Biography:

Hsiu-fen Chen is a Professor of History at National Chengchi University, Taiwan. Since receiving her Ph.D. degree in England, U.K., Chen has published several journal articles on the topics of madness, emotions and regimen in late imperial China. She also contributed book chapters to Medieval Chinese Medicine: the Dunhuang Medical Manuscripts (2005), Psychiatry and Chinese History (2014) and The Making of the Human Sciences in China: Historical and Conceptual Foundations (2019). In addition to the history of body and mind, Chen also researches into religious healings, medical images, and material cultures of drugs in Ming-Qing China. Her first book, Nourishing Life and Cultivating the Body: Writing the Literati’s Body and Techniques for Preserving Health in the Late Ming, obtained a publication grant from the National Science Council (Taiwan) in 2010. She is writing her second book, tentatively entitled Unrestrained Mind: Emotions, Madness and Mental Healings in Ming-Qing China.