underground (New World Library, 2023).

Oregon Health Authority, “333-333-3050: Psilocybin Training Program Core Requirements,” along with any mention of integration on this page (of which there are 38). 

4) What to do about ayahuasca: some questions about the South American brew(s)

Frédérique Apffel-Marglin and Randy Chung-Gonzales, "Part 2," in Initiated by the Spirits: Healing the Ills of Modernity through Shamanism, Psychedelics and the Power of the Sacred (Green Fire Press, 2022).

André van der Braak, “Introduction” and “Religiosity as Engaging with Beings of Religion,” in Ayahuasca as Liquid Divinity: An Ontological Approach (Lexington Books, 2023).

5) Psychedelics and creativity

Emily Lordi, “The Radical Experimentation of Black Psychedelia,” The New York Times Style Magazine, February 10, 2022. 

Sam Gandy et al, “Psychedelics as potential catalysts of scientific creativity and insight,” Drug Science, Policy and Law 8 (2022).

Nese Devenot and George Erving, “Psychedelic literary studies and the poetics of disruption,” Frontiers in Psychology 14 (2023). 

6) Psychedelics and epistemic justice: a debate

Eduardo Schenberg and Konstantin Gerber, “Overcoming epistemic injustices in the biomedical study of ayahuasca: Towards ethical and sustainable regulation,” Transcultural Psychiatry 59, no. 5 (2022). 

Beatriz Labate et al, “On epistemic injustices, biomedical research with Indigenous people, and the legal regulation of ayahuasca in Brazil: The production of new injustices?” Transcultural Psychiatry 59, no. 5 (2022).

Eduardo Schenberg and Konstantin Gerber, “Epistemic losses, cultural exclusions, and the risk of biopiracy in the globalization of ayahuasca: A reply to Labate et al,” Transcultural Psychiatry 59, no. 5 (2022).
 

Led by CSWR Visiting Scholar Christine Hauskeller, this series of six workshops explores the intersection of decolonial theory and psychedelic ethics. We will examine power dynamics within the evolving field of psychedelic studies, focusing on conflicts between diverse knowledge systems and practices. Beginning with an overview of decolonial concepts, we'll progress through critical analyses of clinical research, aesthetic representations, and the commodification of psychedelic experiences. The final sessions will focus on those objectified by colonizing practices in the psychedelic space namely plants and animals, indigenous groups, and underground practitioners.

Adopting a Decolonial Lens: Rethinking Psychedelic Ethics

This opening session will provide a comprehensive overview of decolonial approaches to psychedelic ethics, why it matters and the current state of discussion in psychedelic studies. We will explore key concepts from decolonial theory and their application to psychedelic studies, reading the open-access article "Decolonization is a metaphor towards a different ethic. The case from psychedelic studies" (Hauskeller et al. 2022). 

Readings: 

1. Celidwen, Y., Redvers, N., Githaiga, C. et al. (2023) Ethical principles of traditional Indigenous medicine to guide western psychedelic research and practice, The Lancet Regional Health - Americas, Volume 18
2. Hauskeller C. et al. 2022, Decolonization is a Metaphor for a Different Ethic. 

The Power of Knowledge – Decolonizing the Clinical Gaze

The medical sector is a powerful institution in contemporary society. The way in which psychedelics are currently filtered through scientific processes and procedures is creating a specific kind of expertise and knowledge. However, the medicalization of psychedelics can also be read as a contradiction in terms. The session will discuss how the standardization of psychedelic experiences in clinical settings can be seen as a form of colonization, potentially erasing or delegitimizing other ways of knowing. We will analyze the ongoing debates within clinical teams about standards for researching these substances and experiences. Recommended preparatory reading includes the relevant chapter in the book "Philosophy and Psychedelics."

Reading(s): Please reflect on how of the clinical article approaches its subject, what its approach highlights, what it takes for granted, and what it renders invisible: 

1. van Elk M, Fried E.I. History repeating: guidelines to address common problems in psychedelic science. Therapeutic Advances in Psychopharmacology. 2023;13.
2. If you want to read some more, I suggest Hauskeller, C. (2022). Individualization and Alienation in Psychedelic Psychotherapy. In C. Hauskeller & P. Sjöstedt-Hughes (Ed.). Philosophy and Psychedelics: Frameworks for Exceptional Experience (pp. 107–132). London: Bloomsbury Academic.

