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the grave in darkness?’ They understood that their common language project
necessarily cut out the older generations from salvation. Most young people
learned Nyanja or Tumbuka at mission schools and did not face difficulties
attending church and related mission activities. However, old people who were
only conversant in their mother tongue were de facto excluded from the church,
posing a dilemma for missionaries throughout the Protectorate.
Although Tumbuka, Nyanja and Yao were associated with specific
missions and regions, there is no evidence to suggest that there existed a link
between Chewa language and reformed faith/Anglicanism or Tumbuka language
and Presbyterianism. In simple terms, neither Chewa, Tumbuka or Yao languages
were used as surrogates of Protestant religious identity. Moreover, the Chewa,
Tumbuka or Yao languages did not become religious language in the same way
as Hebrew is to Judaic faith or Arabic is to Islamic faith.
The translation studies also had unintended political ramifications. The
colonial government used the same languages in governing, propaganda and
collecting data on Africans. In the case of Nyanja, their language was adopted as
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the official language for government communication to aid in governance . Thus,
vernacular translation was a tool for maintaining colonial power. Notwithstanding
this, Africans used the same languages to promote their causes. Mission
translations improved literacy amongst Africans and united Africans through the
usage of regional languages. Eventually, Africans were pursuing regional interests
and this led to the creation of ‘imagined identities’. Vernacular languages that had
previously been local and ethnic languages, were popularised by mission
translation and became a vehicle of people’s political expressions. In the 1950s
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and 1960s mission educated Africans were influential in African resistance
movements leading to the decolonisation of Malawi.
However, in post-colonial Malawi, especially the Kamuzu Banda era,
Tumbuka and Chewa ethnic identities were redefined through Banda’s
educational policies among other factors. Several studies indicate that Banda
pursued policies of discriminating against the Tumbuka north by favouring the
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Chewa centre. Deborah Kaspin explains that in ‘1988 northerners on the Malawi
National Examination Board were accused of skewing the results of the Certificate
of Education exams and were dismissed’ by Kamuzu Banda. Furthermore, in
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1989, ‘northerners teaching in central and southern region schools were accused

59 Livingstonia Manuscripts, “The Nyasaland United Missionary Conference Report of
the Meeting Held at the Livingstonia Missionary Institution.”
60 See Vail and White, “Tribalism in the Political History of Malawi.”
61 Ananthamurthy, “Globalization, English and ‘Other’ Languages,” 54.
62 R. Carver, Where Silence Rules: The Suppression of Dissent in Malawi (Human Rights
Watch, 1990), 55.
63 Deborah Kaspin, “Tribes, Regions, and Nationalism in Malawi,” Nomos 39 (January 1,
1997): 485.