Foremost in the contribution of the early Christian missionaries to the development of Ghana is their efforts to bring Western education to Ghanaians. Cultural deprivation is what many of us suffer from []. In line with this, formal education in Ghana was started by the western traders and the missionaries by the 15th century through the 18th century respectively. He introduced the Methodist Church in Asante in 1839, and won the support of the Asante king, Otumfour Nana Kweku Duah I who reigned between 25th August 1834 to 27th April 1867). Instead of needing to import skilled workers such as carpenters, the mission schools provided colonial governments with workers capable of building and maintaining the colonys infrastructure and basic technology, a contribution that kept the colonies running smoothly. They include Sierra Leone 1900-1933; Ghana 1903; Cape Verde 1904-1910; and St Vincent 1907-1912. For terms and use, please refer to our Terms and Conditions All work is written to order. Therefore, considering that the impact of mission education continues to have serious repercussions today, one must question whether the First World should continue to interfere in African education. The third, St Nicholas Grammar School (now Adisadel College), was founded by the Anglican Church in 1910. university courses Operating from Whydah in what is today the Peoples Republic of Benin (formerly Dahomey), Father Berghero, in 1860, visited Abeokuta and Lagos where freed Catholic slaves from Brazil welcomed him warmly. The original Yaba College in Lagos has grown into a polytechnic. Roman Catholic and Anglican missionaries came to the Gold Coast from the 15th century. The anti-slavery issue and the humanitarian conscience also played a vital role in stimulating European interest in Africa and gave an impetus to mission work. Reiterating what teacher education must encapsulate, Adegoke (2003) and Benneh (2006) indi-cated that the mission of Ghana's teacher education is to pro- Father Jean Marie Coquard, operating in and from Abeokuta for forty years, was renowned among the Egba as a priest and surgeon in the second half of the nineteenth century. Christian converts were indoctrinated to frown upon the use of indigenous first names in favour of Christian ones. They provided missionaries a way to spread Eurocentric norms and attract new converts. Before we examine the contribution of Christian missionaries in Ghana, we need to identify the missionaries that came to Ghana. Their activities had both positive and negative effects on Ghanaian society. Again, in West-Africa, the efforts to go beyond the coast to reach those inland with the gospel coincided with the southwards expansion of Islam which posed some threat to the expansion of the work of Christian evangelizing missions. Looking for a flexible role? Are you ready to discover the points for an essay on the contribution of the Christian mission to the social and economic development of Ghana? Being able to speak and write in the colonisers language was considered a privilege. Already have a license? Some of these new crops were grapes coffee, mango, ginger, and olives. History These missionaries saw death in the course of their evangelizing work as a means to ascend to heavenly glory. Thus, because of the motive of proselytization, unqualified teachers, and inter-denominational rivalry, missions frequently provided poor education. Evans Brothers, Ltd. London. While they frowned upon bridewealth, female genital cutting, or matrilineality, they held a special grudge against polygamy. They worked tirelessly to lay a foundation for formal education The European missionaries established elementary and second-cycle institutions in the country. More women than men attend church, and the more strict churchgoers tend to be wealthier and of higher social status than less churchgoers or non-Presbyterians. The missionary and colonial education aimed at character training and civilization resulted in cultural annihilation and religious, and linguistic hegemony. House, 1967. Also, Christian missionaries in Ghana were as zealous as their counterparts in Nigeria in pioneering medical services. 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. His immigrant Irish-born parents instilled faith and a firm work ethic in their sons. Furthermore, mission schools discouraged traditional ways of life outside of the classroom. Within a short time the missionaries spread their activities inland. One method of discouraging traditional practices was to give students a fully Western education. But with the abolition of slavery, the introduction of cocoa, and the Churchs efficient school system, she gradually became the Church of the social elite. 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. All rights reserved. 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). In Fanteland, the Methodists and Roman Catholics pioneered similar works. Christianity reborn: the global expansion of evangelicalism in the twentieth century. Christianity in West Africa: The Nigerian Story. 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. In Ghana the Presbyterians were pioneers in reducing Ga and Twi into . Arnold, 1986. The constant tensions between traditionalists and Christian converts often erupted into all-out conflicts. This was the work of the great missionary, Thomas Birch Freeman, who placed two missionaries, Mr and Mrs. de Graft, in charge of the school. He was followed, three years afterwards, by the Rev. 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 Sierra Leone, among the earliest higher institutions which the C.M.S. But that increase was greater in monogamous societies. For example, they made our people view polygamy and puberty rites as pagan practices. In 1981, Father Burke was promoted to headmaster and rector of Pope John XXIII Secondary School and Minor Seminary in Koforidua. The Akim area had about 3400 converts over 32 villages and there were about 900 children distributed in 27 Schools. Last, missionaries provided a very poor education, causing their students to be ill-equipped for social or material success, as they believed education to simply be a means for proselytization, were unqualified teachers, and allowed inter-denominational rivalries to interfere. The training college later became part of Achimota College. I wanted to buy a smartphone for him, but when he got to know the price of the cell phone, he humbly declined. The most momentous discovery in western Africa came in 1471, when Portuguese captains first reached the coast of modern Ghana between the mouths of the Ankobra and Volta rivers. I well remember when he came to live with me in Trenton. Hastings, Adrian. Today almost all of the population is Presbyterian, although the ancestral royal cult and many spirit cults still flourish. And thats why I decided to look deeply into this issue. I found that while educational outcomes are generally better in places that were exposed to Christian missions in the colonial era, traditionally polygamous societies benefited less. Listen as we explore missions, theology, and practice to help senders and goers alike. 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. Apart from giving to the converts a new religious faith which they consider is superior to the traditional religions, the Christian missionaries did pioneering work in introducing new crafts, industries, Western education and modern health services. The consequences of norm conflicts are likely to manifest beyond educational pursuit. This decreased the zeal with which people began to accept the Gospel leading to nominal Christianity. Box 6000, Techny, IL 60082-6000. We must not lose sight of the fact that the colonial government in Ghana and elsewhere in Africa relied on the activities of the missionaries to help them achieve the objectives of colonial rule. The agricultural schools the missions ran would have been even more advantageous to the colonial governments considering the discouragement of local industries that might have competed with the motherland. In addition, the contributions of celebrity missionaries, such as Christian Schwartz, William Carey, Alexander Duff, and James . These attempts were traumatic for the students and threatened the survival of unique cultures. 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. They therefore set about to achieve this through introduction of formal education among the Batswana people. Apart from the extreme south and the Horn, the interior was hardly touched by Europeans before the last quarter of the Nineteenth Century. T. Nelson. As happened in parts of Yorubaland in the last century, some of the Christian missionaries often engaged in local politics and took an active part in helping the colonial authorities in their wars of territorial expansion. What would have happened if missionaries had not insisted on monogamy? It was not until 1909 that the government opened a teacher training college and a technical school in Accra. The Methodists founded Mfantsipim (1876) for boys and Wesley Girls High School (1884). faceless characters This was because all the ships that came to the coast at that time were owned by trading firms and companies whose interest were basically on trade. He told me that that amount of money could pay for school fees for five students in secondary school in Ghana.. They also introduced vocational education in the country. mock tests %PDF-1.7 % Moreover, it was not in the colonial powers interest for the natives to become too educated, as they might become self-reliant and could conceivably demand independence from the colonial power, so encouraging the less intellectual agricultural schools was in the governments interest. By focusing on the African demand for education, I showed that Africans were not just passive recipients of mission schooling. 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. This hymn sums up the reasons why the Christian missionaries came to Africa and other parts of the world.