Changes

Nakamura does an excellent job throughout this book demonstrating that social networks developed between local physicians and proponents of Western medicine. Nakamura’s underlying thesis in this work is that these social networks allowed for the “exchange of ideas between urban and rural intellectuals, and, eventually, for social change in the late Tokugawa period and beyond.” (p. 180.) Nakamura successfully demonstrates that these networks did exist, but she fails to show how extensive they truly were. At the end of the book, it is not clear whether or not the relationship between Chōei had with the Kōzuke physicians was a typical arrangement. Nakamura’s work would benefit from additional examples of consulting arrangements between proponents of Western medicine and Japanese physicians. Despite this minor complaint, Nakamura’s book does an excellent job elucidating the growing influence of Western medicine during the Tokugawa period.

[[Category:Book Review]] [[Category:Historiography]] [[Category:Medical History]] [[Category:Japanese History]] [[Category:Asian History]]