J. Christian Greer
As a lecturer at Stanford University, my work is focused on institutionalizing the study of psychedelics from a humanistic perspective. To that end, my scholarly expertise is in the history of psychedelic spirituality, religion, and ritual from a global perspective.
Having held teaching positions at Harvard University, Yale University, and the University of Amsterdam, I am also currently the director of “The Psychedelic Universe: Global Perspectives on Higher Consciousness,” the first university-accredited seminar exploring the global history of psychedelics that is open to participants from a variety of backgrounds (and not simply college students). This course is hosted by the University of Amsterdam each July.
Additionally, I am the director and lead instructor for “Forbidden Knowledge: Introduction to Esotericism” (offered online each winter) and “Arcane Worlds: New Directions in the Study of Esotericism” (offered every summer), both intensive seminars hosted in collaboration with the Graduate School of Social Sciences at the University of Amsterdam.
In the last few years, I also co-founded the Drugs and Religion program unit at the American Academy of Religion, the Harvard Psychedelic Walking Tour, and The Chalice, a psychedelic salon hosted in Berkeley, CA on the first Wednesday of each month.
With respect to published manuscripts, my latest book, "Kumano Kodo: Pilgrimage to Powerspots" (co-authored with Dr. Michelle Oing) analyzes the pilgrimage folklore associated with the rainforests of Japan's Kii Peninsula. My forthcoming book, "Angelheaded Hipsters: Psychedelic Militancy in Nineteen Eighties North America" (Oxford University Press), I examine the expansion of psychedelic culture within underground networks that emerged during the Drug War.
I hold a B.A. from Boston University's Professors Program, a M.A. in Hermetic Philosophy and Related Currents from the University of Amsterdam, and a M.Div. from Harvard Divinity School. My PhD written at the University of Amsterdam, where it was awarded with honors (cum laude).
Supervisors: Wouter Hanegraaff and Marco Pasi
Having held teaching positions at Harvard University, Yale University, and the University of Amsterdam, I am also currently the director of “The Psychedelic Universe: Global Perspectives on Higher Consciousness,” the first university-accredited seminar exploring the global history of psychedelics that is open to participants from a variety of backgrounds (and not simply college students). This course is hosted by the University of Amsterdam each July.
Additionally, I am the director and lead instructor for “Forbidden Knowledge: Introduction to Esotericism” (offered online each winter) and “Arcane Worlds: New Directions in the Study of Esotericism” (offered every summer), both intensive seminars hosted in collaboration with the Graduate School of Social Sciences at the University of Amsterdam.
In the last few years, I also co-founded the Drugs and Religion program unit at the American Academy of Religion, the Harvard Psychedelic Walking Tour, and The Chalice, a psychedelic salon hosted in Berkeley, CA on the first Wednesday of each month.
With respect to published manuscripts, my latest book, "Kumano Kodo: Pilgrimage to Powerspots" (co-authored with Dr. Michelle Oing) analyzes the pilgrimage folklore associated with the rainforests of Japan's Kii Peninsula. My forthcoming book, "Angelheaded Hipsters: Psychedelic Militancy in Nineteen Eighties North America" (Oxford University Press), I examine the expansion of psychedelic culture within underground networks that emerged during the Drug War.
I hold a B.A. from Boston University's Professors Program, a M.A. in Hermetic Philosophy and Related Currents from the University of Amsterdam, and a M.Div. from Harvard Divinity School. My PhD written at the University of Amsterdam, where it was awarded with honors (cum laude).
Supervisors: Wouter Hanegraaff and Marco Pasi
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Books by J. Christian Greer
Sharing personal interviews and anecdotes about the strange outrageous adventures of religious psychonauts alongside rare photos and illustrations, this extensively researched study of underground psychedelic religious sects in the United States reveals their spiritual and cultural influence from the 1960s to the present day."
Informed by the material study of religion, the also examines the clandestine social network build by psychedelicists in response to the subsequent criminalization of their devotional practices under state and federal law. As a result of government persecution, the allied forces of psychedelicist militancy fomented the rise of the so-called “zine scene,” an alternative communication microcosm based on the participatory and decentralized exchange of homemade artworks, publications, music, and literature. Driven by the utopian potential of what was then termed “cyberspace,” the hipster militants of the zine scene eventually migrated away from epistolary exchange to pioneer online communication in the 1990s. A historiographic intervention on behalf of ephemeral material culture, my dissertation ultimately traces the “digital turn” towards home-computing back through the earlier social media paradigm of fanzine exchange.
Papers by J. Christian Greer