Michael James Winkelman

Michael Winkelman’s wide-ranging teaching and research interests focus on shamanism, consciousness, psychedelic medicine. He teaches in the Human Health Program on the ASU Polytechnic Campus, and he has served as President of the Society for the Anthropology of Consciousness and the Founding President of the Anthropology of Religion Section of the American Anthropological Association.

Michael received his B.A. from Rice University (1976), a Ph.D. from the University of California, Irvine (1985) and a Masters in Public Health in Community Health Practice from the University of Arizona (2002). His research on shamanism includes the 
investigation of the origin of shamanism and contemporary applications of shamanic healing in substance abuse rehabilitation. As an author, he has pioneered perspectives on shamanism as humanity’s original neurotheology.

Michael has published Altering Consciousness: Multidisciplinary Perspectives, Shamanism: A Biopsychosocial Paradigm of Consciousness and Healing, Supernatural as Natural: A Biocultural Approach to Religion and edited the 2 volume collection Psychedelic Medicine: New Evidence for Hallucinogenic Substances as Treatments.