Gary L. Wenk
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195388541
- eISBN:
- 9780199863587
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195388541.003.0004
- Subject:
- Neuroscience, Behavioral Neuroscience, Neuroendocrine and Autonomic
The consumption of many different plants by our ancestors lead to the discovery of the important role played by the neurotransmitter serotonin in your brain. Chemicals in these plants that interfere ...
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The consumption of many different plants by our ancestors lead to the discovery of the important role played by the neurotransmitter serotonin in your brain. Chemicals in these plants that interfere with the function of serotonin can produce vivid and colorful hallucinations, migraine headaches, anxiety, depression, sleep, and death. Consumption of grain or corn that is contaminated with an ergot fungus may have been responsible for the death of thousands of people in ancient Europe while the consumption of mushrooms in ancient Mexico may have lead to the appearance of various religious ceremonies that defined specific cultures. The merging and mixing of sensory processes, for example, sights that produce sounds or smells that have color, must have been very frightening to our ancestors. The experience often took on a mystical or religious interpretation in order to make sense of what we now call a hallucination. It is possible that ritualistic manipulation of serotonin neurons in the brain played a role in the individual expressions of religiosity across cultures. Today, we mostly focus upon the role of serotonin in the control of mood and migraines.Less
The consumption of many different plants by our ancestors lead to the discovery of the important role played by the neurotransmitter serotonin in your brain. Chemicals in these plants that interfere with the function of serotonin can produce vivid and colorful hallucinations, migraine headaches, anxiety, depression, sleep, and death. Consumption of grain or corn that is contaminated with an ergot fungus may have been responsible for the death of thousands of people in ancient Europe while the consumption of mushrooms in ancient Mexico may have lead to the appearance of various religious ceremonies that defined specific cultures. The merging and mixing of sensory processes, for example, sights that produce sounds or smells that have color, must have been very frightening to our ancestors. The experience often took on a mystical or religious interpretation in order to make sense of what we now call a hallucination. It is possible that ritualistic manipulation of serotonin neurons in the brain played a role in the individual expressions of religiosity across cultures. Today, we mostly focus upon the role of serotonin in the control of mood and migraines.
William A. Richards and G. William Barnard
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780231174060
- eISBN:
- 9780231540919
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231174060.003.0008
- Subject:
- Psychology, Psychopharmacology
Role of interpersonal relationships in spiritual life.
Role of interpersonal relationships in spiritual life.
William A. Richards and G. William Barnard
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780231174060
- eISBN:
- 9780231540919
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231174060.003.0016
- Subject:
- Psychology, Psychopharmacology
Physiological and Psychological Safety, Legal Considerations.
Physiological and Psychological Safety, Legal Considerations.
Stephen Siff
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252039195
- eISBN:
- 9780252097232
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252039195.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
Now synonymous with Sixties counterculture, LSD actually entered the American consciousness via the mainstream. Time and Life, messengers of American respectability, trumpeted its grand arrival in a ...
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Now synonymous with Sixties counterculture, LSD actually entered the American consciousness via the mainstream. Time and Life, messengers of American respectability, trumpeted its grand arrival in a postwar landscape scoured of alluring descriptions of drug use while lesser outlets piggybacked on their coverage with stories by turns sensationalized and glowing. This book offers the untold tale of LSD's wild journey from Brylcreem and Ivory soap to incense and peppermints. As the book shows, the early attention lavished on the drug by the news media glorified its use in treatments for mental illness but also its status as a mystical—yet legitimate—gateway to exploring the unconscious mind. The book's history takes readers to the center of how popular media hyped psychedelic drugs in a constantly shifting legal and social environment, producing an intricate relationship between drugs and media experience that came to define contemporary pop culture. It also traces how the breathless coverage of LSD gave way to a textbook moral panic, transforming yesterday's refined seeker of truths into an acid casualty splayed out beyond the fringe of polite society.Less
Now synonymous with Sixties counterculture, LSD actually entered the American consciousness via the mainstream. Time and Life, messengers of American respectability, trumpeted its grand arrival in a postwar landscape scoured of alluring descriptions of drug use while lesser outlets piggybacked on their coverage with stories by turns sensationalized and glowing. This book offers the untold tale of LSD's wild journey from Brylcreem and Ivory soap to incense and peppermints. As the book shows, the early attention lavished on the drug by the news media glorified its use in treatments for mental illness but also its status as a mystical—yet legitimate—gateway to exploring the unconscious mind. The book's history takes readers to the center of how popular media hyped psychedelic drugs in a constantly shifting legal and social environment, producing an intricate relationship between drugs and media experience that came to define contemporary pop culture. It also traces how the breathless coverage of LSD gave way to a textbook moral panic, transforming yesterday's refined seeker of truths into an acid casualty splayed out beyond the fringe of polite society.
