Qigong Fever: Body, Science, and Utopia in China

by David Palmer

Overview

Qigong—a regimen of body, breath, and mental training exercises—was one of the most widespread cultural and religious movements of late-twentieth-century urban China. The practice was promoted by senior Communist Party leaders as a uniquely Chinese healing tradition and as a harbinger of a new scientific revolution, yet the movement's mass popularity and the almost religious devotion of its followers led to its ruthless suppression.

In this absorbing and revealing book, David A. Palmer relies on a combination of historical, anthropological, and sociological perspectives to describe the spread of the qigong craze and its reflection of key trends that have shaped China since 1949, including the search for a national identity and an emphasis on the absolute authority of science. Qigong offered the promise of an all-powerful technology of the body rooted in the mysteries of Chinese culture. However, after 1995 the scientific underpinnings of qigong came under attack, its leaders were denounced as charlatans, and its networks of followers, notably Falungong, were suppressed as "evil cults."

According to Palmer, the success of the movement proves that a hugely important religious dimension not only survived under the CCP but was actively fostered, if not created, by high-ranking party members. Tracing the complex relationships among the masters, officials, scientists, practitioners, and ideologues involved in qigong, Palmer opens a fascinating window on the transformation of Chinese tradition as it evolved along with the Chinese state. As he brilliantly demonstrates, the rise and collapse of the qigong movement is key to understanding the politics and culture of post-Mao society.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780231140669
Publisher:	Columbia University Press
Publication date:	03/27/2007
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	5.80(w) x 8.80(h) x 1.10(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

David A. Palmer is Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology and the Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of Hong Kong. He obtained his Ph.D. at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes (Sorbonne, Paris) and was the Eileen Barker Fellow in Religion and Contemporary Society at the London School of Economics.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Abbreviation
Introduction1. The Birth of Modern Qigong, 1949-642. Political Networks and the Formation of the Qigong Sector3. The Grandmasters4. Qigong Scientism5. Qigong Fever6. Controversy and Crisis7. Control and Rationalisation8. Militant Qigong: The Emergence of Falungong9. Falungong Challenges the CCPEpilogue: The Collapse of the Qigong Movement
ConclusionAppendix: On the Sources Used for this Study
Bibliography
Index

What People are Saying About This

Frank Dikotter

This is a pathbreaking study, elegantly written and meticulously researched. It constitutes the first thorough analysis of qigong and its many mutations between state and society in China and offers an original interpretation of the suppression of the Falungong movement in 1999. Qigong Fever is indispensable to the field of Chinese studies but also to the more general topics of religion and modernity.

Frank Dikötter

This is a pathbreaking study, elegantly written and meticulously researched. It constitutes the first thorough analysis of qigong and its many mutations between state and society in China and offers an original interpretation of the suppression of the Falungong movement in 1999. Qigong Fever is indispensable to the field of Chinese studies but also to the more general topics of religion and modernity.

Marlowe Hood

Critically important; an exemplary piece of scholarship. Quite simply, if one does not understand the qigong movement in all its complexity, then one cannot understand post-1949 China. David A. Palmer has built the foundation upon which all future conversations on this subject will be built.

— Marlowe Hood, Agence France Presse

Editorial Reviews

[A] remarkable study... the best work in its field.

Journal of Social History

A brilliant piece of scholarship... it is to be hoped that this excellent book reaches a wide readership.

Pacific Affairs - David Ownby

The most comprehensive volume published on the Qigong movement in contemporary China.

Journal of Chinese Religions - Gareth Fisher

David Palmer's fascinating and solidly researched Qigong Fever represents the first serious English-language history of the qigong explosion that rocked China over the course of the 1980s and 1990s

History of Religions - Patricia M. Thornton

Qigong Fever is well written, engaging, and extensively researched. It is a landmark in the study of qigong and an indispensible resource for anyone attempting to understand Chinese society in the aftermath of the Cultural Revolution.

International Journal for the Study of New Religions - Scott Lowe

"A powerful historical, political, cultural, and sociological analysis of the Qigong movement and its relationship to the state... Essential." -Choice

Choice

The most comprehensive volume published on the Qigong movement in contemporary China.

— Gareth Fisher

Journal of Chinese Religions

David Palmer's fascinating and solidly researched Qigong Fever represents the first serious English-language history of the qigong explosion that rocked China over the course of the 1980s and 1990s

— Patricia M. Thornton

History of Religions

Qigong Fever provides original and profound insights into Chinese social and political history over the last 60 years.

— Georges Favroud

China Perspectives

A brilliant piece of scholarship... it is to be hoped that this excellent book reaches a wide readership.

— David Ownby

Pacific Affairs

Qigong Fever provides original and profound insights into Chinese social and political history over the last 60 years.

China Perspectives - Georges Favroud