传播“健康”:民族主义、科学现代性与近代中国“健康”话语的建构与传播——一项基于《中华健康杂志》(1939-1949)的考察

Communicating Health: Nationalism, Scientific Modernity and Construction of Health Discourses in Contemporary China

本文立足于近代以来救亡图存、建设现代民族国家的历史语境下,探究本土医学精英是如何建构并传播"健康"观念及话语的。通过对中华医学会主办的《中华健康杂志》(1939-1949)中有关健康的话语文本的深入分析,本文发现,一方面,与经典中医中注重个体和养生之道的"健康"含义不同,"健康"话语在近代语境中超越了个体的意义,更多地与"民族主义"话语相勾连,进而成为本土医学精英实现与现代民族国家建设的政治目标相结盟的话语武器。另一方面,"健康"话语作为"科学现代性"的表征,它被用来传播与宣扬现代医学的普适价值。在本土医学精英的话语操弄下,"健康"成为"民族主义"和"科学现代性"的中介性话语。由此,现代中国的"健康"话语承载了本土医学精英利用公共卫生推动现代民族国家建设的政治目标以及普及公共卫生知识和"科学现代性"的传播目的。

This study sets out to explore how the local medical elites proactively construct and propagate the idea of 'communication' to facilitate nation-state building in the context of saving the nation from subjugation and colonization. On an extensive analysis of the articles centering on 'health' in Chinese Journal of Health(1939-1949) established by Chinese Medical Association, this study reveals that on the one hand, the modern discourse of 'health' deviated from its classical meaning in the Chinese medical tradition which addressed individualistic health and way of nurturing life. Health became more associated with the discourse of nationalism, which was served as a discursive weapon manipulated by local medical elites to engage with the political mission of modern nation state building. On the other hand, as a discursive representation of scientific modernity, health was managed by local medical elites to communicate and propagate the universality of modern medicine in China. Thus, these local medical elites strived to construct health as a mediated discourse of nationalism and scientific modernity. In this vein, 'health' was born to imbued with the political impetus of local medical elites to steer the course of state building through the way of public health, as well as the communicative ambition to legitimize the knowledge of public health and therefore 'scientific modernity' in modern China.