Mission as Globalization

Methodists in Southeast Asia at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

David W. Scott

Through an examination of Methodist mission to Southeast Asia at the turn of the twentieth century, this broad-ranging book unites the history of globalization with the history of Christian mission and the history of Southeast Asia. The book explores the international connections forged by the Methodist Episcopal Church’s Malaysia Mission between 1885 and 1915, putting them in the context of a wave of globalization that was sweeping the world at that time, including significant developments in Southeast Asia.

To establish intellectual connections between the study of globalization and this historical setting, the book suggests six metaphors for understanding the mission. Each metaphor is based on some aspect of secular globalization: the Methodist connection as a migratory network, mission agencies as multinational corporations, the Malaysia Mission as a franchise system, the Methodist Episcopal Church as a media conglomerate, mission institutions as civil society organizations, and Methodist mission as a global vision.

In chapters exploring each metaphor separately, the book reviews how each form of secular globalization functions to create transnational connections before examining the details of how the Malaysia Mission functioned in a similar fashion. Along the way, the book investigates the lives of all involved in the mission: missionaries, church members of the mission, and mission supporters. Although Southeast Asia (including the Straits Settlements, Federated Malay States, Sarawak, and Netherlands Indies) and the United States are important geographic foci for the book, India, China, Britain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Germany, Australia, and Canada all have parts to play.

In exploring these metaphors, the book draws on several scholarly fields including migration studies, business history, media studies, political theory, and cultural history, blending them together into a social history of the mission. By so doing, it identifies both ways in which the effects of Christian mission paralleled other globalizing forces and unique contributions Christian mission made to turn-of-the-twentieth-century globalization.

Lexington Books

Pages: 240 • Trim: 6⅜ x 9¼

978-1-4985-2663-0 • Hardback • July 2016 • $117.00 • (£90.00)

978-1-4985-2664-7 • eBook • July 2016 • $111.00 • (£85.00)

Subjects: Religion / Christian Ministry / Missions, Religion / General, Religion / Christian Church / History, Religion / Christianity / Methodist, Social Science / World / Asia

Mission as Globalization

Methodists in Southeast Asia at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

Hardback

eBook

Summary

Through an examination of Methodist mission to Southeast Asia at the turn of the twentieth century, this broad-ranging book unites the history of globalization with the history of Christian mission and the history of Southeast Asia. The book explores the international connections forged by the Methodist Episcopal Church’s Malaysia Mission between 1885 and 1915, putting them in the context of a wave of globalization that was sweeping the world at that time, including significant developments in Southeast Asia.

To establish intellectual connections between the study of globalization and this historical setting, the book suggests six metaphors for understanding the mission. Each metaphor is based on some aspect of secular globalization: the Methodist connection as a migratory network, mission agencies as multinational corporations, the Malaysia Mission as a franchise system, the Methodist Episcopal Church as a media conglomerate, mission institutions as civil society organizations, and Methodist mission as a global vision.

In chapters exploring each metaphor separately, the book reviews how each form of secular globalization functions to create transnational connections before examining the details of how the Malaysia Mission functioned in a similar fashion. Along the way, the book investigates the lives of all involved in the mission: missionaries, church members of the mission, and mission supporters. Although Southeast Asia (including the Straits Settlements, Federated Malay States, Sarawak, and Netherlands Indies) and the United States are important geographic foci for the book, India, China, Britain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Germany, Australia, and Canada all have parts to play.

In exploring these metaphors, the book draws on several scholarly fields including migration studies, business history, media studies, political theory, and cultural history, blending them together into a social history of the mission. By so doing, it identifies both ways in which the effects of Christian mission paralleled other globalizing forces and unique contributions Christian mission made to turn-of-the-twentieth-century globalization.

