Seminars
First Symposium on Psychonautics: Utopy & Inebrantia
11th - 16th of December, 2023
Conguillío, Chile
This meeting is an initiative of the Lobeliana Foundation together with Manuel Constantino Torres, supported by Giuliana Furci and Jonathan Ott, to bring together researchers with a long history, contemporary scholars and local representatives of the shamanic world (native peoples) on the study, practice and understandings of psychonautics, shamanism, psychopharmaceuticals and ecstasy from its multiple facets. The purpose is to create an atmosphere of exchange between Latin American researchers and their equivalents in Europe, United States, United Kingdom, Africa and Australia, and to address issues that help to understand the possibilities of applying shamanic techniques and the use of psychoactive drugs to contemporary life. in western society.
The guests at the symposium belong to a multidisciplinary background, coming from anthropology, archaeology, chemistry, ethnobotany, art and art history, music, dance and others. In this way, we will be able to investigate psychonautics and shamanism not as separate and distinct phenomena, but as unifying phenomena that must be considered based on the specific needs and circumstances that gave rise to their formation and from a contemporary, perhaps privileged point of view, which makes it possible for us to contemplate the totality and diversity of shamanic expressions.
The intimate knowledge of an individual about himself, his community, his living
space, is probably the most relevant lesson that we can extract from a investigation on this subject. From the point of view of shamanic ideologies we can learn how to develop an intimate knowledge of our immediate environment as an entity full of patterns with which we can become familiar, and faced with the reopening of work with psychoactives, incorporate conscious practices of navigating the unknown. that appears when crossing the “veil” of what is understood as real through the threshold of the ecstatic. Such knowledge brings with it and demonstrates the interconnection of all the elements that compose it. Indigenous cultures around the world, over the centuries have cleverly developed concepts of what is appropriate for them and their environment at any given time.
A gathering like this onewill allow us to explore into our global traditions and what strategies to follow to determine what is appropriate for our time and place, and not simply imitate indigenous cultures. Both shamanic technologies and Western manifestations can help answer these questions about our own culture. We shall explore the different aspects of shamanism, psychonautics, psychopharmaceuticals and ecstasy which could be applied to our current life, with immediate communication, capable of instantly retrieving all kinds of information and the opportunity to move across the planet in a few hours.
Click names below to see more information on the speakers...
