The original letters from abroad cover West Africa from 1899 to 1933. Some progressive Europeans, like the first principal of Achimota College, Rev. They preferred to hold onto polygamy, even at the cost of illiteracy. As long as the Africans could read the Bible, the missionaries were satisfied that they had had enough academic education. A member of the CMS, Henry Venn, boasted that the mission schools of Nigeria would produce an educated African elite that could form an intelligent and influential class of society and become the founders of a Kingdom which shall render incalculable benefits to Africa (Venn cited in Bassey 1991:37). By using postcolonial theory as a framework for analysis, it is evident that the Western formal education introduced to the people of the Gold Coast by the Christian missionaries and the British Colonial government did not serve the indigenous population well. The missionaries condemned African religion, music, art, festivals and customary practices. In traditionally monogamous societies, primary school completion increased by about eight percent, but only four percent in polygamous societies. Christianity reborn: the global expansion of evangelicalism in the twentieth century. Theres still so much to be learned from the history of education in Africa and its long-term consequences. Email: henrydonsco@gmail.com The latter, non-academic form of education provided by the missions has stimulated much interest among scholars, who are particularly interested in the failure of many of these schools and the hypocritical government support for the schools, seeing as the import of cheap goods from the mother countries caused many vocational school graduates, such as seamstresses, to be unemployed (Ayandele 1966:296; Foster 1965:134). I well remember when he came to live with me in Trenton. Their luggage and other necessities had to be carried on heads and took a long time before reaching the missionaries. As they could not recruit British missionary volunteers initially, the Church Missionary Society sponsored the services of German missionaries, who were Lutherans, to come out to Sierra Leone. Besides education, they cared for the sick. Isichei, Elizabeth. Under the Basel Missions Salem system, converts were separated from the traditional society. And thats why I decided to look deeply into this issue. A large percentage of Ghanas 30 million people are nominally Christian (more than 70% as of the last census), and 28% consider themselves evangelical believers. It is important to emphasize that the modern history of the Christian Mission in Africa started from the late Eighteenth Century, the Catholics had been there earlier in the first centuries of the Christian era especially during the first Portuguese adventures. Father Tetteh also took note of Father Burkes humility and devotion to his students. The Basel Mission. For instance, in Nigeria in 2006, approximately only 51.2% of primary school teachers of either gender were trained as teachers, and the enrolment rate in primary education for both genders in 2000 stood at about 62.7%, compared to 99.5% in Canada (UN Data 2010). Was this information useful? He was very simple in dress and in the use of modern technology, Father Tetteh said. Hope Waddell of the Church of Scotland had opened a school at Duke Town, Calabar. life skills Rev. church were founded in south-eastern Nigeria, the chief centres being Bonny and Brass. Box 6000, Techny, IL 60082-6000. station in 1858, it was not until 1889 that the missionaries entered Hausaland, which was predominantly Muslim. Thus by training Africans to fill only the lower levels of the colonial administration and providing skilled workers from the vocational and agricultural schools who contributed to the economy and were less likely to question colonial rule than more educated Africans, mission schools helped to strengthen colonial rule. From 1835 to the middle of the nineteenth century the Church was in opposition to traditional religion. Barely ten years later, after the first missionaries arrived, the Methodists, for example, had started a station as far inland as MacCarthy Island. Economics This allowed me to estimate the impact of mission schooling directly. Another contribution of missionaries to the development of Ghana was their pioneering role in writing many local languages. Of the ten largest congregations for men, the Society of the Divine Word is the fastest growing over the past 50 years. %%EOF In Nigeria, one of the lasting works of the C.M.S missionaries was the development of literature in Yoruba. This was the work of the great missionary, Thomas Birch Freeman, who placed two missionaries, Mr and Mrs. de Graft, in charge of the school. DISCLOSURE. As an institution introduced by agents with radically different values, the Christian religion damaged the culture and traditional beliefs of the people of West Africa. Mission societies often expanded into territories before colonial powers did, and providing education only cost them a little more. skills for his or her future role in the society (Hetherington, 1979; Davidoff, 1980; Aboagye, 1997). Furthermore, mission schools discouraged traditional ways of life outside of the classroom. Study for free with our range of university lectures! All work is written to order. The Committee for Women's Work was responsible for the education of native girls. This box contains: the correspondence of Bishop See thematic groupings of our digital collections, See all of our digital collections in one place, Ghana in Records from Colonial Missionaries, 