Barbara Gerke
Barbara Gerke
Contact:
E-Mail: barbara.gerke@univie.ac.at
Web: https://univie.academia.edu/BarbaraGerke
Barbara Gerke received a M.Sc. in Medical Anthropology (2003) and a D.Phil. in Social Anthropology (2008) from the University of Oxford. She is currently the Principal Investigator of the FWF-funded projects Pandemic Narratives of Tibet and the Himalayas (P36136) (with post docs Dr. William McGrath and Dr. Jan van der Valk) and the project Potent Substances in Sowa Rigpa and Buddhist Rituals (P30804) (with post doc Dr. Jan van der Valk). She came to the University of Vienna in 2015 with a Lise-Meitner senior fellowship on Tibetan precious pill formulas. Her DFG-funded post doc project on Sowa Rigpa (Tibetan medical) pharmacological detoxification methods (2011-2015) was based at Humboldt University of Berlin, where she also taught. She also taught at universities in the USA (University of California Santa Barbara and Dartmouth College, NH).
She works across the disciplines of medical anthropology and Tibetan studies. Her research interests are the anthropology of Sowa Rigpa, specifically Sowa Rigpa-related responses to the pandemic, the medico-religious interfaces in Sowa Rigpa pharmacology, and the use of potent and poisonous substances. Her ethnographic fieldwork is based in Buddhist communities across the Himalayas.
Her open-access monograph Taming the Poisonous: Mercury, Toxicity, and Safety in Tibetan Medical Practice (Heidelberg University Publishing, 2021) examines the use of refined mercury in Tibetan medicines. Her first monograph Long Lives and Untimely Deaths (Brill, 2012) analyzes long-life rituals, as well as vitality and life-span concepts among Tibetans in the Darjeeling Hills. Together with Jan van der Valk and Sienna Craig (2020) she co-edited a Hot Spots issue on Asian medical responses to COVID-19. With Jan van der Valk she co-edited the special issue section of HIMALAYA (vol. 39.1, 2019) on potent substances. She also edited a special issue of Asian Medicine (vol. 8.1, 2013) on mercury in Ayurveda and Tibetan Medicine. For her numerous articles and book chapters visit: https://univie.academia.edu/BarbaraGerke
Online Resources
FWF Project Pandemic Narratives of Tibet and the Himalayas
FWF Project Potent Substances in Sowa Rigpa and Buddhist Rituals
Taming the Poisonous open access monograph
All activities
The multiple potencies of nine aromatic substances: The Tibetan anti-epidemic amulet formula Nakpo Gujor
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Taming the Poisonous
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Tibetan Buddhist Longevity Rituals and Traditional Medicine in India
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
European Conference for South Asian Studies
Jan Van der Valk (Speaker) & Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
COVID-19 in Sowa Rigpa: Approaching Epidemics in the Texts and Practices of Tibet and the Himalayas
Barbara Gerke (Speaker), Jan Van der Valk (Speaker) & William McGrath (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Smellscapes of Protection: NAKPO GUJOR, The 9-Compound Black Pill
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Sowa Rigpa Responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic: Material Manifestations of Protection and Treatment.
Barbara Gerke (Speaker) & Jan Van der Valk (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Potent Substances in Sowa Rigpa and Buddhist Rituals
Barbara Gerke (Speaker), Jan Van der Valk (Speaker), Tawni Lynn Tidwell (Speaker) & Calum Blaikie (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Sowa Rigpa Infectious Disease Etiologies, Buddhist Rituals, and COVID-19 Vaccination Compliance
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Continuity of Potency: Ethnographies of Lineage Substances (phab rta)
Barbara Gerke (Speaker) & Calum Blaikie (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Tibetan Spiritual Ecologies of Substances: The Anti-Epidemic “9-Compound Black Pill” (nag po dgu sbyor)
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Depicting poisons, contagion, and antidotes in Tibetan medical paintings of the 17th century
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Precious and Potent: Tibetan Medical Pill Traditions
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Public
Artisanship in Sowa Rigpa Medicine Making
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
When Practice Contradicts Texts: The Use of Panacea in Sowa Rigpa
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Potency, poison cultures, and the politics of toxicity: Processing mercury in Asian medicines
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Artisanship and "Potency-in-Becoming"
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
What Makes a Substance Potent? Senses, Substances, and the Art of Tibetan Pharmacology
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Other
Enhancing the Potency of Substances in Sowa Rigpa: Chongzhi (cong zhi), the ‘Essence of Stones’
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
"Potency-in-Becoming": Artisanship among Amchi Practitioners Making Sowa Rigpa Medicines in Ladakh
Barbara Gerke (Speaker) & Jan Van der Valk (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Biographies of Tibetan Precious Pills: A Project Exhibition at ISTB
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Other
Sterben am Ganges: Hospize in Varanasi, Indien
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Other
Starting and running an NGO in India in my Twenties
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Other
Tod und Sterben in Indien
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Other
The Globalization of Asian Medicines
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Precious Substances in Tibetan Pharmacopoeia: Exploring Tibetan Jewel Pill Ingredients
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
On the History and Manufacturing of Tibetan Precious Pills
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Challenges in Translating Epistemologies of Toxicity in Tibetan Medical Texts and Ethnographic Encounters
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
The Potency of Preciousness: Gems as Potent Substances in Sowa Rigpa Pharmacopoeia
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Entangled Efficacies in the Biographies of Tibetan Precious Pills
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Reformulations in Sowa Rigpa: Thinking about “Classical Formulas” Taking the Example of Tibetan Precious Pills
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Science to Science
Mercury as a chülen in Tibetan traditions
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Other
Potent substances in Tibetan multicompound formulas: Anthropological considerations
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Other
The Signature of Recipes: Genre, Authenticity and the Development of Tibetan Precious Pill Formulas
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Other
On the Sensory Engagement with Poisonous Substances: 'Taming' Poisons into Elixirs in Tibetan Pharmacological Practices
Barbara Gerke (Speaker)
Activity: Talks and presentations › Talk or oral contribution › Other
Pandemic Narratives of Tibet and the Himalayas
Gerke, B., Van der Valk, J. & McGrath, W.
1/12/22 → 30/11/25
Project: Research funding
Potent Substances in Sowa Riga and Buddhist Rituals
Gerke, B. & Van der Valk, J.
11/06/18 → 10/09/24
Project: Research funding
Department of South Asian, Tibetan and Buddhist Studies
Spitalgasse 2
1090 Wien
Room: 2B-O1-12