Missionary Conversions and Cross-Cultural Transla3ons in the highveld, 1820 to 1870

Abstract

This disserta8on examines missionary encounters, conversions and cross-cultural transla8ons in the Southern African Highveld during the nineteenth century. It primarily focuses on the effects of alterity, or ‘self’ and ‘other’ binaries, within the context of Robert Moffat’s encounters with the Batlhaping, or Batswana. The paper first iden8fies and examines historical theories of encounter, conversion and transla8on and then applies key aspects of these theories to the specific historical circumstances of the London Mission Sta8ons and Wesleyan Mission Sta8ons. It looks at the how missionary conversions, categoriza8ons and modes of classifica8on and transla8ons helped to create a seemingly universal but actually Eurocentric regime of truth. This regime was premised on the nega8on of Batlhaping cultures and customs, and ul8mately on their norma8ve assimila8on into idealized European cultures and norms. This assimila8on was never complete, since African peoples had their own ideas regarding faith and belonging, but it nonetheless played a major role in construc8ng new forms of African subjec8vity within a Eurocentric mirror, with a further bifurca8on between ‘converted’ and ‘unconverted’. A further component of this historical transforma8on was the ideological and ins8tu8onal role played by European missionaries from 1816 to 1857 in the crea8on and inven8on of tribal categories on the highveld. These tribal categories ended up superseding more fluid and overlapping forms of iden8ty, and thereby paved the way for essen8alist models of iden8ty and difference which had profound implica8ons for not only the nineteenth century, but also the twen8eth century and contemporary society.