High Religion: A Cultural and Political History of Sherpa Buddhism

HIGH RELIGION

PRINCETON STUDIES IN

CULTURE/POWER/HISTORY

HIGH RELIGION

A Cultural and Political History

of Sherpa Buddhism

SHERRY B. ORTNER

PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS

PRINCETON, NEW JERSEY

Copyright © 1989 by Princeton University Press

Published by Princeton University Press, 41 William Street,

Princeton, New Jersey 08540

In the United Kingdom: Princeton University Press,

Chichester, West Sussex

All Rights Reserved

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Ortner, Sherry B., 1941 –

High religion : a cultural and political history of Sherpa

Buddhism / Sherry B. Ortner.

p. cm.—(Princeton Studies in culture/power/history) Bibliography: p.

Includes index.

ISBN 0-691-09439-X—ISBN 0-691-02843-5

eISBN 978-0-691-21807-6

1. Sherpas—Religion. 2. Buddhism—Nepal. 3. Sherpas.

I. Title. II. Series.

BL2034.5.S53078 1989

294.3'923'095496—dc19

89-30337

CIP

R0

In memory of Nyima Chotar

(1927–1982)

Nyima Chotar is getting competitive about this project. [He asked rhetorically] Did [a certain anthropologist] photograph a particular set of documents as we did? No. Did [another anthropologist] interview [a certain very knowledgeable informant] at length as we did? No. He is now referring to our book and saying it’s going to be good.

