The Jesuit Mission in Ranchi Introduction Idesbald Goddeeris 30 - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

The Jesuit Mission in Ranchi Introduction

Idesbald Goddeeris 30 May 2018

2

History of the Ranchi mission

Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000

3

History and relevance of the Ranchi mission

Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000

4

Relevance and vibrance of the Ranchi mission

Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000

5

Researching the Ranchi mission

Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000

• Research questions
• Missionaries in a postcolonial context
• Local agency
• Sources
• Oral history and participant observation
• Published materials
• Archives

6

Research team

Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000

• Prof. Parimala V. Rao (JNU, New Delhi)

Benjamin Steegen (KU Leuven) Lourens Van Haaften (KU Leuven) Rinald D’Souza (KU Leuven)

Jesuit Business Education in East- India: 1970 to present

Lourens van Haaften 30 May 2018

8

• Important role of the Society of Jesus in providing

education in colonial and post-colonial India.

• Post-war rise of global business education (US as

main driver)

• Belgian missionary activity in East India, since second

half 19th century: Ranchi mission

• Fr. Michel van den Bogaert, institution builder in

management institutes.

Context

Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000

9

• XLRI, Jamshedpur (1949)
• XISS, Ranchi (1955)
• XIM, Bhubaneshwar (1987)
• XIDAS, Jabalpur (1995)

Cases

Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000

10 Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000

11

• Management debates from the 1970s to present. Is it

the task of the Society of Jesus to provide business management education?

• Business management versus social service/rural

management

• ‘Making the rich more rich’ vs ‘helping the unprivileged’
• Missions as post-colonialism?

Controversies

Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000

12

• Questions on Jesuit identity and future in India from the

1970s to present. Is it the task of the Jesuits to support business education?

• Empirical understanding of the indianisation of the

Society of Jesus

• Development discourses in India and post-colonial

critique

Relevance

Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000

13

• Semi-structured interviews/Oral history
• Archival research,
• KADOC
• Institute’s administrations
• Personal collections of friends and

family

• Discourse analysis of

institute’s publications

Research methods and using heritage

Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000

Indigenising Mission Indigenising Mission

The Jesuit Mission in Ranchi 1920-2000

India | Chota Nagpur | Jharkhand | Ranchi

Research period and context

• Native agency
• Transition from a Belgian Jesuit Mission to a Jesuit Adivasi Province
• The case against indigenisation?
• To what extent did native Adivasi Jesuits

(1) borrow European ideas and models to their mission, (2) use these as points of departure to evolve their own, or (3) reimagine the mission through their own cultural norms and practices

The case for indigenisation

• Ranchi Jesuit Province

province/institutional archives and community libraries

• ARSI, Rome

until 1939

• KADOC, Leuven
• Jesuit libraries/archives in India
• State archives?

Archives and sources

Sources

• Nishkalanka
• Monthly Christian news and spiritual magazine in Hindi (since

1920)

• Books by Ranchi Jesuit authors (selection)
• related to Adivasi culture and identity making
• Jesuit news bulletins, catalogues, etc.
• Jesuit correspondence
• Policy documents
• Newspapers/magazines

Sources

• Discourse Analysis
• Nishkalanka: themes, debates
• Newsbulletins: practices
• Quantify data: persons, institutions
• agency, power relations
• Oral history interviews

Methodology

• Identity making

Adivasi / Jesuit / Christian

• Christian mission histories

their relevance in the context of (post)colonialism and nationalism Christian public sphere

• Native agency and indigenization in the Jesuit mission

In sum

The Belgian ‘Gandhi’ and village development in postcolonial India

A Jesuit missionary’s legacy (1969 to present)

Benjamin Steegen 30 May 2018

Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000 24

• missionary identity of Jesuits: social apostolate
• historically: global and local (Ranchi mission)
• post WW II: focus on justice and human dignity
• (personal) need to redefine ‘missionary calling’
• disenchantment with Modernization / ‘Development Decade’ (1960s)
• ‘alternative development’ discourse
• indigenous development, conscientization, participation,…
• Indian context
• failure of India’s Community Development Programme (°1952)
• the spirit of Gandhian villagism
• anti-conversion sentiment and restrictions for missionaries

Context (1960s-70s)

Michael Windey sj (1921-2009) VRO (°1969)

‘missionary development spin-off’

individual (versus institutional) some distance from mission society agenda of social change (versus charity) faith as inspiration and motivation (versus goal)

Principles and activities

• “a secular voluntary organization”
• “a new rural lifestyle” as alternative for urbanization/industrialization
• housing construction, education, health services, skill training, village

councils, agroforestry, old age homes, child labour rehabilitation,…

Windey

Jesuits India / Europe Indian ‘volunteers’ VRO leadership Western volunteers European donors villagers Indian actors

Relevance

Empirical research gaps

• mission history: postcolonial Catholic missionaries
• history of development: a ‘parallel history’ of development work

Social apostolate and international solidarity in a changing context

• in search of a new (Jesuit) missionary identity?
• in search of new forms of international solidarity?
• ideas, discourse, and practice: sources? congruity?

Faculty of Arts, History departement, Modernity and Society 1800 - 2000 30

• archival research and discourse analysis (1969-…)
• VRO India
• VRO Belgium (KADOC)
• personal archives of donors and family
• to do: selected European donors
• oral history (open and semi-structured interviews)
• participant observation

Research methods and sources