Buch, Englisch, 384 Seiten, Format (B × H): 161 mm x 240 mm, Gewicht: 740 g
Women Missionaries and the Revival of French Empire
Buch, Englisch, 384 Seiten, Format (B × H): 161 mm x 240 mm, Gewicht: 740 g
ISBN: 978-0-19-539418-4
Verlag: Oxford University Press
Makes use of archival material from religious orders that most historians neglect. Thoroughly researched in colonial, foreign ministry, departmental, municipal, and church archives on three continents.
Profiles three missionary women in the same book, using biography to illuminate the context of French empire and vice versa.
Curtis is the first outside researcher to consult the letters and archives of Emilie de Vialar.
Civilizing Habits explores the life stories of three French women missionaries - Philippine Duchesne, Emilie de Vialar, and Anne-Marie Javouhey - who transgressed boundaries, both real and imagined, to evangelize far from France's shores. In so doing, this book argues that they helped France reestablish a global empire after the dislocation of the Revolution and the fall of Napoleon. They also pioneered a new missionary era in which the educational, charity, and health care services provided by women became valuable tools for spreading Catholic influence across the globe.
Philippine Duchesne, who began her religious life in a cloistered convent before the Revolution, traveled to former French territory in Missouri in 1818 to proselytize among Native American tribes. Thwarted by the American policy of removing tribes even further west, her main legacy became girls' education on the frontier. Emilie de Vialar followed French troops to Algeria after conquest in 1830 and opened missions throughout the Mediterranean basin. Prevented from direct conversion, she developed strategies and subterfuges for working among Muslim populations. Anne-Marie Javouhey made her life's work the evangelization of Africans in the French slave colonies, including a utopian settlement in the wilds of French Guiana. She became a rare Catholic proponent of the abolition of slavery and a woman designated a <"great man>" by the French king.
Freed from physical enclosure, these women were protected from worldly corruption only by their religious habits and their behavior. Paradoxically, however, through embracing religious institutions designed to shield their femininity, these women gained increased authority to travel outside of France, challenge church power, and evangelize among non-Christians, all roles more commonly ascribed to male missionaries. Their stories teach us about the life paths open to religious women in the nineteenth century and how both church and state benefitted from their initiative and energy to expand boundaries of faith and nation.
Zielgruppe
Academics and undergraduates studying French history, imperial history, gender history, women's biographies, history of Catholicism, history of slavery and abolitionism
Autoren/Hrsg.
Fachgebiete
- Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Soziale Gruppen/Soziale Themen Gender Studies, Geschlechtersoziologie
- Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Geschichte einzelner Länder Europäische Länder
- Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Europäische Geschichte
- Geisteswissenschaften Christentum, Christliche Theologie Christentum/Christliche Theologie Allgemein Missionswissenschaft, Missionsgeschichte
Weitere Infos & Material
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Part I The Limits of Enclosure: Philippine Duchesne
1.: From Old Worlds to New
2.: Foothold on the Frontier
3.: "We shall need Jesuits to bring them to us"
Part II Saving Souls: Emilie de Vialar
4.: Rehearsal in Algeria
5.: Refuge in Tunisia and Malta
6.: Expansion in the Ottoman Empire
Part III Missionary Utopias: Anne-Marie Javouhey
7.: French Origins and African Experiments
8.: The Mana Colony
9.: Catholics and Abolitionists
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index
