Book Launch — The World Ayahuasca Diaspora: Reinventions and Controversies

Co-authors Beatriz Labate and Clancy Cavnar will present their new edited publication, The World Ayahuasca Diaspora (2016). Anthropologist Henrique Antunes will provide commentary, and UC Berkeley graduate student Tracy Brannstrom will moderate. The book tackles questions surrounding the rapid expansion of the use of Ayahuasca – a psychoactive sacrament that has long been associated with Amazonian shamanism. In it, scholars discuss the legal issues, economic inequalities, and other controversies tied to its expansion.

Monday, November 28
5 – 7 pm
University of California, Berkeley
221 Kroeber Hall, Gifford Room
More information: tracyb@berkeley.edu

Beatriz Caiuby Labate has a Ph.D. in Social Anthropology from the State University of Campinas (UNICAMP), Brazil. Her main areas of interest are the study of psychoactive substances, drug policy, shamanism, ritual, and religion. She is Visiting Professor at the Center for Research and Post Graduate Studies in Social Anthropology (CIESAS), in Guadalajara, Mexico. She is also co-founder of the Nucleus for Interdisciplinary Studies of Psychoactives (NEIP), and editor of NEIP’s website (http://www.neip.info). She is author, co-author, and co-editor of seventeen books, one special-edition journal, and several peer-reviewed articles. For more information, see: http://bialabate.net/

Clancy Cavnar has a doctorate in clinical psychology (PsyD) from John F. Kennedy University. She currently works at a dual-diagnosis residential drug treatment center in San Francisco and is a research associate of the Nucleus for Interdisciplinary Studies of Psychoactives (NEIP). She combines an eclectic array of interests and activities as clinical psychologist, artist, and researcher. She has a master of fine arts in painting from the San Francisco Art Institute and a master’s in counseling from San Francisco State University. She is author and co-author of articles in several peer-reviewed journals and co-editor, with Beatriz Caiuby Labate, of six books, among them, Ayahuasca Shamanism in the Amazon and Beyond (Oxford University Press, 2014). For more information see: http://www.neip.info/index.php/content/view/1438.html

Henrique Fernandes Antunes is a PhD candidate in Anthropology at the University of São Paulo (USP) and Visiting Scholar in the Anthropology Department at UC Berkeley. Master’s degree in Social Anthropology from the University of São Paulo (2012). Graduated in Social Sciences (2006) and a bachelor in Anthropology (2008) from São Paulo State University (UNESP). Associate researcher at the Brazilian Centre of Analysis and Planning (CEBRAP). Member of the research group “Religion in the Modern World”, coordinated by Professor Dr. Paula Montero. His current research focuses on the debate on the processes of regulation of ayahuasca use for religious purposes in Brazil and in the U.S.A.

Tracy Brannstrom is a graduate student in the department of folklore studies at the University of California, Berkeley. Her interests are centered around folk models of health and consciousness, ritualized use of medicinal plants, and discussions about what constitutes ‘traditional’ medicine. She received a BA in anthropology and philosophy from Mount Holyoke College, and has worked as a newspaper reporter in central Vermont.

Facebook event here