Chinese Medicine in Contemporary China

Chinese Medicine in Contemporary China PDF

Author: Volker Scheid

Publisher: Duke University Press

Published: 2002-06-12

Total Pages: 429

ISBN-13: 0822383713

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As a traditional healing art that has established a contemporary global presence, Chinese medicine defies categories and raises many interesting questions. If Chinese medicine is "traditional," why has it not disappeared with the rest of traditional Chinese society? If, as some claim, it is a science, what does that imply about what we call science? What is the secret of Chinese medicine's remarkable adaptability that has allowed it to prosper for more than 2,000 years? In Chinese Medicine in Contemporary China Volker Scheid presents an ethnography of Chinese medicine that seeks to answer these questions, but his ethnography is informed by some atypical approaches. Scheid, a medical anthropologist and practitioner of Chinese medicine in practice since 1983, has produced an ethnography that accepts plurality as an intrinsic and nonreducible aspect of medical practice. It has been widely noted that a patient visiting ten different practitioners of Chinese medicine may receive ten different prescriptions for the same complaint, yet many of these various treatments may be effective. In attempting to illuminate the plurality in Chinese medical practice, Scheid redefines-and in some cases abandons-traditional anthropological concepts such as tradition, culture, and practice in favor of approaches from disciplines such as science and technology studies, social psychology, and Chinese philosophy. As a result, his book sheds light not only on Chinese medicine but also on the Western academic traditions used to examine it and presents us with new perspectives from which to deliberate the future of Chinese medicine in a global context. Chinese Medicine in Contemporary China is the product of two decades of research including numerous interviews and case studies. It will appeal to a western academic audience as well as practitioners of Chinese medicine and other interested medical professionals, including those from western biomedicine.

The Making of Modern Chinese Medicine, 1850-1960

The Making of Modern Chinese Medicine, 1850-1960 PDF

Author: Bridie Andrews

Publisher: UBC Press

Published: 2014-04-01

Total Pages: 317

ISBN-13: 0774824344

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Medical care in nineteenth-century China was spectacularly pluralistic: herbalists, shamans, bone-setters, midwives, priests, and a few medical missionaries from the West all competed for patients. This book examines the dichotomy between "Western" and "Chinese" medicine, showing how it has been greatly exaggerated. As missionaries went to lengths to make their medicine more acceptable to Chinese patients, modernizers of Chinese medicine worked to become more "scientific" by eradicating superstition and creating modern institutions. Andrews challenges the supposed superiority of Western medicine in China while showing how "traditional" Chinese medicine was deliberately created in the image of a modern scientific practice.

Mao's Bestiary

Mao's Bestiary PDF

Author: Liz P. Y. Chee

Publisher: Duke University Press

Published: 2021-03-29

Total Pages: 188

ISBN-13: 1478021357

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Controversy over the medicinal uses of wild animals in China has erupted around the ethics and efficacy of animal-based drugs, the devastating effect of animal farming on wildlife conservation, and the propensity of these practices to foster zoonotic diseases. In Mao's Bestiary, Liz P. Y. Chee traces the history of the use of medicinal animals in modern China. While animal parts and tissue have been used in Chinese medicine for centuries, Chee demonstrates that the early Communist state expanded and systematized their production and use to compensate for drug shortages, generate foreign investment in high-end animal medicines, and facilitate an ideological shift toward legitimating folk medicines. Among other topics, Chee investigates the craze for chicken blood therapy during the Cultural Revolution, the origins of deer antler farming under Mao and bear bile farming under Deng, and the crucial influence of the Soviet Union and North Korea on Chinese zootherapies. In the process, Chee shows Chinese medicine to be a realm of change rather than a timeless tradition, a hopeful conclusion given current efforts to reform its use of animals.

Chinese Drugs of Plant Origin

Chinese Drugs of Plant Origin PDF

Author: Weici Tang

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2013-06-29

Total Pages: 1005

ISBN-13: 3642737390

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Traditional Chinese medicine has been used for thousands of years by a large population. It is currently still serving many of the health needs of the Chinese people; and still enjoying their confi dence it is practised in China in parallel with modern Western medical treatment. In addition to scientific organisations dedi cated to modern Western medicine, e. g. the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and various medical schools, a series of parallel institutions have been established in China to promote traditional Chinese medicine, such as the Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine and training institutions. Almost all hospitals in China have a department of traditional medicine. Furthermore, a large number of scientific journals are dedicated to traditional Chinese medicine, covering both experimental and clinical investigations. Medicinal materials constitute a key topic in the treatment of disease according to traditional Chinese medicine. The Chinese Pharmacopoeia (1985 edition) is therefore divided into two sepa rate volumes, Volume I containing traditional Chinese medicinal materials and preparations and Volume II containing pharmaceu tics of Western medicine. The oldest Chinese review of medicinal materials, Shennong Bencao Jing (100-200 A. D. ), covered 365 herbal drugs. The clas sic compilation in this field, Bencao Gangmu (Compendium of Materia Medica), was published in 1578 by Li Shi-zhen and recorded as many as 1898 crude drugs of plant, animal and min eral origin.

Citizens and Groups in Contemporary China

Citizens and Groups in Contemporary China PDF

Author: Victor C. Falkenheim

Publisher: U OF M CENTER FOR CHINESE STUDIES

Published: 1987-01-01

Total Pages: 331

ISBN-13: 0892640669

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Citizens and Groups in Contemporary China began with two symposia held in 1977 and 1978. The first, a workshop on “The Pursuit of Interest in China,” was held in August 1977 at the University of Michigan, and was organized by Michel Oksenberg and Richard Baum. It was supported by a grant from the Joint Committee on Contemporary China of the Social Science Research Council and the American Council of Learned Societies, using funds provided by the Andrew Mellon Foundation. Its principal goal was to use detailed case studies to explore the relevance of interest group approaches to the study of Chinese politics. The second, a panel organized by the editor for the 1978 Chicago meeting of the Association of Asian Studies, sought to apply participatory approaches to the role of social groups in the Chinese political process. The striking degree of overlap in the focus, methodology, and participants in both meetings suggested to a number of the paper writers that there was a need for a more eclectic approach which would focus simultaneously on individual and group actors. The recognition that a volume based on such an approach might serve the needs of students and scholars seeking to examine the dynamics of informal influence and power in China was the stimulus for publishing the studies presented here in book form. [ix]

Classical Chinese Medicine

Classical Chinese Medicine PDF

Author: Liu Lihong

Publisher: The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press

Published: 2019-04-19

Total Pages: 696

ISBN-13: 9882370578

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The English edition of Liu Lihong’s milestone work is a sublime beacon for the profession of Chinese medicine in the 21st century. Classical Chinese Medicine delivers a straightforward critique of the politically motivated “integration” of traditional Chinese wisdom with Western science during the last sixty years, and represents an ardent appeal for the recognition of Chinese medicine as a science in its own right. Professor Liu’s candid presentation has made this book a bestseller in China, treasured not only by medical students and doctors, but by vast numbers of non-professionals who long for a state of health and well-being that is founded in a deeper sense of cultural identity. Oriental medicine education has made great strides in the West since the 1970s, but clear guidelines regarding the “traditional” nature of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) remain undefined. Classical Chinese Medicine not only delineates the educational and clinical problems faced by the profession in both East and West, but transmits concrete and inspiring guidance on how to effectively engage with ancient texts and designs in the postmodern age. Using the example of the Shanghanlun (Treatise on Cold Damage), one of the most important Chinese medicine classics, Liu Lihong develops a compelling roadmap for holistic medical thinking that links the human body to nature and the universe at large.

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