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Research by Region
Tibet
A brief history of Tibetan Medicine
Modern History (since 1959)
The modern history of Tibetan medicine is characterised by the emergence of complex and new issues. Since 1959, Tibetan medicine has increasingly encountered cultural dominance by Western biomedicine in exile and at home. Consequently, the theoretical, institutional and clinical practice of Tibetan medicine has undergone great transformations linked to its confrontation with modernity and secularism. Its introduction to the West, attempts at preserving the tradition in the Tibetan exile community in India and Nepal, and the institutionalisation of education and clinical practice in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) are the main areas where such key transformations have taken place.
Some research works have appeared on the problems of these transitions. Craig R. Janes wrote about the transformation of Tibetan Health care system under Chinese rule (1995) and analysed the political and economic forces that have transformed both the role of Tibetan medicine in the primary health care system of the TAR, as well as the perspectives and behaviours of the users of Tibetan medicine (1999a, 2001). Vincanne Adams analysed Tibetan medical theories on women's health in Lhasa (1998, 2001a), ambiguous practices of science in Tibetan medicine (2001b) and the interrelationship of science and the State in contemporary Tibetan medical practice in Lhasa (2002a). Her latest paper (2002b) investigates the criminalisation of Tibetan medicine and medical practitioners as part of the global pharmaceutical pursuit of new medical products. Medical anthropological research by Sienna Craig focuses on professionalisation, identity and efficacy among Tibetan medical practitioners in Nepal (forthcoming, 2003). Audrey Prost explores how the changing lifestyles of Tibetan refugees in Dharamsala and the emerging medical pluralism of exile affects local perceptions of health and therapeutic strategies (forthcoming, 2003).
Schrempf and Garrett in their current project on Bon medicine analyse "story like" narrative description of pre-Buddhist illness experiences and treatment, preserved in the caves of Dunhuang (9th century AD), and in later 11th to 15th century Bon literature (Schrempf and Garrett 2003).They argue that ideological and cultural narratives are greatly influenced by changes in religious and social concepts, local and historical contexts and other forms of culture and want to study how Bon medicine is defined as a tradition distinct from other forms of Tibetan medicine.
Several doctoral theses have appeared on Tibetan medicine since the 1980s. These recent historical and anthropological studies emphasise the complexities of local medical practice and of indigenous understandings of health and illness in various Tibetan communities.
Text supplied by Barbara Gerke
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