|
Trends and Buzz
Chinese medicine strikes back at criticsPosted by Joel Martinsen on Saturday, November 4, 2006 at 9:00 PM
![]() Arguments between between proponents of traditional Chinese medicine and critics who wish it would give way to modern science are nothing new, but recent months have seen a flurry of debate over the subject. Professor Zhang Gongyao, whom we last saw advocating the retirement of the lunar calendar, launched an online petition to do away with Chinese medicine. Predictably, this campaign drew criticism from TCM supporters, but it also was condemned by some of TCM's strongest critics, who felt that matters of science shouldn't be decided by poll, and who would rather see a clear, convincing demonstration that traditional remedies are ineffectual at best. At a Chinese medicine conference in Chongqing yesterday, the first held since Zhang "declared war" (in the words of China Association of Chinese Medicine president Ma Youdu), representatives said that those seeking to do away with the discipline are ignorant of 5000 years of Chinese civilization. From Chongqing Morning Post:
Chongqing Evening News provides more commentary, courtesy of Xuan Wen, head of the American Institute of Chinese Medicine*:
There's a lot here for the skeptics to weigh in on tomorrow, as no doubt they will - in the past two months, over 300 essays on Chinese medicine have been posted on the XYS website alone. Note: I'm not certain about the English names of Xuan Wen (宣文) and the American Institute of Chinese Medicine (美国中医研究院), which seems to be located in downtown Guangzhou. Links and Sources
|
Partner Links
Jobs in China
Recent Comments
Henry on
The Eurasian Face
Caroline W on
Big in China
Michael on
Julia Lovell on translating Lu Xun's complete fiction: "His is an angry, searing vision of China"
Brandon K. on
Clueless academic takes on popular fantasy novels
China Media Timeline
Major media events over the last three decades
Danwei Model Workers
The latest recommended blogs and new media
From 2008
Books on China
The Eurasian Face : Blacksmith Books, a publishing house in Hong Kong, is behind The Eurasian Face, a collection of photographs by Kirsteen Zimmern. Below is an excerpt from the series:
Big in China: An adapted excerpt from Big In China: My Unlikely Adventures Raising A Family, Playing The Blues and Becoming A Star in China, just published this month. Author Alan Paul tells the story of arriving in Beijing as a trailing spouse, starting a blues band, raising kids and trying to make sense of China.
Pallavi Aiyar's Chinese Whiskers: Pallavi Aiyar's first novel, Chinese Whiskers, a modern fable set in contemporary Beijing, will be published in January 2011. Aiyar currently lives in Brussels where she writes about Europe for the Business Standard. Below she gives permissions for an excerpt.
Front Page of the Day
A different newspaper every weekday
From the Vault
Classic Danwei posts
+ Korean history doesn't fly on Chinese TV screens (2007.09): SARFT puts the kibbosh on Korean historical dramas. + Religion and government in an uneasy mix (2008.03): Phoenix Weekly (凤凰周刊) article from October, 2007, on government influence on religious practice in Tibet. + David Moser on Mao impersonators (2004.10): I first became aware of this phenomenon in 1992 when I turned on a Beijing TV variety show and was jolted by the sight of "Mao Zedong" and "Zhou Enlai" playing a game of ping pong. They both gave short, rousing speeches, and then were reverently interviewed by the emcee, who thanked them profusely for taking time off from their governmental duties to appear on the show.
Danwei Archives
Danwei Feeds
Via Feedsky
or Feedburner |






Comments on Chinese medicine strikes back at critics
This truly is 禮失而求諸野. As a TCM enthusiast, although I can read Mandarin fluently, I almost never use contemporary Chinese textbooks, simply because they stray too far from the original tradition. Instead, I use a combination of western literature (e.g. Manfred Porkert) and Classical Chinese texts.
Of course, as in most orientalist genres, many western texts are flaky and superficial. But the good ones bear no comparison, either in the West or in China. And good western texts are much more likely to be purist and driven by traditional theories.