Missionary Cosmopolitanism in Nineteenth-Century British Literature (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780814214268)

Missionary Cosmopolitanism in Nineteenth-Century British Literature explores the notion that missionaries, often perceived as only evangelically motivated in the British imperial project, were also spurred on by cosmopolitan ideals. Winter Jade Werner makes this surprising connection in order to write against standard understandings of missionary work as well as typical understandings of cosmopolitanism as a deeply secular project.
Missionary Cosmopolitanism identifies the nineteenth-century novel as thematically and formally attuned to the tension between missionaries' cosmopolitan values and the moral impoverishment of their imperialist and expansionist practices. Werner's chapters interact with canonical works such as Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre and Charles Dickens's Bleak House, along with lesser-known works by Robert Southey and Sydney Owenson. Ultimately, Missionary Cosmopolitanism demonstrates that nineteenth-century literature both illustrated and helped define missionary discourses regarding cosmopolitan ideas, showing how global evangelicalism continues to tap into the "new cosmopolitanisms" of today.


Author: Winter Jade Werner
ISBN-10: 0814214266
ISBN-13: 9780814214268
Publisher: Ohio State University Press
Language: English
Published: 06/01/2020
Pages: 232
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 1.10lbs
Size: 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.63d

Review Citation(s):
Choice 04/01/2021