Hardiman, David. (2009) Indian medical indigeneity: from nationalist assertion to the global market. Social History, Vol.34 (No.3). pp. 263-283. ISSN 0307-1022

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Abstract

The Indian system of healing known as Ayurveda is today popularly projected as a holistic form of healing that works on the mind, body and spirit. It is also said to be extremely ancient, with a knowledge rooted in successful practice that has continued largely unchanged for millennia. The article seeks to understand how a ‘traditional’ form of healing that is associated with Indian civilisation came to occupy such an epistemic space. The related practice of Unani Tibb (a practice that was associated with Islam in India) is compared. It is argued that the claims of Ayurveda and Unani Tibb are typical of many ‘invented traditions’ that sought to forge cultures that helped to bind disparate peoples within supposedly uniform nationalities. In the process, many cultural phenomena that did not fit into the created categories were either marginalised or excluded. The essay examines how claims to great antiquity were forged, the idea of a decline from a glorious past, with a corresponding need for present-day revival, attempts to create uniform ‘systems’ out of a range of eclectic practices, the politics of medical education for indigenous practitioners, and conflicting claims as to what ‘Indian indigenous medicine’ entailed.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Subjects:	R Medicine > R Medicine (General) D History General and Old World > DS Asia
Divisions:	Faculty of Arts > History
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH):	Medicine, Ayurvedic -- India, Medicine, Arab -- India, Folklore and history -- India, India -- Civilization -- Philosophy
Journal or Publication Title:	Social History
Publisher:	Routledge
ISSN:	0307-1022
Official Date:	August 2009
Dates:	Date Event August 2009 Published
Volume:	Vol.34
Number:	No.3
Number of Pages:	22
Page Range:	pp. 263-283
Identification Number:	10.1080/03071020902975131
Status:	Peer Reviewed
Access rights to Published version:	Restricted or Subscription Access
URI:	http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/id/eprint/2163

Data sourced from Thomson Reuters' Web of Knowledge

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