Speakers from the first annual Entheogenesis Conference
Entheogenesis Conference: Greg
The Importance Of Drugs In Literature 30 Jun 2005 28 min Greg will give a short talk on the importance of drugs in literature and to literary studies. Beginning with Rabelais' Gargantua and Pantagruel , the discussion will concentrate on the importance of drug use in the writing of the following luminaries: Samuel Taylor Coleridge, John Keats, Thomas De Quincey, Charles Baudelaire, Fritz Hugh Ludlow, Jack Kerouac, William S. Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg, Phillip K. Dick, and Hunter S. Thompson. A brief examination of the importance of the study of drug use in contemporary literary studies (especially in the work of Jacques Derrida and Avital Ronnell) will conclude the talk.Greg was born in England and has lived in Vancouver since 1990. He received a First Class Honors B.A. from Simon Fraser University in 1994 and a Master of Arts (English) from SFU in 2004. He is the interested in researching the "rhetoric of drugs" and the author of Crystal Children .
Entheogenesis 2 Conference: Kenneth Tupper
Ayahuasca & the Internet 28 Jun 2005 1 hr 0 min Ayahuasca, an entheogenic tea, was until relatively recently unheard of by most people in modern Western societies, despite a long history of use among indigenous people of the Amazon. The “psychedelic” 1960s saw an explosion of interest in plant-based spiritual healing tools such as cannabis, peyote and psilocybin mushrooms. However, for a variety of reasons, ayahuasca remained known only to a few anthropologists and travelers to remoter regions of South America and was not among the panoply of substances that began to be used recreationally at that time.At the end of the 20 th century, a rapid rise of interest in and use of ayahuasca began outside its native environment. Although some syncretistic religions had been using ayahuasca as a sacrament for a number of decades in Brazil, by the 1990s these practices had spread both to urban centres within Brazil and to communities beyond its borders. At the same time, ayahuasca tourism to Amazonian regions has started to become a significant industry, and assorted plant materials to make home-brewed “anahuasca” mixtures have become readily available online.
Entheogenesis Conference: Prof. Susan Boyd, 'From Witches To Crack Moms'
Drug War Witch Hunt 20 Jun 2005 58 min Susan Boyd will be reading from her new book, From Witches to Crack Moms: Women, Drug Law, and Policy. She will examine how drugs are a source of peace and the current war on drug is a war on any form of consciousness that competes with the ideology of hierarchal power.Susan Boyd is a community activist working with drug user groups and an associate professor in Studies in Policy and Practice at the University of Victoria. She is the author of From Witches to Crack Moms: Women, Drug Law, and Policy (2004) and Mothers and Illicit Drugs: Transcending the Myths (1999).
Entheogenesis Conference: Martin A Lee
Phantasticants, Fascism & Phenomenology 13 Jun 2005 1 hr 5 min Ruminations on the philosophy and politics (far right and far left) of German and French mescaline circles in Europe between the two world wars.Martin A Lee is the Author of Acid Dreams - The Complete Social History Of LSD: The CIA, the Sixties and Beyond.
EntheoGenesis 2: Witch Hunts and the War on Weed
With Rev. Damuzi 06 Jun 2005 46 min As an Entheogenesis presentation, Witch hunts and the war on weed will first compare important social, artistic, legal, and pharmacologicalsimilarities between the medieval inquisition and today's drug war. The second part of the presentation will explore the role of the Black Death as the historical incentive for the inquisition, and then inquire into the evolution of scapegoating in the early 20th Century.The Rev. Damuzi is a writer for Cannabis Culture, co-host of Fane of the Cosmos radio and POT-TV show, reverend of the Church of the Universe, director of the Nelson Compassion Club.
Entheogenesis 2: Prof. Francis Thackeray on Shakespeare's Pipes
Did the Bard Burn Bud? 05 Jun 2005 1 hr 12 min Marc Emery gives some short opening comments and introduces the first Presenter, Prof. Francis Thackeray of the Transvaal Museum in South Africa, who discusses his research connecting Shakespeare with Cannabis use. Careful analysis of Shakespearean texts suggests that William Shakespeare, a prolific wordsmith, was aware of the stimulating properties of Cannabis sativa. Chemical analysis of residues in clay pipes from Startford-upon-Avon and elsewhere supports the view that Cannabis and other "compounds" were being smoked in 17th century England, even after the Pope had declared Cannabis to be associated with witchcraft.
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