This is to be a book on """"""""fu k'o"""""""" and """"""""erh k'o""""""""-- the classical medical systems for the treatment of diseases of women and children, as found in China between the late Ming dynasty (16th Century) and 1850. Since biological concepts bridge nature and culture, they must be studied not only as history of science but as social history as well. While sexuality and disease may be biological facts, gender and illness are culturally and socially defined. To explore the traditional Chinese medical system it applied to women and children is to observe the way in which interpretations of biological processes shaped Chinese cultural norms concerning women's estate, child development, the nature of the life cycle, and the meaning of sexuality. The research has the following goals: (1) to analyse fundamental medical concepts and so uncover their logical and symbolic structure, and their psycho-cultural implications; (2) to understand reproduction and infancy as social practice, involving family, professional and class relationships, shaping social roles of doctors and patients, parents and children, women and men; (3) to evaluate traditional medicine as empirical science, with a possible role to play in understanding historical patterns of fertility and mortality. The years 1600-1850 have been chosen because the sixteenth century ushered in a period of growth which gives late traditional China distinct historical characteristics. Although the scale of these changes is still debated, there is an emerging consensus that market forces played an increasing role in the economy beginning in these years. This socio-economic process underlay the phenomena of rising literacy, growth in the publishing industry and a democratization of literate medical knowledge and practice. At the other end, 1850 (rather than 1900 as originally proposed) turns out to be the logical place to end a study which seeks to look at medicine in China before Western missionary doctors were a significant presence.
