‘This will not be the first time that the softest hand has proved the strongest’ : the Eastern Division of the Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society of the Presbyterian Church in Canada and the fate of Scottish identity, 1876-1914

Abstract

Scotland’s commitment to the British imperial project after 1707 helped configure ‘Scottishness’ as a decidedly masculine construct, while the methodology developed by historians in the study of Scottish migrant identity since then promotes a male-centric source base. This undermines how Scottish migrant women associated with their Scottish cultural, ethnic and national identities. Through detailed analysis of the composition, operations and rhetoric of the Eastern Division of the Women’s Foreign Missionary Society of the Presbyterian Church in Canada during the society’s lifespan, 1876 to 1914, this thesis investigates the underexplored potential of civic institutions in developing a more nuanced understanding of Scottish identity during Britain’s ‘victorious century’. It also demonstrates how decisions to engage with certain local, national and global issues during the post-Confederation period contributed to the gradual disintegration of the society’s distinctively Scottish identity in favour of increasing identification with Canada before the First World War.