“A friend of god and the poor wretched blacks”: violence, race, and redemption in missionary narratives of Nile Valley slavery
This article explores narratives of slavery written by Christian missionaries in the Nile Valley in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Focusing on works produced by the Italian Comboni mission, American Presbyterians, and the British Church Missionary Society, I approach missionary n...
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Format: | Journal article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Penn State University Press
2022
|
| _version_ | 1817931235222093824 |
|---|---|
| author | Bland, W |
| author_facet | Bland, W |
| author_sort | Bland, W |
| collection | OXFORD |
| description | This article explores narratives of slavery written by Christian missionaries in the Nile Valley in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Focusing on works produced by the Italian Comboni mission, American Presbyterians, and the British Church Missionary Society, I approach missionary narratives of Nile Valley slavery as a distinct genre of storytelling shaped by the unique position of the missionary as a narrator and the symbolic utility of slavery as a vehicle for conveying suffering. Reading these sources critically, I argue that the slaves and former slaves that missionaries depicted in their writings served as a discursive canvas for missionaries to situate their activities in a world of suffering and violence. By positioning mission work alongside the material trials of slavery, missionaries lent a temporal urgency to their spiritual projects and justified their relationship with colonial violence. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-09T03:18:47Z |
| format | Journal article |
| id | oxford-uuid:93a6098f-bf03-4be1-91a4-2f0d76e8c364 |
| institution | University of Oxford |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-09T03:18:47Z |
| publishDate | 2022 |
| publisher | Penn State University Press |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | oxford-uuid:93a6098f-bf03-4be1-91a4-2f0d76e8c3642024-10-25T16:24:50Z“A friend of god and the poor wretched blacks”: violence, race, and redemption in missionary narratives of Nile Valley slaveryJournal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_dcae04bcuuid:93a6098f-bf03-4be1-91a4-2f0d76e8c364EnglishSymplectic ElementsPenn State University Press2022Bland, WThis article explores narratives of slavery written by Christian missionaries in the Nile Valley in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Focusing on works produced by the Italian Comboni mission, American Presbyterians, and the British Church Missionary Society, I approach missionary narratives of Nile Valley slavery as a distinct genre of storytelling shaped by the unique position of the missionary as a narrator and the symbolic utility of slavery as a vehicle for conveying suffering. Reading these sources critically, I argue that the slaves and former slaves that missionaries depicted in their writings served as a discursive canvas for missionaries to situate their activities in a world of suffering and violence. By positioning mission work alongside the material trials of slavery, missionaries lent a temporal urgency to their spiritual projects and justified their relationship with colonial violence. |
| spellingShingle | Bland, W “A friend of god and the poor wretched blacks”: violence, race, and redemption in missionary narratives of Nile Valley slavery |
| title | “A friend of god and the poor wretched blacks”: violence, race, and redemption in missionary narratives of Nile Valley slavery |
| title_full | “A friend of god and the poor wretched blacks”: violence, race, and redemption in missionary narratives of Nile Valley slavery |
| title_fullStr | “A friend of god and the poor wretched blacks”: violence, race, and redemption in missionary narratives of Nile Valley slavery |
| title_full_unstemmed | “A friend of god and the poor wretched blacks”: violence, race, and redemption in missionary narratives of Nile Valley slavery |
| title_short | “A friend of god and the poor wretched blacks”: violence, race, and redemption in missionary narratives of Nile Valley slavery |
| title_sort | a friend of god and the poor wretched blacks violence race and redemption in missionary narratives of nile valley slavery |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT blandw afriendofgodandthepoorwretchedblacksviolenceraceandredemptioninmissionarynarrativesofnilevalleyslavery |