SELECTED, ANNOTATED
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF
THE HISTORY OF CHINESE
SCIENCE AND MEDICINE
SOURCES IN WESTERN
LANGUAGES
N. Sivin
This annotated
bibliography covers science and medicine in traditional and modern China. It is
organized as follows:
HISTORY OF SCIENCE
IN IMPERIAL CHINA *
Reference Works *
General *
Science and
Society *
Science and
Philosophy *
Science and
Religion *
The Early
Encounter With Europe *
Mathematics and
Divination *
Astronomy *
Alchemy and
Early Chemical Arts *
Siting
(geomancy), Cartography, and Earth Sciences *
HISTORY OF
SCIENCE IN TWENTIETH-CENTURY CHINA *
HISTORY OF
MEDICINE IN IMPERIAL CHINA *
Reference Works *
Studies Useful
for Orientation *
Medicine and
Related Topics *
Materia Medica *
HISTORY OF
MEDICINE IN TWENTIETH-CENTURY CHINA *
Reference Works *
Medicine and
Related Topics *
This list
emphasizes recent publications, for two reasons. With respect to China before
ca. 1800, the bibliographies in Joseph Needham’s Science and Civilisation in
China (see below, p. *) are extremely rich, and merely
need to be supplemented. Although they are unannotated, the reader can easily
use the indexes to find evaluations of sources. There is no correspondingly
thorough survey for the last two centuries, but on the other hand a large part
of the literature on that period published more than a decade ago is already
obsolete.
The obvious
differences in the subdivisions of this bibliography reflect the varying
character and extent of the literature in each category. Books on traditional
medicine keep pouring out, most of them with no scholarly value, because,
unlike the old astronomy, alchemy, and so on, medicine is still widely
practiced and the commercial demand, outside China as well as inside, is
enormous. Historians have conspicuously neglected recent technology and
science. Most publications are concerned with policy about them rather than the
work and the people who did them.
Publications
are included mostly because of their quality and usefulness, a few in order to
warn readers that the promise of their titles is specious. Most of the books
about Chinese medicine not listed here are of no use at all.
HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN IMPERIAL CHINA
Cullen,
Christopher. 1983. Science and Medicine in China. In Information Sources in
the History of Science and Medicine, ed. Pietro Corsi & Paul Weindling,
476-499. Butterworths Guides to Information Sources. London: Butterworth Scientific,
1983. Introductory historic survey, oriented toward bibliography of secondary
sources.
Fan
Ka-wai. 2003. History of Chinese Medicine Online. A Guide to the Useful Sites
on the WWW. The European Journal of Oriental Medicine, 4. 3: 52-60.
General annotated list of sites.
Fan
Ka Wai. 2004. Online Research Databases and Journals of Chinese Medicine. The
Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, 10. 6: 1123-28.
Categorized list of main resources.
Ho
Peng Yoke. 1977. Modern Scholarship on the History of Chinese Astronomy.
Occasional Papers of the Faculty of Asian Studies, 16. Canberra: The Australian
National University. A bibliographical essay on the state of the field, with a
bibliography of about 400 items. See review in Chinese Science, 1982, 5:
42-44.
Loewe,
Michael, editor. 1993 (publ. 1994). Early Chinese Texts. A Bibliographical
Guide. Early China Special Monograph Series, 2. Berkeley: The Society for
the Study of Early China and the Institute of East Asian Studies, University of
California. Includes essays on early scientific texts.
Needham, Joseph, et al. 1954- . Science and
Civilisation in China. 21 vols. to date. Cambridge University Press. The
massive bibliographies in each volume provide the fullest documentation of most
topics.
Pregadio,
Fabrizio. 1996. Chinese Alchemy. An Annotated Bibliography of Works in Western
Languages. Monumenta Serica, 44: 439-473.
Revue
bibliographique de sinologie, 1955- . 1957- . Paris: Mouton. Valuable analytical
annual bibliography of current sinological articles and books in humanities and
social sciences published in Chinese, Japanese, and European languages. Wide
coverage, but far from exhaustive. Abstracts, 40-250 words in length, in
English or French, are signed by experts. Section VII, Histoire des sciences,
includes astronomy, medicine, and technology.
Selin,
Helaine. 1992. Science across Cultures: An Annotated Bibliography of Books
on Non-Western Science, Technology, and Medicine. Garland Reference Library
of the Humanities, 1597. London: Garland Publishing. Useful for cross-cultural
studies, but not a first choice for China. Entries are neither comprehensive
nor carefully chosen. Notes generally give an accurate idea of topics, but do
not evaluate. It is impossible to tell whether an item is a classic or
incompetent, an especially serious problem with respect to medicine.
Selin,
Helaine. 1997. Encyclopedia of the History of Science, Technology and
Medicine in Non-Western Cultures. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
Some articles are excellent and some embarrassing. The book is poorly
integrated. Use only those you are prepared to evaluate.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1981. Some Important Publications on Early Chinese Astronomy from China
and Japan, 1978-1980. Archaeoastronomy, 4. 1: 26-31. Annotated, with
analytic discussions. Includes collections of essays.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1989. Chinese Archeoastronomy: Between Two Worlds. In World
Archeoastronomy. Selected Papers from the 2nd Oxford International Conference
on Archeoastronomy Held at Merida, Yucatan, Mexico 13-17 January 1986,
53-64. Cambridge University Press. Summary of recent work and research issues,
with bibliography.
Sivin, Nathan. 2000. Editor’s Introduction. In
Needham, Science and Civilisation in China, vol. 6, part 6, pp. 1-37.
Recent and developing trends, important studies.
Tsien
Tsuen-hsuin; James K. M. Cheng. 1978. China: An Annotated Bibliography of
Bibliographies. Boston: G. K. Hall. Lists over 2500 bibliographies, mainly
in English, Chinese, and Japanese, with coverage of science and medicine.
Author, title, and subject indexes.
Wilkinson,
Endymion. 2000. Chinese History: A Manual. Harvard-Yenching Institute
Monograph Series, 52. xxiv + 1181 pp. Cambridge: Harvard University Asian
Center. Now the standard for Western, Chinese, and Japanese sources, esp.
recent.
Xi
Zezong. 1981. Chinese Studies in the History of Astronomy, 1949-1979. Isis,
72: 456-470.
Xia
Nai. 1980. Bibliography of Recent Archeological Discoveries Bearing on the
History of Science and Technology. Chinese Science, 4: 19-52. Supplement
by Donald Blackmore Wagner, 53-60. Good evaluative coverage of Chinese
publications, with some references to related studies published elsewhere.
Bodde,
Derk. 1953. Harmony and Conflict in Chinese Philosophy. In Studies in Chinese
Thought, ed. Arthur F. Wright, 19-80. University of Chicago Press. A
penetrating attempt at a synthesis of Chinese cosmology and values.
Bodde,
Derk. 1957. Evidence for ‘Laws of Nature’ in Chinese Thought. Harvard
Journal of Asiatic Studies, 20: 709-727. Issue published 1959. Takes issue
with Needham, who doubts that the word law is applicable to Chinese natural
conceptions. Concludes at least a few early Chinese thinkers viewed the
universe in terms strikingly similar to those underlying the Western concept of
`laws of nature.’
East
Asian Science, Technology and Medicine. Published twice a year by the International
Society for the History of East Asian Science, Technology, and Medicine.
Occasional reviews. Title was Chinese Science 1975-1999.
Elvin,
Mark. 1973. The Pattern of the Chinese Past. Stanford University Press.
A stimulating but problematic attempt to interpret Chinese social history in
the light of the economics of technology, with some attention to science.
Sivin, "Imperial China: Has Its Present Past a Future?" Harvard
Journal of Asiatic Studies, 1978, 38: 449-480, evaluates the book’s
use of evidence pertaining to science and technology.
Elvin,
Mark, editor. 1980. Symposium: The Work of Joseph Needham. Past and Present,
87: 17-53. Essay reviews of Needham’s writing on philosophy (W. Peterson),
mathematics (U. Libbrecht), and astronomy (C. Cullen).
Fèvre,
Francine; Georges Métailié. 2005. Dictionnaire Ricci des plantes de Chine.
Paris: Éditions du Cerf. Lists 16,500 plants and 3500 medical plants, with
definitions in French, Latin, and English.
Furth,
Charlotte; Judith T. Zeitlin; Ping-chen Hsiung, editors. 2007. Thinking with
Cases. Specialist Knowledge in Chinese Cultural History.Honolulu;
University of Hawai’i Press. Essays explore what connects uses of the word an,
"case," in law, medicine, religion and philosophy.
Graham,
A. C. 1973. China, Europe, and the Origins of Modern Science: Needham’s The
Grand Titration. In Nakayama & Sivin 1973: 45-69. A thorough and
original critique of assumptions in Needham 1979.
Graham,
A. C. 1978. Later Mohist Logic, Ethics and Science. Hong Kong: Chinese
University Press. A translation and study of the Mohist Canons (ca. 300 B.C.),
propositions that juxtapose ethics, logic, geometry, optics, mechanics, and
other subjects. A major contribution.
Historia
scientarum.
Annual. 1962-1979. Tokyo: Nippon Kagakusi Gakkai. Originally published as Japanese
Studies in the History of science. Frequently includes studies of China.
Huff,
Toby E. 1993. The Rise of Early Modern Science. Islam, China, and the West.
Cambridge University Press. Argues that science arose only in the West because
of its legal concept of corporation, which gave rise to neutral space and free
inquiry, concepts integral to modern science. Good example of fallacious,
one-sided analysis.
Kim,
Yung Sik; Francesca Bray, editors. 1999. Current Perspectives in the History
of Science in East Asia. Seoul National University Press. Wide selection
(53 papers) from a 1996 international conference.
Li
Guohao et al., editors. 1982. Explorations in the History of Science and
Technology in China. A Special Number of the Collections of Essays on Chinese
Literature and History. Shanghai: Chinese Classics Publications House. Festschrift
for the eightieth birthday of Joseph Needham. Pp. 703-720 are a complete list
of Needham’s writings to 1980.
Lloyd,
G. E. R., and Nathan Sivin. 2002. The Way and the Word. Science and Medicine
in Early China and Greece. New Haven: Yale University Press. Uses a new methodology
for comparative and other studies.
