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Arnold van Gennep. The Rites of Passage. 1909; English translation, University of Chicago Press, 1960. Use for: separation, transition, incorporation, initiatory structure, and the candidate’s movement through old identity, liminal state, and return. Victor Turner. “Betwixt and Between: The Liminal Period in Rites of Passage.” In The Forest of Symbols: Aspects of Ndembu Ritual. Cornell University Press, 1967. Use for: liminality, threshold identity, the candidate as “betwixt and between,” and darkness as embodied transition. Victor Turner. The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure. Aldine Publishing, 1969. Use for: liminality, communitas, anti-structure, social transformation, and the ritual pressure placed on ordinary identity. Catherine Bell. Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice. Oxford University Press, 1992. Use for: ritualization, ritual power, the ritualized body, and the temple as a structured environment that trains perception and action. Catherine Bell. “The Ritual Body and the Dynamics of Ritual Power.” Journal of Ritual Studies 4, no. 2 (1990): 299–313. Use for: ritualized bodies, spatial discipline, gesture, power, and the way ritual arrangements shape action. John C. Lilly. The Deep Self: Profound Relaxation and the Tank Isolation Technique. Simon & Schuster, 1977. Use for: the isolation tank, reduced stimulation, altered consciousness, and the modern technological black room. John C. Lilly. The Center of the Cyclone: Looking into Inner Space. Julian Press, 1972. Use carefully for: Lilly’s altered-state/counterculture context, isolation tank work, consciousness exploration, and the bridge between research and psychedelic-era experimentation. Justin S. Feinstein et al. “Examining the Short-Term Anxiolytic and Antidepressant Effect of Floatation-REST.” PLOS ONE 13, no. 2 (2018): e0190292. Use for: Floatation-REST, reduced environmental stimulation, anxiety reduction, mood change, and the clinical side of float tanks. Hannah Hruby et al. “Induction of Altered States of Consciousness During Floatation-REST Is Associated With the Dissolution of Body Boundaries and the Distortion of Subjective Time.” Scientific Reports 14 (2024). Use for: float tanks, altered states, body-boundary dissolution, and subjective time distortion. Madison K. M. Garland et al. “A Randomized Controlled Safety and Feasibility Trial of Floatation-REST in Anxious and Depressed Individuals.” PLOS ONE 18, no. 6 (2023): e0286899. Use for: safety, tolerability, repeated Floatation-REST, and caution against overclaiming. Lashgari et al. “Floatation-REST Systematic Review.” 2025. Use for: the broad current state of Floatation-REST research, including anxiety, pain, stress, sleep, well-being, and the need for stronger standardization and larger studies. Michael T. H. Do. “Melanopsin and the Intrinsically Photosensitive Retinal Ganglion Cells.” Neuron 104, no. 2 (2019): 205–226. Use for: ipRGCs, melanopsin, non-image-forming vision, circadian entrainment, pupil response, sleep, and light as biological timing information. Lorenzo Lazzerini Ospri, Glen Prusky, and Samer Hattar. “Mood, the Circadian System, and Melanopsin Retinal Ganglion Cells.” Annual Review of Neuroscience 40 (2017): 539–556. Use for: light, mood, circadian rhythm, melanopsin, and the biological consequences of light exposure. Charles A. Czeisler and related circadian medicine research. Use for: artificial light, circadian disruption, melatonin suppression, shift work, and modern light exposure as a biological intervention. Anne-Marie Chang, Daniel Aeschbach, Jeanne F. Duffy, and Charles A. Czeisler. “Evening Use of Light-Emitting eReaders Negatively Affects Sleep, Circadian Timing, and Next-Morning Alertness.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 112, no. 4 (2015): 1232–1237. Use for: screens, evening light, melatonin suppression, delayed circadian timing, altered sleep, and modern light’s effect on the body. A. Roger Ekirch. At Day’s Close: Night in Times Past. W. W. Norton, 2005. Use for: premodern night, darkness before electric light, nocturnal fear, dreams, prayer, crime, labor, and the cultural history of darkness. A. Roger Ekirch. “Sleep We Have Lost: Pre-Industrial Slumber in the British Isles.” The American Historical Review 106, no. 2 (2001): 343–386. Use for: segmented sleep, first sleep and second sleep, night waking, dreams, prayer, and premodern sleep culture. Craig Koslofsky. Evening’s Empire: A History of the Night in Early Modern Europe. Cambridge University Press, 2011. Use for: early modern night culture, artificial lighting, urba
