East Asian Science: Tradition and Beyond (review)

316 China Review International: Vol. 4, No. 2, Fall 1997© 1997 by University ofHawaii Press tion presented in the main body ofthe text. They effectively enable readers to visualize historical events and issues, and will certainly be helpful to novice students ofChinese history who are trying to synthesize the considerable quantity ofcomplex information presented in the textual portion ofthe book. The Cambridge Illustrated History ofChina provides an excellent introduction to the study of China and Chinese civilization. It offers a straightforward, yet complex, account ofhistorical events and issues that is well supported and augmented by the supplementary special-topic sections and illustrations. More advanced scholars may enjoy Professor Ebrey's lucid synthesis and analysis of familiar history, but because of the necessarily general level of the discussion and the lack offootnotes, this book will probably not serve them as a reference book. For teachers and students of Chinese history, however, or for people who are interested in pursuing Chinese history on their own, this book will be an invaluable instructional resource. In the foreword, Kwang-Ching Liu expresses his belief diat this book will eventually be "regarded as a classic." Given the many outstanding qualities of the book noted here, Professor Liu's confidence in this matter certainly seems justified. Charles Mason Oberlin College Charles Mason is Curator ofAsian Art at the Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin College. He specializes in Qing dynasty material culture. Hashimoto Keizo, Catherine Jami, and Lowell Skar, editors. EastAsian Science: Tradition and Beyond. Osaka: Kansai University Press: 1995. xii, 568 pp. Paperback. (Papers from the Seventh International Conference on the History of Science in East Asia, Kyoto, 2-7 August 1993) For those concerned with the history of science, this phrase usually means a discussion ofWestern science, invoking images of figures like Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, and Darwin. For better or for worse, we are used to linking these names to the sciences as we know them today. In sinological studies, on the other hand—thanks to the efforts of Needham, Zhu Kezhen ??? nJíif, Yabuuti, Sivin, and many others—we know that beyond the Western there are other important traditions of science and medicine. With the continued publication offine journals like Chinese Science, some of us have even begun to use "Chinese science" as Features 317 a special conception and category, as opposed to sciences that have evolved in other civilizations. However, despite many excellent studies by historians ofChinese science, especially by members of the younger generation worldwide, it must be said that the study ofthe history ofChinese science is still in a "cultural ghetto"1 within the history ofscience in general. The mainstream ofWestern history ofscience (and its sister disciplines like philosophy ofscience and sociology ofscience) still knows verylittle about the relevance or the significance ofthe history ofChinese science. Moreover, it is also an interesting question for current Western sinology whether it has in fact engaged in a strong and fruitful interaction with the study of Chinese science. Now, in addition to Chinese science, we have new epithets like "Korean science " and "East Asian science." In 1990, at the 6th International Conference on the History ofScience in China (ICHSC), held in Cambridge, England, the conference body modified its name to include a wider scope, and the International Society for the History ofEast Asian Science, Technology, and Medicine (ISHEASTM) came into being. And then, as stated in the Foreword to East Asian Science: Tradition and Beyond, "The 7th ICHSEA [International Conference on the History of Science in East Asia] was the latest incarnation of the conference series, and at the same time held the first triennial meeting of the ISHEASTM" (p. iii). The present book under review is a large conference volume (sixty papers included ), representing about half of all the presentations at the 7th International Conference on the History ofScience in EastAsia, held in Kyoto, 2-7 August 1993. By widening the scope ofboth its subject and its community, the discipline heretofore known as the "history ofChinese science" is now in a gradual process of expansion and incorporation that would naturally include the history of science in Korea, Japan, and, conceivably in the future, Tibet, Vietnam, Taiwan, and so on. The editors of this...