High society
Subtitle: the central role of mind-altering drugs in history, science, and culture
By: Mike Jay
Publisher: Park Street Press
Published: 2010
Place of publication: Rochester, Vt
Language: eng
Number of pages: 192
ISBN-13: 9781594773938
Description: "An illustrated cultural history of drug use from its roots in animal intoxication to its future in designer neurochemicals"--Provided by publisher.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: A universal impulse. Introduction. 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; title: 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; title: 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.' The decline of tobacco.