East Asian Science, Technology, and Medicine (EASTM - Universität Tübingen)
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Melissa S. Dale, Inside the World of the Eunuch: A Social History of the Emperor’s Servants in Qing China
Full text linkMapping in Manchu: The Development of Usage of the Manchu Script and Language on Qing Imperial Mapping Projects
Full text linkThe Qing Overview Maps of the Imperial Territories are heterogeneous in nature: from the production process and production techniques to the different languages and scripts in the finished works, each complete edition is different from the others. This article focuses on the heterogeneity found in the usage of the Manchu language, which functions as the descriptive language of the Outer parts of the empire in all editions of the Overview Maps. After the transcriptions of toponyms, synonymous head addition occurs; e.g. in the Manchu transcription hvwang ho bira (Yellow River), both the Chinese character he 河 transcribed in Manchu script as ho and the Manchu bira mean ‘river’. The use of the Manchu language separates the Outer from the Inner regions, but it takes varying forms; Manchu is even written in Chinese characters in several editions, and it conceals a profound variety of languages used in toponyms across the maps. Through a comparison between the different editions, Manchu emerges not merely as a tool to accurately represent geographical space and names, but also as a way to idealize the division of space in the empire
Daoing Medicine: Practice Theory for Considering Religion and Medicine in Early Imperial China
Full text linkThis article is a critique of the neologism “Daoist medicine” (daojiao yixue 道教醫學) that has recently entered scholarly discourse in China. It provides evidence that this expression is an anachronism which found its way into scholarly discourse in 1995 and has now become so widely used that it is seen as representing an undisputed “historical fact.” It demonstrates that the term has no precursor in the pre-modern record, and critiques two substantive attempts to set up “Daoist medicine” as an analytical term. It reviews earlier scholarship on Daoism and medicine, or healing, within the larger context of religion and medicine, and shows how attention has shifted, particularly in relation to the notion of overlap or intersection of these historical fields of study. It proposes that earlier frameworks grounded in epistemology or simple social identity do not effectively represent the complexity of these therapies. Practice theory, on the other hand, provides a useful analytic for unpacking the organisation and transmission of curing knowledge. Such an approach foregrounds the processes and dynamics of assemblage, rather than theoretical abstractions. The article concludes by proposing a focus on the Daoing of medicine, that is, the variety of processes by which therapies come to be known as Daoist, rather than imposing an anachronistic concept like Daoist medicine
Jacobina K. Arch, Bringing Whales Ashore: Oceans and the Environment of Early Modern Japan
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Miners, Benevolent Government, and Administration: A History of Medical Policy in Tokugawa Japan
Full text linkSince the 1980s, the rise of local history scholarship has increasingly pushed historians of medicine of Japan’s Tokugawa period to examine how people dealt with sickness and disease in local communities. Scholars have shown that while local people benefitted from the rising number of village doctors, the shogunate and domains provided scant medical services. In part for this reason, the history of medical policy in the Tokugawa has been understudied, despite important initiatives by some domains to employ physicians and distribute drugs to save lives. Specifically, this article examines how the Akita domain was more actively engaged in medical policy than the shogunate or other domains, both in terms of ideology and administration. The Tenmei famine (1782-1788) sparked political reformation in Akita, leading newly educated officials to play a significant role in providing medical aid to the population, especially miners, as an act of benevolent government
Science and Politics in China’s Official Water System: the Management of the Qiantang River (1927-1949)
Full text linkWestern water science and technology were introduced to upgrade China’s traditional water management methods and strategies during the Nanjing decade (1927-1937) under the Nationalist government. The engineering efforts expended to control the Qiantang River were typical examples of such initiatives. The primary strategy to protect areas surrounding the river from the destruction caused by the Qiantang bore was for centuries one of “passive defence”, with the construction of defensive seawalls featuring prominently among the methods used. However, the Qiantang tide consistently broke through these defences, and caused devastation. After 1927, while the old defensive methods were not completely discarded, more active strategies of river regulation were introduced, under the combined influence of Western methods, materials and expertise, and Western-trained Chinese engineers who stepped forward to tackle the problem. These activities were interrupted during the war years (1937-1945), but resumed again after the war. During the 22 years from 1927 to 1949, in four discrete stages, different technological solutions were devised, priorities identified, guidelines developed and strategies attempted, with each stage championed by a different engineer in charge. Gradually these efforts formed into what can be called the Qiantang River Project, a concerted effort to apply the knowledge of Western science and technology to change previous “passive defence” methods to “active governance” strategies for river regulation that combined both prevention and control. Efforts at each stage were influenced by factional struggles at the top of the government, and also affected by Western competition for Chinese interests. These developments were all part of the complex interaction of science and politics that took place in the management of the Qiantang River between 1927 and 1949
