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Transforming the Gospel of Domesticity: Luhya Girls and the Friends Africa Mission, 1917–1926

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 May 2014

Samuel S. Thomas
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Abstract:

Efforts to transform the lives of colonized women and girls were integral to Christian missionary efforts throughout the world. This study of the attempts by a Quaker mission, in what is now Western Province, Kenya, to remake African womanhood indicates the limited success missionaries had in this effort. As with most evangelical missions, “women's work for women” involved domesticating African women and girls. According to one missionary, the purpose of the Girls' Boarding School (GBS) was to teach girls to be “better wives and mothers.” This goal, however, was subverted by both the missionaries and the schoolgirls. While the curriculum was designed to teach girls to submit to male authority, the female missionary in charge of the school refused to do so herself. Furthermore, the schoolgirls manipulated missionaries and mission institutions to delay marriage and to control their choice of marriage partners. Graduates also used the skills learned at the GBS to cross gender and class boundaries, and contributed to the restructuring of Luhya society. Thus, while missionaries undoubtedly caused many dramatic changes in the lives of Luhya women and girls and in Luhya culture, we see that they were manifestly unsuccessful in controlling the nature of these changes.

Résumé:

Résumé:

Les efforts faits pour transformer la vie des femmes et des jeunes filles colonisées ont fait partie intégrante des efforts des missionnaires Chrétiens dans le monde entier. Cette étude des essais d'une mission de quakers de remodeler la féminité africaine dans ce qui est aujourd'hui la province ouest du Kenya est indicative du succès limité remporté par les missionnaires dans leur tentative. Comme c'était le cas dans la plupart des missions évangéliques, “le travail des femmes pour les femmes” impliquait la relégation des femmes et des jeunes filles africaines aux travaux domestiques; d'après l'un des missionnaires, le but du pensionnat de jeunes filles “Girls' Boarding School” (GBS) était d'apprendre aux jeunes filles à devenir “de meilleures épouses et mères.” Ce but fut cependant subverti à la fois par les missionnaires et par les jeunes filles de l'école. Alors que le programme était conçu pour apprendre aux jeunes filles à se soumettre à l'autorité masculine, la missionnaire en charge de l'école refusa elle-même de se plier à cette règle. De plus, les jeunes filles de l'école manipulèrent les missionnaires et les institutions de la mission pour retarder leur mariage et contrôler le choix de leur futur époux. Les jeunes diplômées utilisèrént également les méthodes apprises au GBS pour franchir les barrières de classe et de “gender,” et contribuèrent à la restructuration de la société Luhya. Ainsi, tandis que les missionnaires sont sans aucun doute la cause de bien des changements dramatiques dans la vie des femmes et des jeunes filles de Luhya ainsi que dans la culture de Luhya, nous pouvons constater qu'ils échouèrent manifestement dans le contrôle de la nature de ces changements.

Type
Articles
Information
African Studies Review , Volume 43 , Issue 2 , September 2000 , pp. 1 - 27
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 2000

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