Christianization Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! === French Canada, North America, west Africa and the West Indies === In the seventeenth century, the [[French colonial empire|French]] used [[Cultural assimilation|assimilation]] as a means of establishing colonies controlled by the nation-state rather than private companies.{{sfn|Belmessous|2013|p=6}} Referred to as the "[[Civilizing mission|Civilizing Mission]]", the goal was a political and religious community representative of an ideal society as articulated through the [[Progressivism|progressive theory of history]]. This common theory of the time asserts that history shows the normal progression of society is toward constant betterment; that humans could therefore eventually be perfected; that primitive nations could be forced to become modern states wherein that would happen.{{sfn|Belmessous|2013|pp=2β5}}{{sfn|Priestley|2018|p=192}}{{sfn|Burrows|1986|p=abstract}} The French advocated multiple aspects of European culture such as "[[civility]], [[social organization]], [[law]], [[economic development]], [[Marital status|civil status]]", as well as European dress, bodily description, religion, and more, excluding and replacing local culture as the means to this end.{{sfn|Belmessous|2013|pp=1β2}} Dutch historian [[Henk Wesseling]] describes this as "... turning the coloured peoples - by means of education - into coloured Frenchmen".{{sfn|Wesseling|2015|p=201}} Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page