Near Death Experiences: Indigenous Approaches | Natasha Tassell-Matamua

Show Notes

‘Season 2 Episode 6 Near Death Experiences: Indigenous Approaches’

Associate Professor Natasha Tassell-Matamua is a Senior Lecturer and Deputy Head of the School of Psychology at Massey University in Aotearoa New Zealand. She is also co-Director of the recently established Centre for Indigenous Psychologies. Her research and teaching is in the area of indigenous psychologies, indigenous knowledges and Exceptional Human Experience. This research focusses on the interplay between spirituality, well-being and the wider ecosystem. She has spent the last decade researching the phenomenology, after-effects and cultural specificity of Near Death Experiences, and has published extensively in the area as well as providing numerous presentations both nationally and internationally.

In today’s talk, we discuss Natasha’s work in Near Death Experiences and the importance of indigenous psychologies and indigenous knowledges. We talk about the problem of power and privilege in Near Death studies, which often leads to the domination of materialist-reductionist approaches. And we talk about how Māori conceptions of spirituality might contribute to better mental health and wellbeing.

Resources

Natasha’s page at Massey University, Aotearoa New Zealand:

https://www.massey.ac.nz/massey/expertise/profile.cfm?stref=830930

And at the Centre for Indigenous Psychologies, with her writing and some media appearances:

https://www.doorofthenight.co.nz/natasha

Her page on Google Scholar:

https://scholar.google.co.nz/citations?user=aKsLIN0AAAAJ&hl=en

The Centre for Indigenous Psychologies:

https://www.indigenouspsychologies.nz

Natasha’s talk at the Alef Trust can be viewed here.

Terminal Lucidity project:

https://www.indigenouspsychologies.nz/terminal-lucidity-in-children

The Door of the Night project:

https://www.doorofthenight.co.nz

Reference for the NDE paper we discuss:

Tassell-Matamua, N. (2024). Power and privilege in the study of near-death experiences. In The Routledge Handbook of Research Methods in Spirituality and Contemplative Studies. (pp. 271 - 281).

Other Resources

“Near-death experiences are ‘electrical surge in dying brain’” — Borjigen lab’s framing of NDEs.

Vandana Shiva’s chapter on Monocultures of the Mind and the exclusion of indigenous knowledges:

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0019556119930304

Title Music: ‘Stranger things’ by Music Unlimited on Pixabey.