If Western, Christian and modern society is marked by the strong stigma of drugs and their users, other experiences, in other times and cultures, may show a quite different scenario, for example, of the religious use and the positive associations of altered states of consciousness. This is the subject of the articles in The Ritual Use of Plants of Power. [ read more ]

The distinctions between drugs and food, vice and necessity, and medicine and poison may be found in history. The articles in Alcohol and Drugs in the History of Brazil show, for example, that modern mercantilism has favored the commerce of certain substances such as wine and tobacco, suppressing the use of others, which began to be associated with addiction and marginality and have been regarded as harmful to health. [ read more ]