IDNO

N.18948.ROS

Description

The C.M.S. High School at Masindi; a European-style brick building.

Place

E Africa; Uganda; Bunyoro; Masindi

Cultural Affliation

Banyoro

Named Person

Photographer

?Roscoe, John R.

Collector / Expedition

Roscoe, John R. [Mackie Ethnological Expedition, Uganda, 1919 - 1920]; Church Mission Society

Date

1919 - 1920

Collection Name

Roscoe Collection

Source

Format

Film Negative Black & White

Primary Documentation

Other Information

This negative was kept in an envelope marked C29/113/ by the cataloguer. The envelope was kept in box marked C29/ by the cataloguer.
Previously stored on Shelf 4, in group of 4 wooden boxes numbered 180.

Context: "There is at Masindi a mission station which has an excellent industrial branch attached to it. Here some of the best cabinet work of which Uganda can boast is turned out. The station belongs to the Church Missionary Society, and such good progress has been made from tables, chairs and sofas are supplied from this centre to most part of the Protectorate. The lads are trained to work the native timber which they cut for themselves in the forests. There is also a school attached to this mission, but , owing, to the lack of property trained men as teachers, it is not so well worked as the technical branch.
As a Christian nation the Banyoro are, with the exception of the Baganda, the mot advanced in this part of Africa. They belong to the Church of Uganda , but they are able to support their own few native pastors and teachers. The standard of training of these native pastors is, however, low, and might be raised with much profit to the community. Another drawback is that the native pastors are chiefly drawn from the lower classes- that is, from the agricultural people, and they cannot easily gain admission among the Bahuma, or upper class, who despise them. Men of the latter class admitted that they would pay more attention to pastors and teachers drawn from their own ranks.
another difficulty which now appears is one I foresaw years ago when I was attached to the mission at Kampala; that is, that the training of the secular teachers and sons of chiefs is better than that offered to the native pastors, who, being of the poorer class, are unable to pay for the education given in the higher schools. This is not without is effect on the youth who are being educated in these secular schools and who show a tendency to regard their religious pastors and teachers with feelings of superiority. I fully realize that this is not the spirit we should hope to find in a Christian community, but human nature is much the same all the world over, and here, where the natives are still only just emerging from barbarism, it behoves the Christian Church to see that her pastors are not inferior in education and training to the men they are expected to lead. Here it is exceptionally easy for the native mind to draw false inferences, for the superior secular schools and those which give the inferior religious training are under the control and management of the same mission!” (Roscoe, J., 1922. The Soul of Central Africa: An Account of the Mackie Ethnological Expedition. (London: Cassell and Co.), p. 222 - 223.). [ED 18/12/2007]

This catalogue record has been updated with the support of the Getty Grant Program Two. [Elisabeth Deane 18/12/2007]