Aesthetics and Experience: Decolonizing Psychedelic Representations

The workshop will examine the commodification of psychedelic art and its potential impact on individual experiences. We explore the sensory and aesthetic dimensions of psychedelic experiences and their ethical implications. We discuss two contrasting perspectives: first, the possible molding or alienation of experiences through research designs and questionnaires; second, the impact of artistic representations of psychedelic experiences on public perceptions and expectations. We will also address the ethical responsibilities in communicating about psychedelic experiences, particularly in therapeutic contexts where unmet expectations can lead to distress. The session will touch on historical perspectives, such as Herbert Marcuse's views on psychedelics' potential for social change and consider how these ideas relate to contemporary psychedelic culture.

Material and Readings:

1. https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/articles/inside-the-johns-hopkins-psilocybin-playlist
2. Kaelen M, Giribaldi B, Raine J, et al. The hidden therapist: evidence for a central role of music in psychedelic therapy. Psychopharmacology (Berl). 2018 Feb 235(2):505-519. doi:10.1007/s00213-017-4820-5.

Study playlists listening to (https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/articles/2021/02/playlist-for-a-psychedelic-journey and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JYsn76ALfrw

And also Luna L.E., https://www.overdrive.com/media/677389/songs-the-plants-taught-us

Respecting Nature - Relationships with Plants and Animals in Psychedelic Cultures

This workshop examines the ethical implications of bioprospecting and commodification of psychedelic plants and animals. We will explore concepts like Terra Nullius and the "doctrine of discovery" that have historically justified the appropriation of natural and indigenous resources.  We will explore how the medicalization and commercialization of psychedelics often exploit nature and discuss the institutional systems that have been designed to secure this power relation, such as patent laws and intellectual property regimes continuing colonial patterns of domination. Yet, there are also new forms of cultivation and economic relations emerging, for instance in peyote farming. We'll consider tensions between indigenous and Western engagements with nature and address "natural" versus "synthetic" substances in psychedelic research.

Readings:

Look up : https://www.decriminalizenature.org/about

1. Kettner H, et al. (2019): From Egoism to Ecoism: Psychedelics Increase Nature Relatedness in a State-Mediated and Context-Dependent Manner. Int J Environ Res Public Health. Vol 16(24):5147.
2. Luis Eduardo Luna (2011) Indigenous and mestizo use of ayahuasca. An overview. The Ethnopharmacology of Ayahuasca, 2011: 1-21 ISBN: 978-81-7895-526-1 

Respecting Indigenous Knowledges and Practices in the Commodification of Psychedelics

This workshop focuses on the complex intersections between the rich and diverse indigenous uses of psychedelics and Western interests. Past actions from the colonial powers in the Americas prosecuting peyote-using women in the 1500s to the transactions Gordon R Wasson conducted with Maria Sabina, exploitation and oppression seem to shape transcultural encounters. The contemporary psychedelic tourism industry is another problematic case in point. In this session we'll discuss the ethical considerations surrounding the use of traditional knowledge in modern contexts, and the role of another set of dualism, namely "scientific" versus "traditional" and "spiritual". We'll also address the right of refusal and the importance of indigenous control over research involving their practices and knowledge. In recent developments indigenous scholars and practitioners discuss how they can ethically share their expertise and practices and thus remodel the power dynamics between Western and indigenous knowledge holders concerning psychedelics.

Countercultural Expertise: The Role of Psychedelic Subcultures

Our final workshop delves into the rich history and knowledge base of psychedelic subcultures, examining how these communities have developed their own forms of expertise outside mainstream institutions. We will explore the validity of experiential knowledge in psychedelic contexts, such as that of experienced ravers. We will explore how the current "psychedelic renaissance" relates to earlier waves of Western interest in psychedelics, and how subcultural knowledge is often marginalized in the push for medicalization and professionalization. The session will examine the tension between the individualized, commodified approach to psychedelics in much current research and the more communal, spiritual, or countercultural approaches found in many subcultures. We'll discuss how to acknowledge and respect diverse forms of psychedelic knowledge and practice without falling into problematic dualisms or perpetuating colonial power structures.

