Expanding Mindscapes: A Global History of Psychedelics. By ErikaDyck, ChrisElcock (Eds.), Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. 2023. ISBN: 9780262546935

When the Saskatchewan-based British psychiatrist Humphry Osmond first wrote to his fellow British émigré, novelist Aldous Huxley, he could have had little idea of how the ripples of their private correspondence of the early 1950s would reverberate across the world and into the future. But here we are in 2024, and the term that Osmond coined—‘psychedelic’—is quite literally everywhere, from microdosing and Michael Pollan’s Netflix series to ibogaine and ayahuasca. It is in this context that Erika Dyck and Chris Elcock’s Expanding Mindscapes: A Global History of Psychedelics emerges. Dyck is probably the most pre-eminent historian of the psychedelic, having literally written the book on Osmond (2008’s Psychedelic Psychiatry: LSD from Clinic to Campus), as well as co-edited a 2018 volume of his correspondence with Huxley. Her co-editor, Chris Elcock, can also lay claim to deep expertise with his excellent 2023 monograph Psychedelic New York: A History of LSD in the City. Together they have marshalled an essential edited collection that across its 20 chapters expands the historiography of drugs both temporally and geographically, but also opens up tantalizing glimpses of future directions for the field. At first glance, the story that is narrated across many of these chapters is similar to the familiar psychedelic history from the North American (and to a lesser extent European) context. Following its invention by Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) is introduced into clinical practice, before leaking into the counterculture, where its widespread consumption discredited its ‘legitimate’ use in psychiatric contexts. This is, of course, a clumsy, albeit oft-repeated version of events, and Expanding Mindscapes offers a kaleidoscopic intervention on accepted narratives as well as pushing us beyond what are considered ‘classic’ psychedelic substances [typically, LSD, dimethyltryptamine (DMT), mescaline and psilocybin]. For example, Andrew Jones contributes a fascinating chapter that explores the use of LSD in the so-called ‘clinical theology’ of medical missionaries in India. Meanwhile, on the latter point, there are chapters on voacanga africana and tabernanthe iboga from Timothy Vilgiate and Julien Bonhomme, respectively. One of the most impressive aspects of Expanding Mindscapes is the cohesiveness and diversity that it manages to maintain. Contributors range from recognizable names in the field (Ido Hartogsohn, Mike Jay, Wendy Kline, Stephen Snelders) to PhD students with their first publications. Ethnographic observations (from Ian Baker) sit alongside Peter Sachs Collopy’s analysis of Korean artist Nam June Paik’s video work as a parallel ‘technology of consciousness’ to the ‘strange “ontology” of drug experience’ (p. 333). Geographically, the collection takes in Europe, Asia, Africa, the Middle East and South America, with useful maps illustrating the diffusion of research on naturally derived and synthetic psychedelic substances. In short, these North American historians have gone to greater lengths than many to ensure that this is indeed a global history (albeit one in which scholars from the Global South are heavily outnumbered). Across these diverse topics, methods and geographies, however, there is a unified and critical perspective and even a consistent prose style. There are numerous threads that could be explored throughout the collection, but perhaps the most prominent is that of the political, exhibited through Hartogsohn and Itamar Zadoff’s ‘brief history’ of psychedelics in Israel, as well as Hallam Roffey and Mark Gallagher’s respective takes on the ‘acid anarchism’ of 1970s Britain. All of these are very much in conversation with contemporary moments. In the case of the former, it is worth noting that the Hamas attack of 7 October 2023 was on an Israeli psytrance festival, a genre of music and subculture that Hartogsohn and Zadoff identify as an ‘intriguing test case for thinking about the political and social context of… psychedelic use’ (p. 413). Meanwhile in Roffey and Gallagher’s chapters, both use cultural theorist Mark Fisher’s briefly politically fashionable concept of Acid Communism to interrogate the influence—or perhaps lack of influence—of psychedelics on left movements in Britain, from anti-psychiatry to squatting. On a less overtly political level, there are also a couple of strong chapters on the gender dynamics of psychedelics, from Zoë Dubus (on post-war France) and Manal Khan (on contemporary Karachi, Pakistan). These continue the significant strand of feminist histories (and sociologies) of drugs pioneered by Nancy Campbell as well as Dyck herself, among many others. Expanding Mindscapes is indeed an expansive and intelligently curated compilation. The editorializing by Dyck and Elcock is light-touch—the introduction and conclusion are brief and sprightly, as they should be—because of the quality of the chapters, and the depth and breadth of the collection. As the psychedelic renaissance continues apace, this important volume should find a place on many drug researchers’ bookshelves.

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