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Date(s)： 2025/10/19
Time： 10:30~11:20
Venue： Archives 1st Conference Hall
Speaker：Prof. Fu Jia-Chen（Associate research fellow, IMH, AS）
Organizer： Secretariat
How do we know if a food is good for us? Who do we trust? To answer these questions, this presentation will explore the history of Chinese nutrition science during the first half of the 20th century and focus on how soybeans, especially soybean milk, was framed as the answer to China’s many and profound problems. How a simple, even common, drink like doujiang could become the site of intense intellectual and scientific scrutiny depended upon the emergence of a scientifically-sanctioned consensus about the composition of and the associated strengths and weaknesses of the Chinese diet. And as I’d like to emphasize through my discussion of doujiang as a dairy alternative, understanding the Chinese diet or Chinese food according to scientific nutritional principles was itself an act of cultural construction. In addition, to expand the impact of this year’s popular science lectures topic, “A Life of Acupuncture and Food: Health Secrets in History”, the IMH library staff will record the lectures and produce podcasts, making the content available for online streaming. This opens the public to engaging and accessible research findings. By extending the benefits of in-person events, it also enhances the reach and accessibility of scholarly content, demonstrating the Institute of Modern History’s active commitment to promote knowledge to the public.