Christopher Gair
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748619887
- eISBN:
- 9780748671137
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748619887.003.0010
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
Unlike the chapter on art in section one, this chapter focuses on figures who do not generally feature in accounts of the history of American Art. It commences with a look at the role of artists ...
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Unlike the chapter on art in section one, this chapter focuses on figures who do not generally feature in accounts of the history of American Art. It commences with a look at the role of artists operating around Haight-Ashbury and at the importance of posters for psychedelic rock concerts and at album cover artwork. It then assesses more overtly political West Coast art, such as the ‘Peace Tower’ erected in LA in 1966, before returning to New York and Andy Warhol’s Factory.Less
Unlike the chapter on art in section one, this chapter focuses on figures who do not generally feature in accounts of the history of American Art. It commences with a look at the role of artists operating around Haight-Ashbury and at the importance of posters for psychedelic rock concerts and at album cover artwork. It then assesses more overtly political West Coast art, such as the ‘Peace Tower’ erected in LA in 1966, before returning to New York and Andy Warhol’s Factory.
Christopher Gair
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748619887
- eISBN:
- 9780748671137
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748619887.003.0009
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
During the 1960s the music of the counterculture was transformed rapidly and repeatedly. This chapter traces these changes from the folk revival through the British invasion, Blues rock, psychedelia, ...
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During the 1960s the music of the counterculture was transformed rapidly and repeatedly. This chapter traces these changes from the folk revival through the British invasion, Blues rock, psychedelia, etc., looking at the impact of key figures including Bob Dylan, The Beatles, Jefferson Airplane and Jimi Hendrix. It argues that the anti-modernist impulses of the early 1960s were replaced by an obsession with new technology and a corporate structure in which artists were able to hide their economic ambitions through the separation of musician and manager.Less
During the 1960s the music of the counterculture was transformed rapidly and repeatedly. This chapter traces these changes from the folk revival through the British invasion, Blues rock, psychedelia, etc., looking at the impact of key figures including Bob Dylan, The Beatles, Jefferson Airplane and Jimi Hendrix. It argues that the anti-modernist impulses of the early 1960s were replaced by an obsession with new technology and a corporate structure in which artists were able to hide their economic ambitions through the separation of musician and manager.
Jack Schafer
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- November 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780231159319
- eISBN:
- 9780231500586
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231159319.003.0009
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This essay reviews the book The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, by Tom Wolfe. Published in 1968, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test is a nonfiction work that chronicles the experiences of Ken Kesey and his ...
