[PDF] Dictionary of Acupuncture and Moxibustion, A Practical Guide to Traditional Chinese Medicine Nguyen Duc Hiep.

Thorsons Publishers, 1987. ? 176 pp. ? ISBN 0722512902Acupuncture has grown in popularity and importance in Europe only in the last thirty years, although it has been known in the West since the seventeenth century. Jn North America, acupuncture became popular only after the reopening of relatio ns between America and China in 1972.However, this development of acupuncture in the West is still slow and limited for two main reasons:
? The language barrier. Chinese is not an easy language to translate, even if the o riginal is perfectly understood and it is sometimes very difficult to explain Chinese medical concepts due to the relative lack of adequate equivalents in Western languages.
? Great conceptual differences between Chinese and Western medicine. Chinese medicine has been in existence for o ver two millennia, well before the birth of modern medicine, and is founded on a philosophy, Taoist thinking and Yin Yang theory which are totally foreign to the
West.ln recent years, a number of Chinese medical books and journals have been translated into Western languages, mostly F rench and English, and an increasing number of books, dealing particularly with acupuncture, written by Western authors, have been published. Readers who are not familiar with Chinese medicine, may be confused not only by the new medical concepts but also by the stra nge termino logy. Moreover, Chinese terms are sometimes translated and interpreted differently according to the authors.
I have tried to select a number of terms commonly used in acupuncture as well as some Chinese medical terms which are more or less related to acupuncture and moxibustion to make this book a practical guide so that eaders may quickly obtain a reasonable but concise amoum of information about acupuncture and moxibustion. If they then require further informacion, they should refer to other books dealing with the subjects in detail.
The Chinese characters are given in addition to romanized and translated terms since the Chine e words can often be romanized and tran lated in many different ways and the pronunciation of many Chinese characters identical while the meanings are quite different. The Vietnamese
pronunciation is also included. I hope that chis book will be useful to acupuncturists and laymen for a better understanding of Traditional Chinese Medicine in general and acupuncture and moxibustion in particular.