RUBIN, Vera "Ganja in Jamaica: The Effects of Marijuana Use" [Anchor, 1976]

RUBIN, Vera & COMITAS, Lambros Ganja in Jamaica: The Effects of Marijuana Use Garden City, New York: Anchor Press / Doubleday, 1976. Paperback edition. Approximately 7" x 4.25". Published as part of the West Indian Perspectives series. Moderate rubbing and handling wear to covers with a partially removed price sticker on the front cover, light creasing to corners, and scattered staining to page edges and margins. Text remains clean and fully legible. Good+. Groundbreaking anthropological study of cannabis use in Jamaica, originally issued in hardcover in 1975 as Ganja in Jamaica: A Medical Anthropological Study of Chronic Marihuana Use. Sponsored by the Center for Studies of Narcotic and Drug Abuse and the National Institute of Mental Health, the project represented the first major multidisciplinary field study of long-term cannabis use conducted in a natural cultural setting rather than a laboratory environment. Drawing upon medical examinations, sociological surveys, and ethnographic observation, Rubin and Comitas challenged many prevailing assumptions about marijuana use and argued for the importance of understanding cannabis within its broader social and cultural context. An influential work in the history of drug policy, medical anthropology, and Caribbean studies, frequently cited for its early evidence-based approach to a subject that was often dominated by political rhetoric and moral panic. The volume remains an important primary source in the development of modern cannabis research.