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The World the Students Made: Agriculture and Education at American Missions in Colonial Zimbabwe, 1930–1960

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 February 2017

Todd H. Leedy
Todd H. Leedy*
Affiliation:
Center for African Studies at the University of Florida
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Extract

In 1930, the same year in which the segregationist Land Apportionment Act was passed, the governor of Rhodesia addressed a meeting of representatives from the various missionary organizations operating in the colony. He proceeded to argue against the sort of education that might create a class of African intellectuals who would eventually challenge white economic and political dominance:

The nature of the intellectual advance to be aimed at should be one of which advantage can be taken in the ordinary daily lives of the people, and should be a step forward in a field already familiar to them, rather than a violent transition into fields which belong to a different type of civilization. As the life of African peoples is to a preponderating extent agricultural, education should aim at making them better agriculturalists and better able to appreciate all the natural processes with which agriculture is connected.

Type
Articles
Information
History of Education Quarterly , Volume 47 , Issue 4 , November 2007 , pp. 447 - 469
Copyright
Copyright © 2007 History of Education Society 

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References

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