In 1971 Ram Dass, born Richard Alpert, Timothy Leary's Harvard colleague turned pilgrim, publishes Be Here Now, the square, illustrated book of his journey to India and his guru Neem Karoli Baba. Printed first by a New Mexico commune's press, the book becomes the counterculture's spiritual manual and sells in the millions.
Tagged: New Age
The Event
- Date
- 1971 (exact)
- Era
- The Countercultural Bloom; Standard periodization of New Age history
- Location
- Lama; today Lama, New Mexico
- Traditions
- New Age Spirituality
- Streams
- New Age
- Key figures
- Ram Dass
- Key texts
- Be Here Now
Connections
Primary Sources
- Ram Dass. Be Here Now. Lama Foundation, 1971.
Secondary Sources
- Hanegraaff, Wouter J. New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in the Mirror of Secular Thought. Leiden: Brill, 1996.
- Heelas, Paul. The New Age Movement. Oxford: Blackwell, 1996.
- York, Michael. The Emerging Network: A Sociology of the New Age and Neo-Pagan Movements. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1995.
Provenance: HIST-1475; confidence 0.95; accessed 2026-10-30.
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World View
New Age Spirituality
New Age spirituality is an eclectic search for the divine within: through healing, meditation, and ancient wisdom, each person awakens to their own sacred power.