Precious Pills: Medicine and Social Change Among Tibetan Refugees in India

169 Pages·2008·2.48 MB·English

by  Audrey Prost

Precious Pills
Series: Epistemologies of Healing
General Editors:David Parkin and Elisabeth Hsu, Institute of Social
and Cultural Anthropology, Oxford
This series in medical anthropology will publish monographs and
collected essays on indigenous (so-called traditional) medical
knowledge and practice, alternative and complementary medicine,
and ethnobiological studies that relate to health and illness. The
emphasis of the series is on the way indigenous epistemologies inform
healing, against a background of comparison with other practices, and
in recognition of the fluidity between them.
Volume 1
Conjuring Hope: Magic and Healing in Contemporary Russia
Galina Lindquist
Volume 2
Precious Pills: Medicine and Social Change among Tibetan Refugees in
India
Audrey Prost
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Precious Pills
Medicine and Social Change
among Tibetan Refugees in India
Audrey Prost
prost.qxd:prost.qxd 7/14/08 10:15 AM Page iv
First published in 2008 by
Berghahn Books
www.berghahnbooks.com
© 2008 Audrey Prost
All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the
purposes of criticism and review, no part of this book may be
reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and
retrieval system now known or to be invented, without written
permission of the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Prost, Audrey, 1977-
Precious pills : medicine and social change among Tibetan refugees
in India / Audrey Prost.
p. cm. -- (Epistemologies of healing ; v. 2)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-84545-457-9 (hardback : alk. paper)
1. Medical anthropology--India. 2. Medical anthropology--Tibet. 3.
Traditional medicine--India. 4. Traditional medicine--Tibet. 5.
Tibetans--Medicine--India. 6. Tibetans--India--Social conditions. 7.
Refugees--Tibet. 8. Refugees--India. I. Title.
GN296.5.I4P76 2008
306.4'610954--dc22
2008014702
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Printed in the United States on acid-free paper.
ISBN: 978-1-84545-457-9 (hardback)
(cid:2)
For my family

(cid:2)
Contents
List of Figures and Tables viii
Acknowledgements ix
Note on Transliteration and the Wylie System x
List of Abbreviations xi
Introduction 1
PART I: INEQUALITIES IN EXILE
1. ‘Because we are Tibetans …’: Talking about Health 15
2. ‘India is the Happiest Place!’: Contextualising Exile 30
3. The Pathogenic Nature of Exile 43
4. From ‘Old-timers’to ‘Newcomers’: Social Inequalities
in the Diaspora 54
PART II: THE ROLE OF TRADITIONAL TIBETAN MEDICINE
5. The Mentsikhang: Construing Traditional Authority 77
6. Humours on Trial: The Mentsikhang’s Dilemmas 98
Epilogue 127
Glossary 130
Bibliography 143
Index 151
(cid:2)
List of Figures and Tables
Figures
2.1 Gangkyi’s main square 33
2.2 Young Tibetan newcomers 37
3.1 Tibetan woman selling medicinal substances 50
5.1 His Holiness the Dalai Lama with landmarks from
Bodh Gaya 79
5.2 The Lhasa Mentsikhang in 2005 84
6.1 Library of Tibetan Works and Archives
(Dharamsala, Himachal Pradesh) 104
6.2 Anatomical drawings 112
Tables
2.1 Medical pluralism in Dharamsala 39
3.1 Disorders considered ‘prevalent’in the exile
community 45
3.2 Explanations for prevalent disorders 46
3.3 Medicinal and protective substances 49
(cid:2)
Acknowledgements
I would like to express my deepest gratitude to the many people who
helped me during fieldwork in Dharamsala. Dr Dawa (Mentsikhang),
the late Dr Tenzin Choedak, Dr Dickyi Tsomo, and Dr Tseten offered
help and insights. For their support and humour, I wish to thank friends
Tenzin Lhawang, Jamyang Tenzin, Tsering Tendel, Tenzin Tsultrim, and
Lobsang Gyatso at the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives. I am
grateful to Norzum and her family for looking after me during the first
half of my stay. Humble thanks are also due to Tashi Tsering of the
Amnye Machen Institute for his insightful research suggestions, to
Sangye Tendar Naga for his teachings, and to Nyima Phuntsok’s family
for their kind support. I have not named friends and informants who
contributed stories of illness, but my biggest debt is obviously to them.
Alexandra Correia, Paula Sharp, Stuart Yeh, Frédéric Geri, Sanna
Allsopp, Claire Colomb, Nathalie Rivère de Carles, and Murielle
Cozette offered friendship and inspiration. Dr Yoshitaka Ota and Dr
Etsuko Ota were generous beyond all expectations.
I am also grateful to the various persons who have read and offered
suggestions on drafts of this work: my supervisors Dr. Mukulika
Banerjee and Prof. Murray Last, Prof. Phil Burnham and Prof. Danny
Miller at University College London, Dr. Martin Mills and Dr Martin
Potter, as well as to my thesis examiners, Dr. Charles Ramble and
Prof. Geoffrey Samuel. Prof. Murray Last provided much inspiration
as well as some of the photographs included in this book. I am
particularly indebted to Barbara Gerke from Oxford and the
International Trust for Traditional Medicine, and to Dr Mona
Schrempf at the Humboldt Universität zu Berlin for their invaluable
comments and advice. The shortcomings of this work are, however,
entirely my own. This book is dedicated to the students of
Dharamsala’s Mentsikhang, who serve patients with insight and
compassion despite the traumas of exile.