Details

Lexington Books

Pages: 240 • Trim: 6⅜ x 9¼

978-1-4985-2663-0 • Hardback • July 2016 • $117.00 • (£90.00)

978-1-4985-2664-7 • eBook • July 2016 • $111.00 • (£85.00)

Subjects: Religion / Christian Ministry / Missions, Religion / General, Religion / Christian Church / History, Religion / Christianity / Methodist, Social Science / World / Asia

Author

David W. Scott is director of Mission Theology for the General Board of Global Ministries of the United Methodist Church. Previously, he taught history of religion, world religions, and leadership at Ripon College in Ripon, Wisconsin.

Table of Contents

1. The Malaysia Mission in the Context of Southeast Asian Globalization
2. Methodist Mission as a Global Vision
3. Methodism as a Global Culture
4. Methodist Episcopal Church as a Media Conglomerate
5. Mission Agencies as Multinational Corporations
6. The Malaysia Mission as a Franchise System
7. The Methodist Connection as a Migratory Network

Reviews

That Christianity and the global mission movement have been driving forces in globalization is not a new idea. What makes Scott’s study invaluable is the substantial evidence he offers about the early years of globalization and the role of religion in this process.... The book contributes both to an academic study of mission history in Asia and to a growing body of literature that discusses the transformation of the Christian movement in the tension between what Andrew Walls so aptly called the “pilgrim principle and the indigenizing principle”.... The book will be attractive to many types of reader: those interested in the history of mission in general; to readers in cultural history willing to understand that globalization has always been more than an economic expansion; to those wanting to learn about characteristics of the Methodist tradition; and to anyone interested in the history of Southeast Asia, where Methodist Christianity played an important role, particularly in education and among the Chinese and Tamil minorities. The book is a most welcome academic contribution to the discussion of globalization at a time when it has come under fire in new ways.
— Mission Studies

By focusing on three decisive decades of the Methodist missionary enterprise in Southeast Asia, David Scott has added a meticulously researched and delicately stitched history of fervent evangelism, ecclesiastical growth and institutional development. Scott artfully places Methodist missionary expansion in Malaysia and Singapore in the context of a rapidly changing socioeconomic and political environment emphasizing their interconnectivity and mutually reinforcing patterns..... Scott takes the reader on a fascinating journey.... Scott makes an original contribution to mission studies by providing remarkable insights into the unfolding of the Methodist church’s methodical movement from the U.S. temperate climes (especially Minnesota) into the tropics of equatorial Malaysia.... Having come to this project knowing very little about the status of mission in Southeast Asia at the turn of the twentieth century, I was swept away by the scope and depth of this historical survey. Not only was I immersed in the macro-realities of a complex region undergoing profound transnational connections, but also of the talent, commitment, and courage of my missionary forebears and the people their ministries touched. Scott’s innovative approach to consider the missional experience in the context of globalization worked. Hopefully it will encourage other scholars to follow in his footsteps.
— Methodist History

By focusing on the spread of Methodism in Malaysia, David Scott illuminates the interface between missionary Christianity and globalization. This excellent volume brings mission history into the mainstream of World History. I highly recommend this book as a substantial contribution to the study of cultural globalization and of Christianity as a worldwide, interconnected religion.
— Dana Robert, Boston University

Employing a nuanced construction of globalization as research framework, David Scott's careful study of Methodism in Malaysia, and southeast Asia more broadly, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries brims with provocative insight and fertile possibilities for future research. Meticulously researched, thoroughly versed in the subject matter, and well written, Scott's work is an important contribution not only to world Christian historiography but also, and especially, to Methodist historical and theological studies.
— Hendrik R. Pieterse, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary

David Scott's study of the Malaysia mission provides a refreshing look at Western missionary expansion by moving past typical explanatory frameworks of mission and colonialism or recipient responses by embedding mission history thoroughly within the discussion of the forces of globalization. By doing so, he exemplifies a method and approach crucially needed in today's scholarship.
— Charles Farhadian, Westmont College

This is a fine study that sheds new light on a neglected aspect of Methodist history. Scott is to be commended for the interdisciplinary nature of this work, which offers a nuanced treatment of the subject and suggests that further examination of the relationship between Christian mission and globalization may be in order.
— Journal of World History