Animal Substances in Contemporary Tibetan Medicine

Abstract One of the fundamental principles of Tibetan pharmacology is that all substances – correctly understood and used – have medicinal properties. This includes animal parts and products, which, like in other Asian medical traditions, constitute an integral part of Sowa Rigpa’s classical pharmacopoeia. But what about their use in contemporary Tibetan medical/pharmacological practice? How have these practices, most notably regarding animal products, been shaped by the transformations of Sowa Rigpa during the twentieth century and its more recent industrialization? Based on over twenty years of ethnographic and textual materials as well as a review of the scant existing scholarly literature, this article argues that we can observe a partial pharmaceutical defaunalization in Sowa Rigpa. This stands in sharp contrast to the Chinese context, where the industrialization of Traditional Chinese Medicine coincided with a dramatic medicalization of all kinds of animals.