A Cultural History of Modern Science in China

by Benjamin A. Elman

Overview

Historians of science and Sinologists have long needed a unified narrative to describe the Chinese development of modern science, medicine, and technology since 1600. They welcomed the appearance in 2005 of Benjamin Elman's masterwork, On Their Own Terms. Now Elman has retold the story of the Jesuit impact on late imperial China, circa 1600-1800, and the Protestant era in early modern China from the 1840s to 1900 in a concise and accessible form ideal for the classroom. This coherent account of the emergence of modern science in China places that emergence in historical context for both general students of modern science and specialists of China.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780674030428
Publisher:	Harvard University Press
Publication date:	04/20/2009
Series:	New Histories of Science, Technology, and Medicine , #15
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.10(h) x 3.20(d)

About the Author

Benjamin A. Elman is Gordon Wu ’58 Professor of Chinese Studies at Princeton University.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations

Conventions

Chinese Dynasties

Introduction

1. The Jesuit Legacy

2. Recovering the Chinese Classics

3. The Rise of Imperial Chinese Manufacturing and Trade

4. Science and the Protestant Mission

5. From Textbooks to Darwin: Modern Science Arrives

6. Government Arsenals Spur New Technologies

7. The Displacement of Traditional Chinese Science and Medicine

Appendixes:

1. Tang Mathematical Classics

2. "Science Outline Series," 1882–1898

3. Table of Contents for the 1886 Primers for Science Studies

4. Twenty-three Fields of the Sciences in the 1886 Primers for Science Studies

5. Some Officially Selected Chinese Prize Essay Topics from the Shanghai Polytechnic

6. Some Translations of Chemistry, 1855–1873

7. Partial Chronological List of Arsenals, etc., in China, 1861–1892

Notes

Acknowledgments

Index

Editorial Reviews

Elman shows that progress in Chinese science continued after 1600, as it absorbed new ideas from the West, and, for him, China's nineteenth-century failure to respond adequately to Western incursions has been exaggerated...[A Cultural History of Modern Science in China] offer[s] a new and important perspective on Sino-European interaction.

Times Literary Supplement - Delia Davin

Elman's study is a tremendous achievement, both in its analytical insight and empirical depth.

Science - Thomas S. Mullaney

In this concise but comprehensive new book, Elman makes his masterful synthesis of the scholarship in the field—including his own—accessible to nonspecialists. A textbook treating modern Chinese science up to 1900, long awaited, has at last emerged.

Isis - Danian Hu

In this concise, accessible, but comprehensive book, Benjamin Elman describes the effects on science of the Jesuit mission in imperial China in 1600–1800, and the latter influence of Protestants in the nineteenth century. By doing so, he places the emergence of modern science in China in historical context.

Nature

In this concise, accessible, but comprehensive book, Benjamin Elman describes the effects on science of the Jesuit mission in imperial China in 1600–1800, and the latter influence of Protestants in the nineteenth century. By doing so, he places the emergence of modern science in China in historical context.

Nature Lib

In this concise but comprehensive new book, Elman makes his masterful synthesis of the scholarship in the field—including his own—accessible to nonspecialists. A textbook treating modern Chinese science up to 1900, long awaited, has at last emerged.
— Danian Hu

Isis

Elman's study is a tremendous achievement, both in its analytical insight and empirical depth.
— Thomas S. Mullaney

Science

Elman shows that progress in Chinese science continued after 1600, as it absorbed new ideas from the West, and, for him, China's nineteenth-century failure to respond adequately to Western incursions has been exaggerated...[A Cultural History of Modern Science in China] offer[s] a new and important perspective on Sino-European interaction.
— Delia Davin

Times Literary Supplement