Associate Professor
BA (Hons) (Otago), BTh (ACT), PhD (Massey), FRHistS
Dunedin Campus
Tel +64 3 479 4240
Email hugh.morrison@otago.ac.nz
Biography
My graduate studies in Geography and History took me to the Christchurch College of Education and then to a teaching position at New Plymouth Girls’ High School.
I then went on to theological study and professional youth work, with a focus on volunteer adult training. PhD study in New Zealand religious history at Massey University led to teaching contracts in the History Department at the University of Waikato, where I was a History Research Associate between 2007 and 2017.
Current teaching focuses on Social Science curriculum areas for pre-service Secondary trainees, on the history of children and young people, and on education history. Research is in the broader areas of religious, social and cultural history with a focus on New Zealand’s interface with the British world and British Empire (especially through the modern Protestant missionary movement), and on the religious identities of children and young people.
Scholarly Involvement and Connections
- Society membership and involvement: Member of the Society for the History of Children and Youth (and Co-chair, Australasian Regional Network); Children’s History Society UK (Overseas Committee Member); Ecclesiastical History Society (UK); Yale-Edinburgh Group on the History of the Missionary Movement and World Christianity; New Zealand Historical Association, New Zealand Religious History Association
- Editorial board member for the Palgrave Studies in the History of Childhood series (Palgrave Macmillan) and the New Zealand Journal of Educational Studies (Deputy Chair); Panel Judge for the Grace Abbott Book Prize Committee, Society for the History of Children and Youth
- Visiting Fellowships and Distinctions: Elected Visiting Fellow, Magdalen College, University of Oxford (2017); Visiting Fellow, School of Divinity, University of Edinburgh (2012); Research Associate in the History Programme, University of Waikato (2007-2017)
- Invited research presentations / addresses: Centre for the History of Childhood, University of Oxford (2017 and 2012); Institute of Historical Research, University of London (2017 and 2010); Scottish Centre for Diaspora Studies, University of Edinburgh (2015); Centre for the Study of Christianity in the Non-Western World, University of Edinburgh (2012)
- Research Centre affiliations / membership: the Centre for the History of Childhood (University of Oxford); the Centre for Research on Colonial Culture (University of Otago); the Centre for Irish and Scottish Studies (University of Otago)
- Peer or book reviewer for: Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth; Journal of Ecclesiastical History; Journal of Religious History; Social Sciences and Missions/Sciences Sociales et Missions; Journal of Educational Administration and History; New Zealand Geographer; New Zealand Journal of History; and New Zealand Sociology
- Book Reviews Co-editor for the Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth (John Hopkins University Press).
Teaching Area
- History of children and young people
- Secondary Social Sciences Curriculum Areas
- History of Education
Research Interests
My research focuses on New Zealand and British world religious history, with a particular emphasis on the nineteenth and twentieth century Protestant missionary movement and its relationship to children, literature and education. There are three critical aspects.
- The mission history aspects are seminal and programmatic with respect to the New Zealand context and to colonial religious childhoods. This research provides a framework and counterpoint for national and international scholars to engage with further.
- I adopt a transnational and comparative approach for interpreting British world religious history. For example my focus on children and religion compares three different settings - New Zealand, Canada, Scotland – by looking at ways that religion, empire, nation, education, geography, and family shaped children’s and young people’s identity.
- I adopt a theoretical and historiographical perspective across all areas of research, to elucidate new historical understanding by scrutinising religious history and practice with respect to contexts, discourses, emotions and new possibilities. This approach is directly influenced both by the focus on mission history (requiring local religious trends to be interpreted globally) and by wider reflection on religious and childhood history thinking and practice.
Publications
Morrison, H. (2022). 'It is well with the child': Changing views on protestant missionary children's health, 1870s-1930s. Studies in Church History, 58, 306-329. doi: 10.1017/stc.2022.15
Morrison, H. (2021). Protestant children, missions and education in the British World. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill. doi: 10.1163/9789004503083
Morrison, H. (2016). Pushing boundaries: New Zealand protestants and overseas missions 1827-1939. Dunedin, New Zealand: Otago University Press, 340p.
