Hu Shih
China should write in everyday language, test ideas by scientific method and examine its own philosophy critically instead of revering it.
Placement
Student of Dewey and leader of the New Culture Movement: writing in the vernacular, scientific method and a critical history of Chinese philosophy.
Key ideas
- Pragmatism in China
- Vernacular literature
- Science and experimental method
Teachers: John Dewey
Influence
Influenced by 3
Dai Zhen
influenced by
In The Philosophy of Dai Zhen (1927) Hu Shih presented Dai Zhen’s evidential method and his defence of human desires as a native forerunner of scientific thinking. Hu Shi, Dai Dongyuan de zhexue (1927); A. Chin & M. Freeman, Tai Chen on Mencius (1990)
Evidence: AI draft
Dai Zhen › 1724–1777
Yan Fu
influenced by
Hu Shih recalled reading Yan Fu’s Tianyanlun as a schoolboy and taking the name Shi, ‘fit’, from its ‘survival of the fittest’ (Autobiography at Forty, 1933). Hu Shi, Sishi zishu (1933); B. Schwartz, In Search of Wealth and Power: Yen Fu and the West (1964)
Evidence: AI draft
Yan Fu › 1854–1921
John Dewey studied with
studied with ✓
Hu Shih studied with Dewey at Columbia from 1915 to 1917 and completed his dissertation on the development of logical method in ancient China in 1917 (degree conferred 1927); he interpreted for Dewey on his lecture tour in China (1919–21). J. B. Grieder, Hu Shih and the Chinese Renaissance (1970)
Evidence: AI draft
John Dewey › 1859–1952
Criticism
Criticizes 1
Liang Shuming
criticised
Hu Shih criticised Liang Shuming’s Eastern and Western Cultures and Their Philosophies (1921) for forcing civilisations into three neat ‘paths’, defending science and democracy as universal (1923). Hu Shi, review of Liang Shuming’s Dong Xi wenhua ji qi zhexue (1923); G. Alitto, The Last Confucian, 1979
Evidence: AI draft
Liang Shuming › 1893–1988
Works
Often regarded as the first history of ancient Chinese philosophy written with modern critical method, treating the classical masters as historical thinkers; an earlier general history by Xie Wuliang had appeared in 1916.
Position
Hu Shih brought Dewey’s pragmatism, which he called experimentalism, to China, where Dewey lectured in 1919–21. His 1917 proposals for literary reform helped launch writing in the vernacular instead of classical Chinese. He insisted on scientific method – formulating daring hypotheses and checking them carefully – and on solving concrete problems rather than embracing grand “isms”, which set him against Marxists such as Li Dazhao. His Outline treated the ancient masters critically and historically, and he found a native scientific spirit in Qing evidential scholarship, above all in Dai Zhen. A liberal critic of Nationalists and Communists alike, he was denounced in a mass campaign in the People’s Republic in the 1950s.
Life & context
Hu Shih was born in 1891 in Shanghai to a family from Anhui. With a Boxer Indemnity scholarship he studied in the United States from 1910, first at Cornell, then under John Dewey at Columbia. From 1917 he taught at Peking University and led the New Culture Movement. Ambassador to the United States (1938–42), he left the mainland in 1949 and died in Taipei in 1962.
Further main works
- Some Modest Proposals for the Reform of Literature (1917)
- More Study of Problems, Less Talk of Isms (1919)
- The Development of the Logical Method in Ancient China (1922)
Appears in
- Journey ‘Asia and Europe in Dialogue’ · Stop 6 of 11
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