contribution of missionaries to education in ghanacontribution of missionaries to education in ghana

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Among other things the regulations required that all teachers should be registered, and a minimum salary was fixed. As Ayandele points out (1966:285), the ideal of many of the missions was to make their converts live literally as the unlearned and ignorant apostles of old. This ideal, combined with the fact that many missionaries discovered that Africans with only basic education were best at spreading the Gospel, meant that missionaries were reluctant to provide higher primary or secondary education (Ayandele 1966:286). The activities of the early Christian missionaries negatively affected the development of African traditional political institutions. Preventive medicine was hardly known; the result was that epidemics of different kinds were frequent. self help Establishment of Christian Churches In Ghana. Among the early Protestant evangelical societies founded in Great Britain were the Baptist Missionary Society, the Church Missionary Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, the Wesleyan Missionary Society and what became known as the Presbyterian Missionary Society of the Church of Scotland. Following agitation by the people in 1934, the government opened the old Yaba Higher College and Medical School, which awarded diplomas acceptable only locally. The traditions and values of the community, as well as the meaning of life, were taught to the child. Notably among these missionaries are the Wesleyan, Basel, and Bremen. The Portuguese were the first to introduce the Christian faith into West Africa but following their departure from the West Coast in the mid-seventeenth century, the Christian religion survived only in Upper Guinea where a bishop was maintained in the Cape Verde Islands serving also a part of the mainland. After earlier unsuccessful attempts by the missionaries Chretien Proten, Henrick Huckuff and Jacobus Capitein, the Anglican, Rev. Because of rivalry, instead of building one common, multi-denominational school in a village that really only needed the one school, missionaries each built a school for their particular denomination and competed for students (Berman 1974:533). Thus, despite what the images of suffering African children on websites such as that of Compassion Canada might lead one to believe, it is time for Africans to educate their own, without any interference. Within ten years the C.M.S had opened twelve more schools in what is today Cross Rivers State. These contradictions are surprisingly absent from contemporary research. Prominent among the early Christian missionaries to come to the Gold Coast (Ghana) were the Roman Catholic, Methodist, Basel, Bremen and Anglican missions. And yet the Asafo provided most of the services which a community needed: protection against military attacks, communal services, etc. In 1827 it grew into Fourah Bay College. The statistical evidence suggests that education would have spread more evenly. The early European Christian missionaries in West Africa experienced a number of difficulties, some arising from factors outside their control and others of their own making. The Basel Mission. English African prose Third, rivalry between the various Christian denominations also contributed to the poor standards of education. These trends occasionally brought kings into conflict with the missionaries and their converts. This study simply offers systematic, long-term evidence of it. The missionaries seemed to have concentrated much of their effort on the production of export crops. In the Gambia, the Methodist missionary and first principal of what later became known as the Gambia High School, the Rev. ), Father Auguste Moreau and Father Eugene Murat, arrived at Elmina and revived the Roman Catholic Church in Ghana. But the funds and other needed materials even when available could not reach their station in time. Do you have a 2:1 degree or higher? Frank Ogodo Ogbeche These missionaries saw death in the course of their evangelizing work as a means to ascend to heavenly glory. In this chapter, we shall examine how Christianity and Western-style education influenced West Africans values, attitudes and life-styles. Being ignorant of the significance of certain institutions and practices of the people of West Africa, and occasionally being misled by their over-zealous followings into wrongly interpreting the peoples heritage, the missionaries compelled pupils in their schools and docile adult converts to shun their own ancestral practices. From 1870 to 1914 the Basel Mission succeeded in extending its work from the Akwapim Ridge to Kwahu, Akim and Asante and across the Volta as far as Yendi the north in 1913. Hope Waddell was later joined by the Rev. Father