Nakayama,
Shigeru; Nathan Sivin, editors. 1973. Chinese Science. Explorations of an
Ancient Tradition. MIT East Asian Science Series, 2. Cambridge, MA: MIT
Press. A collection of essays on many aspects of science and medicine.
Nakayama,
Shigeru. 1984. Academic and Scientific Traditions in China, Japan, and the
West, tr. Jerry Dusenberry. University of Tokyo Press. English version of Rekishi
toshite no gakumon (Academia as history; Tokyo, 1974). Important comparative
study of educational institutions in China, Japan, Europe, and the Middle East.
Needham,
Joseph. 1954- . Science and Civilisation in China (see above, p. *). "The single work of scholarship which in our time has
raised the banner of human unity most bravely and most triumphantly"
(Philip Morrison). Based on a great mass of scattered research in European
languages and Chinese, and work in the sources by the author and several
Chinese collaborators. Recent volumes are by other authors. Audacious,
literate, and arranged for maximal accessiblity, with enormous bibliographies.
Needham,
Joseph, et al. 1969. The Grand Titration. Science and Society in East and
West. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd. Needham’s collected arguments
for the primacy of social and economic factors in the conditioning of Chinese
scientific achievement. Particularly important is “Science and Society in East
and West” (190-217) and his survey of noncyclical time conceptions, “Time and
Eastern Man” (218-298). One can follow in this collection of papers, published
from 1944 on, the development and modification of the author’s views. See the
review in Journal of Asian Studies, 1971, 30: 870-873.
Needham,
Joseph. 1970. Clerks and Craftsmen in China and the West. Lectures and
Addresses on the History of Science and Technology. Cambridge University
Press. Another gathering of contributions published from 1946 on, dealing with
a spectrum of themes from the most general to articles on the earliest snow
crystal observations. Includes a group of essays on medicine.
Needham, Joseph. 1981. Science in Traditional
China. A Comparative Perspective. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Four informal lectures, of which only one is based on previously unpublished
research.
Perdue,
Peter C. 1999. China in the Early Modern World. Short Cuts, Myths and
Realities. Education about Asia, 4. 1: 21-26. Rebuts common
misconceptions: that Chinese humanism was anti-scientific, that the government
was intolerant of commerce, that people lacked freedom; emphasizes China’s
involvement in global system ca. 1500 on.
Ronan,
Colin A. 1978- . The Shorter Science and Civilisation in China. An
Abridgement of Joseph Needham’s Original Text. 3 vols. to date. Cambridge
University Press. A readable but mechanical multi-volume condensation, which
does not correct substantive errors, even those corrected by Needham in
subsequent volumes of his series. Idiosyncratic short bibliographies. Skimming
the original is likely to be more useful.
Sivin,
Nathan, editor. 1977. Science and Technology in East Asia. History of
Science: Selections from Isis, 4. New York: Science History
Publications. Articles published in the international history of science
journal over 60 years and still useful.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1995. Science in Ancient China. Researches and Reflections.
Variorum Collected Studies Series. Aldershot, Hants: Variorum. Eight previously
published studies, three revised.
Yabuuti
Kiyosi [=Yabuuchi Kiyoshi]. 1979. The Study of the History of Chinese Science in
Kyoto. Acta Asiatica, 36: 1-6. On the work over the past half-century of
the main Japanese research center in Chinese science.
Huang,
Ray; Joseph Needham. 1974. The Nature of Chinese Society: A Technical
Interpretation. East and West, n.s., 24: 381-401. An attempt to specify
material and social factors that impeded the development of capitalism and
thus, in the authors’ opinion, modern science in China. Cf. Needham 1969.
Emphasizes failure to fully develop a money economy.
Lee,
Thomas H. C. 2000. Education in Traditional China, A History. Handbuch
der Orientalistik. IV. China. 13. Leiden: Brill.
Nelson,
Benjamin. 1974. Sciences and Civilizations, `East’ and `West.’ Joseph Needham
and Max Weber. Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science, 11: 445-493.
A sociologist’s overview of the Scientific Revolution Problem.
Qian,
Wen-yuan. 1985. The Great Inertia. Scientific Stagnation in Traditional
China. London: Croom Helm. A shallow answer to the Scientific Revolution
Problem uninformed by acquaintance with the primary literature.
Restivo,
Sal P. 1979. Joseph Needham and the Comparative Sociology of Chinese and Modern
Science. Research in Sociology of Knowledge, Sciences and Art, 2: 25-51.
Excellent sociological assessment.
Bodde,
Derk. 1991. Chinese Thought, Society, and Science. The Intellectual and
Social Background of Science and Technology in Pre-modern China. Honolulu:
University of Hawaii Press. A summing up by a substantial contributor to the
history of Chinese philosophy. A major theme is that "written Chinese has
. . . hindered more than it has helped the development of scientific ways of
thinking in China," but the book does not study the scientific and medical
literature, and does not directly link early philosophy and later technical
activity or society.
Graham,
A. C., translator. 1981. Chuang-tzu. The Seven Inner Chapters and Other
Writings. London: George Allen & Unwin. By far the best translation to
date of a classic influential upon attitudes toward Nature. For documentation
see Graham, Chuang-tzu. Textual Notes to a Partial Translation (London:
School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 1982).
Graham,
A. C. 1986. Yin-Yang and the Nature of Correlative Thinking. Occasional
Paper and Monograph Series, 6. Singapore: The Institute of East Asian
Philosophies. A philosophic analysis, with attention to pre-Han history, of
yin-yang and the Five Phases. See also Sivin, Traditional Medicine in
Contemporary China (below, p. *), pp. 43-94.
Lamont,
H. G. 1973-1974. An Early Ninth Century Debate on Heaven: Liu Tsung-yuan’s T’ien
shuo and Liu Yü-hsi’s T’ien lun. Asia Major, 1973, 18:
181-208; 1974, 19: 37-85. Lamont’s interpretation is debatable, but the
translated documents are important, and deserve to be studied in context.
Major,
John S. 1993. Heaven and Earth in Early Han Thought: Chapters Three, Four,
and Five of the Huainanzi. SUNY Series in Chinese Philosophy and Culture.
Albany: State University of New York Press. Important for cosmology and
cultural geography.
Yang
Hsiung, ca. 4 B.C./1993. The Canon of Supreme Mystery, trans. with
commentary by Michael Nylan. SUNY Series in Chinese Philosophy and Culture. Albany:
State University of New York Press. Translation of a fundamental work on
Chinese cosmology, based on the Book of Changes, but a systematic exposé in a
form close to that of a prose poem.
Yosida
Mitukuni [=Yoshida Mitsukuni]. 1979. The Chinese Concept of Technology: A
Historical Approach. Acta Asiatica, 36: 49-66. Broad and general
reflections on several landmarks of the literature.
Harper,
Donald J. 1997. Warring States, Qin, and Han Manuscripts Related to Natural
Philosophy and the Occult. In New Sources of Early Chinese History: An
Introduction to the Reading of Inscriptions and Manuscripts, ed. Edward J.
Shaughnessy, pp. 223-252. Technical but fascinating account of the relations of
popular religion and science in the 4th to 2nd centuries B.C. as based on
recently excavated documents.
Kaltenmark,
Max. 1969. Lao tzu and Taoism. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
On Taoist mysticism and religion. Little on science, but useful for background;
by a leading scholar.
Ngo
Van Xuyet. 1976. Divination magie et politique dans la Chine ancienne. Essai
suivi de la traduction des ``Biographies des Magiciens’’ tirées de l’``Histoire
des Han postérieurs.’’ (Bibliothèque de l’Ėcole des Hautes
Ėtudes. Section des Sciences Religieuses, 78). Paris: Presses
Universitaires de France. Illuminating on the connections between divination
and technology in the Han period.
Robinet,
Isabelle. 1984. La Révélation du Shangqing dans l’histoire du Taoisme
(Publications de l’Ecole Française d’Extrême-orient, 87). 2 vols. Paris: Ecole
francaise d’Extrême-Orient. Important for the pre-Taoist origins of alchemy and
other disciplines for self-cultivation.
Schipper,
Kristofer M. 1978. The Taoist Body. History of Religions, 17:
355- 386. See also Schipper 1982 (p. * below).
Schipper,
Kristofer M. 1982. Le corps taoïste. Corps physique, corps social.
(L’espace intérieur, 25). Paris: Fayard. These two items are on interior
cosmography in Taoist religious doctrine, but the theme is pertinent to
medicine as well.
Schipper,
Kristofer M. 1985. Seigneurs royaux, dieux des épidémies. Archives de
sciences sociales des religions, 59: 31-40. On ideas of epidemics in
Chinese popular religion.
Schipper,
Kristofer, Franciscus Verellen, editors. 2004. The Taoist Canon. A
Historical Companion to the Daozang. 3 vols. University of Chicago Press. A
historical description and abstract of every book in the Taoist canon, with
much additional reference material.
Schipper,
Kristofer M.; Wang Hsiu-huei. 1986. Progressive and Regressive Time Cycles in
Taoist Ritual. In Time, Science and Society in China and the West. The
Study of Time, 5, ed. J. T. Fraser et al., 185-205. Amherst, MA: University of
Massachusetts Press.
Schluchter,
Wolfgang, editor. 1983. Max Webers Studie über Konfuzianismus und Taoismus.
Intepretation und Kritik. Suhrkamp Taschenbuch, Wissenschaft, 402.
Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp. Essays by sociologists and Sinologists on Weber’s
interpretations of Chinese religion.
Seidel,
Anna, 1974. Taoism; Michel Strickmann, Taoism, History of; Strickmann, Taoist
Literature. Encyclopedia Britannica (15th ed.), s. v. Long articles by
two of the best historians of Taoism in the new Britannica. Concerned as
much with religious as with philosophic Taoism, and with their links.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1978. On the Word "Taoist" as a Source of Perplexity. With
Special Reference to the Relations of Science and Religion in Traditional
China. In Medicine, Philosophy, and Religion in Ancient China, chapter
6. Aldershot, Hants: Variorum, 1995. On common confusions due to vagueness in
thinking about Taoism and its social contexts.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1995. Taoism and Science. In ibid., chapter 7. On the mistaken
assumption that Taoism played an important role in the evolution of science.
