Thesis (D. Min.)--Trinity International University, 2004. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 167-182).

Thesis (D. Min.)--Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 93-101).

Thesis (M. Th.)--Catholic Theological Union, 1985. / Bibliography: leaves 55-56.

Thesis (M.A.)--Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, 1993. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 92-99).

Thesis (D. Min.)--Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, 1993. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 153-157).

A questionnaire study was conducted to investigate the psychological adjustment of people who had been aid workers overseas. Nearly fifty percent of the sample of returned aid workers (n = 145) reported that they had experienced psychological difficulties while they were overseas or following their return to Britain. Most had not received any treatment for their difficulties. People who reported psychological problems had, on average, spent longer as aid workers than those who reported no psychological problems. Compared with a group of people preparing for their first term as overseas aid workers (n = 43), returned aid workers had significantly higher mean scores on measures assessing depression, intrusive thoughts, and, among women, avoidance. Aid workers who invalidated their feelings appeared to be especially vulnerable to developing psychological difficulties. When compared with people who did not intend to become aid workers (n = 71), returned aid workers and people preparing to become aid workers were found to perceive the world as a more benevolent and meaningful place. However, a small proportion of returned aid workers expressed views that the world was malevolent and meaningless; such views were related to the development of psychological problems. This finding was discussed with relation to Janoff-Bulman's (1992) theory of shattered assumptions. Implications of the findings were considered, including implications for the selection, preparation and treatment of aid workers.

My dissertation explores the transmission of musical knowledge between China, Portugal, and France in the context of a global Enlightenment. Through the lenses of two treatises authored by Jesuit missionaries serving at the Chinese Imperial Court––one introducing Western music to China, the other introducing Chinese music to France––I investigate how music and the system of knowledge represented by each treatise challenged their audience's worldview: although their interpretation differed, both the Europeans and the Chinese acknowledged China as the origin of the Western civilization. I argue that this construction of a universal history that accommodates all cultures on a single timeline shows there was a common effort across the globe to systematize the diversity of the world's musical cultures into one coherent principle and, more importantly, that the Enlightenment did not originate in Europe but was built on a shared effort of the East and the West to use history to make sense of the expanding globe. My research offers a new model for musicological studies by situating music at the intersection between East Asian Studies, Mission Studies, History of Science, and Global History. Moreover, it challenges the preconceived notion of the Enlightenment as a purely European phenomenon and argues instead that the Enlightenment was global at its inception. In doing so, it moves beyond the framework of dissemination and the comparative approach that characterize much of the past scholarship on global history. Emphasizing simultaneous emergence over successive development and integration over connection, I examine how local societies actively incorporated foreign systems of knowledge in the face of globalizing forces and how this incorporation not only expanded but also transformed their conception of the world.

Leaving home to become a missionary is important for many young adults in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (CJC). Some missionaries return home from their missions before their anticipated return date and struggle to make sense of who they are while facing judgment from members within the church communities and families. Little is known about the experience of identity development for early return missionaries (ERMs). There have not been many chances for ERMs to share what it means to them to have come home early from their mission. This study investigated the process of how ERMs make sense of who they are after returning home early from their mission. One goal of this study was to find a broad and unifying understanding of how ERMs make sense of who they are given their experiences from their own perspectives while also honoring unique experiences. The second goal was to learn of specific ways to help ERMs feel satisfied and connected to who they are after their ERM experience. Two interviews were completed with each of six ERM participants. Transcripts from interviews were analyzed for common themes across participants and unique experiences. Each participant’s story was rewritten in order of what happened before, during, and after their mission, careful to include the most important parts of their stories. Then stories were analyzed for growth-promoting endings and negative endings based on the participants’ descriptions. Stories with good endings indicated more contentment with the ways they saw themselves. From the interviews, specific actions and helps were identified to help ERMs find happy endings to the stories they tell themselves about who they are after having returned from their mission early. The findings were compared and discussed in light of existing research. Lastly, the trustworthiness of the conclusions and ideas for future research questions were considered.

<p>This dissertation will examine the motives and intentions of four native men, John Thunder, Peter Hunter, George Flett and John McKay, who participated in the missionary endeavour as native missionaries of the Presbyterian Church in Canada ministering to native people in southern Manitoba and Saskatchewan between 1866 and 1912. In examining the lives and careers of Thunder, Hunter, Flett and McKay, it becomes apparent that their goals and their perception of the missionary role were not necessarily those of the Foreign Mission Committee (FMC), the governing body concerned with the missionary work of the Presbyterian Church in Canada.</p> <p>The dissertation follows and extends the theoretical framework delineated by historian Richard White (1991), who argues that in cross-cultural encounters a 'middle ground' may emerge, a common, mutually comprehensible world partaking of aspects of all cultures in the contact situation. It will be shown that the two Dakota men, John Thunder and Peter Hunter, used the office of missionary and the symbols of Christianity to communicate their needs to the dominant white society and to achieve their own goals on behalf of the Dakota people. Likewise, the Country-born men, John McKay and George Flett, appropriated the role of missionary in an attempt to maintain the atmosphere of negotiation and accommodation which characterized the middle ground of the Red River Settlement in which they were raised.</p> <p>In contrast to prevailing views of missions as destructive of native culture and an imposition of the colonial agenda on native life, I demonstrate the various ways in which the missionary endeavour was perceived as valuable by the native people and how, as missionaries, each of these four native men had some degree of influence over the pace, level, and type of adaptation which they and their people would make to white society.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

published_or_final_version / Chinese Historical Studies / Master / Master of Arts