Presbyterian Missions and Cultural Interaction in the Far Southwest, 1850-1950

When Presbyterian missionaries arrived in the Southwest in the mid-nineteenth century, they were confident of the superiority of their own culture and religion and turned to "Christian education" to bring the region's Native Americans, Hispanic Catholics, and Mormons into the American mainstream. By 1890 they operated more than seventy-five mission schools in the region, and for years between 4,000 and 5,000 young people enrolled in the schools annually. The vitality and tenacity of the southwestern cultures, combined with unanticipated hardships and repeated disappointment, foiled the missionaries' attempts at cultural transformation. Mark T. Banker presents a balanced view of the missionaries' motives and practices. He also shows how they modified their views after a time, often coming to accept the people to whom they ministered. The primary concern of Banker's book is, as he states in its preface, "not the Presbyterian impact on the Southwest, but instead the impact of the Southwest on the Presbyterians".Banker, Mark T. is the author of 'Presbyterian Missions and Cultural Interaction in the Far Southwest, 1850-1950' with ISBN 9780252019296 and ISBN 0252019296.