Skar,
Lowell. 2003. Golden Elixir Alchemy: The Formation of the Southern Lineage and
the Transformation of Medieval China. xiv + 375 pp. Ph.D. dissertation, Asian
and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Pennsylvania. See especially chap. 2,
"Nourishing the Vi-talities and Embodying the Way," for a remarkable
history of Chinese self-cultivation.
Strickmann,
Michel. 1979. On the Alchemy of T’ao Hung-ching. In Facets of Taoism. Essays
in Chinese Religion, ed. Holmes Welch & Anna Seidel, 123-192. New
Haven: Yale University Press. On the relations between alchemy, revelation, and
eschatology in writings by the founder of a major Taoist movement.
Ware,
James R. 1966. Alchemy, Medicine and Religion in the China of A. D. 320. The
Nei P’ien of Ko Hung. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. Well-indexed but
frequently careless translation of the Pao p’u tzu nei p’ien, a book
written to prove that the hierarchy of the gods of popular religion really
exists. Alchemy is among the techniques of transcendence explored. The
translator’s parallels between Taoism and Christian mysticism are best regarded
with caution.
Wolf,
Arthur P., editor. 1974. Religion and Ritual in Chinese Society.
Stanford University Press. Conference papers, mostly excellent, on popular
religion in Taiwan and Hong Kong. The next best thing to a book on Chinese
popular religion.
The
Early Encounter With Europe
Chu,
Ping-yi. 1994. Technical Knowledge, Cultural Practices and Social Boundaries.
Wan-nan Scholars and Recasting of Jesuit Astronomy, 1600-1800. Ph.D. diss.,
History, UCLA. On local traditions and their response.
D’Elia,
Pasquale M. 1960. Galileo in China. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press. A partisan account of the introduction of astronomy in the early 1600’s,
but provides a good chronological narrative.
Elman,
Benjamin A. 1984. From Philosophy to Philology. Intellectual and Social
Aspects of Change in Late Imperial China (Harvard East Asian Monographs,
110). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Council on East Asian Studies. A
seminal work on a revolution in the content and social context of thought ca.
1600-1750, with a subtle analysis of the limits of European impact.
Engelfriet,
Peter M. 1996. "Euclid in China: A Survey of the Historical Background of
the First Chinese Translation of Euclid’s Elements (Jihe yuanben:
Beijing, 1607), an Analysis of the Translation, and a Study of its Influence up
to 1723." 428 pp. Ph.D. dissertation (cum laude), Sinologisch Instituut,
Leiden.
Gernet,
Jacques. 1985. China and the Christian Impact. A Conflict of Cultures,
tr. Janet Lloyd. New York: Cambridge University Press. Translation of Chine
et christianisme. Action et réaction (Bibliothèque des histoires; Paris: La
Maison des sciences de l’homme, 1982). For a summary see Christian and Chinese
Visions of the World in the Seventeenth Century, Chinese Science, 1980,
4: 1-17. Gernet writes with equal authority on science and religion.
Hashimoto,
Keizo. 1988. Hsü Kuang-ch’i and Astronomical Reform. The Process of the
Chinese Acceptance of Western Astronomy 1629-1635. Osaka: Kansai University
Press. A Cambridge dissertation, which among other things documents the
European sources of the missionaries’ early astronomical translations.
Henderson,
John. 1984. The Development and Decline of Chinese Cosmology.
Neo-Confucian Studies, 11. New York: Columbia University Press. An original
look at changes in Chinese philosophy in the seventeenth and early eighteenth
centures, with much material that suggests Jesuit influence through astronomy.
Martzloff,
Jean-Claude. 1980. La compréhension chinoise des méthodes démonstratives
euclidiennes au cours du XVIIe siÈcle et au début du XVIIIe. In Actes,
IIe Colloque International de Sinologie. Les rapports entre la Chine et l’Europe
au temps des lumiÈres. Centre de Recherches Interdisciplinaires de Chantilly
(CERIC), 16-18 septembre 1977. La Chine au temps des lumiÈres, 4, pp. 125-143.
Paris: Le Centre. On the character of Chinese responses to Euclid.
Spence,
Jonathan D. 1969. To Change China. Western Advisors in China, 1620-1960.
Boston: Little, Brown. Characteristically reflective, but uncharacteristically
based on secondary sources, often unreliable ones.
Spence,
Jonathan D. 1983. The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci. New York: Viking
Penguin Inc. On the transplantation to China of the classical art of memory.
Not important but brilliant and curious. For background see Frances A. Yates’
equally brilliant and curious The Art of Memory (Harmondsworth: Penguin
Books, 1969).
Xi
Zezong [=Hsi Tse-tsung] et al. 1973. Heliocentric Theory in China. In
Commemoration of the Quincentenary of the Birth of Nicolaus Copernicus. Scientia
Sinica, 16: 364-376.
Zürcher,
Erik; Nicolas Standaert, S. J.; Adrianus Dudink. 1991. Bibliography of the
Jesuit Mission in China (ca. 1580-ca. 1680). Leiden: Center of Non-Western
Studies, Leiden University.
Chemla,
Karine. 1982. Etude du livre Reflets des mesures du cercle sur la mer de Li Ye.
Dissertation for doctorat de 3e cycle, University of Paris. 4 vols.
Pathbreaking study of mathematical classic Ts’e yuan hai ching (1248).
Chemla,
Karine; Guo Shuchun. 2004. Les neuf chapitres. Le classique mathématique de
la Chine ancienne et ses commentaries. Paris: Dunod. Complete scholarly translation.
Cullen,
Christopher. 1982. An Eighth Century Chinese Table of Tangents. Chinese
Science, 5: 1-33. On a table of gnomon shadow lengths using third-order
finite differences, perhaps the oldest extant tangent table in the world.
Pertinent to astronomy as well.
Hoe,
John. 1977. Les systèmes d’équations polyn"mes dans le Siyuan yujian
(1303) (Mémoires de l’Institut des Hautes Etudes Chinoises, Collège de
France, 6). Paris: L’Institut. A dissertation concerned with polynomials in the
Ssu yuan yü chien (Jade mirror of the four unknowns) of Chu Shih-chieh.
Good introductory orientation.
Jami,
Catherine. 1990. Les Méthodes rapides pour la trigonométrie et le rapport
précis du cercle (1774). Tradition chinoise et apport occidental en
mathématiques (Mémoires de l’Institut des Hautes Etudes Chinoises, Collège
de France, 32). Paris: L’Institut. Sophisticated analysis of a trigonometric
treatise by the Mongol astronomer Minggantu. Important for its conclusions
about how traditional methods and assumptions were imposed on techniques
borrowed from Europe.
Lam
Lay Yong. 1977. A Critical Study of the Yang hui suan fa. A
Thirteenth-Century Chinese Mathematical Treatise. Singapore University
Press. Complete translation of an important text of ca. 1270, with explanations.
Lam
Lay Yong; Ang Tian Se. 1992. Fleeting Footsteps. Tracing the Conception of
Arithmetic and Algebra in Ancient China. Singapore: World Scientific.
Introduction to ancient Chinese computational methods and translation of Sun-tzu
suan ching, a textbook of ca. A.D. 400.
Li
Yan; Du Shiran. 1987. Chinese Mathematics. A Concise History, tr. John
N. Crossley & Anthony W.-C. Lun. Oxford Science Publications. Oxford
University Press. Uncomprehending translation of Du’s competent but
positivistic textbook written for Chinese cadres in 1963.
Libbrecht,
Ulrich. 1973. Chinese Mathematics in the Thirteenth Century. The Shu-shu
chiu-chang of Ch’in Chiu-shao (MIT East Asian Science Series, 1).
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Full of examples and informed discussions of differences
in approach between Chinese, Islamic, Indian, and European mathematics.
Emphasizes indeterminate equations.
Martzloff,
Jean-Claude. 1981. Recherches sur l’oeuvre mathématique de Mei Wending
(1633-1721). Mémoires de l’Institut des Hautes Etudes Chinoises, Collège de
France, 16. Paris: L’Institut. Dissertation on a great seventeenth-century
mathematician’s work on arithmetic and elementary geometry.
Martzloff,
Jean-Claude. 1995. A History of Chinese Mathematics, tr. Stephen L.
Wilson. Berlin: Springer-Verlag. Translation of Histoire des mathématiques
chinoises (Paris: Masson, 1988). Highly competent historical survey, with
equal attention to the intellectual and social contexts of mathematics and its
technical content.
Mikami,
Yoshio. 1913. The Development of Mathematics in China and Japan.
Leipzig: B. G. Teubner; reprint, New York: Chelsea Publishing Company, n.d.
Still worth consulting, particularly for details of operations.
Needham,
Joseph, et al. 1959. Science and Civilisation in China. Vol. III. Mathematics
and the Sciences of the Heavens and the Earth, 1-168. Cambridge University
Press. A good survey of the literature and classic problems, but in other
respects the weakest section of the series, superficial and largely reliant on
obsolete Western-language sources.
Smith,
Richard J. 1991. Fortune-tellers and Philosophers : Divination in
Traditional Chinese Society. Boulder : Westview Press. Good non-technical
introduction, with substantial bibliography.
Vogel,
Kurt, translator. 1968. Neun Bücher arithmetischer Technik. Ostwalds
Klassiker der exakten Wissenschaften, n. s., 4. Braunschweig: View E G. A
complete translation of the oldest text of the classical arithmetical
tradition, the Chiu chang suan shu (late first century A.D.?), with
scanty introduction and commentary. Largely based on a Russian translation by
Elvira Berezkina.
Wagner,
Donald Blackmore. 1978. Liu Hui and Tsu Keng-chih on the Volume of a Sphere. Chinese
Science, 3: 59-79.
Wagner,
Donald Blackmore. 1979. An Early Chinese Derivation of the Volume of a Pyramid:
Liu Hui, Third Century A.D. Historia mathematica, 6: 164-188. On
geometrical proofs, the use of which in China has often been denied.
Wylie,
Alexander. 1897/1966. Chinese Researches. Reprint, Taipei: Ch’eng-wen
Publishing Company. Wylie (1815-1887) was a polymathic missionary who wrote on
topics in technology, mathematics, and science that have not been freshly
studied since.
