"The effect of the colonial administration was reinforced by the missionaries and mission schools. Christian missions were established in Igboland in the late 19th century. They had few converts at first, but their influence by the 1930’s was considered significant, generally among the young. A majority of Igbo eventually “became Christians” - they had to profess Christianity in order to attend mission schools, and education was highly valued. But regardless of how nominal their membership was, they had to obey the rules to remain in good standing, and one rule was to avoid “pagan” rituals. Women were discouraged from attending mikiri [meetings] where traditional rituals were performed or money collected for the rituals, which in effect meant all mikiri.
"Probably more significant, since mikiri were in the process of losing some of their political functions anyway, was mission education. English and Western education came to be seen as increasingly necessary for political leadership - needed to deal with the British and their law - and women had less access to this new knowledge than men. Boys were more often sent to school, for a variety of reasons generally related to their favored position in the patrilineage. But even when girls did go, they tended not to receive the same type of education. In mission schools, and increasingly in special “training homes” which dispensed with most academic courses, the girls were taught European domestic skills and the Bible, often in the vernacular. The missionaries’ avowed purpose in educating girls was to train them to be Christian wives and mothers, not for jobs or for citizenship.62 Missionaries were not necessarily against women’s participation in politics - clergy in England, as in America, could be found supporting women’s suffrage. But in Africa their concern was the church, and for the church they needed Christian families. Therefore, Christian wives and mothers, not female political leaders, was the missions’ aim. As Mary Slessor, the influential Calabar missionary, said : 'God-like motherhood is the finest sphere for women, and the way to the redemption of the world.'"
— Judith Van Allen (1972). “Sitting on a Man”: Colonialism and the Lost Political Institutions of Igbo Women.
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adex3g 5 months
