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High Society

Mind-Altering Drugs in History and Culture

Mike Jay

£12.99

'A vivid report on the other side of drugs' Hanif Kureishi, Guardian

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Overview

Mind-altering drugs have been part of virtually every human culture that has ever existed. Mike Jay’s narrative traverses the globe and ranges from prehistory to the present day, exploring the role of drugs from ayahuasca in the Amazon to coffee in early modern Europe, opium in China to the discovery of psychedelics. In the process, he shows how they have shaped cultures, kick-started global trade, transformed our understanding of the mind, built empires and threatened the fabric of society.

Reviews

'A vivid report on the other side of drugs'
Hanif Kureishi, Books of the Year, Guardian

'Excellent … shows that drug use stretches back too far, and too widely across the globe, to be considered an aberration of the human condition'
Financial Times

'An excellent book … a wonderfully open-ended subject'
Daily Telegraph

'Straightforward and engaging storytelling and cool headed analysis of use of, and attitudes towards, mind-altering drugs … deserves high praise for rendering a complex, controversial topic with clarity and elegance. It’s also good looking … quite marvellous'
British Medical Journal

'Fascinating and highly recommended'
Psychedelic Press

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Product Information

Book Details

Format: Paperback

Size: 19.8 x 12.9 cm

Extent: 208 pp

Illustrations: 46

Publication date: 18 July 2024

ISBN: 9780500297940

Contents List

A Universal Impulse High Societies • The Evolution of Drugs • Animal Intoxication • Drugs and Shamanism • Drugs and Culture • The Culture of Kava • The Culture of Betel • Drug Prohibitions • Drug Subcultures • The Cultures of Ecstasy From Apothecary to Laboratory What Is a Drug? • Drugs in Antiquity • Renaissance Herbals • Witches and Flying Ointments • The Invention of Laudanum • Linnaeus and the Enlightenment • The First Synthetic Drugs • Opium and the Romantics • The Club des Haschischins • Freud and Cocaine • Addiction and Drug Control • Mescaline{,} LSD and Beyond • Drugs of the Future The Drugs Trade Drugs of the New World • The Psychoactive Revolution • Tobacco in China{,} Tea in Europe • The Opium Wars • The Anti-Opium campaign • Temperance and Prohibition • The ‘War on Drugs’ • Epilogue: The Decline of Tobacco

About the Author

Mike Jay has written widely on the cultural history of science, medicine and the mind. His books include The Influencing Machine, Psychonauts, Mescaline and This Way Madness Lies, the latter also published by Thames & Hudson. He is a research affiliate of the Health Humanities Centre at University College London and an Honorary Research Fellow at HHC/UCL.