Rise of Modern Tibet:
History and Society, 1600-1913
Course Instructor: Gray Tuttle
Day/Time: Thursday 2:10pm-4:00pm Location: 522C Kent Hall
Email: gwt2102@columbia.edu
Office: 913 IAB (WEAI); Office hours: Thursday 1-2pm; Phone: 854-4096
Course overview: This course is designed for students interested in gaining a broad view of Tibetan history from the 1600 to 1913. We will cover the institutional history of major Tibetan state structures and their rivals in the Tibetan borderlands. The three main themes we will examine are the cosmopolitan aspects of Tibetan culture, the central role of Buddhist religion in Tibet, and the social and economic world, which shaped the experiences of Tibetans.
Required Reading
Available For Purchase (at Book Culture) and on reserve (at Starr Library):
Schaeffer, Kurtis. Himalayan Hermitess: The Life of a Tibetan Buddhist Nun, 2004.
Schaeffer, Kurtis. The Culture of the Book in Tibet, 2009.
Gyatso, Janet. Apparitions of the Self: The Secret Autobiographies of a Tibetan Visionary, 1998.
Pomplun. Trent. Jesuit on the Roof of the World, 2009.
Cuevas, Bryan. Travels in the Netherworld, 2009.
Gray Tuttle, Kurtis R. Schaeffer, eds. The Tibetan History Reader, 2013.
Kurtis R. Schaeffer, Matthew Kapstein, Gray Tuttle, eds. Sources of Tibetan Tradition, 2013.
Reserves & Courseworks, (available on reserve at Starr East Asian Library or on-line under Courseworks) including:
• Gray Tuttle, ed. Mapping the Modern in Tibet. 2011.
• Ahmad, Zahiruddin. Sino-Tibetan Relations in the Seventeenth Century. 1970.
• Petech, Luciano. China and Tibet in the early 18th century; history of the establishment of Chinese protectorate in Tibet. 1950.
• Petech, Luciano. Aristocracy and Government in Tibet, 1728-1959. 1972.
Evaluation based on: Percentage of Grade
• Participation (in class, weekly courseworks postings & presentations) 25%
• Paper 1: abstract & summary of biography (see list), Due Oct 25 25%
• Paper 2: Independent Research Proposal & bibliography, Due Nov. 8 25%
• Paper 2: Final Draft, due at the end of reading period 25%
General Expectations:
As participation is such a key component of the class, attendance at all classes is expected.
Your written work for the final paper should be entirely your own, with careful citation of all sources according to an accepted Manual of Style (Chicago, MLA).
Week 1 (9/5): Introducing Tibet: Where is Tibet? Who are the Tibetans? What is modern?
If you are new to Tibet, or have not read this article, please read:
Kapstein, The Tibetans, Chapter 1 “The Vessel and Its Contents.”
READER: (Everyone read)
1) Ch2 Bryan Cuevas. “Some Reflections on the Periodization of Tibetan History”
2) CH3 Peter Schwieger. “History as Myth: On the Appropriation of the Past in Tibetan Culture.” pp. 49-85.
Week 2 (9/12): 17th Century Society: Borderlands and Women’s Lives
Schaeffer, Kurtis. Himalayan Hermitess: The Life of a Tibetan Buddhist Nun, 2004. Read entire book (translation of biography is quick and easy reading).
Week 3 (9/19): Early 17th Century Politics: Civil War and Geluk Hegemony
Kapstein, The Tibetans, 127-143.
SOURCES:
1) “The Rise of the Gelukpa Order,” & “The Fifth Dalai Lama and the Ganden Government,” pp. 522-555; “Kelden Gyatso’s Religious History of Amdo,” & The Donors of Gonlung Monastery in Amdo,” pp 587-594.
READER:
2) Ch20 Leonard van der Kuijp. “The Dalai Lamas and the Origins of Reincarnate Lamas.”
3) Ch21 Kurtis Schaeffer. “The Fifth Dalai Lama.”
4) Ch22 Janet Gyatso. “Experience, Empiricism, and the Fortunes of Authority: Tibetan Medicine and Buddhism on the Eve of Modernity.”
5) Ch26 Luce Boulnois. “Gold, Wool and Musk: Trade in Lhasa in the Seventeenth Century.”
