Caste and chrishtianity: attitudes and policies on caste of anglo- saxon protestant missions in India.

My attention was attracted to the subject of this book as a field of
considerable interest and importance while I was myself teaching in
Madras, the scene of so many of the controversies with which the
study is concerned. I was not, however, able to begin my
investigation until some time after my return to the United Kingdom
in 1970. I then found myself to my delight within reach of the great
and still largely unworked resources for the student of missions
which are available in London. The first debt I must acknowledge,
therefore, is to the custodians of the various missionary society
archives and libraries, particularly the archivists and librarians of the
Church Missionary Society, the United Society for the Propagation
of the Gospel, the Methodist Missionary Society and the Society for
Promoting Christian Knowledge. I am also grateful to the India
Office Library and Records, the National Library of Scotland, the
Library of New College, Edinburgh, and the Sussex University
Library for much willing help in obtaining materials which I
required. The Arts Research Support Fund of the University of
Sussex generously made possible a visit to India in the Spring of 1975
which enabled me, among the projects, to use the resources of
libraries and archives in Madras and Bangalore as well as benefitting
from discussion with various Indian scholars.
I owe an immense debt of gratitude to more friends and colleagues
in India, Britain, the United States and Australia than I can mention
here, who have read, discussed and commented upon drafts of parts
of this book. I have done my best to benefit from their suggestions
and criticisms, and I owe much to their encouragement. In particular
I may mention Dr. Pratima Bowes, Dr. Kenneth Cragg and
Professor Eric Sharpe who have been outstandingly generous with
advice and help. A more stimulating setting for the preparation of a
work of this sort than the School of African and Asian Studies at the
University of Sussex, to which I was privileged to belong from 1970 to
1978, could hardly be imagined. I am indebted to the secretaries of
the School for cheerfully typing successive versions of my chapters.
The support, patience and encouragement of my wife and children
in this, as in all that I do, is beyond calculation and deserves far more
than a formal acknowledgement in a Preface. Here all I can say to
them is a heartfelt ‘Thank You'.
Much of the material in Chapter 4 has appeared as an article on
“The Depressed Classes and Conversion to Christianity 1860-1960',
in Religion in South Asia: Religious Conversion and Revival
Movements in South Asia in Medieval and Modern Times. (New
Delhi, 1977) edited by Dr. Geoffrey Oddie. Versions of chapters six
and nine were published as articles in the Indian Church History
Review in 1975. I am grateful to the editors for permission to use this
material here.