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This essay reviews the book The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, by Tom Wolfe. Published in 1968, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test is a nonfiction work that chronicles the experiences of Ken Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters, who traveled across the country in a colorfully painted school bus named Furthur. Wolfe takes his readers directly into the heads of his subjects, when necessary, to describe three years of Prankster adventures in consciousness along the California coast, across the country in Furthur, down to Mexico, where Kesey skedaddled to escape prosecution for possession of marijuana, and back to San Francisco. The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test remains the best account—fictional or non, in print or on film—of the genesis of the 1960s hipster subculture. Kesey and the Pranksters didn't single-handedly invent psychedelic culture, and they weren't the only LSD proselytizers in the mid-1960s. But they swung the big broom, sweeping everything into their acid gospel—trash and kitsch, consumer culture, spray paint, electronics, daredevilry, and practical jokes—and it was their version that rose to dominance.Less
This essay reviews the book The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, by Tom Wolfe. Published in 1968, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test is a nonfiction work that chronicles the experiences of Ken Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters, who traveled across the country in a colorfully painted school bus named Furthur. Wolfe takes his readers directly into the heads of his subjects, when necessary, to describe three years of Prankster adventures in consciousness along the California coast, across the country in Furthur, down to Mexico, where Kesey skedaddled to escape prosecution for possession of marijuana, and back to San Francisco. The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test remains the best account—fictional or non, in print or on film—of the genesis of the 1960s hipster subculture. Kesey and the Pranksters didn't single-handedly invent psychedelic culture, and they weren't the only LSD proselytizers in the mid-1960s. But they swung the big broom, sweeping everything into their acid gospel—trash and kitsch, consumer culture, spray paint, electronics, daredevilry, and practical jokes—and it was their version that rose to dominance.
Sharif Gemie and Brian Ireland
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781526114624
- eISBN:
- 9781526132437
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781526114624.003.0002
- Subject:
- History, Social History
Was a search for drugs the main motivation that inspired travellers to go to the East? The chapter begins by considering one addict’s experience: however, the argument presented is that this was not ...
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Was a search for drugs the main motivation that inspired travellers to go to the East? The chapter begins by considering one addict’s experience: however, the argument presented is that this was not typical. A historical contextualisation for drug-taking is given, noting how drugs of all sorts were often linked to Eastern cultures, even when there was no direct connection. Varied attitudes towards drug-taking are identified; in particular, the attitudes of an abstaining minority are considered. The chapter concludes by arguing that the existence of a wide range of considerably different attitudes to drug-taking means that drugs cannot be seen as a single, all-encompassing explanation for travel to the east.Less
Was a search for drugs the main motivation that inspired travellers to go to the East? The chapter begins by considering one addict’s experience: however, the argument presented is that this was not typical. A historical contextualisation for drug-taking is given, noting how drugs of all sorts were often linked to Eastern cultures, even when there was no direct connection. Varied attitudes towards drug-taking are identified; in particular, the attitudes of an abstaining minority are considered. The chapter concludes by arguing that the existence of a wide range of considerably different attitudes to drug-taking means that drugs cannot be seen as a single, all-encompassing explanation for travel to the east.
Alexander S. Dawson
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780520285422
- eISBN:
- 9780520960909
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520285422.003.0008
- Subject:
- History, Latin American History
After several decades in which scientists produced a slow trickle of scholarship on the potential uses of peyote/mescaline for mental health afflictions, in the 1950s this genre of psychiatric ...
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After several decades in which scientists produced a slow trickle of scholarship on the potential uses of peyote/mescaline for mental health afflictions, in the 1950s this genre of psychiatric research into hallucinogens expanded significantly. Mexico remained a relative backwater for this type of work until 1957, when Dr. José Rodríguez at the Sanatorio Psiquiatrico Santiago Ramírez Moreno in Mexico City initiated a mescaline study, in which a young Mexican doctor named Salvador Roquet participated. Though terrified and initially incapacitated by his experience, over time, Roquet came to believe that the psychedelics he took in this session offered profoundly powerful tools for psychiatry. Over the course of a decade, he sought to learn as much as he could about these drugs from their traditional users, the shamans of the Mazatec and Huichol communities, and to build a medical practice in Mexico City that translated that knowledge into something that would be useful for his urban, ladino, and generally well-educated patients. His Clínica de Psicosíntesis operated in Mexico City from 1967 to 1974.Less
After several decades in which scientists produced a slow trickle of scholarship on the potential uses of peyote/mescaline for mental health afflictions, in the 1950s this genre of psychiatric research into hallucinogens expanded significantly. Mexico remained a relative backwater for this type of work until 1957, when Dr. José Rodríguez at the Sanatorio Psiquiatrico Santiago Ramírez Moreno in Mexico City initiated a mescaline study, in which a young Mexican doctor named Salvador Roquet participated. Though terrified and initially incapacitated by his experience, over time, Roquet came to believe that the psychedelics he took in this session offered profoundly powerful tools for psychiatry. Over the course of a decade, he sought to learn as much as he could about these drugs from their traditional users, the shamans of the Mazatec and Huichol communities, and to build a medical practice in Mexico City that translated that knowledge into something that would be useful for his urban, ladino, and generally well-educated patients. His Clínica de Psicosíntesis operated in Mexico City from 1967 to 1974.
