Transforming the Gospel of Domesticity: Luhya Girls and the Friends Africa Mission, 1917-1926

Abstract

Efforts to transform the lives of colonized and girls were integral to Christian missionary efforts throughout the world. This study of the attempts by a Quaker mission, in what is now Western Province, Kenya, to remake African wom- anhood indicates the limited success missionaries had in this effort. As with most evangelical missions, women's work for women involved domesticating African and girls. According to one missionary, the purpose of the Girls' Boarding School (GBS) was to teach girls to be better wives and mothers. This goal, how- ever, was subverted by both the missionaries and the schoolgirls. While the cur- riculum was designed to teach girls to submit to male authority, the female mis- sionary in charge of the school refused to do so herself. Furthermore, the school- girls manipulated missionaries and mission institutions to delay marriage and to control their choice of marriage partners. Graduates also used the skills learned at the GBS to cross gender and class boundaries, and contributed to the restructuring of Luhya society. Thus, while missionaries undoubtedly caused many dramatic changes in the lives of Luhya and girls and in Luhya culture, we see that they were manifestly unsuccessful in controlling the nature of these changes.