Medical Identities in South Asia (ERC Workshop, 30-31 January 2020, The Wellcome Collection)

Summary

The medical landscape of South Asia is complex, plural and fluid. The range of formal and informal systems—Ayurveda, Unani, Siddha and so-called tribal medicine, to name a few traditions—reflect the ecological, ethnic and religious diversity of South Asia as a whole. This medical world has provided (and continues to provide) a space where identities are created and relations between different social groups and medicines are developed and negotiated.

This two-day workshop will start with presentations on Indian materia medica and be followed by discussions around a range of medical texts, focusing on Ayurveda and Siddha medicines as a way of exploring how medical knowledge and practice have shaped changing perceptions of self, community, liminality and causality.

30 January (2-5 PM), The Wellcome Trust, 215 Euston Road. Day 1 will be dedicated to South Asian medical traditions.

Daniela De Simone (ERC Synergy Project Beyond Boundaries, British Museum) "The materia medica of Indian forests"

Jason Birch (Haṭha Yoga Project, SOAS) "Yoga and Āyurveda: premodern interactions"

Brigitte Sebastia (EAP 810 Project) "From the siddha corpus to siddha medicine: an exploration of manuscripts digitised for the project EAP 810 “Conservation, Documentation and Preservation of the Knowledge of Siddha Medicine”

Michael Willis (ERC Synergy Project Beyond Boundaries, British Museum) "Buddhism and the Buddhist landscape of Central India: hydrology, humours and food"

31 January (10 AM-4 PM), The Wellcome Collection, 183 Euston Road. Day 2 will deal with cross-cultural exchanges documented by early Central Asian texts and Persian works on Indian learned traditions, and with the medical systems of Tibet and southeast Asia, which like those in India, exhibit borrowing and syncretic tendencies.

10 AM-1 PM

Adrian Plau (Wellcome Collection) "Samples of Wellcome Collection’s Early Hindi Medicine Manuscripts"

Fabrizio Speziale (EHESS, Paris) "Entangled knowledges: Persian manuscripts on Ayurvedic medicine in the Wellcome Collection"

Matt Kimberly (British Library) "New Contributions to the Study of the Jivakapustaka"

Wellcome Collection TBC

1-2 PM Lunch break

2-4 PM

Ronit Yoeli-Tlalim (Goldsmiths) "Early Tibetan medicine in context"

Elizabeth Elliott (UCL) "Medicinal knowledge of southern Laos: localised or syncretic?"

Kate Crosby (King’s College) "Obstetrics, medicine and pre-modern Theravada meditation"

Important Information

On 30 January, participants need to arrive at the Wellcome Trust (215 Euston Road) at 1.30 PM in order to collect their visitor passes.

Contact Email: ep36@soas.ac.uk for registration. Visitor passes restricted.