“This paper examines how ingestion of the mind-altering peyote cactus, (Lophophora williamsii), endemic to the desert of northern Mexico and the borderlands of Texas, may interact within the human reproductive system, specifically in women.”
Biography
Dr. Stacy B. Schaefer, Professor Emerita in the Department of Anthropology, California State University, Chico (CSUC) and former Co-Director of the Museum of Anthropology (CSUC), has been carrying out ethnographic field research among the Huichol Indians of Mexico since 1976. Recipient of two Fulbright Fellowships, an Organization of American States Fellowship and numerous other research grants, she has been working for decades with the Huichol Indians of Mexico and members of the Native American Church in the United States. Her research has focused on a holistic study of the traditional beliefs and practices that revolve around the use of the mind-altering peyote cactus (Lophophora williamsii). She is co-editor with Peter T. Furst, and contributor to the book People of the Peyote, Huichol Indian History, Religion and Survival, published in 1996 by the University of New Mexico Press. Dr. Schaefer also published the book To Think With a Good Heart: Wixárika Women, Weavers and Shamans, University of Utah Press 2002, with a second edition of the book in 2015 titled Huichol Women, Weavers and Shamans with the University of New Mexico Press. From 1991 to 1999 she was Assistant and then Associate professor at University of Texas Pan American along the Texas/Tamaulipas, Mexico border during which time she conducted extensive fieldwork research among federally licensed Mexican-American peyote dealers and members of the Native American Church (NAC). This work continued through 2015, culminating in Amada’s Blessings From the Peyote Gardens of South Texas, published in 2015 by the University of New Mexico Press. The book received three literary awards in 2016: The Peter C. Rollins Book Award, The Southwest Popular/American Culture Association; the Jim Parish Award for Documentation and Publication of Local and Regional History, the Webb County Heritage Foundation in Laredo, Texas; and the WILLA Literary Award Finalist for Scholarly Nonfiction, from Women Writing the West.
Fertile Grounds? Peyote and the Human Reproductive System.
“From personal perspectives informed through bioassays and participant observation in peyote ceremonies among Huichol Indians and Native American Church members, the topics of menstruation and fertility will be examined.”
Transcript abstract
This paper examines how ingestion of the mind-altering peyote cactus, (Lophophora williamsii), endemic to the desert of northern Mexico and the borderlands of Texas, may interact within the human reproductive system, specifically in women. The influence of peyote on pregnancy will be discussed through pharmacological and neuropharmacological studies found in the scientific literature involving peyote alkaloids, such as mescaline, and qualitative data collected through ethnographic interviews with indigenous women from Huichol Indian culture in Mexico and members of the Native American Church in the United States. From personal perspectives informed through bioassays and participant observation in peyote ceremonies among Huichol Indians and Native American Church members, the topics of menstruation and fertility will be examined. Information grounded in biomedical and fertility research will be presented to hypothesize the interplay that may occur between peyote/mescaline alkaloids, sexual hormones, and the human reproductive system. In conclusion, the role peyote may have on human reproductive endochrinology will be examined and the implications this may have for other serotonergic entheogens.
