1st Edition
Encounter and Interventions Christian Missionaries in Colonial North-East India
The advent of colonialism and its associated developments has been characterized as one of the most defining moments in the history of South Asia. The arrival of Christian missionaries has not only been coeval to colonial rule, but also associated with development in the region. Their encounter, critique, endeavour and intervention have been very critical in shaping South Asian society and culture, even where they did not succeed in converting people. Yet, there is precious little space spared for studying the role and impact of missionary enterprises than the space allotted to colonialism. Isolated individual efforts have focused on Bengal, Madras, Punjab and much remains to be addressed in the context of the unique region of the North East India. In North East India, for example, by the time the British left, a majority of the tribals had abandoned their own faith and adopted Christianity. It was a socio-cultural revolution. Yet, this aspect has remained outside the scope of history books. Whatever reading material is available is pro-Christian, mainly because they are either sponsored by the church authorities or written by ecclesiastical scholars. Very little secular research was conducted for the hundred years of missionary endeavour in the region. The interpretations, which have emerged out of the little material available, are largely simplistic and devoid of nuances. This book is an effort to decenter such explanations by providing an informed historical and cultural appreciation of the role and contribution of missionary endeavors in British India.
Preface
Introduction
Sajal Nag
1. Christianity and Cultural Changes among the Lotha Nagas
Adani Ngullie
2. Christian Missionaries in the Plains of Barak Valley
Amol Sinha
3. Missionaries as Stimulus: Interrogating Political Mobilization in Colonial North-East India
Binayak Dutta
4. The Coming of the Grace of the Christ: The Christian Baptist Missionaries and the Construction of Hindu Identity in Assam: c. 1840-1900
Bipul Chaudhury
5. Colonialism and Christian Missions in North-East India
David Reid Syiemlieh
6. Reading the Open Book: Missionary Print as Hermeneutical and Material Texts
David Vumlallian Zou
7. Christian Missionaries among the Karbis
Donald Teron
8. Nationalist Discourse, Christianity and Tribal Religion: The Tani Tribes of Arunachal Pradesh
Jagdish Lal Dawar
9. Straying beyond Conquest and Emancipation: Exploring the Fault Lines of Missionary Education in North-East India
Hoineilhing Sitlhou
10. Health, a Gift of God at Sanatorium and Missionary Activities in Madras Presidency
B. Eswara Rao
11. Coloniser or Anthropologist?: Locating the Identity of the Christian Missionary vis-à-vis the Tea Garden ‘Coolie’ in Colonial Assam
Anisha Bordoloi
12. Romance of the Wild, the Natural, and the Savage: Glimpses of Evangelism in North-East India, 1836-1900
M. Satish Kumar
13. Welsh Missionaries and the Transformation of Mizo Women
Lalhmingliani Ralte
14. Society, Culture and Conversion: The Jesuit Madurai Mission in Tamil Nadu, 1650-1700 CE
Jangkhomang Guite
15. Introduction of New Literature under the Aegis of Christian Missions in Mizoram
J.V. Hluna
16. Evangelization among the Bodos
Luke Daimary
17. Cultural Hegemony, First World War and the German Salvatorians in North-East India (1890-1915 ce)
Meeta Deka
18. Christianity vs Indigeneity: Colonial State, Mission and Laipianism in Chin Hills
Pum Khan Pau
19. American Baptists in Colonial Assam: The Tale of Oscar Levi Swanson
Nabanipa Bhattacharjee
20. Early Response to Christianity in Mizoram
Rohmingmawii
21. Tribulations of the Catholic Mission in Mizoram, 1925-1946
Sangkima
22. Colonial State, Christian Missionaries and the Politics of Persuasion in Early Nineteenth-Century Bengal
Santanu Sarkar
23. Sociocultural Re-Invention: A Study of Christianity in Arunachal Pradesh
Sarah Hilaly
24. An Analysis of the American Baptist Missionary Sources for the Construction of Gender History in North-East India
Shiela Bora
25. Naga Conversions to Christianity in Manipur in the Twentieth Century
Th. R. Tiba
26. Gendered Mission: The Zenana Work of the American Baptist Mission in Assam (1836-1950)
Tejimala Gurung
Contributors
Biography
Sajal Nag is currently a Senior Professor and Head, Department of History and Dean, School of Social Sciences, Assam University, Silchar. He is the author of The Beleaguered Nation: Making and Unmaking of the Assamese Nationality (2016); and Contesting Marginality: Ethnicity, Insurgency and Sub Nationalism in North East India (2002); among others.
M. Satish Kumar is in the School of Geography, Archaeology and Paleoecology, in Queens University, Belfast Northern Ireland. His publications include Colonial and Postcolonial Geographies of India (co-edited with Saraswati Raju and Stuart Corbridge).
