John Dewey lived in China for over two years (1919-1921), invited by his former Columbia student Hu Shih, during the May Fourth Movement

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John Dewey arrived in China in 1919 for what was planned as a short visit and stayed more than two years, through the height of the May Fourth Movement. The invitation came from his former students — Behuniak names Hu Shih, Dewey's former Columbia doctoral student, and Jiang Menglin as the two who prepared the scene, with Hu Shih "his most well known Chinese student" hoping Dewey would develop his ideas further while in China. It is the same Hu Shih who, seven years later, co-founded the China Institute of America alongside Dewey. Acting Beijing University president Cai Yuanpei introduced Dewey to a Chinese audience with a line that captures the moment's charge: "Confucius said respect the emperor, the learned doctor advocates democracy." Dewey himself later called the stay "intellectually the most profitable thing I've ever done" (Behuniak 2015, Tier 2).

Behuniak, citing the historian Benjamin Schwartz, treats the encounter as bidirectional — reshaping Dewey's own later thinking on individualism, not only introducing pragmatism to China. The relationship between Dewey and Hu Shih predates and outlasts the trip: it is the same teacher-student bond documented independently in this vault's China Institute of America founding note, now given its origin and its texture.