—from the field notes, 1979

Contents

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS  xi

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS  xiii

NOTE ON ORTHOGRAPHY  xvii

DRAMATIS PERSONAE  xix

CHRONOLOGY OF SHERPA HISTORY  xxiii

CHAPTER I

Introduction: The Project, the People, and the Problem  3

Who Are The Sherpas?  4

Fieldwork  7

Expanding Practice Theory  11

CHAPTER II

The Early History of the Sherpas: Fraternal Contradictions  19

Time Frame  21

The Sources  21

Migration, Settlement, and Subsistence  26

Family and Inheritance  30

EGALITARIANISM AND HIERARCHY: THE CORE CONTRADICTION  33

INHERITANCE, ECONOMY, AND INEQUALITY  36

Leadership and Power  38

Religion before the Temples  42

CHAPTER III

The Founding of the First Sherpa Temple: Political Contradictions  45

Time Frame  47

The Novelty of Noncelibate Temples  47

The Stories of the First Founding  49

The Political Rivalry with Zongnamba  53

Contradictions of the Political Order  55

CHAPTER IV

The Meaning of Temple Founding: Cultural Schemas  59

Cultural Schemas  60

The Founding of Zhung Temple  62

The Schema  67

RITUALS FOR GAINING THE PROTECTION OF THE GODS  71

GROUNDING THE SCHEMA  74

Merit and Power  76

CHAPTER V

The Sherpas and the State  82

Time Frame  84

The Period before the Temples (1533–1720)  84

The Further Evil Ways of Zongnamba  85

The Gorkha Conquest and Long-Term State Interference  90

THE ENRICHMENT OF THE BIG PEOPLE  91

THE FOUNDING OF KHUMJUNG TEMPLE  92

CONTROLLING THE BIG PEOPLE  94

CHAPTER VI

The Political Economy of Monastery Foundings  99

Time Frame  100

Getting Rich with the Raj and the Ranas  101

THE EFFECTS OF THE BRITISH IN DARJEELING IN THE SECOND HALF OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY  101

TRADE AND PROFIT: THE FURTHER ENRICHMENT OF THE BIG PEOPLE  105

The Continuing Contradictory Impact of the Nepal State  109

THE STATE AS A SOURCE OF WEALTH  110

MORE PEMBU CONFLICT  111

Further Political Erosion  117

CHAPTER VII

The Big People Found the Monasteries: Legitimation and Self-Worth  124

Actors and Schemas  126

The Founding of Tengboche, 1916  129

KARMA AS HERO  129

THE LAMAS AND THE SCHEMA  130

BUILDING TENGBOCHE: 1916–1919  134

The Founding of Chiwong, 1923  138

BUILDING CHIWONG (1923–1929)  138

SANGYE AS HERO  140

Legitimation from the Big Point of View: Prestige and Merit  143

CHAPTER VIII

The Small People  150

Who Are The Small People?  153

THE SHERPAS IN THE LARGER ECONOMIC CONTEXT OF NEPAL  153

THE GENESIS OF SMALLNESS  155

MIGRATIONS  156

The Introduction of the Potato  158

Wage Labor and the Empowerment of the Small People  159

Founding the Monasteries: Feeling Big  163

CHAPTER IX

Monks and Nuns  168

Time Frame  170

The Founding of Devuche Nunnery  170

Who Are the Monks and Nuns?  172

THE MONKS AND NUNS AS LITTLE BIG PEOPLE  172

THE NINETEENTH-CENTURY MARRIAGE SQUEEZE  195

Rumbu Monastery and the Seeds of Monastic Rebellion  178

THE FOUNDING OF RUMBU  178

GELUNGMA PALMA AND MONASTICISM BY CHOICE  181

FOUNDING THE MONASTERIES  185

Revolution at Thami Temple  188

CHAPTER X

Conclusions: Sherpa History and a Theory of Practice  193

APPENDIX I

Two Zombie Stories of Early Khumbu  203

APPENDIX II

Addendum to the Tengboche Chayik  205

NOTES  207

GLOSSARY  221

REFERENCES  225

INDEX  237

Illustrations

Nyima Chotar, 1927–1982.

Dawa Namgyal, my host at Tengboche monastery, 1979.

Sangye Tenzing, head lama of Sehlo monastery and author of a history of Sherpa religion, 1976.

Khumbu vista: view southeast along the Bhote Khosi, 1976.

Lama Sangwa Dorje, founder of Pangboche temple in the late seventeenth century; from a mural at Pangboche (photo kindly taken for this book by Ang Gyelzen Sherpa).

View of Zhung houses and fields, with chorten containing Lama Dorje Zangbu’s relics, 1967.

Sangye, founder of Chiwong monastery; early-twentieth-century photo (reproduced by kind permission of Tsering Tenzing Lama).

Statue of Lama Gulu, first head lama of Tengboche monastery (photo kindly taken for this book by Ang Gyelzen Sherpa).

Tengboche monastery, 1967.

Kusang, one of the three lay sponsors of Tengboche monastery, in his early nineties in 1979.

Chiwong monastery, 1967.

Ngawang Samden, one of the founding nuns of Devuche nunnery, in her eighties in 1979.

MAPS

Nepal within the greater Himalayan region.

Eastern Nepal, showing the Sherpas’ home area of Solu-Khumbu in relation to their primary points of regional travel.

The Solu-Khumbu region.

Acknowledgments

LET me first explain the dedication. Nyima Chotar, of Khumjung, was my field assistant for this project from January to June of 1979. I cannot imagine a more perfect assistant. He was intelligent, responsible, knowledgeable, well-connected, sensitive to the problems of a well-meaning but clumsy anthropologist, and more. He helped me in innumerable ways, including—as indicated in the quote from my field notes on the dedication page—identifying with the project and making it as much his own as mine.

What was particularly fine about Nyima Chotar, over and above his rock-solid and dignified character, was the fact that although he had worked much of his life for Westerners—on mountaineering and scientific expeditions—he was nonetheless utterly at home in his own village context, in which he was an active and highly respected citizen. He managed to use the resources of the world system to the fullest, without any hint of being corrupted by it.

While I was writing the first draft of this book in 1982–83, I got word that Nyima Chotar and his wife, Sumjok, had been killed along with twenty-six other Sherpas in a bus accident, on the way back from a pilgrimage to see the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala. I am sorry for many, many things about his death, and all the other deaths in that terrible accident, but one thing I particularly regret at this moment is that I cannot send him our book. I dedicate it to him.

