John Wolfe Dardess (January 17, 1937 – March 31, 2020) was an American historian of China, especially the Ming dynasty.

He wrote nine books on the topic, including A Ming Society.

[1] He learned Chinese in the American military, and was posted to Taiwan.

[3][4] One obituary summarised his principal legacy as consisting “not in any particular interpretation he offered, but in a voracious appetite for delving into the written sources, the courage to ask stimulating new questions, and the historical imagination to wonder about the common humanity that linked the authors he read and their communities with his own times.

"[1] He drew notice for pointing to continuities in Chinese history and drawing parallels between contemporary and Ming politics.