This reading group was organized and facilitated by Tristan Angieri, then MTS student at Harvard Divinity School. How does psychedelic experience influence the perception of art and beauty? What role does aesthetics play in the psychedelic experience, and how does it impact ethical considerations? This reading and learning group will explore these questions and more, focusing on the relationship between psychedelics, aesthetics, and ethics. 

Fall 2024

1) Representing extraordinary perceptions

2) Clinical mind games

3) Passing hash

4) What makes the mushrooms speak?

5) Who needs drugs?

Spring 2025

1) Soma in the Rig Veda

2) Flowers and Toads in the Archaeological Record

3) Altered States and Aleister Crowley's Occultism

4) Deleuzian Psychedelic Sobriety

5) Raving, Dancing, Trancing

6) Pranayama, Breathwork, CO₂

The Psychedelics Beyond Psychedelics reading group was organized and facilitated by Emily Lippold-Cheney (MDiv II), Paula Ortiz (MDiv III), and Lila Rimalovski (MDiv II). The reading group explored the ways in which psychedelic experiences without ingestion of psychedelic substances might offer the field of Psychedelic Studies a holistic and just approach to transcendence, healing, and divine connection. In doing so, we sought to engage across disciplines in order to weird, queer, and transcend the definitions and frameworks that we may have consciously and unconsciously imposed upon our understanding of what is and isn’t “psychedelic.” We examined modalities of transcendence–such as sound, childbirth, divination, and clowning–to explore capacities, practices, and potentials that are core to human and non-human cultures. We brought these topics into conversation with the psychedelic humanities by bringing the ideas they offer to the current landscape of the field, while using frameworks core to Psychedelic Studies in our examination of these topics (e.g. set and setting, medical ontologies).

Fall 2025

1) Introduction to the Psychedelic Humanities

Defining the discipline:

Jeffrey Kripal, The Superhumanities: Historical Precedents, Moral Objections, New Realities (University of Chicago Press, 2022), Chapter 1.

J Halberstam, The Queer Art of Failure (Duke University Press, 2011), Introduction.

Ethics and politics:

Christine Hauskeller et al., "Decolonization is a metaphor towards a different ethic. The case from psychedelic studies," Interdisciplinary Science Reviews 48, no. 5 (2023): 732-751.

Unidos de Médicos Indígenas Yageceros de la Amazonía Colombiana (UMIYAC), "Declaration about cultural appropriation from the spiritual authorities, representatives and indigenous organizations of the amazon region" (2019). 

Yuria Celidwen et al., "Ethical principles of traditional Indigenous medicine to guide western psychedelic research and practice," The Lancet Regional Health 18 (2023).

Bridge:

Nicolas Langlitz, "What good are psychedelic humanities?" Frontiers in Psychology 14 (2023). 

2) Shamanism

Wilma Mahua Campos and Samantha Black, "Wilma Mahua Campos, Shipibo Ayahuasquera," Chacruna (2021). 

Mircea Eliade, Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy (Princeton University Press, 1974), Chapter 1. (a summary of Eliade, prepared by Emily Lippold-Cheney)

Evgenia Fotiou, "The role of Indigenous knowledges in psychedelic sciences," Journal of Psychedelic Studies 4, no. 1 (2019): 16-23. 

Jane C. Hu, "Shamanism and psychedelics: 5 Questions for Manvir Singh," The Microdose (June 16, 2025). 

Alex Gearin, Global Ayahuasca: Wondrous Visions and Modern Worlds (Stanford University Press, 2024), "Global Shamanic Tourism in Peru."

Eric Mortensen, "The Ongoing Harm of the Term Shamanism: From Problematic Scholarly Misnomer to Evolving Cultural Appropriation," Uses and Abuses of Power in Alternative Spiritualities Conference, Cambridge, MA, 2023. 