Many others in Nepal helped facilitate this project in one way or another. I mention them here in no particular order.

Harka Gurung set up some critical interviews for me in Kathmandu, and also shared with me some good conversations over Star Beer in the rooftop garden of the Crystal Hotel.

Mahesh Chandra Regmi was kind enough to make himself available to me for several useful conversations on Solu-Khumbu taxation, and to provide me with several valuable research leads.

Mingma Tenzing Sherpa and his family provided me with hospitality and friendship in Kathmandu, and worked with me in Khumbu for part of the fieldwork.

Dawa Namgyal, a Tengboche monk and a relative of Nyima Chotar’s, was my host at Tengboche monastery for several weeks. He also became my good friend. He is a devoted monk, as well as a person of great warmth and wry humor. He teased me and my anthropologist ways all the time, and I loved it. He also knew many good stories. I especially wish to thank him here for his hospitality and his friendship.

Dawa Namgyal, my host at Tengboche monastery, 1979.

My domestic staff included Nyima Chotar’s daughter, Ang Teshi, as kitchen girl. Ang Teshi was beautiful and cheerful, a delight to have around. She held my hand in an hour of particular tribulation. The staff also included Mingma Tenzing’s brother-in-law, Ang Pasang, as cook. Ang Pasang, whom we all called Tsak (Brother-in-law) Pasang, was a wonderful human being, whose special culinary talent was making delicious mo-mo dumplings. His place was taken on the last leg of the trip by Serki, who showed what a professional expedition cook could do.

The Center for Nepal and Asian Studies approved my research project, despite all the rumors I had heard that projects on impractical subjects like religion were having trouble receiving approval. I am acutely aware that I still owe them a final field report, and I hope this book will serve the purpose.

Mike Cheney and the people at Sherpa Cooperative Trekking Ltd. did an excellent job as my agents in Kathmandu, handling much of the dreadful paperwork before I got there, and keeping me well supplied when I was up in the mountains.

The National Science Foundation (Grant No. BNS-7824925) paid for the entire field research, and I am happy to acknowledge their support here. John Yellen, then director of the Anthropology Program at NSF, was particularly helpful and considerate when the grant ran into certain problems later.

For various reasons (including the completion of Ortner and Whitehead [1981]), I was forced to postpone the writing on this project for several years after the fieldwork. It was not until the academic year 1982–83 that I was finally able to take the field notes out of the closet and begin a first draft of this book, with the support of a Solomon R. Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship and of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (National Science Foundation Grant No. BNS-8206304). I am extraordinarily grateful to both the Guggenheim Foundation and the Center for that productive year. I have also subsequently received funding from the University of Michigan Faculty Fund toward the completion of this book.

The manuscript has had many readers. It is impossible to describe the various ways in which each made useful comments. I will simply say that I am blessed with an exceptionally smart and perceptive group of friends and colleagues, who have individually and collectively tried to save me from everything from deep conceptual murkiness to irritating stylistic tics. If they have not succeeded, the fault is entirely my own. Thomas Fricke, Raymond C. Kelly, Joyce Marcus, Harriet Whitehead, and one extremely well informed but anonymous press reader read the entire manuscript thoroughly from beginning to end, and gave detailed, page-by-page criticisms, for which I am deeply grateful. Nicholas Dirks, James Fernandez, Clifford Geertz, David Kertzer, Gananath Obeyesekere, and William H. Sewell, Jr., as well as one other anonymous press reader, plus the students in my Himalayan seminar and the students in Sewell’s and my seminar on Culture, Practice, and Social Change, all read the manuscript and gave me valuable reactions and insights. There is no doubt whatsoever in my mind that this book would be infinitely poorer without all these contributions.

