University of Heidelberg

Linde Goebel

Linde Goebel

Linde Goebel, born and brought up in Germany, went to India for the first time in 2001. Upon returning back home she was faced with the decision to choose a field of academic studies, being interested in both Indology and Medicine. In Ayurveda she found a science combining both these areas of interest with a completely different perspective on human existence and health than the western one. Being aware that India and Ayurveda are intrinsically united and one cannot be grasped without the other, she started to pursue the Bachelor of Ayurvedic Medicine and Surgery (B.A.M.S.) in India in 2002. Not only was she interested in the medical aspect of traditional Indian medicine and in studying the original scriptures but she also wanted to explore and experience the interrelations between culture and the perception of health and disease. Linde graduated from Gujarat Ayurved University in 2010 where she obtained the B.A.M.S. and the accreditation to practice as a Vaidya. After her time of studies at an Indian university and her year of working as an ayurvedic doctor at the university-affiliated hospital, Linde left India and returned to Germany. Many of Linde's questions were answered in the years in India: She had been part of Ayurveda in India both in the academic and in the clinical setting, dealing with patients of all casts, religions, ages and socio-economic backgrounds. But back in Germany she was confronted with different aspects of contemporary Ayurveda: Western expectations from traditional Indian medicine so unlike to what Ayurveda is providing in Indian hospitals, collisions of western and Indian understandings of sickness and disease and the necessity to explain Ayurveda in biomedical scientific terminology. Many new questions came up: How does culture influence the perception of health? Based on what do patients decide for one or the other type of treatment? Why do people in India and Germany speak so differently about their illness-experience? What do people look for in a doctor and why? Which powers are at play with regards to government-funded health care? The MAHASSA-program at the South Asia Institute of Heidelberg's Ruprecht-Karls-University was like a missing puzzle piece: The theory and practice of medical Anthropology is now adding a whole new and extremely valuable dimension to Linde's knowledge and understanding of Health in India and she feels she has only just begun to tap into a great reservoir of answers, new perspectives and research-fields. She is working towards her aim at building a bridge between the western and eastern understanding of health and is convinced that the insights which can be gained through Medical Anthropology can show paths to a globally improved health-care. Linde's M.A. thesis is entitled "Shvetapradara: Negotiating Ayurveda and Biomedicine in Contemporary Ayurvedic Gynecology".


Linde Goebel's M.A. thesis can be found here.
to top of page