Frances Garrett
Areas of interest
- Buddhist Studies
- Tibetan Buddhism
- Buddhism and Medical Traditions in Asia
Biography
I am an Associate Professor of Buddhist Studies and Tibetan Studies in the Department for the Study of Religion at the University of Toronto, where I’ve taught since 2003. From 2016-2021, I was Inaugural Director of the Robert H.N. Ho Family Foundation Centre for Buddhist Studies at the University of Toronto. Before that, I was the Associate Chair of the Department for the Study of Religion (2010-2017). I am currently Director of the Buddhism, Psychology and Mental Health program at New College, University of Toronto.
In my research I’ve collaborated with students, scholars, and community experts to explore the intersections between tantric practice, ritual/occult knowledge, and medical history and theory in Tibet. I’ve also worked with Tibetan scholars and students in Amdo to study the Tibetan King Gesar epic, and most recently have been working with communities in Sikkim around Mt Khangchendzonga. In partnership with students, I’ve also published on experiential learning, outdoor education, and methods for student flourishing. Language instruction methodologies have also been a special interest of mine for over two decades. Although single-authored work is most common in my field, I prioritize co-authoring research publications with students or members of the community as often as possible.
Select publications
Books
- 2020. Hidden Lands in Himalayan Myth and History: Transformations of Sbas yul through Time. Edited by Frances Garrett, Elizabeth McDougal, and Geoffrey Samuel. Brill.
- 2014. Gling sgrung las byung ba’i bod pa’i gso rig skor gleng pa (Tibetan Medicine in the Gesar Epic), published by Qinghai Nationalities University Gesar Research Institute Press (China) in 2014. Chopa Dondrup is primary author; I am collaborator. 226 pages plus 2 DVDs.
- 2010. Studies of Medical Pluralism in Tibetan History and Society: Proceedings from the XIth International Association of Tibetan Studies Meetings. S. Craig, M. Cuomo, F. Garrett, and M. Schrempf, eds. (Bonn: International Institute for Tibetan and Buddhist Studies, Contributions to Research on Central Asia series). 591 pages.
- 2008. Religion, Medicine and the Human Embryo in Tibet. Abingdon, Oxon; New York: Routledge. Critical Studies in Buddhism series. 224 pages. See book reviews in Traditional South Asian Medicine and Religions of South Asia.
Articles
- 2022. Gesar’s Therapeutic Geographies. In The Many Faces of King Gesar: Tibetan and Central Asian Studies in Homage to Rolf A. Stein, edited by Matthew Kapstein and Charles Ramble. Brill.
- 2020. Healing Mountains in Tibetan Buddhist Literature. In Hidden Lands in Himalayan Myth and History: Transformations of Sbas yul through Time. Edited by Frances Garrett, Elizabeth McDougal, and Geoffrey Samuel. Brill.
- 2019. The Food of Meditation: Dietary Healing and Power in Tibetan Buddhism. Asian Medicine 14: 56-80. [Open Access]
- 2016. Hidden Paradises of the Himalaya: Kangchenjunga & Beyul. In Alpinist 54.
- 2014. The Making of Medical History. In Bodies in Balance: The Art of Tibetan Medicine, ed. Resi Hofer. University of Washington Press with Rubin Museum of Art. See book reviews in Medical Anthropology Quarterly, in the Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, or in Asian Medicine. [Open Access]
- 2013. Mercury, Mad Dogs and Smallpox: Medicine in the Situ Panchen Tradition. In Journal of the International Association of Tibetan Studies 7: 277-301. [Open Access]
- 2013. Narratives of Hospitality and Feeding in Tibetan Ritual. With Matt King, Barbara Hazelton, Andrew Erlich and Nicholas Field. In Journal of the American Academy of Religion 81 (2): 1-25.
- 2012. “What children need”: Making Childhood with Technologies of Protection and Healing. In Buddhist Children in Texts and Culture, ed. Vanessa Sasson. Oxford University Press.
- 2010. Shaping the Illness of Hunger: A Culinary Aesthetics of Food and Healing in Tibet. In Asian Medicine 6 (1): 33-54.
- 2010. Tapping the Body’s Nectar: Gastronomy and Incorporation in Tibetan Literature. In History of Religions 49 (3): 300-326. [Download PDF]
- 2009. Eating Letters in the Tibetan Treasure Tradition. Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 32 (1-2): 85-114. [Download PDF]
- 2009. The Alchemy of Accomplishing Medicine (sman sgrub): Situating the Yuthok Heart Essence Ritual Tradition. Journal of Indian Philosophy 37 (3): 207-230. [Download PDF]
- 2008. Tibetan Buddhist Narratives of the Forces of Creation. In Imagining The Fetus: The Unborn in Myth, Religion and Culture, eds. Jane Marie Law & Vanessa R. Sasson. Oxford University Press. Pgs. 107-120. [Download PDF]
- 2008. With Vincanne Adams. The Three Channels in Tibetan Medical and Religious Texts, including a translation of Tsultrim Gyaltsen’s ‘Treatise on the Three Channels in Tibetan Medicine.’ Traditional South Asian Medicine 8: 86-115. [Download PDF]
- 2007. Critical Methods in Tibetan Medical Histories. Journal of Asian Studies 66 (2): 368-387. [Download PDF]
- 2007. Embodiment and Embryology in Tibetan Literature: Narrative Epistemology and the Rhetoric of Identity. In Soundings in Tibetan Medicine: Historical and Anthropological Perspectives, ed. Mona Schrempf, 411-426. Leiden: Brill Publishers. [Download PDF]
- 2007. Buddhism and the Historicizing of Medicine in Thirteenth Century Tibet. Asian Medicine: Tradition and Modernity 2 (2): 204-224. [Download PDF]
- 2005. Ordering Human Growth in Tibetan Medical and Religious Embryologies. In Textual Healing: Essays on Medieval and Early Modern Medicine, ed. Elizabeth Furdel, 31-52. Leiden: Brill Publishers. [Download PDF]
- 2005. Hybrid Methodologies in the Lhasa Mentsikhang. The Tibet Journal 30 (1): 55-64.