FROM LONGHOUSE TO MODERNITY: The Encounter between the Iban of Sarawak and the Anglican Mission.

The first chapter outlines the history, traditional social structure and some of the elements of Iban religion. It reviews the literature about Iban society and the worlds of empire and mission. Chapter 2 shows how the Borneo mission came into being. Chapter 3 describes building a new Anglican diocese and the confrontations with the Brooke government. Chapter 4 covers the four decades under Chambers’ and Hose’s leadership when the missionaries showed increasing respect for Iban religion and attempted deeper engagement with it.Bishop Mounsey’s “bewilderment” and his fears for the mission’s future, owing to a shortage of clergy, mark the next stage in the story described in chapter 5. The contexts in which the church worked under the last Rajah and during the Japanese occupation are described in chapter 6 along with the controversy surrounding the change from Brooke to British colonial government.The first 100 years had been a constant struggle to find missionaries to staff the centres in Iban areas, but the 1950s and 1960s described in chapter 7 saw a new stage of expansion. The missionaries’ task moved from direction to support now that there were more local clergy. The Church entered a period of increasing growth. The implications of modernity, and the changes in the Iban world following Anglican engagement with it, are considered in the final chapter. The implications of modernity, and the changes in the Iban world following Anglican engagement with it, are considered in the final chapter.