1886-1951, Copies of letters received, 1890-1927; West Africa, vol. In due course leprosariums and orphanages were built to supplement their medical services. CUP Archive, 1979. There were no Bibles in local languages, likewise grammar books were scant, so the missionaries had to spend time learning local languages, and translated the Bible and wrote series of grammar books. Many Ghanaian communities got divided along religious lines. After six years at St. Peters, Father Burke was named chaplain and professor of English literature at St. Thomas Aquinas Secondary School in Osu, Ghana. The early success of the missionaries included areas like Freetown and surrounding villages. Wed love to get to know you and discuss how God is calling you. The missions agricultural schools were especially beneficial for colonial governments considering that governments believed that manual labour was a means to prevent discontent and unrest in the tribes (Hansen 1984:232). I have used my expertise to design and implement strategies for major projects including new programme development, global proposals, book launches, international talks, lectures, and executive . To their minds, Africans were too backward and needed help to become more civilized. Within ten years of Father Bergheros visit, the Roman Catholic Church in Nigeria had become so well established that it ceased to be under administration from Dahomey. In 1880, two Roman Catholic priests of the Society of African Missions (S.M.A. The copies of letters received, 1890-1927, mention the plan from 1914 to gain control of future Ashanti Chiefs using education. Moreover, the Islamic religion was also being introduced to the southern section of the country by Muslim immigrants from the north of the colony. Their converts increased steadily in numbers until 1821 when a section broke away to form the first independent African, Christian church in West Africa, called the West Africa Methodist Church. As negative as all these impacts of the missionaries undoubtedly were for the African pupils, the long-term consequences are arguably as serious. The most momentous discovery in western Africa came in 1471, when Portuguese captains first reached the coast of modern Ghana between the mouths of the Ankobra and Volta rivers. Many missionaries died because of the climate and tropical disease. We shall now turn our attention to the activities of the Christian missionaries in Ghana. It is important for several reasons. Moreover, mission education formed a poor foundation for future educational conditions in the former colonies. I found that while educational outcomes are generally better in places that were exposed to Christian missions in the colonial era, traditionally polygamous societies benefited less. For terms and use, please refer to our Terms and Conditions Again, in West-Africa, the efforts to go beyond the coast to reach those inland with the gospel coincided with the southwards expansion of Islam which posed some threat to the expansion of the work of Christian evangelizing missions. Soon after the Methodist experiment, the church Missionary Society set up their own school at Badagry. Indeed, the quality of the education could be so poor that the colonial governments complained, as in the case of the Nigerian government, which complained that the secondary school graduates provided by the missions were illiterate and ignorant and therefore poorly suited to fill the lower levels of the administration (Ayandele 1966:294-5). Operating from Whydah in what is today the Peoples Republic of Benin (formerly Dahomey), Father Berghero, in 1860, visited Abeokuta and Lagos where freed Catholic slaves from Brazil welcomed him warmly. Instead of adapting the teachings and practices of the new religion to suit indigenous values, as it did when the same Christian religion adopted Greek, Roman, German and Anglo-Saxon native practices, the early Christian missionaries condemned totally as pagan, and to be avoided by their converts, whatever they considered strange. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. J. C. Taylor, in these parts of southern Nigeria can still be seen today. if(typeof ez_ad_units!='undefined'){ez_ad_units.push([[250,250],'cegastacademy_com-large-mobile-banner-1','ezslot_15',609,'0','0'])};__ez_fad_position('div-gpt-ad-cegastacademy_com-large-mobile-banner-1-0');The European missionaries began their activities in Ghana as far back as the early fifteenth century. crs questions and anwers From simple essay plans, through to full dissertations, you can guarantee we have a service perfectly matched to your needs. Volunteers and donors to organizations such as Compassion Canada believe that they are being humanitarian when they build schools in Africa, volunteer as teachers or help in other ways to improve the quality of education in African nations, yet missionaries and colonial governments were similarly lauded as performing a great work of humanity (Beck 1966:117) and likewise believed that they were helping their African pupils. After World War I was declared in 1914, the German missionaries were restricted in their movements by the British in the British colonies. He is survived by two brothers, Walter and Kevin Burke. The first school in Nigeria was started by the Methodist missionaries at Badagry in 1842. The Committee for Women's Work was responsible for the education of native girls. These pioneer mission schools met with a discouraging response. Hope Waddell was later joined by the Rev. The European Christian missions preached the Gospel, built