3) Ecological Kinship

Yuria Celidwen & Dacher Keltner, "Kin relationality and ecological belonging: a cultural psychology of Indigenous transcendence," Frontiers in Psychology 14 (2023).

Hannes Kettner et al., “From Egoism to Ecoism: Psychedelics Increase Nature Relatedness in a State-Mediated and Context-Dependent Manner,” International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 16, no. 24 (2019).

Christine E. Webb, "The Most Dangerous Animal on Earth? The One That Forgot It's an Animal," The Next Big Idea Podcast (September 3, 2025). 

ed. John Ryan, Patrícia Vieira, & Monica Gagliano, The Mind of Plants: Narratives of Vegetal Intelligence (Synergetic Press, 2025), “Passionflower” & “Peyote”.

4) Eroticism

Audre Lorde, "Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power" (1984 in Sister Outsider, 1978 as paper delivered at the Fourth Berkshire Conference on the History of Women).

ed. Molly B. Simmons and Emily Marie Passos Duffy, The Holy Hour: An Anthology on Sex Work, Magic, and the Divine (Working Girls Press, 2024), "A Note from the Editors" and "Dreaming the Revolutionary Sacred Whore: Doing the Work of the Goddex" by Britta Love.

Psychedelic Sex Worker Q&A (fieldwork notes by Emily Lippold-Cheney).

Jenny Wade, Transcendent Sex: When Lovemaking Opens the Veil (Pocket Books, 2004), "Why Didn't Anyone Tell Us About This Before? The Dark Side of Transcendent Sex."

5) Sound

María Sabina, Mushroom Ceremony of the Mazatec Indians of Mexico (Folkways Records, 1957).

"Icaros, Shaman Songs & Plant Music: Susana Bustos,” EntheoNation, Visionary Interview Series (July 28, 2016). 

 Marc Shapiro, "Inside the Johns Hopkins Psilocybin Playlist," Johns Hopkins Medicine (October 30, 2020). 

Brandon LaBelle, "Towards Acoustic Justice," Law Text Culture 24, no. 1 (2020): 550-572.

Riya, "Spectator to Spect-actor: Audience Engagement in Augusto Boal’s Theatre of the Oppressed," The Criterion: An International Journal in English 15, no. 3 (June 2024). 

Spring 2026

1) AI/technological advancement

"Erik Davis on technology and myth," TANKtv, Tank Magazine Podcast (November 29, 2024)

Sadie Plant, Zeros + Ones: Digital Women + the New Technoculture (Fourth Estate, 1997), "Cocoons."

Terence McKenna, "Psychedelics in the Age of Intelligent Machines," lecture (April 22, 1999). 

Ursula Franklin, The Real World of Technology (House of Anansi Press, 1992), Chapter 1. 

2) Madness

Wouter Kusters, A Philosophy of Madness trans. Nancy Forest-Flier (MIT Press, 2020), Introduction.

Inside Schizophrenia, "What is Schizophrenia?" (May 29, 2019). 

3) War

Brian Pace, “Jake Angeli: The Psychedelic Guru Who Stormed the Capitol,” Psymposia (January 7, 2021). 

On the historical relationship between psychedelics and war: 

• (stronger focus on policy) Russell Hausfeld, "The Ecstasy of Agony. Part I: A Long Strange Loop," Truthdig (November 1, 2022).
• (includes more first-hand experiences) John Semley, "A Drug Against War: The militarization of Ecstasy," The Baffler 74 (June 2024). 

Dalton Trumbo, johnny got his gun (Citadel, 1939), "Introduction" by Ron Kovic (1990) & Chapters 7-8.

4) Birthing and Mothering

Dana Raphael, The Tender Gift: Breastfeeding (Prentice-Hall, 1973), pp. 15-25, skim 147-161.

