Document Detail


Between passion and repression: medical views of demon dreams, demonic fetuses, and female sexual madness in late imperial China.
MedLine Citation:
PMID:  22066151     Owner:  HMD     Status:  In-Process    
Abstract/OtherAbstract:
This article argues that early Chinese physicians had already related female ailments to their sexual frustration. Moreover, many physicians paid more attention to non-reproductive women – nuns, widows, and unmarried women – as if they were more prone to suffer from unfulfilled desires and sexual frustration and, as a result, produce the sexual dreams and monstrous births that were described in the medical literature of medieval China as physical ailments. The earlier body-oriented etiology of these female illnesses gradually shifted to emotion-oriented perspectives in late imperial China. In particular, the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century doctors began to categorize women's sexual frustration as "yu disorders" or "love madness." In this article I will show not only the changing medical views of female sexual madness throughout the ages, but how these views were shaped by the societies in which both the doctors and patients were situated.
Authors:
Hsiu-fen Chen
Publication Detail:
Type:  Journal Article    
Journal Detail:
Title:  Late imperial China = Chʿing shih wen tʿi     Volume:  32     ISSN:  0884-3236     ISO Abbreviation:  Late Imp China     Publication Date:  2011  
Date Detail:
Created Date:  2011-06-30     Completed Date:  -     Revised Date:  -    
Medline Journal Info:
Nlm Unique ID:  100968901     Medline TA:  Late Imp China     Country:  United States    
Other Details:
Languages:  eng     Pagination:  51-82     Citation Subset:  Q    
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