Editing May Fourth Movement (section)

==Criticism and resistance==
Many intellectuals at the time opposed the anti-traditional message, some felt it did not go far enough, and many political figures ignored it. In the late twentieth century, voices more strongly questioned the premise that Chinese traditional culture had to be destroyed rather than developed. 

[[Kuomintang]] leader [[Chiang Kai-shek]], as a Confucian and a nationalist, was against the iconoclasm of the May Fourth Movement. As an anti-imperialist, he was skeptical of Western culture. He criticized these May Fourth intellectuals for corrupting the morals of youth.{{sfnp|Chen|1971|p=13}} When the Nationalist party came to power under Chiang's rule, it carried out the opposite agenda. The [[New Life Movement]] promoted Confucianism, and the Kuomintang purged China's education system of western ideas, introducing Confucianism into the curriculum. Textbooks, exams, degrees, and educational instructors were all controlled by the state, as were all universities.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Draguhn |first1=Werner |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0Caknr1VAqMC&q=riding+it+of+western+texts+and+models |title=China's communist revolutions: fifty years of the People's Republic of China |last2=Goodman |first2=David S. G. |publisher=Psychology |year=2002 |isbn=0-700-71630-0 |page=39 |via=Google Books}}</ref>

Some conservative philosophers and intellectuals opposed any change, but many more accepted or welcomed the challenge from the West but wanted to base new systems on Chinese values, not imported ones. These figures included [[Liang Shuming]], [[Liu Shipei]], [[Tao Xisheng]], [[Xiong Shili]], [[Zhang Binglin]] and Lu Xun's brother, [[Zhou Zuoren]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Furth |first=Charlotte |title=The Limits of Change: Essays on Conservative Alternatives in Republican China |publisher=Harvard University Press |year=1976 |isbn=978-0-674-53423-0 |editor-last=Furth |editor-first=Charlotte |location=Cambridge, MA |chapter=Culture and Politics in Modern Chinese Conservatism |editor-last2=Alitto |editor-first2=Guy}}</ref> In later years, others developed critiques, including figures as diverse as [[Lin Yutang]], [[Ch'ien Mu]], [[Xu Fuguan]], and [[Yu Ying-shih]]. Li Changzhi believed that the May Fourth Movement copied foreign culture and lost the essence of its own culture. ([[Ta Kung Pao]], 1942). This is consistent with what [[Vera Schwarcz]] has said: "Critically-minded intellectuals were accused of eroding national self-confidence, or more simply, of not being Chinese enough."{{sfnp|Schwarcz|1986|pp=[https://books.google.com/books?id=66DSgtgPu-IC&q=may+fourth+movement&pg=PR11 9–11]}}

Another view was that "this limited May Fourth individualist enlightenment did not lead the individual against the collective of the nation-state, as full-scale, modern Western individualism would potentially do."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Chen |first=Xiaoming |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NREdKvus_twC&q=may+fourth+movement&pg=PR3 |title=From the May Fourth Movement to Communist Revolution |publisher=State University of New York Press |year=2008 |isbn=978-0-791-47986-5 |page=8 |via=Google Books}}</ref>

Chinese Muslims ignored the May Fourth movement by continuing to teach Classical Chinese and literature with the Qur'an and Arabic along with officially mandated contemporary subjects at the "Normal Islamic School of Wanxian".<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Dudoignon |first1=Stephane A. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Nfq-Su60OpYC |title=Intellectuals in the Modern Islamic World: Transmission, Transformation and Communication |last2=Hisao |first2=Komatsu |last3=Yasushi |first3=Kosugi |publisher=Routledge |year=2006 |isbn=978-1-134-20597-4 |page=251 |via=Google Books}}</ref> Ha Decheng did a Classical Chinese translation of the Quran.{{sfnp|Dudoignon|Hisao|Yasushi|2006|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=Nfq-Su60OpYC&pg=PA253 253]}} Arabic, vernacular Chinese, Classical Chinese and the Qur'an were taught in Ningxia Islamic schools funded by Muslim General [[Ma Fuxiang]].{{sfnp|Dudoignon|Hisao|Yasushi|2006|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=Nfq-Su60OpYC&pg=PA256 256]}}