Title Page. Orientalism and Imperialism: Protestant Missionary
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Title page. Orientalism and Imperialism: Protestant missionary narratives of the ‘other’ in nineteenth and early twentieth-century Kurdistan. Submitted by Andrew Wilcox to the University of Exeter as a thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Kurdish Studies In February 2014 This thesis is available for Library use on the understanding that it is copyright material and that no quotation from the thesis may be published without proper acknowledgement. I certify that all material in this thesis which is not my own work has been identified and that no material has previously been submitted and approved for the award of a degree by this or any other University. Signature: ………………………………………………………….. 1 Abstract Through an examination of the letters, reports and published writings of the missionaries of two distinctive Protestant missions active in the Kurdish region during the nineteenth century, this thesis explores the Orientalist and imperialist qualities of missionary knowledge production. It demonstrates the diversity of Protestant missionary thought on the subject of the Orient and the individual nature of missionary knowledge production during this period. Equally importantly the study allows for a critical examination of the Orientalist critique in the context of missionary activity and a contextualised assessment of missionary complicity with imperialism. The findings of the study show that the Orientalism of the Anglican ‘Assyrian Mission’ and that of the American Presbyterian ‘West Persia Mission’ share common characteristics but, importantly, diverge diametrically in the meanings ascribed to the differences perceived to separate ‘Oriental’ from ‘Occidental’. This diversity in the representative style of the two missions can be linked to their opposed objectives in relation to proselytisation and thus suggests that their knowledge production was not solely determined by Orientalist discourse but also influenced by other discursive factors. Given Edward Said’s recognition of the diversity of the phenomenon of Orientalism it is therefore of great value to attempt to map some of this vast and divergent terrain of ideas. My thesis thus suggests that a meaningful division can be made within the Orientalist discourse between expressions of an Orientalism of essential difference and that of an Orientalism of circumstantial difference. Concerning imperialism, the study argues that, although these missionaries can be considered imperialists in an unwitting and indirect sense, care needs to be taken in the application of this label. My argument is that association with and contribution to textual attitudes which promote ideas of ontological or cultural superiority are a very different activity to conscious engagement in projects of imperial expansion; and that this needs to be recognised. Furthermore the standard model of a political metropolitan center determining the fate of its activities in the periphery is reversed in the case of these missionaries, where religious concerns drove engagement against political interests. 2 Table of Contents Title page 1 Abstract 2 List of Contents 3 Chapter One: Introduction 1.1) A Theoretical Model 5 1.2) Historical and Geographical Context 59 Chapter Two: Conflicting Interpretations of Missionary Endeavour 81 2.1) Agents of the Great Powers 82 2.2) Individual Agents of Personal Conscience 90 2.3) Missionaries as Ambiguous Actors 97 Chapter Three: Orientalism and Protestant Mission. 123 3.1) An Oriental Realm of ‘Mohammedan’ Domination 124 3.2) ‘Restoration’ and Essential Difference 155 3.3) Proselytisation and Circumstantial Difference 179 3 Chapter Four: Agents of Imperialism? 211 4.1) The Imperialism of the Anglican Mission 212 4.2) The Imperialism of the American Presbyterian Mission 247 Chapter Five: Conclusion 272 Bibliography 287 Maps Page 79 Map commissioned by Athelstan Riley circa1886 showing the location of the mission field within the region. Page 80 Map commissioned by Athelstan Riley 1886 showing names of towns and tribes within the mission field. 4 Chapter One. Introduction 1.1 Theoretical model The basic objective of this thesis is to examine critically, by way of case study, whether Protestant missionaries of the late nineteenth and early twentieth-centuries can be categorised unambiguously as Orientalists, as some historians have done, and equally to investigate whether these missionaries can be considered to be the agents of imperialism.1 My interest in this subject was initially sparked by the observation that two specific missions, both of which were Protestant, seemed to operate and express themselves in significantly different ways from one another in their missionary engagement with the same geographical location. It also seemed to me that neither mission conformed to my own a priori notion of the ‘imperialistic Orientalist’ as evoked by the works of Edward Said and subsequent scholars whose work will be discussed below.2 This observation throws into question the uniformity of the phenomenon frequently referred to as Orientalism and the explicit link which is often held to exist between Orientalism and imperialism.3 From this interest I have derived the two central research questions which drive this thesis. Firstly, does the knowledge production of these missionaries exhibit an Orientalist style, and if so what form does this Orientalism take? Secondly, can they be considered to be agents of imperialism? In order to understand and answer these two questions the theoretical model of this thesis derives from my own understanding of the Orientalist critique as proposed by Edward Said, and my analysis of the research data acts as a 1 In chapter two I will examine in detail some of the various representations of Protestant missionaries during this period which can be found in contemporary histories concerning the Middle East. 2 See: chapter two - Conflicting Interpretations of Missionary Endeavour. 3 I will discuss and define the concepts of Orientalism and imperialism later in this introduction, but for the time being Orientalism can be considered as ‘a style of thought’ which reifies the idea of the relationship between the ‘West’ and the ‘East’ in terms of a binary of opposition in which the former is represented as superior to the latter. The critique of Orientalism also asserts a relationship between these acts of representation and the furtherance of imperial interests. 5 contextualisation of that critique by testing some of its claims in a very specific setting.4 My case study focuses upon the archival evidence of two Protestant missions whose activities in the Kurdish region during this period have generated a rich source of data for analysis.5 The knowledge production of these missionaries includes representations of the region in which they worked, of the peoples who inhabited that region, and of the perceived relationship between these objects of knowledge and the ‘West’. My thesis gives greatest attention to the differences between these two missions in terms of their world-views, and explores how their divergent representations of ‘Orientals’ played into the inter-missionary struggle for influence over the local Christian community of the Old East Syrian Church. The two missions studied in this analysis are the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Mission to the Assyrian Christians, and the West Persia Mission of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America (PCUSA). Finally, this instructive and perhaps unique historical drama unfolded in a region known to these missionaries as Kurdistan, and it is thus Kurdistan and its various peoples which forms the particular Orient of their representations. In terms of periodisation, the primary focus of analysis is from the 1870s to the beginning of the First World War; a period roughly corresponding to the Belle Époque of continental Europe or the Gilded Era of America, a time which constitutes the height of European imperial expansion.6 Prior to engaging in an analysis of the primary data constituted by the personal textual output of these missionaries, which is the main object of this thesis, I will first define my understanding of the paradigm of Orientalism which I shall be using as my theoretical model and through which I shall be analysing the data. 4 A full explanation and definition of these concepts will be laid out in the proceeding sections of this introduction; the theoretical model of my thesis is thus based upon a critical understanding of the work of Edward Said as articulated in his seminal work Orientalism. Edward Said, Orientalism (London: Penguin, 2003 [1978]). 5 The meaning of the term Kurdistan will be fully discussed later in section two of this chapter. See: section - ‘Kurdistan’, chapter 1.2 - Historical and Geographical Context. 6 Although the work of the Anglican Rev. Badger predates this time frame his work is included for its important contribution to the ethos of the Anglican mission. 6 Orientalism and Essentialism The concept of Orientalism is central to this thesis but the term is potentially ambiguous. On the one hand the word itself can be taken as indicating the esteemed profession of those who simply study the Orient, and whose work does not necessarily conform to the dictates of ‘Western’ interests. On the other, it can indicate a discursive tradition which represents the Orient as a more or less homogeneous entity with regular and generalisable characteristics, and which does so in a manner that supports the underlying thesis of ‘Western’ superiority. It is this latter