A01=Geoff Childs
anthropology
asia scholars
Author_Geoff Childs
biography
Category=JHMC
Category=NHF
Category=QRF
communal society
contemporary nepal
daily life
discussion books
eq_bestseller
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
ethnically tibetan
ethnographers
ethnography
familial obligation
firsthand account
highlands
himalayan valley
himalayas
lamas
life and death
nepal
nonfiction diary
nubri
oral histories
personal account
personal conflicts
religious knowledge
social dynamics
social resolutions
social science
spiritual meaning
tibet
tibetan society
travelogue
Product details
- ISBN 9780520241336
- Weight: 408g
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 27 Sep 2004
- Publisher: University of California Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
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In this rich and deeply personal account of life in the highlands of Nepal, Geoff Childs chronicles the daily existence of a range of people, from venerated lamas to humble householders. Offering insights into the complex dynamics of the ethnically Tibetan enclave of Nubri, Childs provides a vivid and compelling portrait of the ebb and flow of life and death, of communal harmony and discord, and of personal conflicts and social resolutions. Part ethnography, part travelogue, and part biography, Tibetan Diary is a one-of-a-kind book that conveys the tangled intricacies of a Tibetan society. Childs's immensely readable and informative narrative incorporates contemporary observations as well as vignettes culled from first-person testaments including oral histories and autobiographies. Examining the tensions between cultural ideals and individual aspirations, he explores certain junctures in the course of life: how the desire to attain religious knowledge or to secure a caretaker in old age contrasts with social expectations and familial obligation, for example.
The result is a vivid and unparalleled view of the quest for both spiritual meaning and mundane survival that typifies life in an unpredictable Himalayan environment.
Geoff Childs is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Washington University.