Yabuuti,
Kiyosi. 2000. Une histoire des mathématiques chinoises. Regards sur la
science, tr. Catherine Jami & Kaoru Baba. Paris: Belin-Pour la science. Tr.
of Yabuuchi 1974, 2d ed.
Clark,
D. M.; F. R. Stephenson. 1977. Historical Supernovas. London: Pergamon
Press. The best comprehensive attempt to identify supernovas in early
astronomical records. Uses Chinese and other materials in a sophisticated way.
Cullen,
Christopher. 1996. Astronomy and Mathematics in Ancient China: the Zhou bi
suan jing. Needham Research Institute Studies, 1. Cambridge University
Press. Full translation and innovative study of one of the most important early
books on cosmology (between 50 B.C. and A.D. 100).
Deane,
Thatcher E. 1994. Instruments and Observation at the Imperial Astronomical
Bureau during the Ming Dynasty. Osiris, 9: 127-140. On practical
astronomy in the 14th to 17th centuries.
Eberhard,
Wolfram. 1970. Sternkunde und Weltbild im alten China. Gesammelte Aufs„tze.
Occasional Series, 5. Taipei: Chinese Materials & Research Aids Service
Center. A useful collection, all except one article published 1932-1940. Often
unreliable for astronomy and for interpretation, but many are the only
secondary sources on interesting topics, e.g., aspects of early cosmology,
writings of Buddhists on astronomy.
Ginzel,
F. K. 1906-1914. Handbuch der mathematischen und technischen Chronologie.
Das Zeitrechnungswesen der V"lker. 3 vols. Leipzig: Hinrichs. An
introduction to the basic problems of calendar and ephemerides construction and
their solutions in various cultures; none of the literature on Chinese
astronomy provides full introductory information of this kind. For summary
data, see Explanatory Supplement to the Astronomical Almanac (Mill
Valley, CA: University Science Books, 1992).
Ho
Peng Yoke [=Ping-yü]. 1966. The Astronomical Chapters of the Chin shu. With
Amendments, Full Translation and Annotations. Paris: Mouton & Co.
Definitive translation of the Astrological Treatise (T’ien wen chih ),
which provides abundant data on positional astronomy and the astrological
interpretation of observational data. Ho supplements this first translation of
its kind with notes and introductory remarks on historiography and observatory
practice.
Ho
Peng Yoke. 2003. Chinese Mathematical Astrology. Reaching Out to the Stars.
London: Routledge/Curzon. A deep and rather technical discussion of various
forms of divination.
Maeyama,
Y[asukatsu]. 1975. On the Astronomical Data of Ancient China (ca. -100 D2D200):
A Numerical Analysis. Archives internationales d’histoire des sciences,
25: 247-276; 1976, 26: 27-58. Through a strikingly original error analysis,
redates a fundamental source of star data to roughly 70 B.C.
Maeyama,
Y. 1977. The Oldest Star Catalogue of China, Shih Shen’s Hsing ching. In
Maeyama & W. G. Salzer, editors. ä . Naturwissenschaftgeschichtliche
Studien. Festschrift für Willy Hartner, 211-245. Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner
Verlag GmbH. A broader study that confirms Maeyama’s earlier work.
Maspero,
Henri. 1938-1939. Les instruments astronomiques des Chinois au temps des Han. Mélanges
chinois et Bouddhiques, 6: 183-370. Rigorous, accurate, and illuminating.
Basic for early astronomy, and among Needham’s main sources.
Müller,
Paul M. 1975. An Analysis of the Ancient Astronomical Observations with the
Implications for Geophysics and Cosmology. Newcastle upon Tyne: The author.
Dissertation. Considerable use of East Asian observations; many pertinent
references in bibliography.
Nakayama,
Shigeru. 1966. Characteristics of Chinese Astrology. Isis, 57: 442-454.
A concise characterization, discussing the late importation of horoscopic
astrology of the Hellenistic type.
Nakayama,
Shigeru. 1969. A History of Japanese Astronomy. Chinese Background and
Western Impact. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Contains one of
the best characterizations to date of Chinese approaches to computational
astronomy.
Needham,
Joseph, et al. 1959. Science and Civilisation in China. Vol. III. Mathematics
and the Sciences of the Heavens and the Earth, 169-641. Cambridge
University Press. Excellent survey, with much attention to observational
astronomy and instruments. Uses little important research by Japanese
historians. Chinese astronomy was calendrical, that is, oriented toward the
production of a complete ephemeris. Needham misleads the reader when he
dismisses the calendrical problem as trivial, and deals with other aspects of
astronomy as though they were autonomous. In most other respects accurate; in
case of doubt, check sources.
Schafer,
Edward H. 1977. Pacing the Void. T’ang Approaches to the Stars.
Berkeley: University of California Press. Recreates with brio the sky as seen
by medieval poets.
Schlegel,
Gustave. 1875. Uranographie chinoise ou preuves directes que l’astronomie
primitive est originaire de la Chine, et qu’elle a été empruntée par les
anciens peuples occidentaux a la sphère chinoise. 2 vols. with star maps in
folder. La Haye: Martinus Nijhoff. Despite Schlegel’s extravagant views on the
antiquity of Chinese astronomy, this remains the basic Western-language
reference on Chinese constellations and stars.
Stephenson,
F. Richard. 1978. Applications of Early Astronomical Records. Monographs
on Astronomical Subjects, 4. Bristol: Oxford University Press. A technically
sophisticated, but not mathematically difficult, introduction to the topic,
using many East Asian observational records.
Stephenson,
F. Richard; M. A. Houlden. 1986. Atlas of Historical Eclipse Maps. East Asia
1500 BC AD 1900. Cambridge University Press. Useful introduction, and maps
and data on solar eclipses only. Sun Xiaochun; Jacob Kistemaker. 1997. The
Chinese Sky during the Han. Constellating Stars & Society. Leiden. E.
J. Brill. Primarily a reconstruction, with attention to social imagery in
asterisms.
Sun
Xiaochun. 2000. Crossing the Boundaries between Heaven and Man: Astronomy in Ancient
China. In Astronomy across Cultures. The History of Non-Western Astronomy,
ed. Helaine Selin & Sun, pp. 423-454. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic
Publishers. Good introductory essay for encyclopedia.
Sun Xiaochun;
Jacob Kistemaker. 1997. The Chinese Sky during the Han. Constellating Stars
& Society. Leiden: E. J. Brill. Primarily a reconstruction, with
attention to social imagery in asterisms.
Swarup,
Govind, et al., editors. 1987. History of Oriental Astronomy.
International Astronomical Union, Colloquium 91, New Delhi, India, November
1985. Cambridge University Press. Short papers on most of the Asian traditions,
variable in quality.
Teboul,
Michel. 1983. Les premières théories planétaires chinoises (Mémoires de
l’Institut des Hautes Etudes Chinoises, Collège de France, 21). Paris:
L’Institut. Excellent mathematical analysis of Han planetary techniques and
their predecessors, a neglected topic.
Teboul,
Michel. 1985. Sur quelques particularités de l’uranographie polaire chinoise. T’oung
Pao, 71: 1-39. Demonstrates the vagueness of Han nomenclature for stars.
Xu
Zhentao. 1989. The Basic Forms of Chinese Sunspot Records. Chinese Science,
9: 19-28.
Yabuuchi,
Kiyoshi. 1963. Astronomical Tables in China, from the Han to the T’ang
Dynasties. In Chûgoku chûsei kagaku gijutsushi no kenkyû (Studies in the
history of medieval Chinese science and technology), ed. Yabuuchi, 445-492.
Tokyo: Kadokawa Shoten. A systematic survey of Chinese calendrical treatises
and the astronomy they reflect, technically sophisticated. Continued in
Astronomical Tables in China from the Wutai to the Ch’ing Dynasties, Japanese
Studies in the History of Science, 1963, 2: 94-100, a tabular résumé
without discussion.
Yabuuti,
Kiyosi. 1979. Researches on the Chiu-chih li. Indian Astronomy under the
T’ang Dynasty. Acta Asiatica, 36: 7-48. Revised translation of an
important document for the influence of Indian mathematical astronomy and
trigonometric functions in eighth-century China.
Alchemy
and Chemical Arts (see also "Science and Religion")
Eliade,
Mircea. 1962. The Forge and the Crucible. New York: Harper. Original
title Forgerons et alchimistes (Paris: Flammarion, 1956). A
distinguished general study of the primitive roots of alchemical doctrines. The
chapters on Chinese and Indian alchemy are suggestive despite the inadequacy of
their secondary sources. For a survey of later developments, see The Forge and
the Crucible: A Postscript, History of Religions, 1968, 8: 74-88.
Ho
Peng-yoke. 1979. On the Dating of Taoist Alchemical Texts. Griffith Asian
Papers. Nathan, Queensland: Griffith University. A methodological introduction,
with examples. Ho has made important strides in applying dating techniques.
Li
Ch’iao-P’ing. 1948. The Chemical Arts of Old China. Easton, PA: Journal
of Chemical Education. Little space is devoted to alchemy and what Li says is
thoroughly obsolete. But there is still value in the book’s informal compendium
of Chinese chemical technology, explaining traditional methods of making
everything from alloys to soy sauce and wine.
Needham,
Joseph. The Epic of Gunpowder and Firearms, Developing from Alchemy. In Needham
1981: 27-56 (see above, p. *).
Needham,
Joseph, et al. 1974-1983. Science and Civilisation in China. Vol. 5, parts
2-5. Spagyrical Discovery and Invention. Cambridge University Press. A
historical survey of alchemy (including the physiological and spiritual
disciplines of internal alchemy ), mainly from the point of view of modern
chemistry. This anachronistic bias often distracts from understanding what
alchemists were trying to do; in particular, part 5 on “physiological alchemy”
as “proto-biochemistry” is badly misleading, as are Needham’s arguments that
alchemy is essentially Taoist in some sense. The comparative study of Chinese,
Islamic, and Hellenistic alchemy in vol.5, part 4, 323-509, is exceptionally
useful if approached critically.