COURSEWORKS:
6) Peter Schwieger, Towards a Biography of Don yod rdo rje, King of Be ri. In Studia Tibetica et Mongolica (Festschrift Manfred Taube). Helmut Eimer, et. al., eds. Swisttal-Odendorf: Indica et Tibetica Verlag, 1999. 247-260.
7) Kurtis Schaeffer, The Culture of the Book in Tibet. New York: Columbia University Press. 2009. Ch 3, 73-89.
Graduate Students Recommended Reading:
8) Ahmad, Zahiruddin. Sino-Tibetan Relations in the Seventeenth Century.
Week 4 (9/26): Mental Maps of Tibetan Conceptions
Cuevas, Bryan. Travels in the Netherworld: Buddhist Popular Narratives of Death and the Afterlife in Tibet. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2008. Read entire book.
Schaeffer, Kurtis. The Culture of the Book in Tibet. New York: Columbia University Press. 2009. Ch 1, 1-18.
Assignment: Select Tibetan Biography from List Provided, Abstract and Summary due: 10/25
Week 5 (10/3) Early 18th Century Politics: Civil War and Manchu Intervention
Kapstein, The Tibetans, 144-155.
READER: Ch24 Katô Naoto. “Lobjang Danjin’s Rebellion of 1723.”
SOURCES: Ch18 “Aristocrats, Monks, and Hermits,” pp. 556-568.
COURSEWORKS:
1) Lepore, Jill. “What’s in a Name?” in The Name of War: King Philip’s War and the Origins of American Identity. New York: Vintage Books. ix-xxiii.
2) Petech, L. “Notes on Tibetan History of the 18th Century.” T’oung-pao 52 (1965/66): 262-292
3) Ishihama Yumiko, “New Light on the ‘Chinese Conquest of Tibet’ in 1720 (based on the new Manchu sources).” 419-426. 1997.
4) Hartley, Lauran. “Self as a faithful public servant: The autobiography of Mdo mkhar ba Tshe ring dbang rgyal (1697-1763).” Beiträge zur Zentralasienforschung, International Institute for Tibetan and Buddhist Studies—Wissenschaftsverlag GmbH: Sankt Augustin. 2012. 49-77.
5) Graduate Students Recommended Reading: Petech, Luciano. China and Tibet in the early 18th century; history of the establishment of Chinese protectorate in Tibet. 1-159.
Optional resources: 西藏日記 : [上,下卷] /Xizang ri ji / 允禮, Yunli, Prince, son of Kangxi, Emperor of China, 1697-1738. 北平 : 禹貢學會, 民國26 [1937] Beiping: Yu gong xue hui. In Starr East Asian Library.
Week 6 (10/10): Religious and Cultural Exchange (Christian Missionaries)
Pomplun, Trent. Jesuit on the Roof of the World: Ippolito Desideri’s Mission to Tibet. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2009. 1-15, 45-76, 103-130, 153-198.
Week 7 (10/17): 18th Century Borderland Developments, Contact Abroad (Nathan)
Schaeffer, Kurtis. The Culture of the Book in Tibet. New York: Columbia University Press. 2009. Chs 5-6, 90-146.
Jackson, Roger. “Triumphalism and Ecumenism in Thu’u bkwan’s Crystal Mirror” Roger Jackson, Carleton College JIATS, no. 2 (August 2006), THL #T2720.
SOURCES: Ch 19 “Sumpa Khenpo’s Annals of Kokonor,” Makzor Gonpo and the Choné Kangyur,” “Labrang Monastery’s Jamyang Zhepa…,” “The Religious History of Muli,” pp. 594-607; “Intersections with Mongolia and China,” & “Intimations of the West,” pp 633-658.
Courseworks:
1) Lobsang Yongdan. Tibet charts the world: Btsan po No mon han’s The Detailed Description of the World, an early major scientific work in Tibet. .” In Mapping the Modern in Tibet. Gray Tuttle, ed. Beiträge zur Zentralasienforschung, International Institute for Tibetan and Buddhist Studies—Wissenschaftsverlag GmbH: Sankt Augustin. 2012. 77-138.
2) Huber, Toni. The Holy Land Reborn: Pilgrimage and the Tibetan Reinvention of Buddhist India. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 2008. 193-225.
Week 8 (10/24): 18th Century Society: Rise of a Modern Consciousness?
Gyatso, Janet. Apparitions of the Self: The Secret Autobiographies of a Tibetan Visionary, 1998. Read entire book, but in this order: 3-11, 101-271; 15-61.
