Theorizing Conversion: Christianity, Colonization, and Consciousness in the Early Modern Atlantic World

Abstract

While Christian evangelization and conversion were often the primary justifications for imperial expansion in the early modern Atlantic world, the meaning of the word "conversion" remains contested among scholars, particularly when used to refer to non-European conversion to Christianity. Several historians have argued that the term "conversion" simplifies a complex process and reiterates a missionary mindset. This article surveys a variety of alternatives to the word "conversion," including syncretism, hybridity, affiliation, appropriation, and practice. While assessing the benefits and drawbacks of each of these terms, it argues that discarding the word "conversion" risks minimizing or overlooking the experiences of non-European converts. Instead, it is more accurate to say that conversionfor both Europeans and non-Europeanswas a process of transformation that occurred on multiple planes. The social, cultural, and political implications are easier to identify in the historical record, but historians also need to take seriously the possibility of religious transformation as well.In order to do so, this essay draws on literature from the fields of anthropology and religious studies to identify two methods that can be particularly useful for describing non-European conversion: first, an emphasis on "lived religion" can help historians move past the misconception that Christianity is a bound system. By focusing on practice rather than doctrine, it de-centers missionaries and seeks, instead, to examine religious practice from the "bottom up." Second, interrogating the process of translation has great potential for historians of conversion, particularly during a period of colonial encounter. By exploring how Christian terms were redefined through their translation into non-European languages, historians will gain better insight into the cosmologies, beliefs, and practices of Native Americans and Africans. By using these methodsand recognizing that the meaning of "conversion" is, and always has been, in f luxhistorians can move past the "missionary mindset" and acknowledge the significance of the choice that many non-Europeans made to engage in Christian rites.

“Entanglement” as a concept in recent research on Christian missions in the South Pacific and Africa

“…See also the discussion in Katharine Gerber, ‘Theorizing Conversion: Christianity, Colonization, and Consciousness in the Early Modern Atlantic World’, History Compass 13, no. 3 (2015): 138–143.…”

Clergy in the early modern Caribbean (ca. 1650–1800)

“…First, against contemporary assertions that religion was absent from much of the Caribbean, historians have recognized that some sincerely held religious beliefs and practices did not always manifest in ways that were recognizable to those who left behind archival sources. Because of the scarcity of clergy in some locations, many Christian Caribbean inhabitants were forced to practice their religion as best they could with little or no access to the sacraments (Gerbner, , ; Peabody, , p. 82; Pestana, 2004; Shaw, , p. 101–128; Stark, , p. 516). Many contemporary observers equated the presence of religious belief with consistent lay access to clergy and thus decried an ostensibly godless colonial population where the latter were not present.…”

The Iroquois: voyageurs of the North-West and Oregon territories

“…(Sir) James Hector of the Palliser Expedition, ascending the Athabasca River toward Jasper House, recorded on 30 January 1859: … found a camp, four tents of Iroquois half-breeds … These … were originally trappers in the service of the N.W. Company, and on the junction of that company with the HBC (1821) they turned "freemen" … they all talk the Cree language besides their own, and have latterly intermarried a good deal with the Cree half-breeds of Lac St Ann's [Fleming 1877 in A41: 367, primary source, emphasis added].…”