Thinking with Cases : : Specialist Knowledge in Chinese Cultural History / / ed. by Charlotte Furth, Ping-chen Hsiung, Judith T. Zeitlin.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Asian Studies Backlist (2000-2014) eBook Package
• MitwirkendeR: Chu, Hung-lam,; Hsiung, ping-chen,; Karasawa, yasuhiko,; furth, charlotte,; sharf, robert h.,; tienne will, pierre,; yanhong, Wu,; yonglin, Jiang,; zeitlin, judith t.,
• HerausgeberIn: Furth, Charlotte,; Hsiung, Ping-chen,; Zeitlin, Judith T.,
• Place / Publishing House: Honolulu : : University of Hawaii Press, , [2007]; ©2007
• Year of Publication: 2007
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (376 p.) :; 3 illus.

Case studies fascinate because they link individual instances to general patterns and knowledge to action without denying the priority of individual situations over the generalizations derived from them. In this volume, an international group of senior scholars comes together to consider the use of cases to produce empirical knowledge in premodern China. They trace the process by which the project of thinking with cases acquired a systematic and public character in the ninth century CE and after. Premodern Chinese experts on medicine and law circulated printed case collections to demonstrate efficacy or claim validity for their judgments. They were joined by authors of religious and philosophical texts. The rhetorical strategies and forms of argument used by all of these writers were allied with historical narratives, exemplary biographies, and case examples composed as aids to imperial statecraft.The innovative and productive explorations gathered here present a coherent set of interlocking arguments that will be of interest to comparativists as well as specialists on premodern East Asia. For China scholars, they examine the interaction of different fields of learning in the late imperial period, the relationship of evidential reasoning and literary forms, and the philosophical frameworks that linked knowledge to experience and action. For comparativists, the essays bring China into a global conversation about the methodologies of the human sciences.Contributors: Chu Honglam, Charlotte Furth, Hsiung Ping-chen, Jiang Yonglin, Yasuhiko Karasawa, Robert Sharf, Pierre-Étienne Will, WuYanhong, Judith T. Zeitlin.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Note on Citations and Abbreviations -- Foreword -- Introduction :Thinking with Cases -- PART 1: THE CASE IN LAW -- 1 .Satisfying Both Sentiment and Law: Fairness-Centered Judicial Reasoning as Seen in Late Ming Casebooks -- 2. Developing Forensic Knowledge through Cases in the Qing Dynasty -- 3 ,From Oral Testimony to Written Records in Qing Legal Cases -- PART 2: MEDICAL CASE HISTORIES -- 4. Producing Medical Knowledge through Cases: History, Evidence, and Action -- 5. Facts in the Tale: Case Records and Pediatric Medicine in Late Imperial China -- 6. The Literary Fashioning of Medical Authority: A Study of Sun Yikui's Case Histories -- PART 3 :THE CASE IN RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY -- 7. How to Think with Chan Gong'an -- 8. Confucian ''Case Learning'': The Genre of Xue'an Writings -- Appendix: Printed Sources Discussed in This Volume -- Character Glossary -- Bibliography -- Contributors -- Index