Women and Western Mission: A Case Study on the Christian Khasi and Garo Tribal Women
Abstract
Western mission justified a mission to the Global South that was ingrained with the dominance of its culture and values. Women’s mission, as a tool of this mission, patronized themselves as the ‘care-taker’ of the ‘subjugated’ women of the Global South. This mission promulgated new ways of thinking and prescribed new gender roles and values to the Global South. In doing so, it framed the traditional roles and cultural values of the non-Western world as oppressive and replaceable. Subsequently, Women’s mission along with Western feminism and Feminist theology as a broad idea has been challenged by feminists from the Global South. This research examines the impact of Western missions from the early to the modern period among the Khasi and Garo tribal communities in Northeast India. It will examine how the Western context influenced and shaped the later women missionaries’ outlook on these tribal people and analyze the impact of modern missions.