Burke became director of the Divine Word Language and Cultural Centre in Ghana. The last two decades have witnessed the emergence of privately owned higher education institutions in Nigeria, including those owned by religious bodies and even by their individual members. For terms and use, please refer to our Terms and Conditions station in 1858, it was not until 1889 that the missionaries entered Hausaland, which was predominantly Muslim. Johannes Zimmermann wrote a grammar of the Ga language, and in 1874 the Rev. The Rev. Its message was that of love and the universal brotherhood of mankind. History of the church in Africa: a survey. The first Europeans arrived at the West-African Coasts at the end of the fifteenth century. The work of the Basel Missionary Society was taken over with the consent of the Basel Mission Home Board by the United Free Church of Scotland whose ecclesiastical organization was Presbyterian. A new era began with the settlements of Black Christians from Nova Scotia in Sierra Leone in 1787 and the missionary advance inland from Cape Town beginning with the arrival there of J. T. van der Kemp in 1799. It is much easier to interact on an equal basis or even challenge the authority of another group when one is able to communicate in that groups language, instead of having to rely on an interpreter or non-verbal gestures, which undermine ones ability to show authority or express ones beliefs. They include Sierra Leone 1900-1933; Ghana 1903; Cape Verde 1904-1910; and St Vincent 1907-1912. In conclusion, the educational enterprise of the Christian missionaries in the British and Italian colonies of Africa during the mid-nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries was primarily negative for the African pupils. senior high school history In 1859, the first newspaper in Yoruba, called the Iwe-Irohim, was published by the missionaries. Apart from the extreme south and the Horn, the interior was hardly touched by Europeans before the last quarter of the Nineteenth Century. In due course leprosariums and orphanages were built to supplement their medical services. %%EOF This special relationship continued until 1960 when Fourah Bay became a college of the newly reconstituted University of Sierra Leone; the other constituent college located at Njala developed from a training college founded in 1920. Longman Group Ltd. London and Basingstoke, 1986, Fage, J.D. It was not until 1909 that the government opened a teacher training college and a technical school in Accra. Wm. Cultural deprivation is what many of us suffer from []. A permanent station was established in Lagos in 1868, soon followed by others at Lokoja, Abeokuta and Ibadan. J. C. Taylor, in these parts of southern Nigeria can still be seen today. These missions significantly influenced the systematic educational development in the Gold Coast. However hypocritical, government support for the schools should not be surprising, considering the benefits the colonial governments stood to gain. Website design and development by Americaneagle.com, Inc, Society of the Divine Word- Western Province, Society of the Divine Word- Southern Province. The country has diverse geography, people groups, and languageswith English as the common language, and more than 11 others with state recognition. Here you can choose which regional hub you wish to view, providing you with the most relevant information we have for your specific region. Etherington, Norman. In December 1868 he went with his wife and child to Anum in the present-day Volta Region of Ghana. In 1910, a prominent report of the World Missionary Conference concluded: [T]here can be no question of polygamy. It started first among the Yoruba recaptives who had embraced the Christian faith while in Sierra Leone (freed from slave trading ships by the British Royal Naval Squadron), and who returned home between 1839 and 1845. Kalu, Ogbu. In Sierra Leone, the Church Missionary Society (CMS), offshoot of the Anglican Church, was the first to become firmly established chiefly among the freed captive and freed slave settlers from Britain, Nova Scotia and other parts of the New World. Series CLS. One of them, Philip Quaque, returned in 1765 as an ordained priest. Our academic experts are ready and waiting to assist with any writing project you may have. Soon after, in 1835 they moved up to Akropon on the hills in Akuapem, where the pioneer missionary the Rev. Almost all the missions in West Africa faced financial problems in the early stages of their missionary work. A notable example, in Ghana, was the Methodist experimental farm near Cape Coast whose crops included cotton, coffee, black pepper, mango, ginger, cinnamon and olive trees. Soon after the Methodist experiment, the church Missionary Society set up their own school at Badagry. But with