Catherine R. Osborne
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780226561028
- eISBN:
- 9780226561165
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226561165.003.0005
- Subject:
- History, History of Religion
This chapter examines the influence of the theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, SJ, on how American Catholics experienced the Cold War and the space race. It argues that Teilhard's cosmic holism ...
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This chapter examines the influence of the theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, SJ, on how American Catholics experienced the Cold War and the space race. It argues that Teilhard's cosmic holism enabled them to envision a future of cosmic harmony rather than inevitable nuclear annihilation. It also examines interest in Teilhard among both Catholic and non-Catholic users of psychedelic drugs. Case studies of worship space include suggestions by the artist Louisa Jenkins, three "dream churches" commissioned by the magazine editor Maurice Lavanoux and meant for outer space or the depths of the ocean, and the architect and visionary Paolo Soleri's "arcologies."Less
This chapter examines the influence of the theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, SJ, on how American Catholics experienced the Cold War and the space race. It argues that Teilhard's cosmic holism enabled them to envision a future of cosmic harmony rather than inevitable nuclear annihilation. It also examines interest in Teilhard among both Catholic and non-Catholic users of psychedelic drugs. Case studies of worship space include suggestions by the artist Louisa Jenkins, three "dream churches" commissioned by the magazine editor Maurice Lavanoux and meant for outer space or the depths of the ocean, and the architect and visionary Paolo Soleri's "arcologies."
David Farber and Beth Bailey
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780226372884
- eISBN:
- 9780226373072
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226373072.003.0013
- Subject:
- History, History of Science, Technology, and Medicine
The Sixties-era counterculture had its share of stoned, indolent hippies but it also had a productive wing that included a range of tech-savvy, scientifically minded visionaries. These ...
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The Sixties-era counterculture had its share of stoned, indolent hippies but it also had a productive wing that included a range of tech-savvy, scientifically minded visionaries. These countercultural tech activists did some of their best work well into the 1970s as they sought to make science and technology a human-scaled, hands-on enterprise that reached for the sublime possibilities of both transcendence and connection.Less
The Sixties-era counterculture had its share of stoned, indolent hippies but it also had a productive wing that included a range of tech-savvy, scientifically minded visionaries. These countercultural tech activists did some of their best work well into the 1970s as they sought to make science and technology a human-scaled, hands-on enterprise that reached for the sublime possibilities of both transcendence and connection.
Stephen Siff
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252039195
- eISBN:
- 9780252097232
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252039195.003.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This introductory chapter describes the media hype over LSD and related psychedelic drugs: a grand arrival to a 1950s cultural landscape that had been deliberately scrubbed of alluring descriptions ...
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This introductory chapter describes the media hype over LSD and related psychedelic drugs: a grand arrival to a 1950s cultural landscape that had been deliberately scrubbed of alluring descriptions of drug use; the the picturesque drug trips related in mainstream magazines and newspapers; sensational television specials and radio discussions; the contradictory reactions in mass media as the drugs accrued both casualties and countercultural cachet; and, finally, the loss of interest in psychedelic drugs by mainstream media outlets at the end of the 1960s. Ultimately, the book's goal is to not build a general theory but to shed light on a particular case through close examination of the media content and circumstances surrounding it.Less
This introductory chapter describes the media hype over LSD and related psychedelic drugs: a grand arrival to a 1950s cultural landscape that had been deliberately scrubbed of alluring descriptions of drug use; the the picturesque drug trips related in mainstream magazines and newspapers; sensational television specials and radio discussions; the contradictory reactions in mass media as the drugs accrued both casualties and countercultural cachet; and, finally, the loss of interest in psychedelic drugs by mainstream media outlets at the end of the 1960s. Ultimately, the book's goal is to not build a general theory but to shed light on a particular case through close examination of the media content and circumstances surrounding it.