Morrison, H., & Martin, M. C. (Eds.). (2017). Creating religious childhoods in Anglo-world and British colonial contexts, 1800-1950. Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 306p. doi: 10.4324/9781315408781
Morrison, H. (2021). Reimagining the Protestant missionary family: The Malcoms of the China Inland Mission. Journal of Religious History, 45(3), 465-488. doi: 10.1111/1467-9809.12757
Morrison, H. (2022). 'It is well with the child': Changing views on protestant missionary children's health, 1870s-1930s. Studies in Church History, 58, 306-329. doi: 10.1017/stc.2022.15
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2021). Protestant children, missions and education in the British World. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill. doi: 10.1163/9789004503083
Authored Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2016). Pushing boundaries: New Zealand protestants and overseas missions 1827-1939. Dunedin, New Zealand: Otago University Press, 340p.
Authored Book - Research
Morrison, H., & Martin, M. C. (Eds.). (2017). Creating religious childhoods in Anglo-world and British colonial contexts, 1800-1950. Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 306p. doi: 10.4324/9781315408781
Edited Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2021). Reimagining the Protestant missionary family: The Malcoms of the China Inland Mission. Journal of Religious History, 45(3), 465-488. doi: 10.1111/1467-9809.12757
Journal - Research Article
van der Meer, J., Egan, R., Morrison, H., & Pratt, K. (2023). The importance of supporting students' sense of meaning and purpose as part of supporting the "whole student". Open Journal of Social Sciences, 11, 345-360. doi: 10.4236/jss.2023.111025
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2021). The South Pacific. In J. J. Hanciles (Ed.), Christianity worldwide: 1800 to 2000. (pp. 202-218). London, UK: SPCK.
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2021). 'It's really where you parents were': Differentiating and situating protestant missionary children's lives, c.1900-1940. In M. Frederiks & D. Nagy (Eds.), Critical readings in the history of Christian mission (Vol. 3). (pp. 1016-1046). Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill. doi: 10.1163/9789004399600_047
Chapter in Book - Other
Morrison, H. (2020). "Those were grand days": A New Zealand teenager writes her own life, 1928-1946. Journal of New Zealand Studies, 30, 96-115. doi: 10.26686/jnzs.v0iNS30.6500
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2019). British world Protestant children, young people, education and the missionary movement, c. 1840s–1930s. Studies in Church History, 55, 463-478. doi: 10.1017/stc.2018.11
Journal - Research Article
Lineham, P., & Morrison, H. (2020). New Zealand. In T. M. Johnson & G. A. Zurlo (Eds.), World Christian encyclopedia. (3rd ed.) (pp. 577-582). Edinburgh, Scotland: Edinburgh University Press. [Encyclopaedia/Dictionary Entry].
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2019). Three variations on a theme: Writing the lives of Scottish and New Zealand missionary children, ca. 1900-1950. Journal of the History of Childhood & Youth, 12(2), 199-218. doi: 10.1353/hcy.2019.0020
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2018). Colonial archives: Protestant missionary magazines, images, and children. In J. Becker & K. Stornig (Eds.), Menschen – Bilder – Eine Welt Ordnungen von Vielfalt in der religiösen Publizistik um 1900. (pp. 283-304). Göttingen, Germany: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2017). “It’s really where your parents were”: Differentiating and situating Protestant missionary children’s lives, c. 1900-1940. Journal of Family History, 42(4), 419-439. doi: 10.1177/0363199017725021
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2017). Service, sacrifice and responsibility: Religion and Protestant settler childhood in New Zealand and Canada, c. 1860-1940. In H. Morrison & M. C. Martin (Eds.), Creating religious childhoods in Anglo-world and British colonial contexts, 1800-1950. (pp. 241-260). Abingdon, UK: Routledge. doi: 10.4324/9781315408781
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2016). Negotiated and mediated lives: Bolivian teachers, New Zealand missionaries and the Bolivian Indian Mission, 1908-1932. Itinerario, 40(3), 429-449. doi: 10.1017/S0165115316000644
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2016). 'I am sorry it is not more, but it is all I could earn': Presbyterian children, Christmas and charity in colonial New Zealand, c. 1909-1945. Papers: Explorations into Children's Literature, 24(2), 33-73.
