ABSTRACT
Chapter three examines John Dewey’s trip to China in 1919-1921. Dewey’s trip has been characterized by scholars as powerfully influencing China’s young intellectuals. But the evidence suggests Dewey was not as influential as previously thought. Another trip, that of Hu Shih to the United States to study from 1911-1917 promised more influence in China’s future. Hu Shih was Dewey’s student at Columbia University and became a devoted pragmatist. On his return to China and with Dewey’s trip, Hu Shih was Dewey’s translator and he made arrangements for many of the over 200 lectures Dewey gave during his time in China. Hu Shih attempted to convince the Chinese people they needed to liberate themselves from ancient traditions and superstitions and embrace modern rational scientific thinking. His pleading fell on deaf ears. Hu Shih saw Liang Qichao as the intellectual father of modern China and his intellectual mentor. As an intellectual Hu, unlike Liang, refused to pursue politics and nationalism to modernize China, and it left him with a small and shrinking audience. Another Chinese intellectual, Lu Xun more successfully reached the Chinese people with writings that became popular not just in China but worldwide. Yet another trip, Lu’s sojourn to Japan where he studied from 1905-1907, became the basis for his turn toward the Chinese nation. He saw the lack of unity and loyalty of the Chinese people as a major impediment to political stability and modernity in China. A skeptical Lu Xun rejected both Chinese traditions and westernization and the solution, a stronger sense of national loyalty for China, evaded Lu. Ironically, Hu Shih who had also rejected nationalism as a dangerous manipulation, became a staunch nationalist after Japan invaded China proper in 1937. He served as China’s Ambassador to the United States during World War II.
