Missionary lamentations

In 1797, the London Missionary Society arrived in Tahiti. In order to evangelize the Tahitian population, the necessary skills in literacy were emphasized in the small mission schools. Initially, the Tahitians thought that Christianity and literacy were the means by which the wealth of the foreigners could be readily acquired. When such wealth failed to materialize, the fervor for literacy began to diminish with considerable alacrity, much to the dismay of the missionaries. Once the connection between material acquisitions and literacy was dispelled, renewed interest in learning became apparent as a means of coping with introduced institutions and means of transaction. The education of missionary children, however, was altogether a more complex situation. The missionaries themselves were constrained by insufficient finances to send their children away for secondary education. Consequently, a local institution was formed, the South Seas Academy, for the purpose of providing a segregated school for missionary children and a very select few of Tahitian nobility. The separated atmosphere of learning, however, was not totally successful since many of the missionary children began to associate freely with their Tahitian counterparts. Education as a means of Christianizing and civilizing was a qualified success over the long term, but filled with travail during its first two generations of existence

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• Chanter, à corps perdu (II)

  Daniel Denis•Corps•2023

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