Stephen Siff
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252039195
- eISBN:
- 9780252097232
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252039195.003.0003
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This chapter studies the dramatic appearance of LSD on the news agenda in reports on scientific studies using drugs to simulate madness, and the concurrent discussion of mystical, mind-expanding drug ...
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This chapter studies the dramatic appearance of LSD on the news agenda in reports on scientific studies using drugs to simulate madness, and the concurrent discussion of mystical, mind-expanding drug use sparked by the publication of Aldous Huxley's Doors of Perception. In addressing these topics, journalists introduced American audiences to new drugs and to the use of drugs to create mental states considered to have significant scholarly and academic importance. Scholarly interest gave journalists license to describe drug states that previously had been considered inappropriate for public view. Reports in mainstream media outlets were followed quickly by even more sensational coverage in more marginal publications.Less
This chapter studies the dramatic appearance of LSD on the news agenda in reports on scientific studies using drugs to simulate madness, and the concurrent discussion of mystical, mind-expanding drug use sparked by the publication of Aldous Huxley's Doors of Perception. In addressing these topics, journalists introduced American audiences to new drugs and to the use of drugs to create mental states considered to have significant scholarly and academic importance. Scholarly interest gave journalists license to describe drug states that previously had been considered inappropriate for public view. Reports in mainstream media outlets were followed quickly by even more sensational coverage in more marginal publications.
Stephen Siff
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252039195
- eISBN:
- 9780252097232
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252039195.003.0005
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This chapter explores cross-fertilization between researchers and media figures in the late 1950s, as LSD spread from controlled trials to the black market. News reporters gravitated toward research ...
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This chapter explores cross-fertilization between researchers and media figures in the late 1950s, as LSD spread from controlled trials to the black market. News reporters gravitated toward research documenting astonishing results with LSD, even as those studies were becoming further removed from the scientific consensus about the drug. Scholars James Coleman, Elihu Katz, and Herbert Menzel launched the study of the diffusion of tetracycline that resulted in the landmark Medical Innovation, cementing the idea that innovations spread through interpersonal relationships. Allowing for a role for media in informing physicians of the existence of new drugs, the scholars emphasized the apparent importance of social relationships in spreading the determination to actually use them.Less
This chapter explores cross-fertilization between researchers and media figures in the late 1950s, as LSD spread from controlled trials to the black market. News reporters gravitated toward research documenting astonishing results with LSD, even as those studies were becoming further removed from the scientific consensus about the drug. Scholars James Coleman, Elihu Katz, and Herbert Menzel launched the study of the diffusion of tetracycline that resulted in the landmark Medical Innovation, cementing the idea that innovations spread through interpersonal relationships. Allowing for a role for media in informing physicians of the existence of new drugs, the scholars emphasized the apparent importance of social relationships in spreading the determination to actually use them.
Stephen Siff
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252039195
- eISBN:
- 9780252097232
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252039195.003.0006
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This chapter details the celebrity coverage of Timothy Leary in the early 1960s and interest in LSD at Time and Life, where the publisher Henry Luce was becoming increasingly outspoken about his ...
