Short-Term Mission: An Ethnography of Christian Travel Narrative and Experience
Digital Verbum Edition
Overview
Over the past few decades, short-term mission trips have exploded in popularity. With easy access to affordable air travel, millions of American Christians have journeyed internationally for ministry, service and evangelism. Short-term trips are praised for involving many in global mission but also critiqued for their limitations.
Despite the diversity of destinations, certain universal commonalities emerge in how mission trip participants describe their experiences: “My eyes were opened to the world’s needs.” “They ministered to us more than we ministered to them.” “It changed my life.”
Anthropologist Brian Howell explores the narrative shape of short-term mission (STM). Drawing on the anthropology of tourism and pilgrimage, he shows how STM combines these elements with Christian purposes of mission to create its own distinct narrative. He provides a careful historical survey of the development of STM and then offers an in-depth ethnographic study of a particular mission trip to the Dominican Republic. He explores how participants remember and interpret their experiences, and he unpacks the implications for how North American churches understand mission, grapple with poverty and relate to the larger global church.
A groundbreaking book for all who want to understand how and why American Christians undertake short-term mission.
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- Explores the narrative shape of short-term mission (STM).
- Shows how STM combines anthropology of tourism and pilgrimage with Christian purposes of mission.
- Provides a careful historical survey of the development of STM.
- Preface and Acknowledgments
- Part One: Introducing Narratives
- 1. “It Changed my Life”: Short-Term Mission and Christian Narratives of Travel
- 2. “Are You for Them or Against Them?” Defining Short-Term Mission
- Part Two: The History of a Narrative
- 3. “That’s No Missionary!”: Redefining Mission and the Missionary Establishment
- 4. “Youth Try the Impossible!”: Youth Movements and Short Term Mission
- 5. “It Will Change Your Life”: Short-Term Mission and Central Wheaton Church
- Part Three: Traveling Narratives
- 6. “Remember, These Are Real Missions”: Embodying a Missionary Narrative at Central Wheaton Church
- 7. “Pour Out Your Soul”: Living the Narrative of Short-Term Mission
- 8. “Of Course You Always Grow Close to God on a Mission Trip”: (Re)narrating a Short-Term Mission Trip
- Part Four: The Future of a Narrative
- 9. “Just Bring Greetings”: Creating a New Narrative for Short-Term Mission
- 10. “And What Does the Lord Require of You?”: Suggestions and an Encouraging Postscript
- Notes on Transcription
- References
- Index
Christian colonialism, sanctified vacations, or life-transforming service--short-term missions (STM) has evoked positive and negative comments from supporters and naysayers alike. Getting behind the photos, theologies and histories of the STM movement, Howell offers engaging anthropological insight into the narratives that shape and sustain the experience of STM. Bringing a keen ethnographic eye to his subject of STM narratives, Howell’s book is lucid and accessible, striking a helpful balance between constructive criticism and affirmation. If you are at all interested in short-term missions, this book is for you.
—Charles E. Farhadian, associate professor of world religions and Christian mission, Westmont College
Short-Term Mission is a fascinating look at the effects of short-term missions trips. Why is it that when students or adults return from a missions experiences they all seem to share the same story? Have we romanticized the experiences so much that we can’t learn what God wants to teach us? Brian Howell explores how the pretrip narrative is driving the experience. Brian also exams how the culture of short-term missions gets in the way of experiencing and learning from the culture we are going to serve. If you are leading short-term mission trips, you need to read this book. The research that Brian has done clearly points to the need for rethinking and adjusting our short-term missions experiences.
—Doug Franklin, president, LeaderTreks
Anthropologist Brian Howell brings rich research skills in participant observation and expertise in social theory to this fascinating project. His book is at the cutting edge of emerging scholarship on the topic of short-term missions. Scholars, students and participants in short-term mission trips will all find this book educational, insightful and provocative.
—Robert J. Priest, professor of mission and anthropology, G. W. Aldeen Professor of International Studies, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School