Therapeutic Knowledge and Medicinal Materials in the Tibetan World

Objectives

Research bearing on Indian and Tibetan scholarly medicine in the Himalayas has largely neglected ethnographic studies focused on the village level, preferring to study institutions and the effects of macro-scale policies and change processes. Little has been published to date concerning the social and medical practices of Tibetan medicine in the villages of the whole area of Tibetan cultural influence, and little is known on Ayurveda in the depth of the Himalayas. This workshop is a modest attempt towards the filling of this double void, offering a series of papers based upon research that has been conducted among small social groups practicing or using Tibetan medicine or Ayurveda in India, Nepal and Tibet.

What place does Tibetan medicine and Ayurveda hold in contemporary Himalayan societies ? What are the main issues involved in the social and therapeutic transformations of these medicines at the local level ? To what extent can analysis of these transformations shed light on the wider changes taking place in the Himalayas ? The contributors will address these questions by taking two ports of entry : therapeutic knowledge (transmission and transformation) and medicinal materials (exchange networks and commoditization). The anthropological analysis of these two objects of enquiries will highlight from a local standpoint the larger scale dynamics at play in the contemporary transformation that are affecting the communities in question. This workshop will explore the complex social processes, such as national and local government policies, global economic liberalisation and the shifting aspirations of the practitioners and their patients, which all contribute to the ongoing redefinition of Himalayan medicine.

Organizers

International Workshop organized at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (Centre d’Anthropologie – LISST), funded by the French Institute of Pondicherry and the Nomad Research Unit.

Coordinator

Laurent Pordié (IFP / CReCSS)

Speakers

• Florian Besch (SAI, University of Heidelberg)
• Rémi Bordes (CNRS / Université de Bordeaux)
• Calum Blaikie (University of Kent)
• Karma Chodon (Ladakh Society for Traditional Medicines)
• Elisabeth Dodinet (EHESS / Université de Toulouse 2)
• Tsewang Gonbo (Ladakh Society for Traditional Medicines)
• Aline Mercan (CReCSS)
• Marie-Thérèse Nicolas (CNRS)
• Laurent Pordié (CReCSS / IFP)
• Yildis Thomas (CNRS)

Venue

Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) - Toulouse, France.