Entangled with Peyote: Rethinking Western Environmental Science through Indigenous Knowledges and Decolonial Practices

This thesis develops practical and embodied approaches for researchers and research teams in the environmental sciences to decolonize their practices by centering Indigenous sovereignty and knowledge systems. Focusing on the peyote cactus—native to the borderlands of so-called Mexico and Texas and entangled with diverse Indigenous traditions for centuries—it situates research within a history of appropriation, beginning with imperial invasions of Turtle Island. Western academia has long extracted from peyote and other entheogenic organisms while marginalizing the very traditions and knowledges that sustained them. Contemporary psychedelic science continues to overlook or suppress Indigenous epistemologies as well as the perspectives of women, queer people, and People of Color. This thesis traces these dynamics through the legal and colonial regulation of peyote and uses this context to ground a framework for decolonial practice. Five key dimensions are proposed: (1) Positionality and Power, (2) Consent and Sovereignty, (3) Community Involvement and Multisensory Embodied Practice, (4) Language and Communication, and (5) Reciprocity and Benefit-Sharing. Together, these dimensions aim to foster a transformation of academia into a space where humans and more-than-human beings alike are welcomed, heard, and respected—regardless of species, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, or Indigeneity.