Pregadio,
Fabrizio. 2006. Great Clarity. Daoism and Alchemy in Early Medieval China. Asian
Religions and Cultures. Stanford University Press. A detailed and learned study
of an early Taoist movement that made use of alchemical writings. Readers will
want to know something about the history of Taoism and of alchemy before
reading it.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1968. Chinese Alchemy: Preliminary Studies. Harvard Monographs
in the History of Science, 1. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Mostly
discussions and heuristic studies aimed at developing a critical and analytical
approach to the history of alchemy. Among the appendixes is a list of published
translations of alchemical treatises.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1976. Chinese Alchemy and the Manipulation of Time. Isis, 67:
513-527. Reprinted in Sivin (ed.), Science & Technology in East Asia
(New York: Science History Publications, 1976), 108-122.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1980. The Theoretical Background of Elixir Alchemy. In Needham et al.
1974-1983. vol. 5, part 4, pp. 210-297. A general reconstruction of the
theories Chinese alchemists created to explain their work. For a concise
summary see the preceding item, written later but published earlier.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1990. Research on the History of Early Alchemy. In Alchemy
Revisited. Proceedings of the International Conference on the History of
Alchemy at the University of Groningen. 17-19 April 1989, ed.
Z. R. W. M. von Martels, pp. 3-20. Leiden: E. J. Brill.
Discusses the lack
of vitality in research on the history of alchemy in China and worldwide.
Sivin,
Nathan. 2005. Alchemy: Chinese Alchemy. In Encyclopedia of Religion, 2d
ed., 15 vols., vol. 1, pp. 237-41. New York: Macmillan Reference. Reflects the
state of the art.
Sung
Ying-hsing. 1637/1966. T’ien-kung k’ai-wu. Chinese Technology in the
Seventeenth Century, trans. E-Tu Zen Sun & Shiou-chuan Sun. University
Park: The Pennsylvania State University Press. Translation of a 17th-century technological
encyclopedia containing much information about chemical processes.
Siting
(geomancy), Cartography, and Earth Sciences
Bennett,
Steven J. 1978. Patterns of the Sky and Earth: A Chinese Science of Applied
Cosmology. Chinese Science, 3: 1-26. The best available introduction to
geomancy, a misnomer instead of which Bennett proposes siting.
Feuchtwang,
Stephan D. R. 1974. An Anthropological Analysis of Chinese Geomancy.
Vientiane, Laos: Vithagna. Concerned with both the ideas and the social
functions of geomancy. Not a tightly integrated study, nor based on extensive
research, but contains useful materials on the siting compass.
Harley,
J. Brian; David Woodward. 1994. The History of Cartography. Vol. II,
Book 2. Cartography in the Traditional East and Southeast Asian Societies.
University of Chicago Press. Innovative and richly illustrated chapters on
China, including celestial mapping and cosmological diagrams.
Smith,
Richard J. Chinese Maps: Images of "All Under Heaven."
1996.New York: Oxford University Press.
HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN TWENTIETH-CENTURY CHINA
Brown,
Shannon R. 1977. Foreign Technology and Economic Growth. Problems of
Communism, 26: 30-40. Broad discussion of technology transfer to China from
ca. 1935 on.
Buck,
Peter. 1980. American Science and Modern China 1876-1936. Cambridge University
Press. Based on superficial research on China, and concerned mainly with the
social sources and social consequences of scientific development in the United
States. Contains a couple of interesting interpretations, e.g., of the role of
Progressivism in forming ideas of Chinese reformers.
Cao,
Cong; R. P. Suttmeier. 2001. China’s New Scientific Elite: Distinguished Young
Scientists, the Research Environment, and Hopes for Chinese Science. China
Quarterly, 168: 960-984.
Conroy,
Richard. 1987. The Disintegration and Reconstruction of the Rural Science and
Technology System: Evaluation and Implications. In Ashwani Saith (ed.), The
Reemergence of the Chinese Peasantry. Aspects of Rural Decollectivization
(London: Croom Helm), 137-172. On science policy since the Cultural Revolution.
Elman,
Benjamin, et al. 2007. Focus: Science in Modern China. Isis, 98. 3:
517-596. A collection of six articles that cast light on a wide range of
topics. See especially Elman, New Directions in the History of Modern Science in
China: Global Science and Comparative History, pp. 517-523.
Gould,
Sidney H., editor. 1961. Sciences in Communist China. Washington:
American Association for the Advancement of Science. Articles by experts;
useful, among other things, to document U.S. ignorance of China during the period.
Orleans,
Leo A., editor. 1980. Science in Contemporary China. Stanford University
Press. Essays on science, engineering, and medicine by prominent U.S.
scientists who have taken part in exchange delegations to China since the
mid-1970’s.
Reardon-Anderson,
James. 1991. The Study of Change. Chemistry in China, 1840-1949. Studies
of the East Asian Institute, Columbia University. New York: Cambridge
University Press. An excellent first attempt in a Western language to sum up
its topic. Not generally technical; emphasizes institutions, with attention to
ideas and language.
Schneider,
Laurence A. 1982. The Rockefeller Foundation, the China Foundation, and the
Development of Modern Science in China. Social Science and Medicine, 16:
1217-1221.
Schneider,
Laurence A. 1986. Lysenkoism in China. Proceedings of the 1956 Qingdao
Genetics Symposium. Special issue of Chinese Law and Government, 19.
2. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe. Valuable introduction and summaries of the papers
that stopped the persecution of genetics under Soviet Lysenkoist influence.
Sigurdson,
Jon. 1980. Technology and Science in the People’s Republic of China: An
Introduction. New York: Pergamon Press. Systematic introduction, based
mainly on secondary sources. Useful mainly as documentation of the state of
science and technology in 1977-1978, the first stage of the transition between
the Cultural Revolution and the modernization of the 1980’s.
Simon,
Denis Fred; Merle Goldman, editors. 1989. Science and Technology in Post-Mao
China. Harvard Contemporary China Series, 5. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Council on East Asian Studies. Wide selection of up-to-date essays
by political scientists, historians, and scientists. The best introduction to
the topic, but see review in Minerva, 1992, 30. 3: 432-439.
Volti,
Rudi. 1982. Technology, Politics, and Society in China. Boulder, CO:
Westview Press. Mainly on agriculture, energy, ground transport, and medicine.
Yamada
Keiji. 1971. The Development of Science and Technology in China: 1949-1965. The
Developing Economies, 9: 502-537. Useful Japanese view.
HISTORY OF MEDICINE IN IMPERIAL CHINA
Bensky,
Dan, et al. 1986. Chinese Herbal Medicine. Materia Medica. Seattle: Eastland
Press. Discusses and illustrates over 400 plants, with data from Chinese
textbooks. Not scholarly, but relatively full and clear, with useful
appendices.
Bretschneider,
E. 1881-1895. Botanicon sinicum. Notes on Chinese Botany from Native and Western
Sources. Journal of the North China Branch, Royal Asiatic Society, 16
(Bibliographical sources), 25 (Botanical identifications), 29
(Uses in medicine). Fascimile reprints, Tokyo, 1937; Nendeln, Lichtenstein,
1967.
Bynum,
W. F.; Helen Bynum. 2007. Dictionary of Medical Biography. 5 vols.
Tunbridge Wells: Greenwood. Includes 33 notices of Chinese physicians and
physicians in China.
Chen
Chan-yuen (Ch’en Ts’un-jen). 1968. Chung-kuo i-hsueh-shih t’u chien
(‘History of Chinese Medical Science Illustrated with Pictures’). Hong Kong:
Shang-hai Yin-shu-kuan. Pictorial archive with condensed English versions of
the captions. Nothing in the sloppy text should be used without checking; the
author has missed no opportunity to represent legends as historical facts and
late imaginative depictions as portraits.
Cullen,
Christopher. 1993. Patients and Healers in Late Imperial China: Evidence from
the Jinpingmei. History of Science, 31. 2: 99-150. Enlightening on the
social relations of medicine as reflected in a great novel.
Ferreyrolles,
Paul. 1953. L’acupuncture chinoise. Lille: Editions S.L.E.L. Recommended
solely for the bibliography of European writing on Chinese medicine from 1671
to 1950 (pp. 177-191).
Hu,
Shiu-ying. 1980. An Enumeration of Chinese Materia Medica. Hong Kong:
Chinese University Press. A concise, authoritative reference list by Chinese
names; provides pharmaceutical and botanical identifications. The most
up-to-date handbook on botanical and pharmaceutic nomenclature in English;
Read, Stuart, etc., are largely obsolete for Latin names of plants.
Huard,
Pierre. 1968. Chinese Medicine, trans. Bernard Fielding. World
University Library. New York: McGraw-Hill. This well-illustrated paperback
deserves praise for its concern with the connections of other Asiatic
traditions to that of China, and European knowledge of Chinese medicine and
vice versa in the last three centuries. At the same time, it is perfunctory,
carelessly thought through, and full of elementary errors of fact,
interpretation, translation, and transliteration.
Huard,
Pierre; Ming Wong (Wang Ming). 1956. Bio-bibliographie de la médecine chinoise.
Bulletin de la Société des Etudes Indo-chinoises, n.s., 31:
181-246. Index of principal Chinese medical writers, and brief bibliography of
Western (including Russian) and Chinese works.
Keys,
John D. 1976. Chinese Herbs. Their Botany, Chemistry, and Pharmacodynamics.
Rutland, VT: C. E. Tuttle Company. Uninformative despite the rich sources that
the author claims to have drawn on.
Read,
Bernard E. 1931-1941. Chinese Materia Medica. Peking Natural History
Bulletin. Standard references for animal drugs. For detailed list of
fascicules, see Needham, Science and Civilisation in China, III,
784-785. Although Read’s publications are the best of their sort in English,
recent publications in Chinese have rendered them obsolete.
Read,
Bernard E.; C. Pak. 1936. A Compendium of Minerals and Stones Used in
Chinese Medicine From the Pen Ts’ao Kang Mu. . . [of] Li Shih Chen . . . 1597
A.D. 2d ed., Peking Natural History Bulletin. Unlike Chinese Materia
Medica, this is not a translation but an ill-digested mass of information
from hither and yon. The order of accuracy is nevertheless high.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1989. A Cornucopia of Reference Works for the History of Chinese Medicine.
