From Agents to Earth Beings
Annalisa Butticci, Osiris García Cerqueda
Worldviews May 7, 2026 DOI: 10.1163/15685357-bja10001 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Ethnography Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Population | Mazatec healers and communities in Huautla de Jiménez, Sierra Mazateca, Mexico |
| Key findings | Argues that the reported disappearance of sacred Niños Santos mushrooms from Mazatec healing practices signals not only ecological decline but a rupture in human-land-spiritual relations, and proposes that the mushrooms' withdrawal represents an insurgent eco-spirituality that challenges extractive planetary dynamics through Mazatec cosmology and more-than-human lifeworlds. |
Abstract
In Huautla de Jiménez, in the Mexican Sierra Mazateca, sacred mushrooms known as the Niños Santos (Holy Children) are openly sold in the psychedelic tourism market. Yet Mazatec healers lament that these sacred fungi are becoming increasingly difficult to find for healing ceremonies known as veladas . Faced with the extractive logics shaping global psychedelic circuits, the Niños Santos are said to be retreating and at times withholding their healing power. Drawing on multispecies ethnography in the Sierra Mazateca, this article argues that the disappearance of sacred mushrooms signals more than ecological decline. It reflects a rupture, revealing fractured relations among humans, land, local spiritual guardians, and the earth’s vital force. Situating these narratives within longer histories of colonial agriculture, knowledge extraction, and the contemporary psychedelic renaissance, the article suggests that the mushrooms’ withdrawal represents an insurgent eco-spirituality that questions extractive planetary dynamics through Mazatec cosmology and more-than-human lifeworlds.