Citizens of a Christian nation : Evangelical missions and the problem of race in the nineteenth century / Derek Chang.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Chang, Derek, 1969-

Series:

Politics and culture in modern America.

Politics and culture in modern America

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

American Baptist Home Mission Society--History--19th century.

American Baptist Home Mission Society.

Home missions--United States--History--19th century.

Home missions.

Baptists--Missions--United States--History--19th century.

Baptists.

Evangelistic work--United States--History--19th century.

Evangelistic work.

African Americans--Missions--History--19th century.

African Americans.

Chinese Americans--Missions--History--19th century.

Chinese Americans.

White people--United States--Attitudes--History--19th century.

White people.

Missionaries--United States--Attitudes--History--19th century.

Missionaries.

Racism--Religious aspects--Baptists--History--19th century.

Racism.

United States--Race relations--Religious aspects--History--19th century.

United States.

Physical Description:

237 p.

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Philadelphia : University of Pennsylvania Press, c2010.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

In America after the Civil War, the emancipation of four million slaves and the explosion of Chinese immigration fundamentally challenged traditional ideas about who belonged in the national polity. As Americans struggled to redefine citizenship in the United States, the "Negro Problem" and the "Chinese Question" dominated the debate. During this turbulent period, which witnessed the Supreme Court's Plessy v. Ferguson decision and passage of the Chinese Exclusion Act, among other restrictive measures, American Baptists promoted religion instead of race as the primary marker of citizenship. Through its domestic missionary wing, the American Baptist Home Missionary Society, Baptists ministered to former slaves in the South and Chinese immigrants on the Pacific coast. Espousing an ideology of evangelical nationalism, in which the country would be united around Christianity rather than a particular race or creed, Baptists advocated inclusion of Chinese and African Americans in the national polity. Their hope for a Christian nation hinged on the social transformation of these two groups through spiritual and educational uplift. By 1900, the Society had helped establish important institutions that are still active today, including the Chinese Baptist Church and many historically black colleges and universities. Citizens of a Christian Nation chronicles the intertwined lives of African Americans, Chinese Americans, and the white missionaries who ministered to them. It traces the radical, religious, and nationalist ideology of the domestic mission movement, examining both the opportunities provided by the egalitarian tradition of evangelical Christianity and the limits imposed by its assumptions of cultural difference. The book further explores how blacks and Chinese reimagined the evangelical nationalist project to suit their own needs and hopes. Historian Derek Chang brings together for the first time African American and Chinese American religious histories through a multitiered local, regional, national, and even transnational analysis of race, nationalism, and evangelical thought and practice.

Contents:

Front matter

Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1. "A Grand and Awful Time"

Chapter 2. Faith and Hope

Chapter 3. Callings

Chapter 4. Congregation

Chapter 5. Conflict and Community

Conclusion

Notes

Index

Acknowledgments

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9781283897471

1283897474

9780812205954

0812205952

OCLC:

794700584