Chinese Science, 9: 29-52. Reports on a large number of reference
sources published in China and Japan since ca. 1985.
Smith,
F. Porter. 1911. Chinese Materia Medica. Vegetable Kingdom. Revised
edition, ed. G. A. Stuart. Shanghai: American Presbyterian Mission Press.
Reprint (ed. Ph. Daven Wei), 1969, Taipei: Ku T’ing Book House. The fullest of
the older monographs on Chinese materia medica. Still worth consulting,
particularly in view of its indexes to Chinese names of herbs. There is also
valuable translated material on identities and characteristics of medicinal
plants in Bretschneider 1881-1895: Part III.
See also
Sivin 2000 (p. * above).
Studies
Useful for Orientation
Brieger,
Gert. 1980. History of Medicine. In A Guide to the Culture of Science,
Technology, and Medicine, ed. Paul T. Durbin, pp. 121-194. New York: Free
Press. A discussion of issues and trends in the study of European medicine.
Chang,
Kwang Chih, editor. 1977. Food in Chinese Culture. Anthropological and
Historical Perspectives. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Essays on
the culinary arts, dynasty by dynasty, mostly by leading historians. Little on
nutrition, but the book is the best of its kind.
Kuriyama,
Shigehisa. 1992. Between Mind and Eye: Japanese Anatomy in the Eighteenth
Century. In Leslie & Young 1992: 21-43. A sophisticated study of the
interaction between Western representations of anatomy and traditional ideas of
spirituality.
Lock,
Margaret. 1980. East Asian Medicine in Urban Japan. Varieties of Medical
Experience. Comparative Studies of Health Systems and Medical Care, 4.
Berkeley: University of California Press. Excellent field study of
Chinese-style medicine and its social matrix.
Lock,
Margaret. 1993. Encounters with Aging: Mythologies of Menopause in Japan and
North America. Berkeley: University of California Press.
McNeill,
William H. 1977. Plagues and Peoples. Garden City: Anchor Press. On the
role of micro-organisms and infectious disease in world history. Weak on China
but important for epidemiology applied to history.
Ohnuki-Tierney,
Emiko. 1984. Illness and Culture in Contemporary Japan. An Anthropological
View. Cambridge University Press. A penetrating analysis of lay conceptions
of body, illness and health care. Like Lock, a model for studies of China.
Pomeranz,
Bruce; Gabriel Stux, editors. 1989. Scientific Bases of Acupuncture. New
York: Springer Verlag. Papers from a 1987 Dusseldorf conference.
Schipper, Kristofer. 1982. The Taoist Body,
tr. Karen C. Duval. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993. Trans. of Le
corps Taoïste (Paris: Fayard, 1982). Penetrating study of conceptions of
the body in Taoist religion.
Ågren,
Hans. 1982. The Conceptual History of Psychiatric Terms in Traditional Chinese
Medicine. In Li Guohao 1982: 573-581.
Anonymous.
1975. Herbal Pharmacology in the People’s Republic of China. A Trip Report
of the American Herbal Pharmacology Delegation. Washington:
National Academy of Sciences. In addition to first-hand reports on clinical use
of herbal drugs and on the cultivation of herbs, includes overly brief but
informative notes on 248 drug substances.
Benedict,
Carol. 1996. Bubonic Plague in Nineteenth-Century China. Stanford
University Press. Interesting study of epidemiology, tracing the advance of the
plague from one locality to another.
Brownell,
Susan. 1995. Training the Body for China. Sports in the Moral Order of the
People’s Republic. University of Chicago Press. Excellent analytic study
based on the author’s experience as an athlete on a Chinese national team, a
Sinologist, and an anthropologist.
Chang,
Che-chia. 1998. The Therapeutic Tug of War. The Imperial Physician-Patient
Relationship in the Era of Empress Dowager Cixi (1874-1908). Ph.D. diss., Asian
and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Pennsylvania. Uses the enormous Qing
palace medical archives and other neglected sources in the first substantial
study of doctor-patient relations in imperial China. An excellent study of the
encounter of official and private medical subcultures. Offers the first solid
solutions to enigmas in the medical histories and deaths of the Tongzhi and
Guangxu emperors and the empress dowager Cixi.
Chang,
Chia-feng. 1996. Aspects of Smallpox and its Significance in Chinese History.
Ph.D. diss., School of Oriental and African Studies. Very general study of
smallpox and its many historical dimensions.
Chao,
Yuan-ling. 1995. Medicine and Society in Late Imperial China: A Study of
Physicians in Suzhou. Ph.D. diss., History, UCLA. On local medical traditions.
Chiu,
Martha Li. 1981. Insanity in Imperial China. A Legal Case Study. In Kleinman
& Lin 1981: 75-94. On k’uang, a technical term for manic behavior or
mania as a syndrome.
Chiu,
Martha Li. 1986. Mind, Body, and Illness in a Chinese Medical Tradition. Ph.D.
diss., History and East Asian Languages, Harvard University. Excellent critical
study of the Inner Canon of the Yellow Lord (Huang ti nei ching t’ai su
that finds exceptions to the predominant holistic viewpoint.
Demiéville,
Paul. 1937. Byō. In Hōbōgirin. Dictionnaire
encyclopédique du Bouddhisme d’aprés les sources chinoises et japonaises,
ed. Demiéville, III, 224-265. Paris: Adrien Maisonneuve. Magisterial survey of
the connections between Buddhism, sickness, and medicine. Trans. Mark Tatz, Buddhism
and Healing: Demiéville’s Article ‘Byō ‘ from Hōbōgirin
(Lanham, MI: University Press of America, 1985).
Despeux,
Catherine. 1985. Shanghan lun. Traité des coups de froid. Paris: de la
Tisserande. Translation of the Treatise on Cold Damage Disorders (Shang han
lun, between A.D. 196 and 220).
Despeux,
Catherine. 1987. Prescriptions d’acuponcture valant mille onces d’or. Traité
d’acuponcture de Sun Simiao du VIIe siÈcle. Paris: Guy Trédaniel.
Translation of part of Prescriptions Worth a Thousand (Ch’ien chin fang,
with an introduction and scholarly notes.
Epler,
Dean C. 1980. Blood-letting in Early Chinese Medicine and its Relation to the
Origin of Acupuncture. Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 54:
337-367.
Furth,
Charlotte. 1995. From Birth to Birth. The Growing Body in Chinese Medicine. In Chinese
Views of Childhood, ed. Anne Behnke Kinney, pp. 157-191. Honolulu:
University of Hawaii Press. On schemata of conception, growth, stages of sexual
activity, etc. Offprint in file.
Furth,
Charlotte. 1999. A Flourishing Yin: Gender in China’s Medical History,
960-1665. Berkeley: University of California Press. On medical care for
women and childbirth, with a chapter on women as healers. NS
Grant,
Joanna. 2003. A Chinese Physician. Wang Ji and the ‘Stone Mountain Medical Case
Histories.’ Needham Research Institute Series, 2. London: RoutledgeCurzon.
Looks at gender issues, not narrowly in connection with gynecology and
obstetrics (cf. Y. L. Wu 1998), but through the full range of disorders in men
and women in Wang Chi’s Shih shan i an, a 16C collection of medical case
records.
Hanson,
Marta. 1997. Inventing a Tradition in Chinese Medicine. From Universal to Local
Medical Knowledge in South China, the Seventeenth to the Nineteenth Century.
Ph.D. diss., History and Sociology of Science, University of Pennsylvania.
Largely focusses on Suzhou. Shows that the Warm Factors (wen-ping)
School, which claims origins in 17-18C doctrines, was invented in 19C as part
of a general trend in Jiangnan of asserting local identity. Builds up a
detailed picture of social networks of support for medical change. Particularly
innovative in its use of geographic themes in medical history.
Harper,
Donald J. 1998. Early Chinese Medical Literature: The Mawangdui Medical
Manuscripts. Sir Henry Wellcome Asian Series. London: Royal Asiatic
Society. Translations of and excellent commentaries on important medical
manuscripts excavated in 1973 at Mawangdui, Hunan. With long prolegomena and
material from other archeological discoveries; indexes of materia medica,
physiological terms, ailments.
Hillier,
Sheila M.; John A. Jewell. 1983. Health Care and Traditional Medicine in
China, 1800-1982. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Compiled from
secondary sources of greatly varying quality.
Ho,
Peng Yoke; F. P. Lisowski. 1998 (publ. 1999). A Brief History of Chinese
Medicine and its Influence. 2d ed. Singapore: World Scientific. Frequently
unreliable, partly obsolete sketch (China, 47 pp.; 11 pp; Japan, 10 pp.; Islam,
3 pp.). Ignores most important recent work.
Hoeppli,
R. 1959. Parasites and Parasitic Infections in Early Medicine and Science.
Singapore: University of Malaya Press. A large part of this collection of
previously published essays is devoted to China and Southeast Asia.
Hoizey,
Dominique. 1988. Histoire de la médecine chinoise. Des origines … nos jours.
Médecine et sociétés, 12. Paris: Editions Payot. Based not on research but on
recent Chinese textbooks. Primarily bibliographical, unreliable on such matters
as translation of technical terms.
Hsu,
Elisabeth, editor. 2001. Innovation in Chinese Medicine. Needham
Research Institute Studies, 3. Cambridge University Press. Papers, varying
greatly in quality, illuminate many aspects of innovation.
Hsu
Ta-ch’un. 1989. I Hsueh Yuan Liu Lun. Forgotten Traditions in Ancient
Chinese Medicine, trans. Paul U. Unschuld. Brookline, MA: Paradigm
Publications. Unreliable, wooden translation of an idiosyncratic, witty book of
1757.
Huard,
Pierre; Ming Wong. 1971. Oriental Methods of Mental and Physical Fitness:
The Complete Book of Meditation, Kinesiotherapy & Martial Arts in China,
India & Japan. New York: Funk & Wagnalls. The authors’ usual
chaotic more-or-less-historical once-over-lightly. Some of the material on
calisthentics is novel, but only the illustrations (many of them excellent) can
be trusted.
Hymes,
Robert P. 1987. ‘Not Quite Gentlemen.’ Physicians in the Sung and Yuan. Chinese
Science, 8: 9-76. Meticulous, important study of changing patterns of
recruitment to medical careers.
