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Future Ayahuasca Care Spaces: An Experimental Speculative Exercise

Pietro Benedito, Isabel Santana de Rose, Emilia Sanabria, Piera Talin

Vibrant Virtual Brazilian Anthropology 2025 DOI: 10.1590/1809-4341.2025v22e00507 (opens in new tab)

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Study at a glance

AI-extracted from the abstract
Characteristics Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed
Topics Ayahuasca
Keywords Conversation Structuring Ambivalence Process computing Space punctuation Psychotherapist Standardization Therapeutic modalities Relation database Speculation
Key points Proposes that speculative methods can help address questions of appropriation, commodification, and standardization of plant medicines in the development of ayahuasca care spaces.

Abstract

Abstract With the rapid advancement of psychedelic-assisted therapy (PAT) trials, psychedelic clinics are set to become a tangible reality in the near future. Questions abound concerning the therapeutic modalities that will be adopted, the human and material infrastructures that will enable the delivery of this novel form of healthcare, and their funding model - which will have direct implications for who can access PATs. In this paper, we reflect on the process of designing, organizing and holding a speculative space to imagine possible future ayahuasca care spaces. Ayahuasca healing practices are (still) mostly indissociable from their ritual settings, placing them in complex and ambivalent relation to “psychedelics” and PATs. Speculation enabled us to collaboratively address questions of appropriation, commodification, standardization and pharmaceuticalization of plant medicines, and explore the more-than-human contours of care. Our goal was to shift the parameters of our interactions with key interlocutors in “the field” in ways that enable co-laboration and co-re-definition. We discuss the process of creating this speculative space of encounter, defining its parameters, and designing the framework within which such a conversation is even possible.

Comparable studies

Other theoretical and historical papers on ayahuasca, most cited first.

Study Year Design Participants
The globalization of ayahuasca: Harm reduction or benefit maximization? 2006 Theoretical or philosophical paper
Ayahuasca Shamanism in the Amazon and Beyond 2014 Theoretical or philosophical paper
The Antipodes of the Mind: Charting the Phenomenology of the Ayahuasca Experience 2003 Theoretical or philosophical paper
Towards psychedelic apprenticeship: Developing a gentle touch for the mediation and validation of psychedelic-induced insights and revelations. 2022 Theoretical or philosophical paper
Ayahuasca healing beyond the Amazon: the globalization of a traditional indigenous entheogenic practice 2008 Theoretical or philosophical paper

Citations in the library

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Ayahuasca Psychedelic-assisted therapy