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2016). Situating Pākehā children and protestant Christianity in New Zealand's religious history. Stimulus, 23(1), 27-36.
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2016). Childhood and youth, history of. In M. A. Peters (Ed.), Encyclopedia of educational philosophy and theory. ([Online] ed.) Singapore: Springer. doi: 10.1007/978-981-287-532-7_271-1
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H., Paterson, L., Knowles, B., & Rae, M. (Eds.). (2012). Mana Māori and Christianity. Wellington, New Zealand: Huia, 356p.
Edited Book - Research
Troughton, G., & Morrison, H. (Eds.). (2011). The spirit of the past: Essays on Christianity in New Zealand history. Wellington, New Zealand: Victoria University Press, 255p.
Edited Book - Research
Morrison, H., & Martin, M. C. (2017). Introduction: Contours and issues in children's religious history. In H. Morrison & M. C. Martin (Eds.), Creating religious childhoods in Anglo-world and British colonial contexts, 1800-1950. (pp. 1-19). Abingdon, UK: Routledge. doi: 10.4324/9781315408781
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2015). Settler childhood, Protestant Christianity and emotions in colonial New Zealand, 1880s-1920s. In S. Olsen (Ed.), Childhood, youth and emotions in modern history: National, colonial and global perspectives. (pp. 76-94). Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2015). 'I feel that we belong to the one big family': Protestant childhoods, missions and emotions in British world settings, 1870s-1930s. In C. McLisky, D. Midena & K. Vallgårda (Eds.), Emotions and Christian missions: Historical perspectives. (pp. 218-239). Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2015). 'As the sunshine dispels the darkness of the night': Settler Protestant children's missionary magazines in New Zealand c.1840-1940. New Zealand Journal of History, 49(2), 136-159.
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2013). Theorising missionary education: The Bolivian Indian Mission 1908-1920. History of Education Review, 42(1), 4-23. doi: 10.1108/08198691311317660
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2013). Empire, nation, and religion in Canadian and New Zealand Protestant juvenile missionary periodicals, C. 1890-1930s: "Men and women the King would wish you to be". In F. Jensz & H. Acke (Eds.), Missions and media: The politics of missionary periodicals in the long nineteenth century. (pp. 19-37). Stuttgart, Germany: Franz Steiner.
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2011). Globally and locally positioned: New Zealand perspectives on the current practice of religious history. Journal of Religious History, 35(2), 181-198. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-9809.2010.01031.x
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2011). “Little vessels″ or “little soldiers″: New Zealand Protestant children, foreign missions, religious pedagogy and empire, c.1880s—1930s. Paedagogica Historica, 47(3), 303-321. doi: 10.1080/00309230.2010.493160
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2012). Representations of Māori in Presbyterian children's missionary literature, 1909-1939. In H. Morrison, L. Paterson, B. Knowles & M. Rae (Eds.), Mana Māori and Christianity. (pp. 159-178). Wellington, New Zealand: Huia.
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2010). The 'joy and heroism of doing good': The New Zealand Missionary Record and late-nineteenth-century Protestant children's missionary support. Journal of New Zealand Literature, 28(2), 158-182.
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2006). Antipodeans abroad: Trends and issues in the writing of New Zealand mission history. Journal of Religious History, 30(1), 77-93.
Journal - Research Article
Coleborne, C., Houlahan, M., & Morrison, H. (Eds.). (2006). Telling lives: Essays in biography and history. Hamilton, New Zealand: Departments of History & Humanities, University of Waikato, 193p.
Edited Book - Research
Morrison, H., & Troughton, G. (2011). Introduction: Perspectives on Christianity and New Zealand history. In G. Troughton & H. Morrison (Eds.), The spirit of the past: Essays on Christianity in New Zealand history. (pp. 11-24). Wellington, New Zealand: Victoria University Press.