colonial conquest and antimalarial drugs, they moved further into the continent. Instead of adapting the teachings and practices of the new religion to suit indigenous values, as it did when the same Christian religion adopted Greek, Roman, German and Anglo-Saxon native practices, the early Christian missionaries condemned totally as pagan, and to be avoided by their converts, whatever they considered strange. West Africa and Christianity. The American Episcopal Evangelical (A.M.E.) Zion Church owes its foundation in Ghana to Bishop J. Bryan Small, who started work first at Keta in 1898. The resulting atmosphere of disunity enabled the European colonialists to easily achieve their goal of economic exploitation. Under the Basel Missions Salem system, converts were separated from the traditional society. And yet this was what earlier missionaries in pagan Europe had done when, for example, they had changed the Sabbath to suit the pagan Sun Day (hence Sunday), and had also adopted the dates of the pagan festivals to celebrate Christmas Day and the Easter festival. Some of these new crops were grapes coffee, mango, ginger, and olives. Some of these effects are still with us today. In an ironic twist, the more Africans became versed in the Bible, the more they began to challenge missionaries. Given their priorities, it should thus come as little surprise that missions often provided poor education to the African pupils. The others include the French trading posts at Grand Bassam (Ivory Coast), Assinie and Libreville in Gabon. There were several reasons for this poor education, some intentional and some not. From the second half of the eighteenth century, a fervent wave of evangelical spirit developed in the United Kingdom, Europe and the New World which inspired men and women with the missionary fervour to found religious societies whose members would go out to Africa and the other lands. Another important German missionary was Wilhelm Johannson, better known by the English version of his name, William Johnson, who is revered in the history of the CMS in West Africa. Africa and the Winder World 3. From simple essay plans, through to full dissertations, you can guarantee we have a service perfectly matched to your needs. New missionary societies (the LMS, the CMS, the Holy Ghost Fathers, the White Fathers, etc.) Their arrival in South Africa was aimed particularly at spreading the Word of God. . This chapter traces the origins and long-term development of African mass education in colonial sub-Saharan Africa. James Fieldhouse, produced a Wolof Grammar in 1876. In 1950 Albert Academy was founded in Freetown; for-a long lime it was the secondary school in the Colony serving largely children from the provinces, among them were the future heads of state, Sir Milton Margai and Dr. Siaka Stevens. There were only bush paths, and no roads in the early times. They provided missionaries a way to spread Eurocentric norms and attract new converts. Included on the website is information about the charitys programs, such as their Leadership Development Program in which participants earn a degree in their chosen field of study, and participate in Christian leadership training, enabling them to become a fully developed agent of change in their nation (Compassion Canada 2011). Among his pioneering achievements, he arranged for three youths to be sent to England for training as evangelists. 2236624), The beginning of Africanisation : the dawn of the missionary motive in Gold Coast education, Early colonial and missionary records from West Africa, West Indies material in the archives of the USPG, 1710-1950. Andrew Jackson Foster (1925-1987) was an American pioneer of deaf education in several countries in Africa. Operational Christianity started 267 Years ago. 2: Trans-Saharan Trade. Missionaries travelled through dense evergreen forests, crossed rivers and climbed mountains to bring the Gospel to as many Ghanaians as they could. Evans Brothers, Ltd. London. Another important Catholic missionary in this area was the Irishman, Bishop Shanahan. Babalola, E. O. Christianity in West Africa. African Drama Through academic lessons and lessons on Western etiquette and hygiene, mission students were isolated from their traditional cultures, a traumatic experience that would continue to trouble many students for the rest of their lives. The latter, non-academic form of education provided by the missions has stimulated much interest among scholars, who are particularly interested in the failure of many of these schools and the hypocritical government support for the schools, seeing as the import of cheap goods from the mother countries caused many vocational school graduates, such as seamstresses, to be unemployed (Ayandele 1966:296; Foster 1965:134). THE CHRISTIAN MISSIONARIES AND VERNACULAR LITERATURE; Another