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Healing Elements: Efficacy and the Social Ecologies of Tibetan Medicine
Tibetan medicine has come to represent multiple and sometimes conflicting agendas. On the one hand it must retain a sense of cultural authenticity and a connection to Tibetan Buddhism; on the other it must prove efficacious and safe according to biomedical standards. Recently, Tibetan medicine has found a place within the multibillion-dollar market for complementary, traditional, and herbal medicines as people around the world seek alternative paths to wellness. Healing Elements explores how Tibetan medicine circulates through diverse settings in Nepal, China, and beyond as commercial goods and gifts, and as target therapies and panacea for biophysical and psychosocial ills. Through an exploration of efficacy – what does it mean to say Tibetan medicine “works”? – this book illustrates a bio-politics of traditional medicine and the meaningful, if contested, translations of science and healing that occur across distinct social ecologies.
- GenresAnthropology
344 pages, Paperback
First published July 1, 2012
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
August 15, 2026
For a mix of reasons (my inconsistent reading habits, constantly shifting life situation, and not owning a physical copy), this took me forever to finish. But every time I picked it back up, I felt so incredibly inspired and contemplative.
I came across this ethnographic work during a summer exchange at Ashoka University (which unfortunately ended up being online). Craig’s research spanned nearly a decade of fieldwork across Nepal and the Tibetan areas of China, exploring what a broader definition of “efficacy” might look like when it comes to Tibetan medicine, or Sowa Rigpa. By asking “What makes a medicine ‘work’? How are such assertions made, by whom, and to what ends?”, she builds a rich account of the social ecologies surrounding the subject, constructed by its historical underpinnings and contemporary political influences.
Across her chapters, Craig walks readers through Tibetan medicine as a process, following the lives of practitioners (such as an amchi) and institutional actors, and showing how recognition and regulation shape the practice. She also examines Tibetan medicine as a product, and here things are equally layered: questions of access and affordability, and how migration and modernisation reshape people’s understandings of the causes and conditions of health problems. On top of all this sit the moral, environmental, and economic pressures on the value of Tibetan medicine, from state regulations like China’s Good Manufacturing Practices to issues of conservation and cultivation, while new pharmacological innovations emerge.
What’s most stunning is Craig’s narrative style. She gives such an intimate, close-up view of Sowa Rigpa that it expanded my mind on the ethical ambiguities, political risks, and social-ecological impacts so often dismissed in the narrower framing of translational science. It also made me more reflective on the wider implication for transforming traditional medicine, given the cautionary case of Tibetan medicine having its identity reduced to a sanitised product that is “culturally intact, spiritually infused, politically docile, and scientifically potent,” fetishised under the forces of global capitalism.
Perhaps my biggest takeaway is to remind myself of the complexity of how people relate to medical practices, and, instead of quickly disregarding the unscientific parts of a practice, to reorient the focus toward ways in which paths to modernity can be most meaningful for people and communities.
I came across this ethnographic work during a summer exchange at Ashoka University (which unfortunately ended up being online). Craig’s research spanned nearly a decade of fieldwork across Nepal and the Tibetan areas of China, exploring what a broader definition of “efficacy” might look like when it comes to Tibetan medicine, or Sowa Rigpa. By asking “What makes a medicine ‘work’? How are such assertions made, by whom, and to what ends?”, she builds a rich account of the social ecologies surrounding the subject, constructed by its historical underpinnings and contemporary political influences.
Across her chapters, Craig walks readers through Tibetan medicine as a process, following the lives of practitioners (such as an amchi) and institutional actors, and showing how recognition and regulation shape the practice. She also examines Tibetan medicine as a product, and here things are equally layered: questions of access and affordability, and how migration and modernisation reshape people’s understandings of the causes and conditions of health problems. On top of all this sit the moral, environmental, and economic pressures on the value of Tibetan medicine, from state regulations like China’s Good Manufacturing Practices to issues of conservation and cultivation, while new pharmacological innovations emerge.
What’s most stunning is Craig’s narrative style. She gives such an intimate, close-up view of Sowa Rigpa that it expanded my mind on the ethical ambiguities, political risks, and social-ecological impacts so often dismissed in the narrower framing of translational science. It also made me more reflective on the wider implication for transforming traditional medicine, given the cautionary case of Tibetan medicine having its identity reduced to a sanitised product that is “culturally intact, spiritually infused, politically docile, and scientifically potent,” fetishised under the forces of global capitalism.
Perhaps my biggest takeaway is to remind myself of the complexity of how people relate to medical practices, and, instead of quickly disregarding the unscientific parts of a practice, to reorient the focus toward ways in which paths to modernity can be most meaningful for people and communities.
October 17, 2020
One of the best books I've read for a class. Well written with arguments clearly articulated. I like the narrative nature mixed with analysis and anthropological theory. Overall, it was really fascinating and I definitely learned a lot.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews