Northern missionaries aimed to discipline black religious emotionalism and home life
Evidence
Similar to other northern white missionaries in the South, Spelman’s founders voiced concern over the expressive character of black religion. They spoke of their work as if they had embarked upon a foreign mission field, and frequently referred to the “heathenism” in both Atlanta and Africa. They strove to rid black worship of emotionalism. Viewing the homes of their students as a retrogressive and debasing influence, Packard and Giles argued for the necessity of boarding school facilities. They sought to surround their students with refined manners, “correct” Baptist doctrine, and “proper” religious and social deportment. — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 185
Categorization
- ADDENDUM: Connects directly to the immodesty moral-panic article: missionary efforts to discipline black worship and home deportment are a racialized extension of the same class/identity policing the article tracks, only here imposed across race lines.
- XREF: connects to: Black and white missionaries jointly imposed Victorian domesticity as core black education. — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 458; Northern Baptist missionaries imposed culturally chauvinist worship norms on black congregations — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 544; White Baptist missionary women supplied model homes to train Black domestics — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 1655 (+3 more)
Broader Connections
- Black missionary training aimed to reform poor blacks’ habits
#expands(0.90) — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 189 - Missionary conversion was a racial-regulatory technology cultivating obedient subjectivity
#expands(0.82)