valuable contribution of the Christian missionaries in West Africa was the development of literature in the local vernaculars, this included the translation of the Bible into some of the important local languages. With the exception of the first two volumes, marked "West Africa", these items are drawn from the volumes Series CWW. In the same year as the Basel missionaries settled in Akuapem 1835 the Wesleyan (later Methodist) Church was established at Cape Coast by the Rev. It is important to emphasize that the modern history of the Christian Mission in Africa started from the late Eighteenth Century, the Catholics had been there earlier in the first centuries of the Christian era especially during the first Portuguese adventures. Debrunner, Hans Werner. All the three secondary schools in Cape Coast were mission institutions. senior high school economics I have used my expertise to design and implement strategies for major projects including new programme development, global proposals, book launches, international talks, lectures, and executive . Brief History. Wed love to get to know you and discuss how God is calling you. church were founded in south-eastern Nigeria, the chief centres being Bonny and Brass. In regions where a denomination felt threatened by another denomination, the denominations were more likely to establish more schools in an attempt to gain more converts than their rival, while in regions such as northern Nigeria, where colonial policy prevented too much rivalry, schools were scarce (Bassey 1991:45). Governments are also not free from blame even if they had a laissez-faire educational policy, as in Ghana, where until 1944 the registration of schools was not required and no attempt was made to exert detailed control even over the activities of grant-aided [by the government] institutions except for a series of minimal registrations (Foster 1965:114). ABWE first began work in Ghana with a goal to reach unchurched Ghanaians in the Volta Region with the gospel and then to expand evangelism efforts to other parts of the country. Among the first missionaries was the Rev. Moreover, speaking through interpreters is a defective means of communicating ones thoughts to ones audience. Many Ghanaian communities got divided along religious lines. In addition to teaching, he served as national spiritual director of the Ghana Sacred Heart Enthronement Centre and spiritual director of the Accra Diocesan Sacred Heart Centre. It was also terribly hard for a woman to be driven away, and to lose her status in the society where she is respected as a wife and a mother. NUUT Co. Ltd. Kumasi, Ghana, 2011, Baarkinado. opened, in Freetown, the first boys secondary school in the country and another for girls in 1849, later renamed the Annie Walsh Memorial School. Daystar Press, 1978. The third, St Nicholas Grammar School (now Adisadel College), was founded by the Anglican Church in 1910. Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Bremen, Research Center on Inequality and Social Policy (SOCIUM), Universitt Bremen. Public money was spent only on the small number of government schools, totaling nineteen when Governor Guggisberg assumed office in 1919. One of their scholarships is a drawing for $2,500. These included the Baptist missionaries who under the American evangelist, Thomas Bowen, started work from Ogbomosho in 1855. Many missionaries died because of the climate and tropical disease. Joseph Dunwell. Efforts to change these norms were often aimed at women. Education (2002), the latest committee to work on education reforms in Ghana, recommended a critical review and approach to making teacher education relevant to the devel-opment of the country. This item is part of a JSTOR Collection. These attempts were traumatic for the students and threatened the survival of unique cultures. The effort of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah. He had a special devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. In addition, while missionaries did run many academic primary schools, they provided little secondary education, a practice which prevented natives from becoming too educated (Ayandele 1966:286) and potentially subversive. Roman Catholic and Anglican missionaries came to the Gold Coast from the 15th century. Grammar School for Boys in 1859, St Gregorys College opened by the Catholics in 1876, Methodist Boys High School 1878 and Methodist Girls High School 1879. The first batch, who came out between 1804 and 1806, included pioneer missionaries like Renner and Nylander. Initially, a majority of the missionary journeys was done with English-Speaking Protestants and later, in the 1820s and 1830s, they were joined by continental Protestantism from Germany, Switzerland and France. While they frowned upon bridewealth, female genital cutting, or