Others provided special bits and pieces that went into making the whole. Håkan Wahlquist has extensive bibliographic knowledge and files on Nepal, and gave me several crucial references that I would never otherwise have found. Ang Gyelzen Sherpa went far out of his way to do some interviewing for me after I left the field, and to retake some pictures for me after mine did not come out. Kathryn March very kindly sent me copies of chunks of her field notes on Sherpa rituals; I have not used them in this book but plan to do so in the next one. Tom Fricke was extraordinarily helpful in several ways, beyond his careful reading of the entire manuscript. He gave me many useful references (usually taking the time to copy whole articles rather than just sending me the titles), and he answered all of my naive demographic questions with carefully worked out responses that were virtual minipapers in themselves. He also went over the Nepali words in the Glossary with me. I particularly want to thank him here. Ray Kelly and Bruce Knauft provided some critical buoying up as the book and I went into our final agonies. My heartfelt thanks to all.

On the technical front, John Klausmeyer was both expert at his mapmaking and marvelously patient with me in the process. Alisa Harrigan cheerfully ran back and forth to the map library some large number of times. She was aided in her task of map retrieval for me by the great helpfulness of the map librarians at the University of Michigan map library. Carol Goldberg tracked down many Tibetan spellings of Sherpa words, and helped to finalize the Glossary. She in turn consulted with Geleg Rinpoche, who was kind enough to assist. Mary Steedly did an excellent job of typing the first draft of the manuscript, and Rachael Cohen did her usual brilliant job on the final version, managing somehow to make it all look easy.

Note on Orthography

AS IN Sherpas through Their Rituals, I have adopted the strategy of spelling Sherpa words the way I, as an English speaker, heard them, and the way in which they would be spelled if they were English words. There seemed no sense in spelling them in the text in their Tibetan spellings, since the uninitiated reader would produce from those spellings pronunciations that bore little or no relation to spoken Sherpa. I have, however, included a Glossary of all non-English words at the end of the text, and where a Sherpa word had an ascertainable Tibetan counterpart, I have included the Tibetan spelling in the Glossary entry.

Readers of Chinese may be interested in consulting an article by the Chinese linguist-ethnologist Qu Ai-tang (n.d.) comparing the spoken language of a Sherpa group in Tibet with several other spoken Tibetan dialects. Professor Qu was kind enough to spend time with me in Lhasa (where he was attending a Tibetology conference, and where I was engaged in discussions with Tibet University about an exchange program), going over some of the main points of the article in English.

Dramatis Personae

I HAVE generally included here only individuals who play an active role in the events (or in the recounting of the events) that follow. I have excluded individuals whose names appear merely in lists of names—for example, all the members of the founding cohort of a particular monastic institution.

Ani Tarchin Karma's daughter, one of the founding nuns of Devuche nunnery

Chak Pön Dudjom Dorje leader of first group of Sherpas to move to Solu

Chopal of Gole (see Gembu Tsepal)

Dawa Tenzing youngest son of Sangye, former Tashilhunpo monk; assisted in the founding of Chiwong monastery

Donka Ringmo ancestor of one of the original Sherpa clans

Dorje Zangbu founder of Gompa Zhung, rival of Lama Gombu (see also Ngagchang Dorje Zangpo)

Gaga Mangden younger brother of the Kusho Tulku, assisted in the founding of Chiwong monastery

Gelungma Palma female monastic, heroine of the charter myth for the observance of Nyungne

Gembu Tsepal head tax collector (gembu) of Solu-Khumbu, sponsor of Tengboche monastery

Guru Rinpoche (Skt., Padma Sambhava) founder of Buddhism in Tibet in the eighth century

Karma senior sponsor of Tengboche monastery

Karma Chotar married lama and tax collector, father of monastery founders Karma and Sangye

Kemba Dorje youngest brother of Ralwa Dorje and Lama Sangwa Dorje; founder of Rimijung temple

Kusang youngest sponsor of Tengboche monastery, son-in-law of senior sponsor Karma

Kusho Dongumba a lama of the Sakya region of Tibet who authorized the founding of Khumjung temple

