Global Tibet General Reference Works

General Reference for English language Overviews on Tibet

  • Shakabpa, T.W.D. 1967 Tibet: A political history. New York: Potala Publications.
  • Stein, R.A. 1972[1962]. Tibetan Civilization. Stanford University Press.
  • Tucci, Giuseppe. 1980[1970]. The Religions of Tibet. University of California Press.
  • Snellgrove and Richardson. 1968. A Cultural History of Tibet. Shambhala. ]
  • Li Tieh-tseng, Tibet Today and Yesterday. New York: Bookman Associates, I960.
  • Wang Furen & Suo Wenqing. 1984. Highlights of Tibetan History.
  • Samuel, Geoffrey. 1993. Civilized Shamans: Buddhism in Tibetan Societies. Smithsonian Institution Press.
  • Kapstein, Matthew. The Tibetans. Blackwell. 2006.

General Reference for Overviews of Modern Tibetan History and Sino-Tibetan Relations

  • Avedon, John. 1984. In Exile from the Land of the Snows. New York: Vintage Books.
  • Walt van Praag, M. C. van. 1987. The status of Tibet : history, rights, and prospects in international law. with a foreword by Franz Michael and an introduction by Rikhi Jaipal. Boulder, Colo. : Westview Press. 
  • Goldstein, Melvyn. A History of Modern Tibet 1913-1951: The Demise of the Lamaist State. 1989.
  • Goldstein, Melvyn. 1997. The Snow Lion and the Dragon: China, Tibet, and the Dalai Lama.Berkeley: Univ. of CA Press.
  • Goldstein, Melvyn. 2007. A history of modern Tibet, volume 2, the calm before the storm, 1951-55. UC Press.
  • Goldstein, Melvyn. 2009. On the Cultural Revolution in Tibet: The Nyemo Incident of 1969. UC press.
  • Kleiger, Christiaan. 1992. Tibetan Nationalism.  Berkeley: Folklore Institute.
  • Grunfeld, Tom. 1996. The Making of Modern Tibet. M.E. Sharpe.
  • Smith, Warren. 1996. Tibetan Nation: a History of Tibetan Nationalism and Sino-Tibetan Relations. 
  • Smith, Warren-. 2008. China's Tibet? Autonomy or Assimilation. Rowan and Littlefield.
  • Tsering Shakya. 1999. The Dragon in the Land of Snows. Columbia Univ Press.
  • Wang Lixiong.  "The People's Republic of China's 21st Century Underbelly," Beijing Zhanlue Yu Guanli, January 2, 1999, translation by BBC Monitoring service. (Also was translated and appeared in Ta Kung Pao in Hong Kong). [PDF link]
  • Wang Jiawei and Nyima Gyaincain. 2001. The Historical Status of China's Tibet. China Intercontinental Press.
  • Rabgey, Tashi and Tsetan Wangchuk Sharlho. 2004. Sino-Tibetan dialogue in the post-Mao era:Lessons and Prospects. 
  • Anand, Dibyesh 2007. Geopolitical exotica: Tibet in western imagination. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

General Reference for Tibetan Studies and Western fantasies

  • Bishop, Peter. 1989. The Myth of Shangri-la.
  • Shakya, Tsering. 1992. "Tibet and the Occident: The myth of Shangri-la" Tibetan Review 27(1) 13-16.
  • Lopez, Donald. 1998. Prisoners of Shangri-La: Tibetan Buddhism and the West. University of Chicago Press.
  • Schell, Orville. 2000.  Virtual Tibet: Searching for Shangri-la from the Himalayas to Hollywood.
  • Kaschewsky, Images of Tibet in the West, Dodin and Rather, eds., Imagining Tibet. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2001.
  • Kvaerne, Tibet Images Among Researchers of Tibet, Dodin and Rather, eds., Imagining Tibet. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2001.
  • Bishop. Not Only Shangri La. Dodin and Rather, eds., Imagining Tibet. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2001.
  • Dagyab Kyabgon Rinpoche. Buddhism in the West and the Image of Tibet. Dodin and Rather, eds., Imagining Tibet. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2001.
  • "Symposium on Donald S. Lopez Jr.'s Prisoners of Shangri-La: Tibetan Buddhism and the West," in Journal of the American Academy of Religion.Vol. 29(1), March 2001. (Includes reviews by David Germano, Tsering Shakya and Robert Thurman, w/response by Lopez). [Link]
  • Dreyfus, George. 2005. "Are we prisoners of Shangrila?: Orientalism, nationalism and the study of Tibet." Journal of the International Association of Tibetan Studies 1(1)-1-21. [Link]
  • Anand, Dibyesh 2007. Geopolitical exotica: Tibet in western imagination. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Tibetans' English language Autobiographies