matrilineality, they held a special grudge against polygamy. PROBLEMS FACED BY THE CHRISTIAN MISSIONARIES. quiz The Christian religion teaches the doctrine of one supreme God and is opposed to the worship of any other forms of deity. He also blogs at BloggingtotheMax.com. These pioneer mission schools met with a discouraging response. In 1859, the first newspaper in Yoruba. Then share it on your favourite social media platform for the benefit of others you care about. Thus missionaries, by imparting education that promoted dependence on colonial rule, arguably contributed to the political instability that continues in the present day in many former African colonies, such as Kenya and Eritrea. For example, they preached against human sacrifice. His funeral Mass was Sept. 27, followed by burial at St. Mary Cemetery at Techny. They often attributed natural ailments to supernatural causes and resorted to mystic cults to appease the unknown spirit, before applying medicine to the sick person. Christian Missionaries. In the days of Portuguese contacts with Nigeria, Catholic priests had established missionary stations in Benin and the neighbourhood. A second reason for the poor education of the mission schools was that in many cases the teachers in mission schools were unqualified as teachers, but were instead preachers by training. By focusing on the African demand for education, I showed that Africans were not just passive recipients of mission schooling. When he arrived in Nkwatia-Kwahu to teach English at St. Peters Secondary School, the town had yet to benefit from electricity and running water. An Alumnus of the University of Cape Coast in Ghana, a Journalist, Author and a Philanthropist. Besides education, they cared for the sick. The missionary impact on education would have far-reaching consequences, as their creation of a weak basis of education would slow down the political and educational development of many former colonies in Africa. Soon after secondary schools were opened in other parts of southern Nigeria, including Bonny High School, which was taken over by government in 1904. Father Tetteh also took note of Father Burkes humility and devotion to his students. We've received widespread press coverage since 2003, Your UKEssays purchase is secure and we're rated 4.4/5 on reviews.co.uk. Christianity in northern Nigeria. They therefore set about to achieve this through introduction of formal education among the Batswana people. 26. It is obvious that the main reason why the missionaries came to Ghana was to convert the indigenous people to the Christian faith. What would have happened if missionaries had not insisted on monogamy? During the first half of the 19th century they targeted healthier places, with relatively lower malaria-risk, where European missionaries could survive and train local African missionaries and teachers (Jedwab et al. In 1954, he became the first Deaf African American to earn a bachelor's degree from Gallaudet University, the American university for the Deaf, and the first to earn a master's degree from Eastern Michigan University.He earned a second master's degree from Seattle Pacific Christian . The achievement of the purpose of these Christian Missions came with some costs. In the 19thh century, too, Afro-Brazilians returned to Benin and Nigeria with Catholicism. homework help It is important for several reasons. In many instances, they made their converts rebel against traditional rulers and other spiritual leaders. I will earn a commission if you follow a link to purchase a product. No plagiarism, guaranteed! Foremost in the contribution of the early Christian missionaries to the development of Ghana is their efforts to bring Western education to Ghanaians. 1931. Private Study Longman Nigeria Plc., 1994, Boahen, A.A. et al Tropics in West Africa History. Perhaps the greatest service of the missionaries was the promotion of western education and the development of vernacular literature. One of them, Philip Quaque, returned in 1765 as an ordained priest. began work in many parts of Africa. Further, the missionaries introduced improved methods of farming together with modern farm implements. People all around the world are searching for hope, but many dont have someone to tell them about the hope found in Jesus. However, as Jonathan Miran (2002) argues in his work on the roles of missionaries and the Italian state in Eritrean education, missionaries should not be held solely accountable for the poor standards of education. They were to spread the message of the Gospel, render social services to the people and to assist in the suppression of slavery and the slave trade. Johannes Zimmermann wrote a grammar of the Ga language and translated the entire Bible and a Bible history into Ga. Then in 1874, the Rev. The effects of work done by Bishop Ajayi Crowther, assisted by the Igbo recaptive the Rev. 503 0 obj <> endobj It was difficult for the European missionaries to communicate freely with the local people. 