Kusho Mangden (see Gaga Mangden)

Kusho Tulku son of the last married head lama of Thami temple, reincarnation of the Chalsa lama of Solu, first head lama of Chiwong monastery

Lama Budi Tsenjen father of Lama Sangwa Dorje, reincarnated in Lama Gulu

Lama Gombu the pembu (tax collector, big man) of the Zhung area in the early eighteenth century, rival of Dorje Zangbu

Lama Gulu first head lama of Tengboche monastery

Lama Pakdze Solu lama, father of Dorje Zangbu

Lama Rena Lingba (Ratna gling-pa) one of the ancestral Sherpa lamas, teacher of Lama Sangwa Dorje

Lama Sangwa Dorje founder of the first Sherpa temple, at Pangboche

Lama Tenzing the head lama of Kyerok gompa

Lama Tundup married head lama of Thami temple, 1923–58

Ngagchang Dorje Zangpo ordained name of Dorje Zangbu

Ngawang Norbu Sangbu religious name of Lama Gulu

Ngawang Samden (a) one of the senior monks of Thami monastery, regent during the current head lamas childhood and permanent assistant to the head lama

Ngawang Samden (b) one of the leaders of the founding cohort of Devuche nuns

Ngawang Tenzing Norbu Sangbu religious name of the Zatul Rinpoche

Phule an affine of Karma, one of the sponsors of Devuche nunnery and of the rebuilding of Tengboche after the earthquake of 1933

Ralwa Dorje (a) member of the Lama clan, leader of a move from Solu to Deorali Bhandar between 1725 and 1750

Ralwa Dorje (b) younger brother of Lama Sangwa Dorje, legendary founder of Thami temple

Sangye sponsor of Chiwong monastery, younger brother of Karma

Sangye Tenzing head lama of Sehlo monastery, author of a history of Sherpa religion

Sehlo lama (see Sangye Tenzing)

Sherap Tsepal (see Gembu Tsepal)

Tengboche Reincarnate Lama the reincarnation of Lama Gulu, current head of Tengboche monastery

Thami Rinpoche (Thami reincarnate lama) current head lama of Thami monastery, reincarnation of Lama Tundup

Tushi Rinpoche reincarnation of the Zatul Rinpoche's teacher in a former existence, leader of the Rumbu monks who went into exile from the Chinese and settled in Solu-Khumbu

Zamte Lama (a) figure in the Lama Sangwa Dorje cycle of tales, killed by Zongnamba; his followers in turn killed Zongnamba

Zamte Lama (b) son of a tax collector, first fully ordained monk of Sherpa birth to be active in Solu-Khumbu, founder of Nauje temple ca. 1905

Zatul Rinpoche (Ngawang Tenzing Norbu Sangbu) founder of Rumbu monastery, instigator of the founding of Tengboche, reincarnation of Lama Sangwa Dorje

Zongnamba legendary pembu and political rival of Lama Sangwa Dorje

Chronology of Sherpa History

(Most dates are only approximate.)

HIGH RELIGION

Introduction:

The Project, the People, and the Problem

THIS is the story of the establishment of the first celibate Buddhist monasteries among the Sherpas of Nepal—of how the monasteries were founded, and by whom, and especially why. It is also an essay on the relationship between worldly dominance and spiritual striving, between power and merit, politics and religion. And at the broadest level, it is an essay in thinking about human action in the world, about how people can be both created and creators, products and producers, symbols and agents, of that world.

Early in the twentieth century, the Sherpas began to build Buddhist monasteries. They had always practiced a folk form of Tibetan Buddhism, in which local married priests (lama) conducted rituals in village temples and in households for the benefit of the general populace. But the Sherpas had never before had the more orthodox monastic institutions, in which celibate individuals live and practice religion on a full-time basis. Unlike the married lamas, the monks and nuns withdraw from social life, do no (materially) productive labor, and devote their whole lives to the practice of religion.