churches, and seminaries translated the Bible to Ghanaian Languages such as Ewe, Ga, and Twi. While colonial administration in colonies such as Kenya attempted to some degree to provide training for Kenyans to fill the high-level positions (Sheffield 1973:86), the attempts in many cases fell short, and when the European administration left, Kenya, for instance, had few sufficiently educated replacements (Sheffield 1973:88). One is led to ask, why this sudden development? They also introduced vocational education in the country. Third, rivalry between the various Christian denominations also contributed to the poor standards of education. The European missionaries engaged in trading and other commercial activities as well. Copyright 2003 - 2023 - UKEssays is a trading name of Business Bliss Consultants FZE, a company registered in United Arab Emirates. In December 1868 he went with his wife and child to Anum in the present-day Volta Region of Ghana. One of them, Philip Quaque, returned in 1765 as an ordained priest. Other Roman Catholic hospitals were built in all the nine regions of the country; including those at Asikuma and Foso (Central Region), Akyem Swedru (Eastern Region), Berekum (BrongAhafo), Maase (Asante Region) and Anfoega (Volta Region). Missionaries continued to be the main providers of education even after colonial powers established control during the so-called Scramble for Africa which occurred between 1884-1914. But Annor (1989) writes that before Europeans came to colonize Africa, Africans had a way of producing artifacts. Efforts to change these norms were often aimed at women. Andrew Jackson Foster (1925-1987) was an American pioneer of deaf education in several countries in Africa. In the Western Region, the Catholic Sisters running a hospital at Eikwe specialized in maternity cases, and like Slessor in Nigeria succeeded in stamping out the practice of killing twins at birth. Despite their significant contributions to education, local language development, agriculture and the economy as a whole, the missionaries have been criticized severally. Thomas Birch Freeman, son of a London-based West Indian father and an English mother. Given their priorities, it should thus come as little surprise that missions often provided poor education to the African pupils. Again, the missionaries persuaded Africans to abandon the practice of tribal marks. In 1876 the college became associated with Durham University in England, which awarded degrees to students of the college. A large body of studies show that missionaries had a lasting impact beyond their early years. These Christian converts considered themselves to be holier than their traditional rulers and elders. Another missionary whose memory is revered in Nigeria was Mary Slessor, she arrived in the country in 1876, and for many years worked assiduously as a missionary nurse. In 2006, Father Burke was appointed lecturer at the newly founded Catholic University College of Ghana in Sunyani. They impressed it upon their converts not to have anything to do with these traditional practices. After a time the idea becomes ingrained -it is heathen and unchristian to be an African culturally (Awori cited in Berman 1974:536). The first batch, who came out between 1804 and 1806, included pioneer missionaries like Renner and Nylander. hbbd```b``vd d"e ] DrI`5 d"(/ Besides being an online tutor, Ralph is an author and expert digital marketer with proven skills in SEO content writing. In Ghana, for instance, they persuaded their converts to reject polygamy and human sacrifice. Father Burke was preceded in death by his parents and his brother John. self help Christian converts were indoctrinated to frown upon the use of indigenous first names in favour of Christian ones. We're here to answer any questions you have about our services. Etherington, Norman. Prior to the advent of western education, Ghana's traditional social structures had inbuilt opportunities for mobility. In addition to teaching, he served as national spiritual director of the Ghana Sacred Heart Enthronement Centre and spiritual director of the Accra Diocesan Sacred Heart Centre. Renewed evangelisation started when the Basel (later known as Presbyterian) missionaries started work at Osu (Accra). Call: +233558280780, Your email address will not be published. Please click this link to download the chapter. We've received widespread press coverage since 2003, Your UKEssays purchase is secure and we're rated 4.4/5 on reviews.co.uk. The practice of inflicting multiple wounds on the bodies of so-called spirit babies now belongs to history. They were to spread the message of the Gospel, render social services to the people and to assist in the suppression of slavery and the slave trade. All the three secondary schools in Cape Coast were mission institutions. But that increase was greater in monogamous societies. CONTRIBUTION OF CHRISTIANITY TO WEST AFRICA. The education and skill development of the people is the highest, most potent agent of national development that the Church imparts to its output of students, scholars, and professionals who perform various precious roles in the various sectors of the national economy for national development,' he stated. In 1880, two Roman Catholic priests of the Society of African Missions (S.M.A. To put it differently, the motive was to gain acceptance in the sight of God so that after death they would be judged kindly by the heavenly father. The home page of Compassion Canada is that of a stereotypical Northern charity: showing pictures of suffering children alternating