Rebecca Novick

You can read Part 1 of this post here.

In April 2010, I interviewed a Tibetan monk named Yidam Kyap as part of the Tibet Oral History Project that documents the life stories of Tibetan elders living in exile. The main aim of the project is...

In April 2010, I interviewed a Tibetan monk named Yidam Kyap as part of the Tibet Oral History Project that documents the life stories of Tibetan elders living in exile. The main aim of the project is to explore what life was like in Tibet for Tibetans from...

The following is a transcript of a talk by British biologist Dr. John Stanley based on an interview with Rebecca Novick. It was presented at the Global Buddhist Congregation in New Delhi, Nov. 29, 2011. Dr. Stanley is co-author of A Buddhist Response to...

With TIME magazine hoisting the self-immolations in Tibet as the top most underreported story of 2011, just one day after the 12th Tibetan set himself on fire, suddenly there is a window of attention on this disturbing trend. Many Tibet activists are hailing these young men...

Zamling sits in a dank concrete hall in a Tibetan slum in the cramped backstreets of Kathmandu. But with his upright urbane confidence, he could just as well be in an office on Wall Street. This 25-year-old Tibetan is the Treasurer of Gyanchen Youth Association -- a humble initiative that...

PHOTO: Kevin Bubriski

The Boudhanath Stupa in Kathmandu has for centuries been a holy place for Tibetans. It is also where Tibetans in Nepal have often demonstrated against Chinese rule in Tibet. On the morning of March 10, 2011,

In a typically sour grapes gesture, China has invented its own peace prize. The ceremony, held on December 9th, is a day ahead of the Nobel Peace Prize function honoring jailed Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo.

It's called the Confucius Peace Prize, but it's actually the second such award created...

"Language shapes the way we think and determines what we can think about." So said the late American linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf. China's Communist Party seems well ahead of the game.

On October 19th, Tibetan students in Eastern Tibet, many barely in their teens, took to the streets...

The sign that greets visitors as they leave Kathmandu airport. Photo: Tenzing Jigme

On October 3rd, police in full riot gear confiscated ballot boxes in Kathmandu and effectively shut down an attempt by 9,000 Tibetans to participate in the vote for their...

Am I the only one getting tired of headlines that begin, China Warns....?

2010 is already thick with them. China kicked off the year by warning Switzerland against accepting Uighur Guantanamo detainees and then warned Hong Kong over a proposed referendum on democracy. China also warned the US that Secretary...

"There will always be people willing to risk everything for freedom."

It's been four years since video footage of the fatal shooting of a teenage Tibetan girl by a Chinese border patrol made international news, before slipping into its final resting place on YouTube. But human rights journalist Jonathan Green,...

It could be argued that the Tibetan uprising of 2008 actually began several months earlier with what appeared to be an impromptu public address by a middle-aged Tibetan nomad. Until now, no one had seen footage of his defiant speech that was released this week for the first time by...

Amidst the accusations of China's belated response to the devastating earthquake that hit Yushu county in Eastern Tibet in the early hours of April 14, the downplaying in the Chinese media of the key role that Tibetan monks played in the rescue efforts and mourning ceremonies, alongside reports of Chinese...

After snubbing him during his Washington DC visit last October, President Obama finally met with the Dalai Lama on February 18th this year. Predictably, China's leaders warned of damage to Sino-US relations if the administration went ahead with the meeting (while making the rather bizarre claim that by doing so...

"I have always taught people that one should not harm any life, not even that of an ant. How could I then possibly be responsible for such an act?" Tenzin Delek Rinpoche

Last week, hundreds of Tibetans, young and old, began gathering...

You're in a jail in a remote region of southwestern China. The men who arrested you have confiscated your mobile phone, which contains photos of a Public Security Bureau official brutally beating a young man who organized a protest over the working conditions in a local salt mine. No one...

As a child growing up in a remote village in the mountainous region of Kham, Tsewang Dhondup loved to listen to the heroic fables recounted by the local elders. But Tsewang's own story is the stuff of legend, and might well end up woven into local lore and marveled at...

Apart from crackdowns in its ethnic minority regions of Xinjiang and Tibet, in recent months Beijing has been busy targeting home-grown adversaries--Chinese civil rights lawyers--in a series of moves that has been described by the group Human Rights in China as "an all-out attack."

On the morning of Friday,...

Sometimes bravery comes in heroic cinematic moments. Sometimes it takes on a far more modest guise. A group of legal scholars from a Chinese think tank fall into the second category, putting their careers and reputations on the line by daring to try to shed some reasoned light on the...

There's something very uplifting-sounding about Serf Liberation Day. Rather like baby seal rescue day, or treat an underprivileged kid to the circus day. Doesn't sound like much there to argue with. But that is just what Tibetans--the 'liberated serfs' and their descendants--are doing. Back in January, Beijing announced its plans...