“物质文化、身体实践与医学文本：当下中国医学史中的研究议题”第二次国际工作坊

The 2nd Workshop on “Material Culture, Bodily Practice, and Medical Textuality: Current Issues in Chinese Medical History”  (29th March 2017, Needham Research Institute, Cambridge)

Co-organized by John MOFFETT (Needham Research Institute), Lena SPRINGER (University of Westminster/Needham Research Institute), Leah Ya ZUO (Bowdoin College) and CHEN Hao (School of History, Renmin University of China)

Sponsored by Wellcome Trust and Needham Research Institute

Body, texts and things, not necessarily in this order, are basic themes which medical historians encounter every day. However, re-assessing these familiar themes with new concepts, sometimes from other disciplines, can shed light onto overlooked or forgotten aspects of them. For example, there are various things stored in the utility room of medical history – drugs and the materials used to produce them; medical apparatus; medical books and manuscripts; and the human body. Studies of “material culture” keep our eyes from being blindfolded by the material and symbolic surface, and maintain our focus on exploring the meanings things hold for people who handle them. This statement can also be applicable to the concept of “bodily practice”, which encourages us not to limit our thinking about the body merely to anatomy or a functional organism, but rather examine the body as a cultural construction and a site of interactive agency. However, for most historians, the medical text is the medium, and sometimes obstacle, to understanding things and the body in the past. How do we determine the meaning of a medical text? Benefitting from philosophy, anthropology, linguistics and literary criticism, we have started to explore how texts and their meanings are related to authors, audiences and contexts. This workshop would like to raise two questions: first, what kind of insights will be sparked off by the encounter of these approaches and the field of Chinese medical history? Second, can we provide a reflective perspective on concepts by negotiating them one to another?

9:00 Introductory remarks _______________________________________________________________

9:10-10:40: Session 1: Medicinal Materials in Qing and Modern China

“Qing Imperial Medicine, Organization and Materiality”

Sare Aricanli (Durham University)

“Formats of Materia Medica and Forms of Medicinals”

Lena Springer (Jing Brand Fellow, NRI)

Tea break

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10:50-12:20: Session 2: Twentieth-Century Science in Modernising China

"Multiple Visions of State Medicine in Wartime China, 1937-45."

Mary Brazelton (University of Cambridge)

"Celestial Lancets, 37 Years On: Lu Gwei-Djen and Joseph Needham's Historiography and Scientific Investigations of Acupuncture"

Leon Rocha (University of Liverpool)

Lunch

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14:00-15:30: New Projects on Medical Bodies and Things

"Documenting Manipulative Skills in Hospital Training? Western Gyneco-Obstetric Manuals in late 19th-century China."

Shing-ting Lin (D. Kim Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow, NRI)

“Classification and Standardisation of Therapeutic Exercises in Sui China (581-618 C.E.)”

Dolly Yang (University College London)

Tea break

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15:45-17:15:

“From Zhangqi 瘴气 to Malaria: Biography of a Tropical Disease in Modern China”

Shen Yubin (Jing Brand Fellow, NRI)

Round-table Discussion