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This chapter details the celebrity coverage of Timothy Leary in the early 1960s and interest in LSD at Time and Life, where the publisher Henry Luce was becoming increasingly outspoken about his interest in the drug. Reporters often treated Leary—a Harvard psychologist removed from his job as a result of drug experimentation—with skepticism while still permitting him to explain the LSD phenomenon and relying on his scholarship and wit. Journalists were often surprisingly accepting of Leary's conclusions about the drug experience, even while condemning his encouragement of drug use. Among the many magazines focusing attention on LSD, Time and Life were particularly protective of the technology and hopeful that it could be productively used by regular people.Less
This chapter details the celebrity coverage of Timothy Leary in the early 1960s and interest in LSD at Time and Life, where the publisher Henry Luce was becoming increasingly outspoken about his interest in the drug. Reporters often treated Leary—a Harvard psychologist removed from his job as a result of drug experimentation—with skepticism while still permitting him to explain the LSD phenomenon and relying on his scholarship and wit. Journalists were often surprisingly accepting of Leary's conclusions about the drug experience, even while condemning his encouragement of drug use. Among the many magazines focusing attention on LSD, Time and Life were particularly protective of the technology and hopeful that it could be productively used by regular people.
Stephen Siff
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252039195
- eISBN:
- 9780252097232
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252039195.003.0007
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This chapter focuses on how media coverage of LSD changed as recreational use of the drug was increasingly identified as an aspect of the blossoming hippie movement. Horror stories about LSD side ...
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This chapter focuses on how media coverage of LSD changed as recreational use of the drug was increasingly identified as an aspect of the blossoming hippie movement. Horror stories about LSD side effects and tales of nightmarish trips, including several that were demonstrably false, circulated through media. Still, the apparent cultural currency of psychedelic experience encouraged magazines in particular to continue to describe and depict drug experiences for their readers. A number of publications, including Time and Life, defended the importance of LSD and psychedelic experiences even while condemning its reckless use. The significance of LSD experiences was weighed against its harm to users in a number of television specials, radio documentaries, and printed reports.Less
This chapter focuses on how media coverage of LSD changed as recreational use of the drug was increasingly identified as an aspect of the blossoming hippie movement. Horror stories about LSD side effects and tales of nightmarish trips, including several that were demonstrably false, circulated through media. Still, the apparent cultural currency of psychedelic experience encouraged magazines in particular to continue to describe and depict drug experiences for their readers. A number of publications, including Time and Life, defended the importance of LSD and psychedelic experiences even while condemning its reckless use. The significance of LSD experiences was weighed against its harm to users in a number of television specials, radio documentaries, and printed reports.
Stephen Siff
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252039195
- eISBN:
- 9780252097232
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252039195.003.0008
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
This concluding chapter explains the dramatic decline in interest in LSD by the news media after about 1968, when the federal government finally prohibited possession of the drug. In the face of ...
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This concluding chapter explains the dramatic decline in interest in LSD by the news media after about 1968, when the federal government finally prohibited possession of the drug. In the face of growing government activism against drugs, elaborate reenactments of LSD trips faded from the news agenda. However, the psychedelic world introduced by the news media was increasingly enacted by television and film producers emboldened by the decline of the television and motion-picture production codes. As the 1960s faded into history, entertainment programming frequently offered itself as a substitute for the psychedelic drug experience that journalists had taught Americans to seek. Through intensive hype of LSD and psychedelic phenomena, the news media demonstrated the transporting, mind-expanding power not only of drugs, but also of journalism.Less
This concluding chapter explains the dramatic decline in interest in LSD by the news media after about 1968, when the federal government finally prohibited possession of the drug. In the face of growing government activism against drugs, elaborate reenactments of LSD trips faded from the news agenda. However, the psychedelic world introduced by the news media was increasingly enacted by television and film producers emboldened by the decline of the television and motion-picture production codes. As the 1960s faded into history, entertainment programming frequently offered itself as a substitute for the psychedelic drug experience that journalists had taught Americans to seek. Through intensive hype of LSD and psychedelic phenomena, the news media demonstrated the transporting, mind-expanding power not only of drugs, but also of journalism.
Matthew Warner Osborn
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- September 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780226099897
- eISBN:
- 9780226099927
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226099927.003.0008
- Subject:
- History, American History: 19th Century
Ranging broadly into the twenty-first century, the epilogue considers the enduring influence of delirium tremens on medical and popular conceptions of alcoholism and drug use. It illustrates how ...
