The Ghost Dance: An Untold His

For the last 53 years Ani has searched through the most remote regions of the Americas for the lost steps of the Ghost Dance.

These steps led Michael to the Sierra Mazateca of Oaxaca, famous for its sacred mushrooms. From the 1960s through 1970s, Ani lived in the Mazateca’s most remote cloud forests in Mexico and then in the 80's and 90's worked with the Yanomami tribes, the last uncontacted, wild and free tribes of the Americas. He became the only outsider who was ever allowed to collect the sacred mushroom species of the region, Desheto.

The wisdom Michael Stuart Ani obtained along his journey was used to fight epidemics among the uncontacted tribes of the Americas that still survive to this day. Ani also learned that these people’s ritual knowledge and entheogen plant sacraments (Talking Plants) may be key to repairing the broken bridge of communication between humans and nature and be essential to our species survival.

MICHAEL STUART ANI lived in Mexico's remote Sierra Mazateca cloud forest of Oaxaca from the end of the 1960's through the 1970's and was the only outsider to have ever been allowed into their sacred cloud forests. He still returns as often as he can to visit the Mazatecan community there. From 1988 to 2002, Ani and his Amazonia Foundation were a central part of the medical outreach program introduced to fight the epidemics among the Yanomami tribe of Venezuela. In 1992, Michael co-won the US Documentary of the Year Award for "Yanomami: Keepers of the Flame." He also directed the Catalina Island Conservancy documentary "Coming Home" about the repatriation of pure American Bison to the Lakota people of Rosebud, South Dakota. Over the last fifty years, he has followed the Rope of the Dead from the tribes of the Amazon rainforest to the tribes of North America, tracking the hidden steps of the Ghost Dance along the way.