Missionary Practices on the Gold Coast, 1832–1895: Discourse, Gaz ...

Thus, gender rests not only on the historical interpretations of masculinity and femininity, but also mirrors the right of self-expression and freedom of white womanhood outside the confinement of European society in the colonial environment. For the purpose of this study “race,” is defined as an ideological construction premised on the notion that differences in terms of, firstly, skin color and rationality and secondly, sexuality, are physical realities that reflect ordering in society. As the focus is on white missionaries, the terms “sexuality” and “skin color” will show what is socially and culturally accepted by encouraging with consanguineous marriages to prevent racial mixing, as we shall see in the case of Rosine Widmann. Consequently, this study defines race as an ideology that attempts to inscribe homogeneity as a valuable instrument in determining culture in the colonial environment. Finally, the term “Gold Coast” is used instead of its present name, Ghana, in order to situate the region within its proper historical context.

The initial investigation was conducted at the Basel Mission Archives in Switzerland, beginning in 2000 and ending in 2002. The various manuscripts presented here, as evidence are largely unpublished documents and secondary materials that have received little attention to date. They include mission reports, diaries, mission ordinances, instructions to the local employees and congregations, photographs, and correspondence between the mission and the colonial government. The manuscripts are all fragmented, except for Reindorf’s The History of the Gold Coast and Asante (1895). It is important to note that Basel missionaries self-censored their reports to meet the mission’s imposed editorial requirements. The Home Committee developed a strong set of ordinances to prevent independent individual development of the missionaries in foreign territories to ensure that power and decision making remained permanently in the hands of the Committee. There is a paragraph in the Goldküste Verordnungen [Gold Coast Ordinances] 1861 (§ 57), which addresses this discursive control.