At Chacruna: Controversies Around the Toad Medicine

Alí Cortina

The booming consumption of 5-meo-DMT—the chemical extracted from the Bufo alvarius toad, endemic to the Sonoran desert—in the second decade of the twenty-first century has caused a series of controversies concerning the substance’s history and its sociocultural uses in alternative urban spaces, as well as its emergence in the indigenous cultures of the Sonoran desert. This “toad medicine” news has been spread mostly through the Internet, which has increased its demand in Mexico, the United States, and in some countries in Europe and South America. The dissemination of diverse user discourses has facilitated the creation of a new range of networks of exchange and consumption that goes beyond the bioregional territory of the toad... continue reading.