Wade Davis

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Edmund Wade Davis (born December 14, 1953 in Smithers, British Columbia, Canada) is a noted anthropologist and ethnobotanist whose work has usually focused on the observation and analysis of the customs, beliefs, and social relations of indigenous cultures in North and South America, particularly the traditional uses and beliefs associated with plants with psychoactive properties. Among Davis' many books are The Serpent and the Rainbow (about the process of zombiefication in Haiti) (1986), Passage of Darkness (1988), One River (1996), and Shadows in the Sun (1998).

Wade Davis grew up in Pointe Claire, Quebec, attending Lower Canada College and later, when his family moved to British Columbia, Brentwood College School. He received his Ph.D. in ethnobotany from Harvard University. Mostly through the Harvard Botanical Museum, he spent more than three years in the Amazon and Andes as a plant explorer, living among 15 indigenous groups in eight Latin American nations while making some 6,000 botanical collections. Davis's work later took him to Haiti to investigate folk preparations implicated in the creation of zombies, an assignment that led to his writing Passage of Darkness (1988) and The Serpent and the Rainbow, an international best-seller, which appeared in 10 languages and was later adapted by Universal Studios into a motion picture. He is author of five other books, including One River, in which he follows in the footsteps of his mentor, Harvard ethnobotanist Dr. Richard Evans Schultes.

Davis is a citizen of Canada, Ireland and the United States. He has worked as a guide, park ranger and forestry engineer. He has conducted ethnographic fieldwork among several indigenous societies of northern Canada. He has published scientific and popular articles on subjects ranging from Haitian voodou and Amazonian myth and religion to the global biodiversity crisis, the traditional use of psychotropic drugs, and the ethnobotany of South American indigenous peoples. His discussions of drugs such as the Amazonian entheogenic tea ayahuasca reveal how some human uses of psychoactive substances can be profound and culturally enriching.

A research associate of the Institute of Economic Botany of the New York Botanical Garden, Davis is also a board member of the David Suzuki Foundation, Ecotrust, Future Generations, and Cultural Survival—-all NGOs dedicated to conservation-based development and the protection of cultural and biological diversity. Recently his work has taken him to Peru, Borneo, Tibet, the high Arctic, the Orinoco Delta of Venezuela and northern Kenya. Davis's television credits include Earthguide, a 13-part television series on the environment, which he hosted and co-wrote. He also wrote for the documentaries Spirit of the Mask, Cry of the Forgotten People, and Forests Forever.

Davis is an outspoken conservationist and belongs to many non-governmental organizations that work to preserve biological and cultural diversity.