Multiplicities in a Medical System: Examining the Changing Nature of Ayurvedic Practices and Products in India and the UK

AYUR旨在检查和比较阿育吠陀（一种传统的印度医疗系统）的形式和实践的变化性质，在不同的社会政治和文化背景下，在地方-国家-全球层面。虽然在印度，阿育吠陀作为一种本土和传统的医疗体系得到了政府的积极支持，但它被视为一种补充和东方医学——受英国和其他欧洲国家的唯心论和古代医学的影响（2020年）。AYUR将比较和对比由印度和英国的市场意识形态、宗教和民族主义驱动的阿育吠陀不断变化的形式和实践。目的是了解这些意识形态如何影响消费者的健康选择和服务提供者的做法。该研究将以比较的视角和多地点的人口统计学来考察其在地方、国家和全球背景下的变化。AYUR将采取跨学科和比较的方法，特别是社会学和人类学/历史理论。通过考察不同地区的阿育吠陀，目的是分析医学、健康和预防保健的合并，以及这种合并如何创造出一种被称为阿育吠陀的商品。AYUR将对阿育吠陀健康中心进行人种学研究（参与者观察和深度访谈，检查宣传材料），以检查中心之间的异同，以及在地方、国家和全球背景下的使命、方法和推广策略的差异。通过关注这些因素，AYUR将有助于在地方-国家-全球背景下对健康、疾病和医学的人类学理解进行深刻的重新构想。

AYUR aims to examine and compare the changing nature of forms and practices of Ayurveda (a traditional Indian medical system) indifferent socio-political and cultural contexts, at local-national-global levels. While in India Ayurveda is getting active state support asan indigenous and traditional medical system, it is seen as complementary and orientalist medicine-informed by spiritualism andancient medicine in the UK and other European countries (Cant 2020). AYUR will compare and contrast the changing forms andpractices of Ayurveda that are driven by the ideologies of market, religion and nationalism in India and the UK. The aim is to see howthese ideologies influence consumers' health choices and service providers' practices. With a comparative perspective and multi-sitedethnography, the study will examine its changes in local, national and global contexts.AYUR will take an interdisciplinary and comparative approach drawing particularly on sociological and anthropological/historicaltheories.By examining Ayurveda in different locations, the aim is to analyse the merger of medicine, wellness and preventive care and how thismerger creates a commodity called Ayurveda. AYUR will conduct ethnographies (participant-observation and in-depth interviews,examine promotional materials) of Ayurvedic wellness Centres to examine the similarities and differences between the centres andthe variations at the local- national-global contexts in terms of their mission, approaches and promotional strategies. By focusing onthese factors, AYUR will contribute in developing a deep reimagining of the anthropological understandings of health, illness andmedicine in local-national-global contexts.