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Converting a Savage Mind: Commerce and Christianity - Page 3

© Jessica Powers

The British government certainly did not have the same scruples as the general public. In South Africa during the first half of the nineteenth century, the government turned a blind eye to missionaries who traded with the Africans, even though the colonists were not allowed to trade (Beck, 211-225).

Part of the government's willing acceptance of missionary trading may have been a recognition that they often used consumption as part of their evangelism efforts. These missionaries attempted to "elevate the soul" by emphasizing the "physicality" of every day life, which had less to do with conversion than with civilization. Part of "civilizing" Africans was making them desire English products. The assumption was that non-Western cultures were changed by consuming Western objects and developing capitalistic ideas (Comaroff, vol. 2, 218-219).

One anonymous missionary wrote a letter suggesting that, by making "savage men...realize their wants," it would awaken "healthful tastes" in them, thus benefiting England. The missions, the writer stated, were a "palpably positive, profitable force 'in our markets'" (Comaroff, vol. 2, 221). Overall, as divided as commerce and the missionary endeavor might be, and even though commerce took precedence among non-missionary groups, each element used the other to achieve its ends.

For Further Reading

Beck, Roger B. "Bibles and Beads: Missionaries as Traders in Southern Africa in the Early Nineteenth Century." Journal of African History 30 (1989): 211-225.

Blyden, Edward W. Christianity, Islam and the Negro Race. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1967 [1887].

British Parliamentary Papers, Colonies Africa. Vols. 2, 63. Shannon, Ireland: Irish University Press, 1970.

Chidester, David. Savage Systems: Colonialism and Comparative Religion in Southern Africa. Charlottesville, Va.: University Press of Virginia, 1996.

Comaroff, Jean and John L. Comaroff. Of Revelation and Revolution. Vol. 1, Christianity, Colonialism, and Consciousness in South Africa. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991.

Comaroff, Jean and John L. Comaroff. Of Revelation and Revolution. Vol. 2, The Dialectics of Modernity on a South African Frontier. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997.

Dickens, Charles. "The Niger Expedition." In The Works of Charles Dickens. Vol. 18, Miscellaneous Papers, Plays and Poems. National Library Edition. New York: Bigelow, Brown and Co., 1920 [1848].

Dickens, Charles. "The Noble Savage." In The Works of Charles Dickens. Vol. 34, Reprinted Pieces, The Lamplighter, To Be Read at Dusk, and Sunday Under Three Heads. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907 [1853].

Elliott-Binns, L.E. Religion in the Victorian Era. London: Lutterworth Press, 1936.

Hansard, Record of the Debates of the Houses of Commons and Lords.

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