with those of post-intervention, happy children. The third, St Nicholas Grammar School (now Adisadel College), was founded by the Anglican Church in 1910. Similar organizations were formed in several other European countries. Therefore the period for the rise of Christianizing Missions in the late Nineteenth Century has been considered as reprise. This comes at no extra cost to you. The CMS began to work in the freed slave villages in Sierra Leone in 1804 and the Methodist in 1811. These commercial activities, therefore, made an important contribution to the economic development of Ghana. Being ignorant of ones history causes one to lose part of ones identity and pride in that identity, and one is therefore more vulnerable to attacks denouncing ones culture as inferior, especially if at the same time one is being taught the noble history of another culture. And yet the Asafo provided most of the services which a community needed: protection against military attacks, communal services, etc. While the Evangelical Presbyterian missionaries were the First to develop literature in Ewe, the Roman Catholics were responsible for Nzima literature. The Journal of Negro Education (JNE), a scholarly refereed journal, was founded at Howard University in 1932. It was however in the coastal territories filled with mulattos and other European trading communities that Christianity won some of its early success. For three years, he taught English and biblical ethics. Thus as early as 1823, the Roman Catholic Sisters started a clinic for the sick and for children in Banjul. Your email address will not be published. The effects of work done by Bishop Ajayi Crowther, assisted by the Igbo recaptive the Rev. 2023 Society of the Divine Word. With the exception of the first two volumes, marked "West Africa", these items are drawn from the volumes Series CWW. One Liberian student recalls that we were taught to dress properly, to eat properly, to speak properly. Schools were deemed important. In short, it was a very successful mission in making us little black Anglo-Saxon Protestants. While it has brought undoubted benefits, it has also harmed the traditional way of life. For several years they paid attention to slave trade rather than evangelization and Christianization of the people of West-Africa. African poetry I compared data on the historical locations of mission stations since 1924, in 26 sub-Saharan countries with recent education data between 2008 and 2018. After earlier unsuccessful attempts by the missionaries Chretien Proten, Henrick Huckuff and Jacobus Capitein, the Anglican, Rev. Andreas Riis, assisted by a team of West Indian evangelists, laid the foundations of the Basel Missionary Church in the country. The training college later became part of Achimota College. Mission schools were popular because of the new skills and opportunities they offered. In Nigeria, one of the lasting works of the C.M.S. Non-African Poetry Moreover, it was not in the colonial powers interest for the natives to become too educated, as they might become self-reliant and could conceivably demand independence from the colonial power, so encouraging the less intellectual agricultural schools was in the governments interest. First, alignment can help you communicate your . All rights reserved. Education (2002), the latest committee to work on education reforms in Ghana, recommended a critical review and approach to making teacher education relevant to the devel-opment of the country. The Church had its strongest hold in the Senegambia area. Teaching in the vernacular had an additional use as it further strengthened colonial rule, of which missionaries were often agents, for as the Kikuyu people of Kenya were aware, [the] inability to communicate in English would be a crucial factor in the perpetuation of their subordinate status in the colony (Berman 1974:531). Often drumming and the harmless songs and dances of the people were condemned. Already have a license? Thank you! The missionary and colonial education aimed at character training and civilization resulted in cultural annihilation and religious, and linguistic hegemony. EVANGELICAL MOVEMENTS AND MISSIONARY SOCIETIES IN THE ENGLISH COLONIES. Governments are also not free from blame even if they had a laissez-faire educational policy, as in Ghana, where until 1944 the registration of schools was not required and no attempt was made to exert detailed control even over the activities of grant-aided [by the government] institutions except for a series of minimal registrations (Foster 1965:114). After more than 20 years at Pope John XXIII School, he returned to the United States and served as parochial vicar at Blessed Sacrament-Our Lady of the Divine Shepherd in Trenton, N.J., where he lived with Father Tetteh. Website design and development by Americaneagle.com, Inc, Society of the Divine Word- Western Province, Society of the Divine Word- Southern Province. The First Missionaries were sent as a result of a request by Major de Richelieu, Governor of Christiansborg. The Basel missionaries, in particular, established experimental farms and plantations in places like Akropong. Some of the positive development outcomes of former British colonies are arguably the result of a permissive attitude towards mission schools. A special memorial Mass was celebrated at the Holy Spirit Cathedral in Accra, Ghana, on Oct. 9. "Big things have small beginnings"; so is The Presbyterian Church of Ghana. Two other training colleges opened by the missionaries, in the early days, were the Wesley College in Kumasi (1922) and the Roman Catholic Training College at Amisano, near Elmina (1931) which in 1936 moved to the campus of the newly founded secondary school, St Augustines College at Cape Coast. 