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2011). Maintaining the church in unsettled times, 1899-1918. In A. K. Davidson (Ed.), Living legacy: A history of the Anglican Diocese of Auckland. (pp. 115-145). Auckland, New Zealand: Anglican Diocese of Auckland.
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2009). Missionaries sent and received, Oceania, 1910-2010. In T. M. Johnson & K. R. Ross (Eds.), Atlas of global Christianity: 1910-2010. (pp. 284-285). Edinburgh University Press.
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2007). Parachurch. In J. J. Bonk (Ed.), Encyclopedia of mission and missionaries. (pp. 321-323). New York: Routledge.
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2006). Biography, family and New Zealand missionary lives. In C. Coleborne, M. Houlahan & H. Morrison (Eds.), Telling lives: Essays in biography and history. (pp. 47-68). Hamilton, New Zealand: Departments of History & Humanities, University of Waikato.
Chapter in Book - Research
Morrison, H. (2008). 'But we are concerned with a greater imperium': The New Zealand Protestant missionary movement and the British Empire, 1870-1930. Social Sciences & Missions, 21, 97-127.
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2006). ″A great Australasian scheme″: Australian influences on New Zealand's emerging protestant missionary movement, 1885-1922. Fides et Historia, 38(2), 87-102.
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2011). Discordant correspondences?: Wartime and religious letter-writing 1939-1945. Proceedings of the New Zealand Historical Association Conference: Past Tensions: Reflections on Making History. Retrieved from http://www.waikato.ac.nz/wfass/NZHA2011/
Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Abstract
Morrison, H. (2011). The Bolivian Indian Mission, education, evangelism and mission, c.1908-1920. Proceedings of the Yale-Edinburgh Group on the History of the Missionary Movement and World Christianity: Missions and Education Conference. [CD-ROM] [Full Paper]
Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper
Morrison, H. (2019, June). New Zealand teenagers, autobiography, self and school, 1930s-1940s. Verbal presentation at the Society for the History of Children and Youth Conference, Sydney, Australia.
Conference Contribution - Verbal presentation and other Conference outputs
Morrison, H. (2016, June). Memories of 'beetles crawling' and 'a large rat': Locating and reading colonial children's lives in the museum. Verbal presentation at the Horrible Histories? Children's Lives in Historical Contexts, London, UK.
Conference Contribution - Verbal presentation and other Conference outputs
Morrison, H. (2012, November-December). "Torch bearers in the cause of Christ and humanity": Religion and "growing up" in British settler societies, New Zealand and Canada 1890s to 1930s. Verbal presentation at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development Centre for the History of Emotions Conference: Childhood, Youth and Emotion in Modern History, Berlin, Germany.
Conference Contribution - Verbal presentation and other Conference outputs
Morrison, H. (2014). The unravelling of a New Zealand family: The Malcolms of the China Inland Mission. Proceedings of the Yale-Edinburgh Group Conference: Gender and Family in the History of Missions and World Christianity. Retrieved from http://divinity-adhoc.library.yale.edu/Yale-Edinburgh
Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Abstract
Morrison, H. (2014, July). Negotiating sources and spaces: Bolivian teachers, New Zealand missionaries and the Bolivian Indian Mission, 1908-1941. Verbal presentation at the Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Workshop of the Cluster of Excellence "Religion and Politics": The Changing Face of Missionary Education, Münster, Germany.
Conference Contribution - Verbal presentation and other Conference outputs
Morrison, H. (2015, January). Sand through the fingers: Tracing notions of Scottish cultural identity in the narrative of New Zealand missionary families. Scottish Centre for Diaspora Studies Seminar, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK. [Research Presentation].
Other Research Output
Morrison, H. (2013). “Impressions which will never be lost”: Missionary periodicals for protestant children in late-nineteenth century Canada and New Zealand. Church History, 82(2), 388-393. doi: 10.1017/S0009640713000061
Journal - Research Article
Morrison, H. (2018, March). Field notes on busy bees & global nomads: Scottish & NZ Presbyterian children and overseas missions. Knox College, Dunedin, New Zealand. [Public Seminar].
Other Research Output
