Oral Presentation Session

Reviewed by: Society for Cultural Anthropology

Of interest to: Practicing and Applied Anthropologists, Teachers of Anthropology in Community Colleges, Students, Those Involved in Mentoring Activities

Primary Theme: Science

Secondary Theme: Materiality

(3-0225) The New Age, Reconsidered: Science, Ontology, Healing, Epistemology

Astrology, shamanism, spirit mediumship, light healing, quantum consciousness -- “New Age” is a catch-all term used, almost always pejoratively, to describe a range of practices thought of as irrational, pseudo-scientific, and culturally appropriative. But in light of the surge of interest in anthropology over the past decade in ontological pluralism, multispecies ethnography, and new materialisms, how might we re-think the movements, practices, ethical commitments, and epistemological and ontological claims associated with “The New Age”? Further, as the global wellness movement expands into a multi-billion dollar industry, a host of health and healing modalities --acupuncture, yoga, meditation, psychedelic therapy, energy work -- once thought of as “New Age” or “alternative” are now marketed as “integrative” and “holistic” and are permeating biomedical institutions. The New Age now seems especially good to think with.

The papers on this panel facilitate a conversation as to how New Age practices and theologies emerge from, travel between, and resist and reject the binaries of science/religion, nature/culture, real and unreal. Collectively, the papers and the concepts they explore – evidence, experience, truth, nature, play – inspire a space to reflect upon the epistemological and ontological foundations of “New Age” life-worlds and how engaging with these life-worlds might push, undermine, and rejuvenate anthropological thought.

Presenter(s)

• Joanna Steinhardt

  University of California, Santa Barbara

Organizer(s)

• Patricia Kubala

  PhD Candidate
  UC Berkeley

Presenter(s)

• Patricia Kubala

  PhD Candidate
  UC Berkeley

• Christopher Cochran

  University of California, Berkeley

Discussant(s)

• Torang Asadi

  PhD Candidate
  Duke University

Chair(s)

• Michael D'Arcy

  Ph.D. Candidate
  University of California, Berkeley

Presenter(s)

• Tehseen Noorani

  Research Fellow
  University of Durham

• Isaac Cohen

  University of California, Berkeley

Presentations:

• 8:00 AM - 8:15 AM

  "Think like a mushroom": the animistic play of amateur applied mycologists
  Joanna Steinhardt – University of California, Santa Barbara
• 8:15 AM - 8:30 AM

  The New Age of Psychedelics: How might Carlos Castaneda’s ‘The Teachings of Don Juan’ be Received Today?
  Patricia Kubala – UC Berkeley
• 8:30 AM - 8:45 AM

  Quantum Consciousness: A Scientific Spirituality
  Christopher Cochran – University of California, Berkeley
• 8:45 AM - 9:00 AM

  Remodelling Psychosis with Psychedelic Science in the New 'New Age'
  Tehseen Noorani – University of Durham
• 9:00 AM - 9:15 AM

  Is Chinese Medicine an Empirical Medicine?
  Isaac Cohen – University of California, Berkeley
• 9:15 AM - 9:30 AM

  Discussion
  Torang Asadi – Duke University