Back to Events of Week No. 30: Monday 22nd July 2024 to Sunday 28th July 2024

Tuesday
23
JUL

05:15 PM

Cleansing the Body, Cleansing the Mind

Nomenclatures and Practices of Panchakarma Therapy in Classical Ayurveda and in Contemporary Europe

Dr. med. Ananda Samir Chopra (Habichtswald-Klinik Kassel)

“Panchakarma” (Sanskrit: Pañcakarman) has almost become a synonym for Āyurveda-treatments. It is often praised as a method for “detox” or “rejuvenation” and is thus aligned to modern concepts of health and wellbeing. Going back to the oldest layer of āyurvedic literature, we find that Pañcakarman, literally meaning “five procedures” in Sanskrit, first denotes a collection of five specific therapeutic procedures. Therapeutic emesis, purgation, two types of enemas and nasal oil-application are enumerated as forming the “five procedures, which are useful for strengthening health, prolonging life and eliminate disease” (as one old text says). In the āyurvedic literature of the past two thousand years the “five procedures” retain their reputation as effective treatments and continue to be developed. In professionalised and institutionalised Āyurveda, as it comes into being in the 20th century, Pañcakarman is (re-)discovered and further elaborated as a specific therapeutic mode. However, a real thrust in the popularity of Pañcakarman is witnessed in the 1980s when Āyurveda is introduced to Europe and North America. Be it because other types of āyurvedic therapy (like the use of elaborate herbal preparations) met with formal and practical obstacles in the new environment or because Pañcakarman resembled traditional types of the European “cure”, Āyurveda as it was introduced into the Western world relied so heavily on Pañcakarman as its main therapeutic procedure, that it has sometimes been termed “Panchakarma Ayurveda” (or “PK Ayurveda”). In the course of these developments Pañcakarman acquires again a different form: there is a tendency to cut out the more drastic procedures like therapeutic emesis while stressing gentle oil-therapies, which in the classical understanding are mere “preparatory measures”. At the same time Pañcakarman is made into a specific therapeutic regime which can be undergone for a fixed period of time in hotels, spas or even hospitals. Following the trajectory of Pañcakarman over the centuries and from South Asia into a globalised sphere of health and wellness will allow us to discuss the role and meaning of Āyurveda in general as a medical system in various contexts.

Dr. med. Ananda Samir Chopra is a practicing physician as well as a medical historian. He studied Medicine and Classical Indology at the University of Heidelberg, Germany. After becoming a registered physician in Germany, he spent one year in Kolkata, India, to study Āyurveda. Since 1996 he has been working as a physician at the Ayurveda-Department of the Habichtswald-Klinik in Kassel, Germany, a unique clinical department for Āyurveda-medicine within a German Rehabilitation-hospital. Here authentic Āyurveda is practiced in constant dialogue with modern biomedicine. Taking leave from his hospital-job Chopra has also been working as a postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Heidelberg, Germany (at the Cluster of Excellence “Asia and Europe in a Global Context”) focussing on the modern history of Āyurveda. His research-interests include the history and current practice of Āyurveda India and around the Globe.
Chopra has been learning and practicing classical Indian (Hindustani) music since his childhood and has for some time served honorary director of studies at the Tagore-Institute, Bonn, Germany.

Address

4010

010.01.05 (Hörsaal)

Voßstr. 2

69115 Heidelberg

Organizer

SAI, Abt. Ethnologie

Contact

Lin Nagels

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Cleansing the Body, Cleansing the Mind

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