Mission christianity and the social gospel in Langa : a socio-political and cultural history, ca.1927-1960
Doctoral Thesis
2000
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University of Cape Town
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Abstract
This study aims to contribute to the socio-political and cultural history of Langa during the years ca. 1927-1960 by exploring the critical religious influences, perceptions and ideologies that deeply shaped the longitudinal development of the local black township of Cape Town,South Africa. It is the contention of the thesis that religious factors and considerations were of fundamental significance to the marked processes of historical change that Langa underwent during this period, from being one of the most peaceful, cohesive and ""politically backward"" urban Mrican communities since its official opening in 1927, to becoming a place of militancy, violence and social polarisation by the time of the March 1960 uprisings against apartheid. In particular, the thesis seeks to trace the formative role of a combination of conservative and liberal modes of mission Christianity. Often loosely described as the ""Social Gospel"", this powerfully shaped the historical development and character of Langa – both positively and negatively, constructively and divisively, subtly and overtly - during a period of increasingly harsh and oppressive segregationist legislation in South Africa. It is argued that the variety of Christian forms of religious consciousness and ideological perceptions operated in a range of contradictory ways to effect historical patterns of social legitimation and solidarity on the one hand, and processes of liberation and dislocation on the other. Especially during the late 1920s, 1930s and early 1940s, it is claimed that the more conventional forms of a predominantly mission Christianity functioned to define a strikingly conservative, integrated and petty bourgeois-orientated township. The strength and influence of the ""respectable"" churches, the staunch, churchgoing petty bourgeoisie and their respective Christian-based cultural, educational and civic organisations, proved crucial in this regard in collusion with the municipal and township authorities. At the same time, it is held that the progressive strands of the Social Gospel, in particular, contributed towards the early shaping of an important dissenting tradition of protest in the township. In addition, the diverse influences of Social Christianity served to reinforce structural trends of class, religious and cultural differentiation and provoked more radical, even militant and antithetical, socio-religious and political responses. Amongst semi-urbanised, rural and migrant working-class elements in Langa, in particular, such processes had become especially evident by the late 1940s and into the 1950s. In this work, each chapter is geared historically towards examining these contradictory functions of the combination of conservative and progressive forms of Christianity, according to particular domains of social activity - the spheres of institutional religion, education and culture, and politics, respectively_ Thus, in a parallel fashion, the chapters address the themes of the Social Gospel's pervasive rise, mediation and consequent decline, together with the related questions of social integration, class differentiation and political liberation, towards assessing the historical role of religion in each distinctive social sphere in relation to the fundamental transition in Langa. The study concludes that Langa's socio-political and cultural history can be more effectively interpreted on the basis of this critical assessment of the Social Gospel's ambiguous impact during the inter-war and early apartheid years. Such an approach allows for conceptual constructs such as petty bourgeois identity, social group divisions, ideological expression and social change to be more fully explored. As such, this local study seeks to make a contribution to the growing body of scholarship that recognises the vital historical role of religion particularly Christianity, in the shaping of South African communities in the twentieth century.
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Bibliography: leaves 338-349.
Reference:
Hartley, G. 2000. Mission christianity and the social gospel in Langa : a socio-political and cultural history, ca.1927-1960. University of Cape Town.