The American Board's Vision of Protestant Anatolia and Fostering Armenian Nationalism 1810–90

Abstract

In recent years there has been much debate about whether the activities of missionaries were an act of religious altruism or a medium of cultural expansion and a preparation for political involvement. The American expedition occurred during the early years of modern Western – as yet mainly British, French and Russian – penetration of the Ottoman realms. The immediate effect was to draw the East into the rapidly expanding capitalist world economy while containing the ambitions of rival powers in order to prepare for the Sublime Porte's ultimate dismemberment. This phase of missionary activity represented something extraordinary, because the Americans were attempting to impose their kind of Christianity, namely, Protestantism, on communities which had been Christian well before the Christian American identity came into being. This article examines the formation of the American Protestant missionaries' activities in Anatolia; missionaries' evaluations of events within the Empire, and their relations with the Armenians will be the focus of the analysis. In other words, attention will be drawn to how the missionary enterprise fostered Armenian nationalism by introducing Western political ideals and promoting Armenian cultural identity through education and the press discussed. Rather than examining the Armenian Question, this paper will trace the genesis of Armenian nationalism through the Boards' Protestant Anatolia vision.