Elisabeth Berger Bolaza, “Birth Pleasure: Meanings, Politics, & Practice,” Journal of the Motherhood Initiative 11, no. 1 (2020). [CW: Ina May as problematic elder]

Ellen Dissanyake, “Ritual and Ritualization: Musical Means of Conveying and Shaping Emotion in Humans and Other Animals,” in Music and manipulation: on the social uses and social control of music ed. Steven Brown and Ulrich Voglsten (Berghahn Book, 2006). 

Mariavittoria Mangini and Erika Dyck, "An Interview with Mariavittoria Mangini," Chacruna (September 23, 2020). 

Photos from El Museo del Mundo Maya exhibit: "Parto Bordado," Image description.

5) Grief, Loss, and Death

Judith Butler, The Force of Nonviolence: An Ethico-Political Bind (Verso, 2020), “Nonviolence, Grievability, & the Critique of Individualism."

Martin Prechtel, The Smell of Rain on Dust: Grief and Praise (North Atlantic Books, 2015), "Grief is a Shameless Dreamer & 4: Grief Is Praise."

Kai Cheng Thom, I Hope We Choose Love: A Trans Girl’s Notes From the End of the World (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2019), "Genie, You’re Free: Robin Williams, Mental Health, and the Stories We Tell About Suicide."

Laura Huxley, Letter to Julia and Juliette Huxley (December 8, 1963). [Aldous Huxley's last week of life]

Fiona Low and Mitch Earleywine, "Psychedelic Experiences After Bereavement Improve Symptoms of Grief: The Influence of Emotional Breakthroughs and Challenging Experiences," Journal of Psychoactive Drugs 56, no. 3 (2024): 316-323. 

Yvan Beaussant et al., "Psilocybin-assisted therapy for demoralisation in hospice patients: feasibility, safety and preliminary efficacy," BMJ Supportive and Palliative Care 16, no. 2 (2026): 423-433. 

6) Clowning, and concluding

Viktor Turner, “Liminality and Communitas: Forms and Attributes of Rites of Passage,” in The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (Routledge, 2017). 

Lucy Amsden, “'When they laugh your clown Is coming': learning to be ridiculous in Philippe Gaulier's pedagogy of spectatorship,” Theatre, Dance and Performance Training 7, no, 1 (2016): 4-16. 

Johanna Skibsrud, "Touching the Impossible: A Conversation with Slava Polunin," in Fool (Routledge, 2023). 

This workshop explored the Ludlow-Santo Domingo Library, the world’s largest collection of psychedelic literature, housed at Harvard. It was organized and led by Andrew Green Hannon.

This workshop was designed to support your own encounter, engagement, and exploration with the archive and its materials. The group's explorations were informed by a commitment to multiple ways of knowing: textual, sociological, experiential, and material.

The Ludlow-Santo Domingo collection is extraordinary in its breadth—both geographic and temporal—and in the multitude of religious traditions seen through the lens of drugs. This resource has been at Harvard for some time, but large swaths of it remain virtually untouched.  It has within it materials that range from the new religious movements inspired by psychedelia, including Timothy Leary League for Spiritual Discovery, electronic neo-shamanism of the turn of the twenty-first century, and the contemporary enthusiasm for ayahuasca, to accounts of the religious traditions of the peoples of the Americas around the time of European contact, and the records of colonialism and suppression of Indigenous religious practices. There are also materials from India, Tibet, Nepal, and North Africa, as well as from Jewish and Muslim religious traditions.  

Dr. Hannon holds a PhD in American Studies from Yale University. He has taught history, American Studies, and labor studies at UMASS Boston and Emerson College. His research focuses on performance and politics in the American Counterculture. He is the chief curator of the forthcoming 2027 exhibit, “Let's Take a Trip Together: A Long History of Psychedelics,” at the Houghton Library.

The workshop looked at practical questions of the archive: 

• How do you find archives you are interested in? 
• How do you search online to find aids and databases, and what are the limitations of those tools? 
• How do you authenticate objects and think about the limitations of sources?

The workshop also explored philosophical questions about archival work: 

• What is an archive? 
• What are the ethical issues raised by encountering trip reports, childhood drawings, and psychological profiles? 
• What is the role of class in the creation and maintenance of objects in the historical record?