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Protestant missionary children's lives, c.1870-1950

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Protestant missionary children’s historical lives are examined from the perspectives of parents, churches and children, to reveal complicated existences. This book takes a comparative approach acro...
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  • 20 January 2026
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Protestant missionary children were uniquely ‘empire citizens’ through their experiences of living in empire and in religiously formed contexts. This book examines their lives through the related lenses of parental, institutional and child narratives. To do so it draws on histories of childhood and of emotions, using a range of sources including oral history. It argues that missionary children were doubly shaped by parents’ concerns and institutional policy responses. At the same time children saw their own lives as both ‘ordinary’ and ‘complicated’. Literary representations boosted adult narratives. Empire provided a complex space in which these children navigated their way between the expectations of two, if not three, different cultures. The focus is on a range of settings and on the early twentieth century. Therefore, the book offers a complex and comparative picture of missionary children’s lives.
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Price: £25.00
Pages: 272
Publisher: Manchester University Press
Imprint: Manchester University Press
Series: Studies in Imperialism
Publication Date: 20 January 2026
ISBN: 9781526194848
Format: Paperback
BISACs:

POLITICAL SCIENCE / Imperialism, Colonialism and imperialism, RELIGION / Christianity / History, EDUCATION / History, History of education, History of religion, Social and cultural history

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‘This is an impressive history of a group until now overlooked in studies of imperialism. In addition to institutional and other adult perspectives, extensive interviews give voice to the children themselves. Drawing upon the history of emotion and memory to enrich his analysis, Morrison sensitively captures the complex significance of missionary children’s lives.’
—Katie Pickles, The University of Canterbury/ Te Whare Wananga o Waitaha

Introduction: Children, missions, empire and emotions
1 Public representations: missionary children inhabiting literary spaces
2 Parental narratives
3 Institutional narratives
4 Children’s and young people’s narratives: life as ordinary
5 Children’s and young people’s narratives: life as complicated
6 Private navigations: missionary children inhabiting imperial and colonial spaces
Conclusion

Index