The founding of the celibate monasteries thus represents, in about as visible a form as this sort of thing ever takes, the birth of a new (for Sherpa society) institution—an institution with its own rules, its own forms of social organization, its own values and ideals, its own raison d’etre. Once the Sherpa monasteries were built, a whole new process was set in motion: the monks launched a campaign to upgrade popular religion and to bring it into line with monastic views and values. The monasteries were thus to have a far-reaching impact on Sherpa society over the course of the twentieth century.

The effects of the newly established monasteries on Sherpa popular religion, culture, and society are the subject of a separate work (Ortner n.d.b). In the present work I will be concerned to illuminate the forces and processes that led up to the foundings in the first place. Who built the monasteries, and why? Who filled the monasteries, and why? What were the constraints—social, economic, political, cultural—on the people involved, and what were the provocations? In order to answer these questions, I have had to write a history of Sherpa society—of the society’s internal dynamics, and of the external forces that interacted with those dynamics, from the time of the Sherpa settlement in Nepal in the early sixteenth century to the time of the monastery foundings in the early twentieth.

Who Are the Sherpas?

It is relatively standard practice to start a work in anthropology with a brief sketch identifying and situating the people to be discussed. This is problematic in the present case for two reasons: first, because who the Sherpas are (in terms of institutional configuration) depends on what historical period one is talking about, and second, because who the Sherpas are (in terms of cultural configuration, or ethos) is a matter of quite divergent assessments on the part of their main ethnographers. I will be brief on both points, and provide more ethnographic detail as the need arises throughout the text.

Institutionally, the modern Sherpas are an ethnically Tibetan group living at high altitudes (between about 8,500 and 14,500 feet) in the Himalayan mountains of northeast Nepal. (Nepal is a Hindu kingdom of about 15.6 million people [Nepal 1984]; the Sherpas constitute one of many ethnic minorities within it.) They are thought to have migrated from Kham, in northeast Tibet, in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. They now occupy three connected regions of the area: Khumbu, the highest, coldest, and northernmost; Solu, the lower, (relatively) warmer, and southernmost; and Pharak, a valley running between Khumbu and Solu. There is a system of patrilineal clans, which in modern times primarily regulates (clan-exogamous) marriage. Their traditional economy combines agriculture (now mostly wheat and potatoes); herding (mostly yak and cow); and trade (selling rice from low-altitude Nepal in Tibet, and Tibetan salt in low-altitude Nepal, as well as breeding and selling dairy animals). They live in small villages and sometimes in isolated homesteads. Property in both land and animals is privately owned by families. They practice the Tibetan Buddhist religion, which includes in modern times both the monastic emphasis on merit and rebirth, and the popular emphasis on rites of exorcism and protection. Since the turn of the twentieth century, they have been very successfully involved in wage labor, as guides and porters for Himalayan mountaineering expeditions. Within the past decade or two, some have become successful entrepreneurs as well, running agencies in Kathmandu that organize mountaineering and trekking expeditions throughout Nepal.

Nepal within the greater Himalayan region

The Sherpas’ success in mountaineering was in part due to their physical hardiness and their physical and social high-altitude adaptations. But it was also due in large part—and here one arrives at the question of ethos—to their friendly and outgoing demeanor, and their willingness to work hard, long, and cheerfully for the greater good of an expedition. The Western mountaineers’ image of the Sherpa—good-natured, hard-working, loyal, reliable—was echoed by the first anthropologist to work with them (in 1954), Christoph von Fürer-Haimendorf. For example, von Fürer-Haimendorf began his monograph by saying:

What I have set out to do is to describe and analyze the type of society in which the Sherpas have developed their spirit of independence, their ability to cooperate smoothly for the common good, their courtesy and gentleness of manner and their values which are productive of an admirable balance between this- worldly and other-worldly aims. (1964:xix)