1 (1971): 103-115. Meanwhile, the Scottish missionary, Mary Slessor, had established a reputation in the Cross River area as a nurse. C.M.S. Properly meant by Anglo-Saxon standards. He told me that that amount of money could pay for school fees for five students in secondary school in Ghana.. essay writing Their educational activities helped spread literacy and vocational skills training among Ghanaians. Almost all the missions in West Africa faced financial problems in the early stages of their missionary work. Public money was spent only on the small number of government schools, totaling nineteen when Governor Guggisberg assumed office in 1919. In fact, Jacobus Capitein, a former Ghanaian slave who became a priest in the Dutch Reformed Church in the 18th century was on record to have defended the practice of slavery. New team members can be part of establishing a biblical foundation for the next generation of believers, the growth of nationally-led churches, and church planting in Ghana. The History of Christianity in West Africa. Similar developments were carried out by the missionaries in other Nigerian languages, Efik, Kanuri, Igbo, etc. In 1858 the Rev. Establishment of Christian Churches In The Gambia. While they frowned upon bridewealth, female genital cutting, or matrilineality, they held a special grudge against polygamy. The reservation of high-level positions in the colonial administrations for Europeans and the corresponding mission education that provided education fit only for lower positions meant that the withdrawal of European rule could cause serious political instability in the newly independent colonies. Within a short time the missionaries spread their activities inland. Thank you for supporting this project. 2: Trans-Saharan Trade. No plagiarism, guaranteed! Renewed evangelism started when the Basel (later known as Presbyterian) missionaries started work at Osu (Accra). Hastings, Adrian. Rather, it denationalized and facilitated the indignity and loss of cultural identity of the Ghanaian. It happens that some people convert at the end of their life in order to be buried in the prestigious Presbyterian cemetery. Series CLR. While missionaries could sometimes clash with colonial governments, for the most part missions were important tools for colonial governments. The school, which was established the year of independence in 1957, was a work in progress. In conclusion, the educational enterprise of the Christian missionaries in the British and Italian colonies of Africa during the mid-nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries was primarily negative for the African pupils. In the Gambia, the Methodist missionary and first principal of what later became known as the Gambia High School, the Rev. In 1859, the first newspaper in Yoruba, called the Iwe-Irohim, was published by the missionaries. senior high school history The others include the French trading posts at Grand Bassam (Ivory Coast), Assinie and Libreville in Gabon. Longman Publishing Group, 1980. Church history, history of Christianity, religious history: some reflections on British missionary enterprise since the late eighteenth century. Church History 71, no. I also matched up locations that differed in proximity to the mission stations, but otherwise had similar preconditions for educational development. Textbooks were heavily biased towards western ideas and values. Ghana continued to call. In addition, the contributions of celebrity missionaries, such as Christian Schwartz, William Carey, Alexander Duff, and James . He worked zealously as an evangelist and schoolmaster in the Castle School until his death in 1816. Born in Cambridge, Mass., in 1933, Vincent Burke was the third of Walter and Eleanor (nee McGoff) Burkes four sons. It is obvious that the main reason why the missionaries came to Ghana was to convert the indigenous people to the Christian faith. I wanted to buy a smartphone for him, but when he got to know the price of the cell phone, he humbly declined. On the opposite side, the coming of the Christian missionaries brought in its wake certain negative developments like disregard for African culture and rebellion against traditional authority. 'In view of this idea, Mmofraturo, the first girls boarding school in Ashanti was officially . Contribution of Christian Missionaries in Ghana, Reasons Why Christian Missionaries Came to Africa, Discontinuation of Outmoded Cultural Practices, Negative Effects of Missionary Activities, Negative Impact on Traditional Authorities, Limited Support for The Production of Local Food Crops. That there are parallels between contemporary Christian organizations efforts and the missionary efforts of the mid-nineteenth to mid- twentieth centuries is a reason for concern, considering the similar impact of missionaries of all Christian denominations on the education of Africans in the British and Italian colonies in Africa. Soon after, in 1835 they moved up to Akropon on the hills in Akuapem, where the pioneer missionary the Rev. cited in Miran 2002:128). It is much easier to interact on an equal basis or even challenge the authority of another group when one is able to communicate in that groups language, instead of having to rely on an interpreter or non-verbal gestures, which undermine ones ability to show authority or express ones beliefs.
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