Between the old and the new: Reevaluating the Critical Review and its legacy—Editors’ introduction

Abstract

One day in May 1930, Irving Babbitt (1865–1933), the Harvard professor in French literature and a leading advocate of New Humanism, traveled to New York city and had an open debate with his critics in the Carnegie Hall. According to his followers who attended the event, Babbitt did not do so well facing his critics on the occasion. But the debate nevertheless was a landmark event in the development of New Humanism in America. Here it perhaps not the place to give a detailed introduction to New Humanism. Suffice it to say that Babbitt and his friends and supporters were unhappy with the decline of classical culture in the advancement of modern social life in America. They argued the need for preserving and promoting the humanist ideals nurtured by and anchored on ancient Greek and Roman culture against the erosion of scientism on the one hand and utilitarianism and individualism on the other. To prove that ancient wisdom and morals remained a valuable model for guiding modern life, Babbitt also extended his interest from the Judeo-Christian world to early traditions of the East, such as the teachings of both Buddhism and Confucianism. It is worth noting that the debate Irving Babbitt had with his critics, such as John Dewey (1859– 1952), had a Chinese rehearsal a decade or so before. After Qing China suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of Japan in the last days of the nineteenth century, the interest in studying abroad cascaded into a strong trend among young Chinese students. At the turn of the twentieth century, for example, the number of Chinese students enrolled in various levels of Japanese schools was estimated to be as high as 20,000. Animated by the rising tide of Chinese nationalism, some of these students took a heroic role in the revolutionary activities that eventually brought the Qing dynasty to an end in 1911. When the country’s political power shifted, the study-abroad trend shifted away from Japan and toward the United States and Europe. The fact that the US government decided to offer the Boxer Indemnity Scholarship to talented Chinese students at the time (using the retribution paid by the Qing for the Boxer Rebellion of 1900) fueled the directional change. Among the students who received the scholarship and began their studies in the United States emerged a number of future Chinese leaders in a variety of fields. Hu Shi 胡適 (1891–1962), who attended Cornell and Columbia between 1910 and 1917, was a notable example. Hu, dubbed “the father of the Chinese renaissance,” advocated for the venacularization of written Chinese, or the “vernacular Chinese movement” (白話文運動). His hope was to foster a sense of citizenship among the populace for the young republic by facilitating social communication and closing the gap between the educated and uneducated classes. Hu’s advocacy was met with enthusiastic support from the faculty and students at Peking University, where he returned from the United States as a professor of philosophy. A disciple of John Dewey at Columbia, Hu was also a staunch supporter and exponent of American pragmatism, which he believed represented a form of modern scientific thinking, badly needed for the Chinese. During 1919 and 1921, while Dewey was visiting Japan, Hu and others arranged him to give a lecture tour in China. Dewey’s explanation of modern scientific culture and method found favor in the burgeoning Chinese academic community. Meanwhile, Hu Shi’s vernacularization project encountered opposition and criticism, as was his promotion and exposition of Deweyan philosophy as an embodiment of modern Western