Culture Confrontation in the Lower Congo From the Old Congo Kingdom to the Congo Independent State with Special Reference to the Swedish Missionaries in the 1880's and 1890's

Abstract: The culture confrontation remains the central theme throughout this book, with special emphasis given to points of conflict. My approach to each particular era has been guided by the question: What were the areas of incompatibility or conflict between African and European culture in the Lower Congo? By focusing my analysis on the dynamics of this confrontation, the point of contact between Congolese and Europeans, I have marked that the purpose of this study is not to present a characterization of Congolese or African culture as separate entities. Its aim has been to analyse the essential features of the confrontation between the two cultures.The book's subtitle indicates that my study of the Lower Congo of the eighteen-eighties and nineties confines itself to the relationship between Congolese and Swedes, specifically the Swedish missionaries. This makes it possible to avoid repetition, since Slade's studies, together with David Lagergren's book Mission and State in the Congo, which was published in 1970, provide adequate coverage of the English-speaking Protestant missionaries, who with their Swedish counterparts played the principal role in the culture confrontation which took place in the region between the Atlantic and Stanley Pool at that period.