2018). As one Eritrean student remarks, Our sisters [the Italian Sisters] would have undoubtedly taught better and more, but the Italian government in the colony did not permit Eritreans to get good instruction (T.T. %PDF-1.7 % Yet, the relationship between European missionaries and African populations had some contradictions. The Presbyterians, also, opened hospitals in several parts of the country, including the one at Agogo in Asante-Akyem. Thus as early as 1823, the Roman Catholic Sisters started a clinic for the sick and for children in Banjul. Agricultural school graduates did not compete with European industries or European farmers, as they mainly grew crops that could not be grown in European climates. Mr. Henry Kwadwo Amoako is a Ghanaian Social Scientist, Researcher and Acclaimed Historian for over two decades. S.J. The study traces the his tory of colonial education and the tremendous contributions of missionaries in the establishment of formal education in the region. They need YOU. Similar developments were carried out by the missionaries in other Nigerian languages, Efik, Kanuri, Igbo, etc. Development of Education in Sierra Leone. Similar developments were carried out by the missionaries in other Nigerian languages, Efik, Kanuri, Igbo, etc. In fact in 1966, Father Burke led students to a victory in a national educational contest called the Ghana TV Cup. C.M.S. By the close of the nineteenth century the major Christian missionary churches had opened elementary schools in many part of southern Nigeria with an enrolment of about 74,000 by the First World War. ), Father Auguste Moreau and Father Eugene Murat, arrived at Elmina and revived the Roman Catholic Church in Ghana. In Nigeria, one of the lasting works of the C.M.S. But despite the work of Portuguese missionaries based on the island of Sao Tome and later of Spanish missionaries in Benin, it was not until the nineteenth century that the Christian religion was firmly established in Nigeria. While the Evangelical Presbyterian missionaries were the First to develop literature in Ewe, the Roman Catholics were responsible for Nzima literature. The city of Akuropong capital of the Akan state of Akuapem in Ghana, has known the Christian presence during the last 186 years, initially centered on the Basel Mission, then on the Free Church of Scotland, and now on the Presbyterian Church of Ghana. There were related organizations that sprang up in Scandinavia, Holland and the USA. Missionaries were no doubt also aware that Africans came to associate European technological achievement with Western education (Bassey 1991:45) and therefore offered Western education as a means to attract Africans of this belief and then convert them. Theres still so much to be learned from the history of education in Africa and its long-term consequences. Above, we have described the role that trading companies, missionaries, and the government played for the spread of Western education in the coastal areas from the late sixteenth century onwards. In short, the impact of teaching in the vernacular was more negative than positive, as it reinforced colonial rule and no doubt did very little to preserve native cultural identities, seeing as missionaries promoted European languages as superior and only used the vernacular because conversion and religious instruction were such high priorities. Initially,. Textbooks were heavily biased towards western ideas and values. Before 1925, there were only three secondary schools and three teacher training colleges in Ghana. Their converts, for many years, were confined to the people of southern Nigerian extraction resident in the north, and to the-large non-Muslim population of the north. In 1880, two Roman Catholic priests of the Society of African Missions (S.M.A. In this essay on the impact of Christian missionary activities on Ghanaian society, we shall examine the role of the missionaries in the development of Ghana and the rest of Africa. Meanwhile, the Scottish missionary, Mary Slessor, had established a reputation in the Cross River area as a nurse. History books tended to exaggerate in achievements of Europeans, making no reference to Africans own great past. Renewed evangelism started when the Basel (later known as Presbyterian) missionaries started work at Osu (Accra). Foremost in the contribution of the early Christian missionaries to the development of Ghana is their efforts to bring Western education to Ghanaians. First, missions saw education foremost as a means of conversion (Ayandele 1966: 286; Bassey 1991: 36; Berman 1974:527; Foster 1965:85; Sheffield 1973:11).

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