Redeeming Indian ‘Christian’ Womanhood?: Missionaries, Dalits, and Agency in Colonial India

Chad M. Bauman, Butler University

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Abstract

This study of dalit Christians in colonial North India suggests that women who converted to Christianity in the region often experienced a contraction of the range of their activities. Bauman analyzes this counterintuitive result of missionary work and then draws on the work of Saba Mahmood and others to interrogate the predilection of feminist historians for agents, rabble-rousers, and gender troublemakers. The article concludes not only that this predilection represents a mild form of egocentrism but also that it prevents historians from adequately analyzing the complexity of factors that motivate and influence human behavior.