Shamanism

Chemical traces of multiple psychoactive plants, including ayahuasca ingredients, were found in a 1,000-year-old ritual bundle, indicating ancient shamanic use and long-distance exchange.

chemical analysis of archaeological residues Sample size: 1

Argues that Amazonian shamanic rituals, especially ayahuasca use, have been creatively reinvented by displaced indigenous people and rubber tappers to build ethnic alliances and political strategies.

theoretical or philosophical paper

Reviews four paradigms of psychedelic and shamanic healing, highlighting profound differences in worldview, particularly regarding multiple realities and the reality of spirits.

review

Reviews hallucinogenic mushrooms in Mexico, hypothesizing that Psilocybe caerulescens is the ceremonial teonanácatl cited by Sahagún.

review

Participants reported motivations and benefits such as self-knowledge and spiritual development, and scored above the norm on traits like intuition and optimism.

observational study Sample size: 77

Discusses integrative medicine and spirituality in palliative care, noting that many patients are spiritual but not religious, but does not directly address shamanism.

review

EEG and LORETA imaging showed that shamanic trance involves a shift from left analytical to right experiential mode and from anterior prefrontal to posterior somatosensory self-experience.

case study Sample size: 1

Identified 55 plant species used in shamanic initiation and apprenticeship, administered in strict 'dietas' that are fundamental to Amazonian healing practices.

qualitative study Sample size: 36

Proposes that shamanic universals reflect innate brain processes and can provide a biopsychosocial framework for neurotheology and evolutionary theology.

theoretical or philosophical paper

Argues that purging is integral to the therapeutic use of ayahuasca and should be reconsidered for its potential therapeutic effects, not dismissed as a side effect.

ethnography with literature review Sample size: 227

Argues that the romanticization of indigenous peoples in ayahuasca tourism hides the complexity of their situations and erases the injustices they have experienced.

ethnography

Ceremonial ayahuasca use was associated with a large reduction in Neuroticism, as measured by both self-report and informant-report.

observational cohort Sample size: 256

Most medicinal plant species are wild-collected, and while antibacterial activity was common in plants used for infections, a significant proportion of extracts showed toxicity.

qualitative and experimental study

Argues that Native Californian rock art depicts trance-induced mental imagery and somatic hallucinations, and that the shamanistic state often involved unpleasant emotions.

theoretical or philosophical paper

Argues that the 1960s transformation of shamanism's representation in Soviet anti-religious journals reflected a shift in the Soviet atheist project.

historical analysis

Proposes that mental alchemy is a systematic science of consciousness transformation rooted in the Hermetic tradition.

theoretical or philosophical paper

Argues that Easterine Kire's novels employ shamanic spirituality and oral traditions to delink indigenous Naga eco-epistemology from colonial legacies.

theoretical or philosophical paper

Argues that folk shamanic rituals in Tales of Hulan River embody a mechanism of survival resilience across material, spiritual, and cultural dimensions.

theoretical or philosophical paper

Shows that indigenous environmental knowledge in Kerala's sacred groves is motivated by reverential eco-fear and emerges from encounters between humans, forest spirits, multi-faith communities, and local Tantric experts.

mixed methods (textual analysis, oral exegesis, anthropological fieldwork)

Argues that the Corpus Hermeticum's Nous functionally performs roles parallel to Kemetic theological conceptions of a creative and regulating divinity.

interpretive translation and commentary with emic autoethnography and textual-historical analysis

Documents a four-part typology of healing and a Three-Pillar theoretical framework from participant-observation across more than 300 psilocybin ceremonies within the African initiatory tradition.

ethnographic study with participant-observation Sample size: 300

Argues that Ganesha/Pillaiyar is best approached as a threshold principle whose ritual repertoires systematize the work of beginning again, and proposes a 'Spiritual Reparations Paradigm'.

theoretical or philosophical paper with autoethnography

Argues that initiated insider scholarship yields unique access to ritual subtleties and pedagogical nuance often elided in conventional etic studies.

theoretical or philosophical paper

Argues that an emic-experiential articulation of Shiva consciousness can engage in critical conversation with classical Śaiva theology and contemporary science.

theoretical or philosophical paper

Proposes that across multiple spiritual traditions, entheogenic practice shares convergent ritual structures, phenomenological motifs, and an ethical-pedagogical framework.

cross-initiatory inquiry combining emic autoethnography with textual-historical and comparative analysis