Institute
of Acupuncture and Moxibustion, Chinese Academy of Traditional Chinese
Medicine. 1990. State Standard of the People’s Republic of China. The
Location of Acupoints. Beijing: Foreign Languages Press. Profusely
illustrated. Includes substantial material from early sources with discussions
to resolve contradictions, and data on related anatomical, incl. nerve,
structures. Does not discuss therapy. Makes previous publications on loci
obsolete.
Kaptchuk,
Ted J. 1983. The Web That Has No Weaver. Understanding Chinese Medicine.
New York: Congdon & Weed. An insightful introduction for laymen. The author
has had some training in a school of traditional medicine in Macao.
Katz,
Paul R. 1995. Demon Hordes and Burning Boats. The Cult of Marshal Wen in
Late Imperial Chekiang. Albany: State University of New York Press. On a
popular religious cult concerned with epidemics.
Keegan,
David. 1988. Huang-ti nei-ching. The Structure of the Compilation, the
Significance of the Structure. Ph.D. diss., History, University of California,
Berkeley. A pathbreaking technical study of how the Inner Canon (and by
implication other Han classics) came together.
Kleinman,
Arthur M., et al., editors. 1975. Medicine in Chinese Cultures: Comparative
Studies of Health Care in Chinese and other Societies. Bethesda;
Washington, DC: National Institutes of Health. This conference volume includes
a couple of good historical papers. A number of the anthropological contributions
are useful, but no attempt is made to test the applicability of field work in
today’s Taiwan and Hong Kong to questions about traditional China.
Kleinman,
Arthur M.; Tsung-yi Lin, editors. 1981. Normal and Abnormal Behavior in
Chinese Culture. Culture, Illness, and Healing. Studies in Comparative
Cross-Cultural Research, 2. Dordrecht: D. Reidel.
Kuriyama,
Shigehisa. 1999. The Expressiveness of the body and the Divergence of Greek
and Chinese Medicine. New York: Zone Books. Sensitive comparison of
experience of body in two cultures. Does not attempt to explain reasons for
change.
Kuriyama,
Shigehisa. 2001. The Imagination of the Body and the History of Embodied
Experience: The Case of Chinese Views of the Viscera. In Kuriyama (ed.) 2001:
17-29. An important essay on how to look at old medical diagrams.
Kuriyama,
Shigehisa, editor. 2001. The Imagination of the Body and the History of
Bodily Experience. International symposium, 15. Kyoto: International
Research Center for Japanese Studies.
Larre,
Claude. 1987. La voie du Ciel. Huangdi, l’Empereur Jaune, disait . . . La
médecine chinoise traditionnelle. Paris: Desclée de Brouwer. A series of
meditations on classical doctrine, with special attention to p’ien 1-2
of the Inner Canon of the Yellow Lord. See also the many other
fascicules published by these authors between 1987 and 1992, concerned with
practice rather than history.
Leslie,
Charles, and Allan Young, editors. 1992. Paths to Asian
Medical Knowledge. Comparative Studies of Health Systems and Medical Care.
Berkeley: University of California Press. One paper on Japan and four on China.
Li
Guohao et al., editors. 1982. Explorations in the History of Science and
Technology in China. Shanghai Chinese Classics Publishing House. Festschrift
for Needham. See Ågren 1982 and Porkert 1982.
Lu
Gwei-Djen; Joseph Needham. 1980. Celestial Lancets. A History and Rationale
of Acupuncture and Moxa. Cambridge University Press. The first scholarly
history of acupuncture. Esp. valuable material on its transmission outside
China and its influence in Europe from the sixteenth century on.
Miyasita
Saburo [Miyashita Saburō]. 1976. A Historical Study of Chinese Drugs for
the Treatment of Jaundice. American Journal of Chinese Medicine, 4. 3:
239-243. This important series of essays is mainly concerned with historical
changes in drugs of choice for various remedies. This and Miyasita 1980 are
confusing because of careless editing.
Miyasita
Saburo. 1977. A Historical Analysis of Chinese Formularies and Prescriptions:
Three Examples. Nihon ishigaku zasshi, 23. 2: 283-300.
Miyasita
Saburo. 1979. Malaria (yao) in Chinese Medicine during the Chin and Yuan
Periods. Acta Asiatica, 36: 90-112.
Miyasita
Saburo. 1980. An Historical Analysis of Chinese Drugs in the Treatment of
Hormonal Diseases, Goitre and Diabetes Mellitus. American Journal of Chinese
Medicine, 8. 1: 17-25.
Needham,
Joseph; Lu Gwei-djen. 1970. Clerks and Craftsmen in China and the West.
Cambridge University Press. ‘Proto-endocrinology in Medieval China’ (pp.
294-315) has not been incorporated in Science and Civilisation in China,
vol. 6, part 6.
Ng,
Vivien. 1990. Madness in Late Imperial China. From Illness to Deviance.
Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. The main emphasis of the book is on law. A
chapter on medicine contains interesting material, but suffers from failure to
consult original sources. Cf. the more acute Chiu 1981.
Obringer,
Frédéric. 1997. L’aconit et l’orpiment. Drogues et poisons in Chine ancienne
et médiévale. Penser la médecine, 4. Paris: Fayard. On medicine as poison
and as cure, an important theme in Chinese medicine.
Otsuka,
Keisetsu. 1976. Kanpo. Geschichte, Theorie und Praxis der
Chinesisch-Japanischen traditionellen Medizin. Tokyo: Tsumura Juntendo.
Translation of the standard introduction to Chinese-style medicine as practiced
in Japan, by its leading practitioner. Different in many fundamental ways from
Chinese practice.
Porkert,
Manfred. 1974. The Theoretical Foundations of Chinese Medicine. Systems of
Correspondence. MIT East Asian Science Series, 3. Cambridge, MA: The MIT
Press. The deepest available analysis of the basic concepts of medicine;
restricted to those concerning the body and its functions. For a heated
comparison of Porkert’s and Needham’s approaches to translating technical
terms, see Needham’s review of this book in Annals of Science, 1975, 32:
491-502.
Porkert,
Manfred. 1988. Chinese Medicine. Its History, Philosophy and Practice, and
Why it May One Day Dominate the Medicine of the West. New York: William
Morrow. A general textbook and synthesis of Porkert’s previous writings.
Somewhat more simply argued than 1974.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1986. Traditional Chinese Medicine and the United States: Past,
Present, and Future. Bulletin, The American Academy of Arts and Sciences,
May, 39. 8: 15-26. Informal survey of Western knowledge of Chinese
medicine since the seventeenth century.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1987. See below, p. *. Contains a long introduction
on classical medicine.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1995. Text and Experience in Classical Chinese Medicine. In Knowledge
and the Scholarly Medical Traditions, ed. Don G. Bates, pp. 177-204.
Cambridge University Press. A study of the role that transmission of written
texts played in Han-dynasty medicine.
Sivin,
Nathan. 1995. Medicine, Philosophy and Religion in Ancient China. Researches
and Reflections. Variorum Collected Studies Series. Variorum Collected
Studies Series. Aldershot, Hants: Variorum. Eight essays, four new, one
revised.
Sung
Tz’u. 1981. The Washing Away of Wrongs (Hsi yuan chi lu): Forensic Medicine
in Thirteenth-Century China, trans. Brian E. McKnight. Science, Medicine,
and Technology in East Asia, 1. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan, Center
for Chinese Studies. Translation of the oldest extant book on forensic medicine
(ca. 1247), which discusses how to determine whether a death is an accident,
suicide, or homicide, and who was responsible. Detailed, comparative
introduction. Contains much of medical interest.
Unschuld,
Paul Ulrich. 1979. Medical Ethics in Imperial China. A Study in Historical
Anthropology, trans. M. Sullivan. Berkeley: University of California Press.
English version of Medizin und Ethik. Sozialkonflikte im China der
Kaiserzeit (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1975). Contains much material previously
unavailable in Western languages, but analytically uncritical and sinologically
unreliable.
Unschuld,
Paul Ulrich. 1985. Medicine in China. A History of Ideas. Comparative
Studies of Health Systems and Medical Care, 13. Berkeley: University of
California Press. Innovative in its attention to medical pluralism and in the
range of issues discussed, but use with caution. For this and the next two
titles see the essay review in Isis, 1990, 81: 722-731.
Unschuld,
Paul Ulrich. 1986. Medicine in China. A History of Pharmaceutics. Idem,
14. Idem. Extremely detailed descriptive bibliography of the main books in the pen-ts’ao
tradition. Ignores pharmaceutics as reflected in other genres.
Unschuld,
Paul Ulrich. 1987. Medicine in China. Nan-ching. The Classic of Difficult
Issues. Idem, 18. Idem. First integral translation of a medical classic.
Also translates a number of its commentaries. Perceptive introduction,
innovative interpretation, but the Chinese edition is sloppy and the
translation unreliable.
Unschuld,
Paul Ulrich, editor. 1988. Approaches to Traditional Chinese Medical
Literature. Proceedings of an International Symposium on Translation
Methodologies and Terminologies. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
Essays on problems of translation vary greatly in competence.
Unschuld,
Paul U. 2003. Huang Di Nei Jing Su Wen. Nature, Knowledge, Imagery in an
Ancient Chinese Medical Text. 525 pp. Berkeley: University of California
Press. Introductory volume to a full translation. As usual, use with caution.
Unschuld,
Ulrike. 1972. Das T’ang-yeh pen-ts’ao und die Übertragung der klassischen
chinesischen Medizintheorie auf die Praxis der Drogenanwendung. München:
Privately published. Provides an overview of a therapeutic treatise by a
leading doctor of the mid 13th century. The argument that the T’ang-yeh
pen-ts’ao marks the first integration of medical theory and pharmaceutical
practice should be approached critically. For a summary see the next item.
Unschuld,
Ulrike. 1977. Traditional Chinese Pharmacology: An Analysis of its Development
in the Thirteenth Century. Isis, 68: 224-248.
Veith,
Ilza, trans. 1949. Huang Ti Nei Ching Su Wen, The Yellow Emperor’s Classic
of Internal Medicine. Baltimore: Williams & Wilkins. Incompetent
partial translation. The University of California Press 1966 ‘revised edition’
revises only a few sentences.
