Glauber Loures de Assis - Can Scholars Talk to the Spirits?

Glauber Loures de Assis argues for necessary ethical transformations in the current psychedelic resurgence by challenging colonial frameworks and the myth of a universal psychedelic community. He posits that scholars and the western psychedelic community must move beyond commodifying indigenous substances toward fostering respectful, genuine co-creation of knowledge. Genuine anti-colonial work requires recognizing the deep spiritual and relational roots of traditional practices instead of merely extracting them for therapeutic applications. Assis emphasizes the role of relationality in indigenous cosmologies, where persons, nature, and community intertwine in ways that standard western clinical models struggle to grasp. By critiquing the western focus on the isolated individual, he suggests that truly meaningful integration includes community, family, and land-based connections. Decolonization, in this context, is not a symbolic act but a commitment to challenging epistemic injustices and welcoming indigenous voices as active, leading participants in shaping the future of medicine.