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Editorial

Editorial EDITORIAL This issue's opening article by Paul Hair is his third instalment in a remarkable series of essays on Iberian Catholicism in Sierra Leone between 1600 and 1800. Having previously told the stories of the Jesuit and Capuchin encounters, he now turns his attention to the activities of the Franciscans. One of the numerous virtues of this rich body of scholarship is that it thoroughly disengages Christianity from capitalist imperialism, placing Catholic priests in a very 'informal' mercantile empire in which relations with local Afro-Portuguese were finely bal- anced and the 'triumph' of Christianity was by no means inevitable. Tania Tribe's review article on Shelemay and Jef?erey's Ethiopian Christian Liturgical Chant takes that disengagement one stage further, reminding us of a Monophysite Christianity completely independent from Western missionary traditions. The themes of African autonomy and creativity, and of American influence in the continent, are treated in David Maxwell's review arti- cle on Paul Gifford's important and influential book, African Chri.stianity: Its Public Role, in which Gifford raises the spectre of a new American imperialism permeating deep into economy and society in contempor- ary Africa. All of these subjects are documented in Bengt Sundkler and Christopher Steed's encyclopaedic A History of the Church in Africa, and Terence Ranger's engaging review/reminiscence reminds readers of Sundkler's significance as a dynamo in African Christian studies. One of the merits of this long-awaited book is its section on gender issues, in which the authors argue that the church is one of the few domains in Africa where women can emerge as leading personalities. Nancy Schwartz observes that notions of what is peripheral and what is significant are, of course, culturally constructed. For ordinary Kenyan women, ideas about death and burial are the centre of life, bringing 'issues of space, place and identity to the fore'. By giving voice to their beliefs, both Christian and traditional religious, and demonstrating their social significance, Schwartz provides a more inclusive description of female agency in Africa. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Journal of Religion in Africa Brill

Editorial

Journal of Religion in Africa , Volume 30 (4): 407 – Jan 1, 2000
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Publisher
Brill
Copyright
© 2000 Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands
ISSN
0022-4200
eISSN
1570-0666
DOI
10.1163/157006600X00384
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

EDITORIAL This issue's opening article by Paul Hair is his third instalment in a remarkable series of essays on Iberian Catholicism in Sierra Leone between 1600 and 1800. Having previously told the stories of the Jesuit and Capuchin encounters, he now turns his attention to the activities of the Franciscans. One of the numerous virtues of this rich body of scholarship is that it thoroughly disengages Christianity from capitalist imperialism, placing Catholic priests in a very 'informal' mercantile empire in which relations with local Afro-Portuguese were finely bal- anced and the 'triumph' of Christianity was by no means inevitable. Tania Tribe's review article on Shelemay and Jef?erey's Ethiopian Christian Liturgical Chant takes that disengagement one stage further, reminding us of a Monophysite Christianity completely independent from Western missionary traditions. The themes of African autonomy and creativity, and of American influence in the continent, are treated in David Maxwell's review arti- cle on Paul Gifford's important and influential book, African Chri.stianity: Its Public Role, in which Gifford raises the spectre of a new American imperialism permeating deep into economy and society in contempor- ary Africa. All of these subjects are documented in Bengt Sundkler and Christopher Steed's encyclopaedic A History of the Church in Africa, and Terence Ranger's engaging review/reminiscence reminds readers of Sundkler's significance as a dynamo in African Christian studies. One of the merits of this long-awaited book is its section on gender issues, in which the authors argue that the church is one of the few domains in Africa where women can emerge as leading personalities. Nancy Schwartz observes that notions of what is peripheral and what is significant are, of course, culturally constructed. For ordinary Kenyan women, ideas about death and burial are the centre of life, bringing 'issues of space, place and identity to the fore'. By giving voice to their beliefs, both Christian and traditional religious, and demonstrating their social significance, Schwartz provides a more inclusive description of female agency in Africa.

Journal

Journal of Religion in Africa – Brill

Published: Jan 1, 2000

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