This collection of essays by eminent anthropologists, missiologists and historians explores the hitherto neglected topic of women missionaries and the effect of Christian missionary activity upon women. The book consists of two parts. The first part looks at 19th century women missionaries as presented in literature, at the backgrounds and experience of women in the mission field and at the attitudes of missionary societies towards their female workers. Although they are traditionally presented as wives and support workers, it becomes apparent that, on the contrary, women missionaries often played a culturally important role. The second and longest section asks whether women missionaries are indeed a special case, and provides some fascinating studies of the impact of Christian missions on women in both historical material and a wealth of contemporary material.Of particular value is the perspective of those who were themselves objects of missionary activity and who reflected upon this experience. Women actively absorbed and adapted the teachings of the Christian missionaries, and Western models are seen to be utilized and developed in sometimes unexpected ways.

Women have been central to the work of Christian ministry from the time of Jesus to the twenty-first century. Yet the story of Christianity is too often told as a story of men. This accessibly written book tells the story of women throughout church history, demonstrating their integral participation in the church's mission. It highlights the legacies of a wide variety of women, showing how they have overcome obstacles to their ministries and have transformed cultural constraints to spread the gospel and build the church.

First Published in 2000. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

In Africa and around the world, the church has been established through the faithful effort of men and women working together for the sake of the gospel. However, failure to acknowledge women’s contributions in evangelism and ministry – or to integrate women’s stories into the history of the church – has led to treating women as secondary within the body of Christ. Women in Mission explores the powerful legacy of women in SIM (formerly, Sudan Interior Mission) and the Evangelical Church Winning All (ECWA), demonstrating that from the beginning women have been active and essential participants in the work of God in Nigeria. Dr. Lami Rikwe Ibrahim Bakari examines various theological and cultural frameworks for understanding the role of women in society before delving into the rich historical reality of women’s involvement in Nigerian church history. This study is a powerful reminder that God’s call to partner in the gospel is not limited by sex, and that it is precisely in recognizing women as primary and active participants in God’s mission – maximizing and not suppressing their giftings –that the kingdom of God is best served.

This selection of texts introduces students and researchers to the multi- and interdisciplinary field of mission history. The four parts of this book acquaint the readers with methodological considerations and recurring themes in the academic study of the history of mission. Part one revolves around methods, part two documents approaches, while parts three and four consist of thematic clusters, such as mission and language, medical mission, mission and education, women and mission, mission and politics, and mission and art.Critical Readings in the History of Christian Mission is suitable for course-work and other educational purposes.

Explores the roles and expectations of women and men in Christian missionary experience

Until now, the missionary plot in Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre has been seen as marginal and anomalous. Despite women missionaries being ubiquitous in the nineteenth century, they appeared to be absent from nineteenth-century literature. As this book demonstrates, though, the female missionary character and narrative was, in fact, present in a range of writings from missionary newsletters and life writing, to canonical Victorian literature, New Woman fiction and women’s college writing. Nineteenth-century women writers wove the tropes of the female missionary figure and plot into their domestic fiction, and the female missionary themes of religious self-sacrifice and heroism formed the subjectivity of these writers and their characters. Offering an alternative narrative for the development of women writers and early feminism, as well as a new reading of Jane Eyre, this book adds to the debate about whether religious women in the nineteenth century could actually be radical and feminist.