ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the cultural role of senses—and in particular, olfaction—in the Chinese late imperial period. It aims to contribute to understanding the evolution of Chinese society by offering a survey of traditional imagery and meanings of senses. Past ways of perceiving the senses partially survive and partially have changed owing to the influx of foreign influences and globalization as well as technological, medical, and hygienic, and sensual and sexual revolutions. After a premise with a few notes on the cultural component of sensory experiences, the first part of this chapter presents a short survey of themes concerning the senses in late imperial Chinese philosophical discourse, notably moral control of senses, their cognitive function, and their role in self-cultivation. The second part focuses on the specific case of olfaction and its multifarious, rich, and contradictory aspects as represented in literary works; in particular, it investigates the polysemantic Chinese term xiang 香 that has the basic meaning of both incense and perfume, but in some contexts can be interpreted as “beauty” and/or “love.”