  • Tibet Oral History Project. Endorsed by H.H. The Dalai Lama, "The Tibet Oral History Project aims to preserve the history and culture of the Tibetan people. We have videotaped interviews with over 300 elderly Tibetans refugees—the last generation born in a free, unoccupied Tibet. His Holiness the Dalai Lama advised us to document the elders’ experiences and make their life stories available worldwide". (on Youtube). [Organized by an American white woman psych PhD. Some in English, most in Tibetan with either subtitles or in situ translation. All done in exile with elders who fled Tibet in the 1950s and 60s. No context given for the elders interviewed or for the interview situation. Translations can be spotty].
  • Tibet Oral History Archive (LOC project registration) Melvyn Goldstein's collection of oral histories of Tibet, upon which his multi-volume history of Tibet was based, in Library of Congress (audio only).
  • Latse Oral History Archive Latse Library in New York City, run by exiled Tibetan scholar Pema 'Bhum. Some videos online.
  • Laurie Hovell McMillin, English in Tibet, Tibet in English: Self-Presentation in Tibet and the Diaspora, Palgrave, Basingstoke, 2001.
  • Rin-chen Lha-mo, We Tibetans, Potala Publications, 1985 (1926).
  • Gonpo Tashi Andrugtsang, Four Rivers, Six Ranges: Reminiscences of the Resistance Movement in Tibet, Information and Publicity Office of H.H. the Dalai Lama, Dharamsala, 1973.
  • Dhondup Choedon.  Life in the Red Flag People's Commune. Dharamsala: Information Office of H.H. the Dalai Lama, 1978.
  • Jamyang Norbu,ed. Warriors of Tibet: Story of Aten and the Khampas' Fight for the Freedom of Their Country, Wisdom Publications, 1986 (first published as Horseman in the Snow by Tibet Information Office, Dharamsala, India, 1979)
  • Dawa Norbu.  Red Star Over Tibet. New Delhi: Sterling Publishers, 1987.
  • Liu Qizhong and Chen Gengtao (eds.), Profiles of 50 Tibetans, Xinhua, Beijing, 1991.
  • Lobsang Gyatso, (Blo bzang rgya mtsho, Phu khang Dge bshes); with Sparham, Gareth. Memoirs of a Tibetan Lama (Ithaca: Snow Lion Publications, 1998).
  • Rinchen Dolma Taring, Daughter of Tibet, Wisdom Publications, 1987 (first published by John Murray, London, 1970).
  • Anonymous (Adrian Moon, translator), "A Monk's Story," published in translation in Background Papers on Tibet - September 1992, Part 2, London: Tibet Information Network, 1992.
  • Pema Chodron, "Biography." Shambhala Publications.
  • K. Dhondup, "The Case for Intellectual Freedom" in Vyvyan Cayley, Children of Tibet: An Oral History of the First Tibetans to Grow Up in Exile. Pearlfisher Publications, [226 Darling St, Balmain NSW, 2041 Australia fax 61 2 8106024] 1994.
  • Hortsang Jigme, Under the Blue Sky – An Invisible Small Corner of the World, translated by Lobsang Dawa and Gussje de Schot, privately printed in typescript, 1989.
  • Rato Khyongla, My Life and Lives: the Story of a Tibetan Incarnation, Button, New York, 1977.
  • Chogyam Trungpa, Born in Tibet, Shambhala, Boulder, 1977 (first published by Allen and Unwin, London, 1966)
  • Dorje Yudon Yuthok, House of the Turquoise Roof, Snow Lion, New York, 1990.
  • Sumner Carnhan with Lama Kunga Rimpoche, In the Presence of My Enemies: Memoirs of Tibetan Nobleman, Tsipon Shuguba, Heartsfire, Santa Fe, 1998.
  • Goldstein, Siebenschuh and Tashing Tsering.  The Struggle for Modern Tibet: The Autobiography of Tashi Tsering. NY: ME Sharpe, 1997.
  • Ama Adhe (with Joy Blakeslee). Ama Adhe, the Voice That Remembers : The Heroic Story of a Woman's Fight to Free Tibet .  Wisdom Publications, 1997.
  • Palden Gyatso with Tsering Shakya, Autobiography of a Tibetan Monk (also published as Fire under the Snow: The Testimony of a Tibetan Prisoner), Harvill Press, London 1998.
  • Ani Pachen with Adelaide Donnelley, Sorrow Mountain: The Journey of a Tibetan Warrior Nun, Kodansha International, 2000.
  • Pema Bhum. Translated by Lauran Hartley. Six Stars With a Crooked Neck: Tibetan Memoirs of the Cultural Revolution.
  • Khetsun, Tubten. 2007 (Matthew Akester, trans.) Memories of Life in Lhasa under Chinese Rule. Columbia.