Wu,
Yi-li. 1998. Transmitted Secrets: The Doctors of the Lower Yangzi Region and
Popular Gynecology in Late Imperial China. Ph.D. diss., History, Yale
University. An ingenious study of the interpenetration of elite and popular
writing on women’s disorders the Qing dynasty, with attention to survivals up
to the present day. A chapter closely and fruitfully analyzes the notion of
specialization in late classical medicine. Also concerned with the role of
hereditary practitioners.
Yamada
Keiji. 1979. The Formation of the Huang-ti Nei-ching. Acta Asiatica,
36: 67-89. Brilliant reconstruction of the theoretical classic by Yamada
and Akahori Akira. Yamada’s identification of different interlocutors in Huang
ti nei ching with different schools is an assumption, not a conclusion.
Yamada
Keiji. 1991. Anatometrics in Ancient China. Chinese Science, 10: 39-52.
A study of ideas in early medicine about dimensions and proportions of the
human body.
Zhang
Zhongjing. 1986. Treatise on Febrile Diseases Caused by Cold (Shanghan lun),
trans. Luo Xiwen. Beijing: New World Press. This and the next item are loose
translations, based on superficial understanding, of early therapeutic
classics.
Zhang
Zhongjing. 1987. Synopsis of Prescriptions of the Golden Chamber (Jinkui
yaolue fanglun), trans. Luo Xiwen. Idem.
Zhu
Ming. 2001. The Medical Classic of the Yellow Emperor. B: Foreign
Languages Press.
Based on a textbook version of the Inner Canon by Ch’eng Shih-te. Author’s
English is not adequate, and he uses obsolete translations of technical terms
without looking at them critically. Generally unreliable.
Bray,
Francesca. 1989. Essence and Utility. The Classification of Crop Plants in
China. Chinese Science, 9: 1-13. Although studies of Chinese taxonomy
are generally based exclusively on materia medica, Bray shows this is
insufficient.
Bretschneider,
E. 1870. The Study and Value of Chinese Botanical Works. Chinese Recorder,
3: 157-163, and in following issues. The author, a famous physician and
botanist, studied most of the Chinese writings specifically devoted to botany.
An introductory essay, better informed than most writings on the subject a
century later.
Li
Hui-lin, translator. 1979. Nan-fang ts’ao-mu chuang. A Fourth Century Flora
of Southeast Asia. Hong Kong: Chinese University Press. Translation of the
classic on southern plants of A.D. 304, with copious notes and good
introduction by a highly competent botanist. The authenticity of the book
translated is a matter of debate; see Ma Tai-loi 1978.
Ma
Tai-loi. 1978. The Authenticity of the Nan-fang ts’ao-mu chuang. T’oung
Pao (Leiden), 64: 218-252. Cf. Li Hui-lin 1979.
Needham,
Joseph. 1968. The Development of Botanical Taxonomy in Chinese Culture. In Actes
du douzieme congrés international d’histoire des sciences. Paris, pp.
127-133. Tentative but suggestive.
Nguyen
Tran Huan. 1957. Esquisse d’une histoire de la biologie chinoise des origines
jusqu’au IVe siècle. Revue d’histoire des sciences, 10:
31-37. Summary account of early developments.
HISTORY OF MEDICINE IN TWENTIETH-CENTURY CHINA
Akhtar,
Shahid. 1975. Health Care in the People’s Republic of China. A Bibliography
with Abstracts. IDRC-038e. Ottawa: International Development Research
Center. Summaries of ca. 600 articles and books, mostly in English, ranging in
quality from excellent to useless. The compiler provides no help in determining
which is which.
Anonymous.
1973. A Bibliography of Chinese Sources on Medicine and Public Health in the
People’s Republic of China: 1960-1970. Bethesda: National Institutes of
Health. A massive compilation; most of the articles and books have been
abstracted and translated into English through Joint Publications Research
Service.
Andrews,
Bridie J. 1996. The Making of Modern Chinese Medicine. Ph.D. diss., History and
Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge. Survey history, mainly mid 19C
to 1930, largely concerned with Western influence.
Anonymous.
1974. A Barefoot Doctor’s Manual. Bethesda: National Institutes of
Health. Reprint, Philadelphia: Running Press, 1977. Translates a compilation by
the Institute of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Hunan Province, 1970. Invaluable
guide to the integrated Western-Chinese primary therapy of the Cultural
Revolution period, with information on plant drugs in wide use. Detailed and
practically oriented.
Bowers,
John Z.; Elizabeth F. Purcell, editors. 1974. Medicine and Society in China.
New York: Josiah Macy, Jr. Foundation. Conference papers on scattered
subjects; those on current medicine are useful.
Bullock,
Mary Brown. 1980. An American Transplant. The Rockefeller Foundation and
Peking Union Medical College. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Good critical study of the most important Western medical teaching institution
in Republican China.
Chen,
C. C.; Frederica M. Bunge. 1989. Medicine in Rural China: A Personal
Account. Berkeley: University of California Press. Chen was the most
eminent public-health reformer of the Republican period. His work continued
until he was purged in 1957. Valuable for his experiences and for his critique
of public health policy and education since 1949.
Croizier,
Ralph. 1968. Traditional Medicine in Modern China. Science, Nationalism, and
the Tensions of Cultural Change. Harvard East Asian Series, 34. Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press. On the struggle of traditional medicine to
survive before 1949. Cf. Zhao 1991, which uses a wider range of sources but is
not as well informed about certain aspects of Republican politics.
Farquhar,
Judith Brooke. 1987. Problems of Knowledge in Contemporary Chinese Medical
Discourse. Social Science and Medicine, 24. 12: 1013-1021. Argues against
imposing theory/practice, reality/symbol dichotomies on contemporary Chinese
medicine.
Farquhar,
Judith Brooke. 1994. Knowing Practice. The Clinical Encounter of Chinese
Medicine. Boulder: Westview Press. Original, extremely perceptive analytic
study based on field work in a traditional medical school. Important for
understanding classical medicine as well.
Farquhar,
Judith. 2002. Appetites. Food and Sex in Post-socialist China. Durham:
Duke University Press. Philosophically substantial and personally informed
account of recent social change.
Furth,
Charlotte; Ch’en Shu-yueh. 1992. Chinese Medicine and the Anthropology of
Menstruation in Contemporary Taiwan. Medical Anthropology Quarterly, 6.
1: 27-48.
Henderson,
Gail E. 1989. Issues in the Modernization of Medicine in China. In Science
and Technology in Post-Mao China, ed. Denis Fred Simon & Merle Goldman,
pp. 199-221. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Council on East Asian Studies.
Henderson,
Gail E.; Myron S. Cohen. 1984. The Chinese Hospital. A Socialist Work Unit.
New Haven: Yale University Press. A sociological field study of the effects of
the work organization on the individual, with valuable observations on recent
health care.
Henderson,
Gail E., et al. 1988. High-technology Medicine in China. The Case of Chronic
Renal Failure and Hemodialysis. New England Journal of Medicine, 14
April, 318: 1000-1004. Discusses the effects of economic reforms on
health care, and the role of occupation and insurance in access to expensive
therapy.
Horn,
Joshua. 1969. ‘Away with all pests’ An English Surgeon in People’s China.
London: Hamlyn. Mainly on public health, a sympathetic and informed account by
a surgeon who practiced in China 1954-1965. Ignores traditional medicine.
Hsu,
Elisabeth. 1999. The Transmission of Chinese Medicine. Cambridge Studies
in Medical Anthropology, 7. Cambridge University Press. Field study of how
knowledge is transmitted in the seminar of a TCM school, in a TCM practice, and
in a ch’i-kung practice. Revision of 1992 diss.
Hu
Teh-Wei. 1975. An Economic Analysis of the Cooperative Medical Services in
the People’s Republic of China. Bethesda: National Institutes of Health.
Concludes that the PRC health care system ca. 1970 was economically successful,
but because it depended on China’s unique political system, its direct
applicability to other countries is limited.
Jamison,
Dean T., et al. 1984. The Health Sector in China. Population, Health and
Nutrition Department, Reports, 4664-CHA. Washington: World Bank. An
exceptionally well-informed, systematic digest of information.
Jennerick,
Howard P. 1973. Proceedings. NIH Acupuncture Research Conference. February
28 and March 1, 1973. Bethesda: National Institutes of Health. Short
reports on a cross-section of acupuncture research in the U. S. show
contradictory results due to lack attention to standards for professional
competence.
Kleinman,
Arthur M. 1980. Patients and Healers in the Context of Culture. An
Exploration of the Borderland between Anthropology, Medicine, and Psychiatry.
Comparative Studies of Health Systems and Medical Care, 3. Berkeley: University
of California Press. Based on field work in Taiwan; perceptive on medical
pluralism.
Kleinman,
Arthur M. 1986. Social Origins of Distress and Disease. Depression,
Neurasthenia, and Pain in Modern China. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Based on field work in a Hunan psychiatric facility; comparative in
interpretation. This and the next item are important for general implications.
Kleinman,
Arthur M.; Byron Good, editors. 1985. Culture and Depression. Studies in the
Anthropology and Cross-Cultural Psychiatry of Affect and Disorder.
Berkeley: University of California Press.
Lisowski,
F. P. 1979. The Emergence and Development of the Barefoot Doctor in China. Nihon
ishigaku zasshi, 25: 339-392. Reprinted in Eastern Horizon,
April 1980, 19. 4: 6-20.
Lythcott,
George I., et al. 1980. Rural Health in the People's Republic of China.
Report of a Visit by the Rural Health Systems Delegation. June 1978.
Bethesda: National Institutes of Health. Observations by U. S. experts.
Liu
Xingzhu; Junle Wang. 1991. An Introduction to China’s Health Care System. Journal
of Public Health Policy, 12. 1: 104-116. Brief but informative survey of
system ca. 1990.
Lucas,
AnElissa. 1982. Chinese Medical Modernization. Comparative Policy
Continuities, 1930s-1980s. New York: Praeger Publishers.
Mann,
Felix. 1963. Acupuncture. The Ancient Art of Healing. New York: Random
House. Useful only as a description of modern European acupuncture.
Quinn, Joseph R