Mission Manifest - (United States in the World) by Matthew K Shannon (Hardcover)

About the Book

"This book is about Presbyterian missionaries, other Americans with ideals, and their Iranian partners during the twentieth century. It analyzes the various ways in which their respective missions became manifest in Iran, particularly the national capital of Tehran, during the reign of the last Pahlavi shah"--

Book Synopsis

In Mission Manifest, Matthew Shannon argues that American evangelicals were central to American-Iranian relations during the decades leading up to the 1979 revolution. These Presbyterian missionaries and other Americans with ideals worked with US government officials, nongovernmental organizations, and their Iranian counterparts as cultural and political brokers--the living sinews of a binational relationship during the Second World War and early Cold War.

As US global hegemony peaked between the 1940s and the 1960s, the religious authority of the Presbyterian Mission merged with the material power of the American state to infuse US foreign relations with the messianic ideals of Christian evangelicalism. In Tehran, the missions of American evangelicals became manifest in the realms of religion, development programs, international education, and cultural associations. Americans who lived in Iran also returned to the United States to inform the growth of the national security state, higher education, and evangelical culture. The literal and figurative missions of American evangelicals in late Pahlavi Iran had consequences for the binational relationship, the global evangelical movement, and individual Americans and Iranians.

Mission Manifest offers a history of living, breathing people who shared personal, professional, and political aims in Iran at the height of American global power.

Review Quotes

[T]his book marks an important contribution to religious and transnational history, and a model from which future historians will surely benefit.

-- "the journal of presbyterian history"

Matthew K. Shannon provides a history of the Presbyterian Mission in Tehran, with a special focus on the period between the end of World War Two and the closure of the mission in 1965. As much as this book is a contribution to the thriving field of western missions to the Middle East, this book offers a valuable addition to the study of US-Iranian relations under the Pahlavi monarchy

-- "American Historical Review"

Matthew K. Shannon's Mission Manifest is a well-researched and thought-provoking examination of American evangelical missions in Iran. By situating these missions within broader historical and cultural contexts, the book offers valuable insights into the complex interplay between religion, culture, and politics.

-- "Journal of Religious History"

Shannon's fine book testifies to the influence and appeal of American soft power, as well as to the intimate but vexed relationship that has prevailed between Iran and the United States.

-- "Iranian Studies"

About the Author

Matthew K. Shannon is Associate Professor of History at Emory & Henry College. He is the author of Losing Hearts and Minds, and editor of American-Iranian Dialogues.