Piera Talin is currently PhD candidate in anthropology in the ERC Starting Grant Program 'Healing Encounters: Reinventing an indigenous medicine in the clinic and beyond', headed by Emilia Sanabria at Cermes3 (Medicine, Science, Health & Society Research Centre), developing her joint PhD between EHESS (École des Hautes Études en ScienceS Sociales) and the Amsterdam Institute for Social Sciences Research (AISSR) at the University of Amsterdam. Her PhD project focuses on the circulation of ayahuasca ritual healing in urban contexts between Brazil and Europe. 

As part of the team of ERC Advanced Grant Program "ChemicalYouth: What chemicals do for youths in their everyday lives" (University of Amsterdam) since 2014, Piera realized ethnographies in the Amazon and Italy, which lead to the publication of the article written with Emilia Sanabria Ayahuasca’s entwined efficacy: An ethnographic study of ritual healing from ‘addiction’.

She trained in Italy with Master Degree in Cultural Anthropology, Ethnology and Ethnolinguistic at Cà Foscari University in Venice in collaboration with the Federal University of Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, Brazil, with dissertation on ayahuasca religious communities and Bachelor degree in Theories and Practices of Anthropology at La Sapienza University of Rome with dissertation on ethno-psychiatry.

Piera’s research focuses on anthropology of health, care and the body, with particular interest for mental health and ritual healing, especially involving plants and non-humans. She is interested in history of medicine, cultural psychiatry and ethno-psychiatry and more recently Piera has started to look into the weavings between art, ritual healing, medicine and drugs.

Piera is a trained counsellor and worked principally with children, young adults and families dealing with end-stage cancer.

Cermes3 - Medicine, Science, Health & Society Research Centre - Villejuif (Paris), France 

http://www.cermes3.cnrs.fr/fr/

'Chemical Youth: What chemicals do for youths in their everyday lives' - ERC Adavanced Grant Program, headed by Anita Hardon 

https://chemicalyouth.org

Talin, P. and Sanabria, E. 2017. “Ayahuasca’s entwined efficacy: An ethnographic study of ritual healing from ‘addiction’.” International Journal of Drug Policy, 44, 23–30. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5773453/

Talin, P. and Sanabria, E. (in press) Healing with the brew: Ayahuasca’s Reconfiguration of “Addiction” in Ayahuasca Healing and Science. Edited by Labate, Beatriz C. and Cavnar, Clancy (Eds.) Cham, Switzerland: Springer. 

Talin, P. (2018). Black as ink. Burning as fire. Ethnography of a B.O.R. session. in Galleria Varsi (eds.) Body of Reverbs. New rituals for contemporary bodies. Galleria Varsi, Roma.

Talin, P. (2013). Santo Daime between the Amazon and the West: Community life at the base of new social bonding. Quaderni di Thule, Documents of the 35th International Americanist Conference, May 3–10, 2013, Perugia, 13, 1133–1143. http://neip.info/texto/santo-daime-tra-amazzonia-e-occidente-vita-comunitaria-e-spiritualita-alla-base-di-nuovi-legami-familiari-e-sociali/