Translating "Taijiao": Modern Metaphors and International Eclecticism in Song Jiazhao's Translation of Shimoda Jiro's Taikyo

「胎教」：宋嘉釗所譯下田次郎的《胎教》中所表現的現代比喻和國際折中主義

林倩萱(Nicole Richardson)

《近代中國婦女史研究》 19期 (2011/12) Pp. 255-288

https://doi.org/10.6352/mhwomen.201112.0257

摘要

當中國國家主義者致力於解決年輕的中華民國政治和軍事積弱問題時，有人建議，回歸古代中國胎教是強國健民的關鍵。這一關於新胎教的話語融入了清末民初有關科學、身體和國家的新討論中。本文致力於分析宋嘉釗於1914出版的《胎教》中有關胎教論述的現代闡釋，宋書本身為下田次郎1913出版著作的翻譯本。宋之《胎教》代表了19世紀末和20世紀初中國醫學的話語：它從日文翻譯而來，而日本正是當時現代婦科知識的一個重要來源；並且認為西方科學可與中國自身醫學和哲學想為相容。宋書以中國經典著作、日本江戶及明治時代的婦科著作，及西方科學為基礎，重新審問有關人類善惡的來源及胎兒跟子宮外世界關係的基本問題。因以中國傳統胎教為中心，宋得以介紹各種新興的歐日文化和科學概念，並且避免挑戰中國醫學和文化的根基。但是與此同時，通過介紹有關妊娠的新比喻，通過現代科學技術而得以用量化及視覺化的手段來展現人類生殖的過程，並且將女性生殖的身體與國家健康相聯繫，宋嘉釗也促進了現代中國對生殖和女性身體的瞭解。

關鍵字

胎教 ； 優生學 ； 西方科學 ； 下田次郎 ； 宋嘉釗

並列摘要

As Chinese nationalists grappled with the political and military weakness of the young Republic of China, some proposed a return to the ancient Chinese practice of fetal education as the key to strengthening the Chinese people and nation. This new discourse on fetal education entered the Chinese discussion amidst an influx of new ideas about science, the body, and the nation in the late Qing and early Republican periods. This paper analyzes the modern syncretic reformulation of fetal education, or taijiao, presented in Song Jiazhao's 1914 monograph Taijiao, itself a translation of Shimoda Jiro's 1913 work Taikyo. Song Jiazhao's Taijiao is representative of late nineteenth and early twentieth century Chinese medical discussions, both in the fact that it is translated from Japanese, a major source of modern gynecological knowledge in this period, and in its portrayal of Western science as compatible with pre-existing Chinese medical and philosophical traditions. The text selectively draws upon classical Chinese texts, Edo and Meiji era gynecological texts, and modern Western science as it re-examines fundamental questions about the origin of human goodness and evil, and the relationship between the fetus and the world outside of the womb. By centering his discussion on the Chinese tradition of fetal education, Song was able to introduce a variety of new European and Japanese cultural and scientific ideas about pregnancy without challenging the fundamental validity of Chinese medicine and culture. At the same time, however, by introducing new metaphors for pregnancy, a new ability to quantify and represent visually the process of human reproduction via the technologies of modern science, and by linking the female reproductive body to the health of the nation, Song helped to transform modern Chinese understandings of reproduction and the female body.

並列關鍵字

fetal education ； eugenics ； Western science ； Shimoda Jiro ； Song Jiazhao

參考文獻

Kinney, Anne Behnke(2004).Representations of Childhood and Youth in Early China.Stanford:Stanford University Press.

Liu Xiang, “Learning Begins in the Womb: Fetal Instruction [Official Document],” in Children and Youth in History, Item #195, http://chnm.gmu.edu/cyh/primary-sources/195 (accessed June 30, 2011).

Song Jiazhao 宋嘉釗, Taijiao 胎教, 19th ed., Women's Studies Series 1 (Shanghai: Zhonghua shuju, 1914; repr., 1936), p. 5.

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