Mezinárodní sinologické centrum Chiang Ching-Kuovy nadace při Karlově univerzitě

The Sciences in Late Imperial China: Tradition and Circulation

Prof. Catherine Jami (CNRS, Paris)

April 4–8th 2011.

Kurz nabízí úvod do historie vědy v Číně se zaměřením na pozdně císařské období (doba Ming a Qing). Zatímco o některých rysech čínské vědecké a technologické tradice již dnes máme poměrně ucelenou představu, společenské a historické souvislosti vědy v Číně zůstávají málo známé, a právě na ně se zaměří přednášky profesorky Catherine Jami.

Lectures will be taught in English.

Cyklus čtyř přednášek představí problematiku studia dějin čínské vědy v nejobecnější rovině (1. přednáška: How has the history of science in China been written?), představí způsoby počítání v Číně a čínskou matematiku (2. přednáška: Rods, beads and brushes - a short history of reckoning in China) a dále se bude věnovat čínské vědě v historických souvislostech kontaktů se západem (3. přednáška: The Jesuits in late Ming China: mission, education and science) a v souvislostech s upevňováňím moci mandžuské dynastie (3. přednáška: Science ant the State in early and mid-Qing China). Společným jmenovatelem jednotlivých přednášek je otázka společenských a historických souvislostí vědy v Číně, zejména kdo byl v čínské společnosti nositelem znalostí a know-how, a jak docházelo k předávání vědeckých informací v čase i prostoru. Kurz je určen pro studenty sinologie i další zájemce o dějiny vědy a dějiny kontaktů mezi Evropou a Asií. Přednášky budou předneseny v anglickém jazyce.

Prof. Catherine Jami (CNRS, Needham Institute) se specializuje na dějiny vědy v Číně obecně a dějiny matematiky zejména. Je autorkou řady publikací na toto téma.

Abstract

This series of lectures proposes an introduction to some history of science in China, focusing mainly on the late imperial period. While we now have a good view of some important features of the Chinese scientific and technological tradition, I will also turn to the location of knowledge and know-how in Chinese society and to its transmission across both time and space.

Rods, beads and brushes — a short history of reckoning in China

Calculation techniques are relevant both to elite learning and to everyday practice of a much wider social group. The use of the abacus, which gradually replaced the older technique based on the manipulation of counting rods, made numeracy to a great extent independent from literacy. The introduction of written calculation in the seventeenth century therefore provided a new basis for mathematics as a scholarly activity.

Monday April 4, Nám. Jana Palacha 2, room 200, 12:30–14:05

How has the history of science in China been written?

Since Joseph Needham started publishing his Science and Civilisation in China series in the 1950s, it has become widely acknowledged that science and technology developed in a significant way in imperial China. However, attempts to explain how and why China differed from “the West” in this respect have long dominated. While giving some general background, this lecture will present the historiography and introduce some recent trends and findings in the history of Chinese science.

Tuesday April 5, Celetná 20, room 118, 10:50–12:25

The Jesuits in late Ming China: mission, education and science

The Portuguese overseas expansion brought about unprecedented direct contacts between Europe and East Asia. Jesuit missionaries entered first Japan and then China. There their evangelising enterprise entailed the teaching of and circulation of printed works on the sciences as taught in Jesuit colleges in Europe. In China, demand on the part of Chinese literati gradually led the missionaries to focus on the mathematical sciences, and to work on an astronomical reform.

Wednesday April 6, Celetná 20, room 118, 12:30–14:05

Science ant the State in early and mid-Qing China

After the Manchus founded the Qing dynasty and took Beijing, they appropriated the sciences both as scholarship as tools for statecraft. They recruited the elite of Chinese literati in their service and became patrons of learning; at the same time, they used the Jesuits as experts in the mathematical sciences, and effectively held a monopoly on knowledge and know-how in these fields. Meanwhile some literati also turned to the sciences, applying to them the textual approach that characterises eighteenth-century scholarship.

Thursday April 7, Celetná 20, room 425, 17:30–19:05

Prof. Catherine Jami (Senior Researcher, CNRS (REHSEIS-UMR 7219), Paris)

DEGREES

Agrégation in mathematics, 1982. DEA in pure mathematics, University of Paris 7, 1984. PhD in History of mathematics, University of Paris 13, 1985. Maîtrise in Chinese language and civilisation, University of Paris 7, 1986. Habilitation a diriger des recherches en histoire des sciences, University of Paris 7, 2009.

CAREER

Ecole normale supérieure (1980–1985); Teaching Assistant, INALCO (1985-1986); Fellow of Fondation Thiers (1987–1991); Senior researcher CNRS (1991–).

Fellow of the JSPS, Kyoto (1990–1991; 1996; 2008); Invited Professor, Kansai University (1993); Invited researcher, Chinese Academy of Sciences (1996 & 1998); Invited researcher, Australian National University, Canberra (1999); Resident, Villa Kujoyama, Kyoto (2000); Member of the Institute for Advanced Studies, Princeton (2002); French Government Fellow, Churchill College, Cambridge, UK (2004–2006); Visiting Professor, Tsinghua University, Beijing (2006).

OFFICES HELD

1993–1996 Treasurer, International Society for the History of East Asian Science, Technology and Medicine.

1996–1998 President, the French Assocition of Chinese studies (AFEC).

1996–1999 President, International Society for the History of East Asian Science, Technology and Medicine.

2005–2009 Assessor, Council of the Division of History of Science and Technology (IUHPS, ICSU)

2009–2013 Treasurer, Council of the Division of History of Science and Technology (IUHPS, ICSU)

2005– Corresponding Member, International Academy of History of Science

MAIN BOOKS

Catherine Jami, Les Méthodes Rapides pour la Trigonométrie et le Rapport Précis du Cercle(1774). Tradition chinoise et apport occidental en mathématiques. Paris, College de France, 1990.

Patrick Petitjean, Catherine Jami & Anne-Marie Moulin (eds.), Science and Empires. Historical Studies about Scientific Development and European Expansion. Dordrecht, Kluwer Ac. Publ., 1992.

Catherine Jami & Hubert Delahaye (eds.), L'Europe en Chine. Interactions scientifiques, religieuses et culturelles aux XVIIe et XVIIIe siecles. Actes du colloque de la Fondation Hugot, 14–17 octobre 1991. Paris, College de France, 1993.

Catherine Jami, Peter Engelfriet & Gregory Blue (eds.), Statecraft and Intellectual Renewal in Late Ming China: The Cross-Cultural Synthesis of Xu Guangqi (1562–1633). Leiden, Brill, 2001.

Luis Saraiva & Catherine Jami (eds.), The Jesuits, the Padroado and East Asian Science. History of Mathematical Sciences: Portugal and East Asia III. Singapore, World Scientific, 2008.

Patrick Petitjean, Stéphane Schmitt and Catherine Jami (eds.), Science, histoire et politique: L'exemple de Cambridge. Paris, Vuibert, 2009.

Catherine Jami, The Emperor’s new mathematics: Western learning and imperial authority in China during the Kangxi reign (1662–1722). Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2011 (forthcoming).

ARTICLES

About 20 articles in peer-reviewed journals, and 30 chapters in edited volumes.

See: http://www.rehseis.univ-paris-diderot.fr/spip.php?article57