ABSTRACT
This chapter is based on field research carried out with a Tibetan community in the refugee settlement of Dalhousie in Himachal Pradesh, North India in June and July 1996. While birthing practices have obviously been affected by the situation in which this refugee population is living, we suggest that much of what we found reflects more general Tibetan attitudes to childbirth and health. We contrast the approach to childbirth among the Tibetan refugees with that found in studies of childbirth in North India and Bangladesh, in order to bring both the Tibetan childbirth practices and the characteristic North Indian-Bangladeshi approach into clearer focus. 2
