Constructing Mission History: Missionary Initiative and Indigenous Agency in the Making of World Christianity
Ebook
Three master narratives currently dominate the analysis of modern mission history. One puts foreign missionaries at the heart of the story. A second emphasizes the colonial aspect of modern missions. Here, missionaries are not heroes but villains, who are implicated in hegemonic schemes of imperial domination. Thirdly, mission history is subordinated to one of its outcomes, the advent of World Christianity. In this master narrative, the concept of contextualization looms large, bolstered by Sanneh's notion of translatability and emphasis on the agency of non-Westerners, who participate in and subtly shape the complex social processes of evangelization. While all three of these master narratives are insightful, none of them adequately balances concern for missionary initiative and indigenous agency.
Borrowing from speech-act theory, Skreslet offers a new analytical approach to the modern roots of World Christianity that differentiates between what a speaker might intend to communicate and the effects of what has been said or actions taken both in the moment and over time. Corresponding to the concepts of illocution and perlocution as these technical terms are used in speech-act theory, the book is structured in two main sections. Initially, the focus is on expressed missionary motives. Part two engages a representative set of modern-era mission performances involving many more actors than just the foreign evangelizers whose stated or implied intentions are emphasized in part one.
- Title: Constructing Mission History: Missionary Initiative and Indigenous Agency in the Making of World Christianity
- Authors: Nimi Wariboko, Stanley H. Skreslet
- Publisher: Fortress Press
- Print Publication Date: 2023
- Logos Release Date: 2022
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Ebook
- ISBNs: 9781506481906, 1506481906
- Resource ID: LLS:9781506481906
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2024-06-14T02:23:34Z
Stanley H. Skreslet is F.S. Royster Professor of Christian Missions at Union Presbyterian Seminary. A former Academic Dean at UPSem and a past president of the American Society of Missiology, he previously served for ten years on the faculty of the Evangelical Theological Seminary in Cairo, Egypt. An earlier book, Comprehending Mission: The Questions, Methods, Themes, Problems, and Prospects of Missiology (Orbis 2012), was the first to receive the American Society of Missiology's annual book award.