Assignment: Paper 1 Due 10/25 for Biography website, which you must join:
Write 1 paragraph Abstract & 4-5 page Summary of Tibetan Biography, post to: http://tibetan-biographies.wikischolars.columbia.edu/List+of+Tibetan+biographies
Start with the abstract: who (include Tibetan spelling of personal names if you can find), when (note the time periods covered), where (again, include Tibetan spellings if given), what (contents of narrative) and why (motive[s] for telling the story).
Week 9 (10/31): Late 18th Century Politics: Border Wars & Chinese Protectorate (Sungoh, Ted)
Kapstein, The Tibetans, 155-164.
READER: CH23 Petech, Luciano. “The Administration of Tibet during the First Half-century of Chinese Protectorate”
SOURCES: “A Tibetan Diplomat Reflecting on the Status of Tibet After War with Nepal” pp. 572-584.
COURSEWORKS:
1) Li, Ruohong. “A Tibetan aristocratic family in eighteenth-century Tibet: A study of Qing-Tibetan contact.” Introduction, CHS 1-2; 2002
2) Elliot Sperling. “Awe and Submission: A Tibetan aristocrat at the court of Qianlong.” The International History Review XX, no. 2 (1998): 325-335.
3) Optional resource: 西藏誌 / Xizang zhi / 允禮, Yunli, Prince, son of Kangxi, Emperor of China, 1697-1738. 清乾隆 57年 [1792]. In Starr East Asian Library.
Week 10 (11/7): Early 19th Century Politics & Economy (Chris)
READER:
1) CH25 Luciano Petech. Aristocracy and Government in Tibet: 1728-1959.
2) CH27 Melvyn C. Goldstein. “The Circulation of Estates in Tibet: Reincarnation, Land and Politics.”
COURSEWORKS: Rockhill, William Woodville. “The Dalai Lamas of Lhasa and their relations with the Manchu emperors of China, 1644-1908.” 1910.
Assignment Deadline 11/8
Independent Research Paper Proposal (1 page research proposal including thesis & bibliography)
Week 11 (11/14): 19th Century Borderland Developments: Kham (Tracy)
Kapstein, The Tibetans, 164-168.
READER: Ch29 Lauran Hartley. “The Kingdom of Dergé.”
SOURCES: “Religious Leaders in Kham,” pp. 673-691.
COURSEWORKS:
1) McClellan, Joseph. On Khampa Educational Developments. Unpublished paper.
2) Yudru Tsomu. “Kham in the Nineteenth Century: Land, People and Politics.” Extracted from “Local Aspirations and National Constraints: A Case Study of Nyarong Gonpo Namgyel and His Rise to Power in Kham (1836-1865).” Extracts from Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, 2006.
Week 12 (11/21): 19th Century Borderland Developments: Amdo (LIZRey)
READER: Ch30 Paul Nietupski. “Labrang: A Tibetan Buddhist Monastery at the Crossroads of Four Civilizations.”
COURSEWORKS:
1) Tuttle, Gray. “Challenging Central Tibet’s dominance of history: The Oceanic Book, a nineteenth century politico-religious geographic history.” Beiträge zur Zentralasienforschung, International Institute for Tibetan and Buddhist Studies—Wissenschaftsverlag GmbH: Sankt Augustin. 2012. 139-178.
2) Extracts from Louis Schram, The Monguors of the Kansu-Tibetan Frontier, originally published in three parts by the Transactions of the American Philosophical Society (Philadelphia) 1954, 1957, 1961; republished by Plateau Publications: Xining, 2006: See especially sections on the rise of Muslims rebellions.
Week 13 (11/28) Thanksgiving – No class
Week 14 (12/5): Trade and Entering an International Environment (Ryan)
READER: Ch28 Wim van Spengen. “The Geo-History of Long-Distance Trade in Tibet 1850-1950.”
COURSEWORKS:
1) Mishra, Tirtha Prasad. “A Critical Assessment of the Nepal-Tibet Treaty of 1856,” in Tibet and her Neighbours, 137-146.
2) Wang, Xiuyu. “Lu Chuanlin’s ‘Great Game’ in Nyarong: Moving Frontiers and Power Projection in Qing Tibet, 1865-1897,” The International History Review 31.3 (September 2009): 481-483.
3) Tuttle, Gray. Tibetan Buddhists in the Making of Modern China, 2005. Selections.
Final Paper Due 12/12 (last day of reading period)