"Life" and "freeing life" (tshe thar) among pastoralists of Kham: intersecting religion and environment

This article examines the interface between religious practices and the physical environment for contemporary pastoralists of the Minyag area in Kham. It details how Kham pastoralists practice their religious beliefs by incorporating entities of their physical environment, such as yaks, in ways that complicate a singular dichotomy between spiritual and physical. Explicating a vernacular understanding of “life”, this article proposes that everyday religious practices normally categorized into a distinct concept of “religion” is, for pastoralists of Kham, best understood as integrally connected with other domains of their world.