“The Cockroaches of Canada”: French‐Canada,Immigration and Nationalism,Anti‐Catholicism in English‐Canada, 1905–1929

This article examines the central influence of anti‐Catholicism upon English‐Canadian nationalism in the first third of the twentieth century. Anti‐Catholicism provided an existing rhetorical and ideological tradition and framework within which public figures, intellectuals, Protestant church leaders and other Canadians communicated their diverse visions of an ideal Canada. The study of anti‐Catholicism problematises the rigid separation that many scholars have posited between a conservative ethnic nationalism and a progressive civic nationalism. Often times these very civic values were inextricable from a context of Britishness. In addition, anti‐Catholicism was not simply about theological differences between Protestants and Catholics. Instead this theological thread often intersected with the perceived socio‐political problems that Catholics and Catholicism posed. Hostility to Catholicism was not limited only to fraternal organisations such as the Orange Order; indeed the importance of anti‐Catholicism as a component of Canadian nationalism lies in its presence across the political and intellectual spectrum. Catholicism was perceived to inculcate values antithetical to British traditions of freedom and democracy.     

Engineering the Kingdom of God: Irrigation,Science and the Social Christian Millennium, 1880–1914

Irrigation was a hot issue in turn‐of‐the‐twentieth century Australia. Most often, it was embraced by booster‐visionaries who wanted it to provide Australia with a place at the table of nations. Not all irrigation enthusiasts placed the same emphasis on wealth and national power, however — indeed, there were some who believed it would help achieve a just distribution of social opportunity. In this article, I look at two Australian “social Christians”, the Melbourne minister, Charles Strong, and the South Australian journalist, Harry Taylor, who saw irrigation as an agent of God's Kingdom on Earth. This belief was part of a more general conviction, shared both by these men and other social Christians, that it was possible to merge millennial religiosity with evolution, progressive politics and rational principles.     

‘The Gospel of Health’: American Missionaries and the Transformation of Ottoman/Turkish Women's Bodies, 1890–1932

This article explores an overlooked aspect of American missionary modernisation efforts in the late Ottoman Empire: the attempted transformation of women's bodies. By the late nineteenth century, American missionary women and Ottoman government officials both viewed Ottoman women's bodies as a visible reflection of the empire's weaknesses, yet also as central to its survival and revival. The transformation of women's bodies from ‘uncontrolled’ to ‘robust’, they believed, was a prerequisite for a modern society. Through a close reading of missionary reports, correspondences and student memoirs, this study traces the development of physical education, hygiene and recreational sports at the missionary‐run American College for Girls (ACG) in Istanbul. Over time, the female teachers at the ACG partnered and collaborated with male Ottoman/Turkish government officials to implement these courses at girls’ schools across the region. While the government endorsed physical education as key to national progress and regeneration, the ACG educators framed it as a mode of international, feminist self‐empowerment. In reality, the missionaries continued to assert their own Western superiority and advance Orientalist notions through the education courses. By highlighting the shifts in women's body ideals, curricular development and nationalist rhetoric, I argue that women's bodies must be studied as a crucial site of missionary and republican reform.     

‘Tomorrow She Will Reign’: Intimate Power and the Making of a Queen Mother in Rwanda,c.1800–1863

This article explores the relationship between erotic and institutional power through the political biography of the Queen‐Mother (Umugabekazi) Nyiramongi (r. 1845–1863) in Rwanda. Using historical narratives, genealogies, epic poetry and the translated text of royal rituals, this article argues that Nyiramongi used her status as first an object of desire and then as an erotic partner to her husband to manoeuver herself and her family into positions of institutional power. In contrast to previous literature, this article frames women like Nyiramongi as political actors who consciously cultivated their intimate assets to participate in the construction of systems of power, using their status as daughters, wives, lovers, mothers and sisters to exercise indirect power, often leading to positions of institutional and direct power.     

Four Decades of “Discreet” Charismata: The Catholic Apostolic Church in Australia 1863–1900

For some years, the historiography of Australian Pentecostalism has been dominated by the belief that Pentecostalism came to Australia in 1909 through the agency of Sarah Jane Lancaster who had, in turn, been influenced by news of overseas events. There had, apparently, been little or no influence in the Australian context by such groups as the Catholic Apostolic Church, which formed in Britain in 1835, in the wake of Edward Irving's proto‐Pentecostal theology. Although members of the Catholic Apostolic Church arrived in Melbourne in the 1850s, the general view was that they had by then abandoned their earlier pursuit of the charismata. In 2012, I argued (based on a limited sample of evidence) that the adherents of the Catholic Apostolic Church in Australia both taught and practised the charismata throughout the second half of the nineteenth century. This evidence is contained in the Angels’ Report Books, located in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Since then, the Bradford collection has been fully digitised, thereby allowing a comprehensive review of the Catholic Apostolic Church's charismatic activity and further evaluation of the Lancaster hypothesis. The significance of this research is that it allows a considerable re‐framing of the pre‐history of Australian Pentecostalism, demonstrating that the Catholic Apostolic Church taught and practised glossolalia, prophecy and divine healing through the last four decades of the nineteenth century.