Abstract: Modern China’s institutions and modes of knowledge have gone through a great deal of tension, ruptures, metamorphoses and transformations. This article traces the genealogy of modern European modes of knowledge under the rubrics of ‘liberal arts’ as the origin and basis for modern China’s institutions and modes of knowledge, and then examines China’s ‘liberal arts’ as institution and modes of knowledge from the early years of the twentieth century to the present. The paper’s objective is to raise the China question of western theory, in order to open up new space for rethinking modern Chinese intellectual history.

Key words:  Wenke (Liberal Arts), modern modes of knowledge, Chinese transformation