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Ranging broadly into the twenty-first century, the epilogue considers the enduring influence of delirium tremens on medical and popular conceptions of alcoholism and drug use. It illustrates how delirium tremens and alcoholic hallucinations carried many of their nineteenth-century meanings into twentieth-century mass culture, featuring in children’s cartoons such as “Dumbo” and sentimental dramatizations of alcoholism. In the twentieth century, however, delirium tremens became fascination with drug-induced insanity, trance-states, and hallucinations persisted even in the literature of the modern recovery movement inspired by Bill Wilson and Alcoholic’s Anonymous, and in the psychedelic generations’ experimentations with LSD. In American popular culture, delirium tremens remained compelling theater because it continued to express a romantic longing to break free of the painful strictures of middle-class existence.Less
Ranging broadly into the twenty-first century, the epilogue considers the enduring influence of delirium tremens on medical and popular conceptions of alcoholism and drug use. It illustrates how delirium tremens and alcoholic hallucinations carried many of their nineteenth-century meanings into twentieth-century mass culture, featuring in children’s cartoons such as “Dumbo” and sentimental dramatizations of alcoholism. In the twentieth century, however, delirium tremens became fascination with drug-induced insanity, trance-states, and hallucinations persisted even in the literature of the modern recovery movement inspired by Bill Wilson and Alcoholic’s Anonymous, and in the psychedelic generations’ experimentations with LSD. In American popular culture, delirium tremens remained compelling theater because it continued to express a romantic longing to break free of the painful strictures of middle-class existence.
Arthur Versluis
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- April 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199368136
- eISBN:
- 9780190201951
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199368136.003.0009
- Subject:
- Religion, Religious Studies
Discusses Timothy Leary, LSD, acid religion, psychedelic revolution as exemplifying American religious immediatism. The history of Leary and of the “psychedelic revolution” and the religious ...
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Discusses Timothy Leary, LSD, acid religion, psychedelic revolution as exemplifying American religious immediatism. The history of Leary and of the “psychedelic revolution” and the religious implications of both.Less
Discusses Timothy Leary, LSD, acid religion, psychedelic revolution as exemplifying American religious immediatism. The history of Leary and of the “psychedelic revolution” and the religious implications of both.
Mark Harris
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- August 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780816677252
- eISBN:
- 9781452947440
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Minnesota Press
- DOI:
- 10.5749/minnesota/9780816677252.003.0018
- Subject:
- Art, Art History
In the 1960s, negotiating psychedelic drugs became a categorical and predetermined undertaking for those seeking immersion in contemporary life. Experimentation with hallucinogens like LSD, peyote, ...
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In the 1960s, negotiating psychedelic drugs became a categorical and predetermined undertaking for those seeking immersion in contemporary life. Experimentation with hallucinogens like LSD, peyote, and mescaline accessed a new world of alternatives to established social behavior. LSD in particular was taken as an agent enabling the change in awareness for hidden qualities of the world to be revealed and for new social and political practices to evolve. This chapter reveals how psychedelics influenced transformations of image and language in representing new possibilities for living. Often defined against the priorities of a previous generation, these features included new community and family structures, an appreciation of inner states of mind and self-knowledge, and responsibility placed on the full experience of the present as a means of transforming the future.Less
In the 1960s, negotiating psychedelic drugs became a categorical and predetermined undertaking for those seeking immersion in contemporary life. Experimentation with hallucinogens like LSD, peyote, and mescaline accessed a new world of alternatives to established social behavior. LSD in particular was taken as an agent enabling the change in awareness for hidden qualities of the world to be revealed and for new social and political practices to evolve. This chapter reveals how psychedelics influenced transformations of image and language in representing new possibilities for living. Often defined against the priorities of a previous generation, these features included new community and family structures, an appreciation of inner states of mind and self-knowledge, and responsibility placed on the full experience of the present as a means of transforming the future.
