| PurposeThis dissertation applies the theory of lexical evolution in Cognitive Linguistics to investigate the historical process of conceptual category and semantic category in "Xu"&"Shi" within TCM books before Qin and Han dynasties, and analyze the therapeutic strategy of reinforcing and reducing method in Golden Chamber Synopsis.MethodMethods mentioned in the theory of lexical evolution in Cognitive Linguistics were applied to investigate the "Xu"&"Shi" concept in TCM Books before Qin and Han dynasties, including category member constitution and status change in conceptual category, prototype change and mutual relationship among distinct meanings of semantic category, the impacts of cultural models on categorization, etc.1. Apply the prototype category theory to investigate the category member constitution and status change of "Xu"&"Shi" conceptual category.2. Apply the metaphor and metonymy mechanism, image-graphical representation, elementary relationship to study the structural changes in "Xu"&"Shi" semantic category, and analyze the relationship among district meanings.3. Analyze the impacts of cultural models on "Xu"&"Shi" categorizing process by studying the history of philosophy, science and technology, political before Qin and Han dynasties in China.4. Compared the reinforcing and reducing methods between Huangdi’s Canon of Internal Medicine and Golden Chamber Synopsis to prove the impacts of category change on guiding the clinic application.Conclusion1. The "Xu"&"Shi" concept belong to the broad philosophical category in the early days while they are narrowed to descript the pathological situation of human in the later days.Traditional Chinese Medical comes from the soil of Chinese culture. A large number of concepts early in the medical field were directly borrowed from philosophical category, there is not much difference between the concepts in two categories."Xu" and "Shi" is one of the cases. The member of the concept category is very broad in the Huangdi’s Canon of Internal Medicine periods, including (1) the pathological situation of human, which means the "the deficiency of immune and excess of pathological factors, including the excess or deficiency of organs, yin and yang, vital essence, blood and body fluids, etc.(2) the physiological situation of human, which means the regular changes of yin and yang, or vital essence, blood, and fluid with the change of seasons, day-and-night, moon’s phases, or the age. In this point, the formal "XU" and "Shi" described in a relative sense, rather than an absolute sense.(3) the normal or abnormal changes of the nature, such as the deficiency and excess of yin and yang, the five elements, month’s phase and so on. However, the member of "Xu" and "Shi" concept categories in the later books like Huangdi’s Eighty One Difficult Issues, Febrile disease, and Shennong’s Herbal Classic,even in the books public recently are gradually narrowed to the pathology situation of human.2. The member status of "Xu" and "Shi" concepts categories change with the development of technologyEarly Zhen stone technology and metallurgical technology development, the Daoyin skill of Taoist, the political dominance of astronomy promote updating of acupunctural apparatus and meridian theory; while later the developing of Taoist alchemy, medicine grinding and preparing process technique, geology, and agriculture impact the further developing of pharmacology theory profoundly. And this made the meridian theory was superior to pharmacology theory in the early days, what lead to the state that concepts in early TCM works tent to focus on the meridian filed which mainly used to guild the treatment of acupuncture and moxibustion, while later then they are gradually changed to pharmacy filed mainly used to guild the treatment of medicine. Member status changed during this process. In the Huangdi’s Canon of internal Medicine,"Xu" and "Shi" concepts can used to describe both the movement and quantity of Qi and the quantity of vital materials of human body, the meridian and pharmacy member both located in the center of the concept categories. Latter then, the pharmacy ones’status were increasingly prominent, while the meridian ones tent to the edge zones.3. Cognitive Linguistics can provide new ideas for the study of the concepts in TCMThe vagueness, aesthetics, metaphor, and iconic characteristics of the TCM language made it hard to define the connotation and extension of concepts clearly, and then lead to the inheritance and development issues. Traditional methods like exegesis and philology focus on describing the different meanings in different contexts based on the original text, ignoring the psychological reasons why these meanings have such a series of changes, and also ignoring the dynamic development in different periods and their internal and external mechanism. An amount of exciting universal paradigms, and the emphasis on cultural models make Cognitive Linguistics capable to resolve those issues.4. Categorization is a gradual process of development, and the concept in Huangdi’s Canon of internal Medicine is just one of the stage of CategorizationCategorization is the psychological process of classification, which result in the concept. The stability and flexibility of the lexical evolution makes the categorical members, members’status, and even the prototype change with the culture. In this process, from the origin of "Xu" and "Shi" categories, to Huangdi’s Canon of Internal Medicine, and then to later works like Febrile Diseases and Shen Nong’s Herbal Classic, even to the present works,"Xu" and "Shi" concepts categories in TCM has experienced changes such as category narrowing, members’ status changing, and prototype in semantic categories transferring, and so on. In addition, they will continue to change. Accordingly, the clinical therapeutic methods guided by the fundamental theory are changing with the development of theory. The category in Huangdi’s Canon of Internal Medicine is just one stage of the Categorization, both the category members and the clinical application will no longer maintain the model of Huangdi’s Canon of Internal Medicine, but constantly change. |
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