I first worked with the Sherpas in 1966. At that time, although I too found people to be quite outgoing, and in many ways quite easy to get along with, I also found much strain in social relations, a great deal of intracommunity conflict, and a general unwillingness on the part of the villagers to cooperate for the general welfare. I described Sherpa life as premised on culturally defined and structurally induced tendencies toward individual selfishness and family insularity (1978a:162). I also said:

Without denying that there are structures and processes of community in Sherpa villages . . . the point is that such community must be achieved through overcoming the basic atomism and insularity of the component family units. (1978a:41)

Much of my monograph was concerned with the way in which popular religion interacted with these structural tendencies in Sherpa society.¹

There are many things to be said about these sorts of discrepancies in ethnographic observation and description, especially in the wake of the recent Mead/Freeman controversy (for an insightful review of the controversy, see Rappaport 1986). Differences in age, gender, cultural background, and the like all enter into the problem. At first I was inclined to put a great deal of weight on these more subjective factors. I now think, however, that the differences are relatively real and objective, and are essentially regional differences: von Fürer-Haimendorf worked in Khumbu and I, initially, in Solu. I later worked in Khumbu as well, and the people of that region did in fact appear more cooperative and community oriented. The reasons for these regional differences cannot be detailed here, and will in any event play no role in the present work. I note them here simply because, after thirty years of varied ethnographic research among the Sherpas, one can no longer give a simple account of their style or ethos.

Fieldwork

The fieldwork for this project entailed five months in the Sherpa regions of Khumbu and Solu, and in the capital of Nepal, Kathmandu, in 1979. I talked for the most part to people selected for having special knowledge of the events surrounding the foundings of the monasteries. (I had already spent seventeen months doing general ethnographic field work in the area in 1966–68, and four months making a film and collecting incidental data in 1976.) I had the impression beforehand that there might be some documentary evidence, but this turned out to play a minor role in the research.² Rather, the work consisted almost entirely of asking people for personal memories, and for stories that they might know about the foundings of monasteries and of temples, and other aspects of Sherpa history.

Compared with earlier ethnographic fieldwork, the oral history fieldwork for this present project seemed very easy. In ethnographic fieldwork, as every field-worker knows, there are a range of difficulties in eliciting data, some general to the nature of the process, and some specific to the culture in question. For example, although the Sherpas have the concept of custom (as in, What is Sherpa custom regarding X?), nonetheless a lot of my questions about Sherpa custom seemed relatively meaningless to people, and they cooperated only out of kindness, or because of anxieties about the (imagined) consequences of non-cooperation. Further, the sequence of my ethnographic questions often seemed meaningless to informants, as I pursued aspects of a topic that seemed unimportant to them, rather than what they felt was the main point. This was especially the case with expert informants—generally lamas—who had their own agenda about what needed to be explained, and in what order, and I was more than once criticized for jumping around from topic to topic (from the informant’s point of view) rather than allowing the informant to present things in the proper order. Moreover, shortly after an interview during which the informant complained about my jumping from topic to topic, the subject of insanity came up with this same informant. I asked him about the causes of insanity, and he listed several items, including—pointedly—jumping from topic to topic.

The fact that there were indeed experts on certain matters (again, usually religious matters) in Sherpa society presented a different set of problems as well. Many lay people were uncomfortable acting as informants on religion, and told me to ask the lamas. My research assistant several times told me to stop asking small people about religion, as they didn’t really know anything. I protested that I wanted to know what a range of people knew and thought about such matters, but this did not make much sense, either to him or to others. (There was a subproblem connected with this point: I was told it was not nice to ask many different people the same question, as this implied that one hadn’t believed the first informant. The first time I was told this, it made me feel utterly despairing about the fieldwork. I simply had to ignore it in order to proceed.) Even among the lamas, the highest-status ones, from the Sherpa point of view, were not necessarily the best informants from the anthropologist’s point of view. I learned to take my informants in status order, even if it meant wasting a few interviews until I could get to the individual who could articulate what I needed to know.

All of these reactions were, of course, revealing in themselves, but it