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The Anthropology of Altered States. Psychological Anthropology (Transpersonal anthropology). relationship between altered states of consciousness and culture. transpersonal psychology: altered states of consciousness (ASC) and transpersonal experience
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Psychological Anthropology(Transpersonal anthropology) • relationship between altered states of consciousness and culture. • transpersonal psychology: altered states of consciousness (ASC) and transpersonal experience • differs from mainstream transpersonal psychology: cross-cultural • role of culture in laying the foundations for, in evoking, in cultivating or thwarting, and in interpreting ASC • fundamental to understanding the incidence and function of transpersonal experiences
altered states of consciousness • conditions in which sensations, perceptions, cognition, and emotions are altered • characterized by changes in: sensing, perceiving, thinking, feeling • modify the relation of the individual to self, body, sense of identity, the environment of time, space, or other people • induced by modifying sensory input • directly by increasing or decreasing stimulation or alertness • indirectly by affecting the pathways of the sensory input by somotopsychological factors
Features of Altered States • alterations in thinking • disturbed sense of time • loss of control • changes in the expression of emotions • changes in body image • perceptual distortion • changes in meaning and significance assigned to experiences or perceptions • a sense of the ineffable • feelings of rejuvenation • hypersuggestiblity
Some Types of Alerted States • Trance • shamanistic ecstasy • prayer ecstasy • sorcery • "highway hypnosis" • Hypnosis • alcohol / drugs • yoga / meditation • dream states • Culture bound syndromes
Stimulation & Consciousness • a decrease form a presumed preexisting "normal" level of stimulation or activity • highway hypnosis • sensory deprivation produced either experimentally or as a result of solitary confinement • involves an increase form a presumed preexisting "normal" level of stimulation or activity • religious conversion • healing trances in revivalistic settings • "dance and music trance" • battle fatigue • hysterical conversion neuroses • dissociational states • mob contagion • increase of alertness or mental involvement • prolonged vigilance or sentry duty, watching a radar screen, fervent prayer • decrease in alterness or mental activity • relaxation of critical faculties in daydreaming, boredom, profound relaxation, mediumistic trance, meditation states
Stimulation & Consciousness • ‘somatopsychological’ factors • drug-induced states • states resulting from other changes in body chemistry
Cross-Cultural Observations & Altered States • diagnosis and healing • divination and reading signs • Dreaming and dreamworking • Trance as evolutionary variable • significance in human life derives from the symbolic transformation of experience and the capacity to share intrapsychic states. • Unlike dreams, ASC derive from models based on pathological states • serve as coping mechanisms for both the individual and the society and thus provide a basis for culture building.
Power & Self • two forms of possession:ritual and peripheral • ritual is displayed in a ceremonialcontext and includes the social function of reinforcing culturalmorality and established power. • peripheral representsa more long-term state in which the individual believes thathe is unwillingly possessed by intruding spirits and functionsas an indirect form of social protest • Ritual possession operates as a socially sanctionedpsychological defense mechanism, while peripheral possessionconstitutes a pathological reaction to individual conflict.
Alterations & The State • legal and illegal • emphasis on the relationship between these alterations and the individual body, the social body, and the body politic • Economies of alterations (political economy) • motivations behind the development and global marketing of both legal and illegal alterations • policy • psychological normalcy • demographics of legal and illegal use • historical shifts in the legal/illegal distinction itself.
Deviance & Society • Modes of action which do not conform to the norms or values held by most of the members of a group or society. • What is regarded as 'deviant' is as widely variable as the norms and values that distinguish different cultures and subcultures from one another. • Many forms of behaviour which are highly esteemed in one context, or by one group, are regarded negatively by others.
Abnormals • abnormal types in the social structure are culturally selected by all groups from every part of the world • different degrees of ease with which abnormals function per each culture • many abnormals function with ease and even honor without danger to the society
Deviance and Conformity • Social constructions • idealized conduct is most clearly seen in marginalized people • deviance forces them into "discredited" or "discreditable" groups, based on the nature of their stigma • deviance & the existence of a stigma
Normality/abnormality • Multi-dimensional concepts • Represents a range of possible perceptions • Of what is normal and not normal • Whether it is controlled or not by the norms of society • Times & places people can behave in an abnormal way • Most cultures disapprove of forms of public behavior that are obviously not being controlled
Zones of social behavior • Not static, fluid categories, spectrum of possibilities • Change with time & circumstance • Normal in one group – abnormal in another • Controlled normality (A) • Uncontrolled normality (D) • Controlled abnormality (B) • Uncontrolled abnormality (C)
Zones of social behavior • A, D, B – it is assumed that the individual is at least aware of what the social norms are • Whether they conform or not • Substance use • Traversing the categories of “bad” and “mad” • Criminal & Intoxication • Temporary madness • Altered States:the cultural and social politics of subjectivity
The Anthropology of the Senses • Comparison & relativism • “diverse sensory SYMBOLISM and experience • study of the senses out of the realm of natural history into that of social history • does not deny the natural history of the senses -- the general process of sensorial experience and its natural processes • able to break the mould of our own sensory bias & experience radically different ways of making sense of the world
The Anthropology of the Senses • the particular & the general • sensory journeys through time and space • dominant sensory medium of symbolic orientation can vary widely -- can only be understood in the context of a particular society & not through generalized external sensory paradigms • Tzotzil of Mexico – heat • Ongee of Little Andaman Islands – smell • Desana of Columbia -- color & multi sensory, chromatic energy flows • dominant sensory symbolic order of west -- seeing & hearing • one kind of visuality (to picture) & one kind of aurality/orality • “So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.” (Shakespeare)
Anthropology of the Senses • “Western” conceptual framework of typical/ “normal” sensory experience • From confusion to order • Developmentally through repetition and habit • Physically through neurochemical processes • Through new sensorial skills • desire to avoid vague sensations • OR, another: To perceive the true substance of the world beyond sensory & mental habits • All bodhisattvas, lesser and great, should develop a pure, lucid mind, not depending upon sound, flavor, touch, odor, or any quality. A bodhisattva should develop a mind which alights upon no thing whatsoever; and so should he establish it. (Diamond Sutra 10)
Participant-Observation & Altered States • Cross-cultural experience & altered states as a psychosis – observations vs. participant observation • Sorcerer’s apprentice • Going native • Trust and science
One ‘Popular’ Consciousness Vision/Version • field expedition to Mexico or someplace ‘other’ • observe the rituals of an isolated Indian tribe, who are said to preserve ceremonies that go all the way back to the Toltecs or some ‘other’ ancients • rituals involve the consumption of a potion made with powerfully hallucinogenic mushrooms • not content merely to observe, but an active participant • unifying theme emerges in hallucinations -- the origin of life, the origin of the Earth, the origin of thought, the origin of humanity. • opened up a kind of physiological pathway that gives access to the vast untapped recesses of his genome • the primitive, atavistic genetic heritage of humankind’s most distant ancestors that lies inactive at the center of his every cell
“Styles” of Alcohol Use as Social Practice • A “style” of alcohol use is not: • a psychological manifestation of the individual nor only determined by environment • “Style” as social practice • “expressive equipment” or “social capital” • Available for the production of subjectivity (self & identity) • “universe of stylistic possibilities” • represents differing ways to “craft self” and be a “person” • Alcohol use is a social and cultural practice some find useful in the context of a set of ongoing social relations