Paper short abstract:

Focusing on correspondence between Beat poet Allen Ginsburg and the anthropologist Weston La Barre, author of “The Peyote Cult”, this paper examines the stakes involved in anthropology’s role as mediator between Native religious practices and non-Native countercultural psychedelic enthusiasts.

Paper long abstract:

Anthropologists studying the use of peyote among plains Indians and the Native American Church found themselves in a curious situation with the rise of 1960s counterculture. Many anthropologists actively advocated for the legalization of the religious use of peyote for the Native American Church, yet also found themselves forced to position themselves before a growing youth counterculture interested in psychedelics, as well as Native practitioners and the US state. Countercultural non-Native psychedelic enthusiasts presented both a growing audience for ethnological research but also one whose reputation posed potential challenges to the scientific respectability to the field of anthropology. Focusing on correspondence between Beat poet Allen Ginsburg and the anthropologist Weston La Barre, author of “The Peyote Cult”, this paper examines the stakes involved in anthropology’s role as mediator between Native religious practices and non-Native countercultural psychedelic enthusiasts.