Spirituality and Conflict in Healthcare: The History of the Canadian Baptists and Medical Mission in Orissa, 1900–1970

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The article is truly remarkable. It combines a well-referenced and debated hypothesis about the contradictory and ambivalent contribution of Western missionaries to colonisation through the medicalisation of colonial subjects, a very good spatial and historical contextualisation, and a wealth of information from archival and secondary sources that really proves the thesis of how Canadian Protestant missionaries exerted cultural influence through medicine on the Adivasi population in the Orissa district of present-day India.

It would almost be an ideal article were it not for the fact that the final section on the conflicts arising from the acculturation of the Indians, after being presented as the main proof of the hypothesis, is hardly dealt with and studied at all. The study is thus abruptly interrupted and incomplete, leaving the impression that there is more information available about these conflicts, either in quantity or in detail, but the author has not used it. In either case, this should be clarified and, if possible, remedied by providing more evidence of conflicts or by focusing attention on some of them and extending the text a little. If there is no more evidence available about conflicts, or about one in some detail, the hypothesis of the article should be modified. This is why the evaluation proposes "major revision", potentially affecting the entire structure of an otherwise sound and high quality study.

On the other hand, the conclusions in their current version are excessively long and overly reiterate the hypotheses and ideas presented in the article's introduction. Shorter conclusions focused on pointing out the relevance of the case to the hypothesis, and of the hypothesis to debates on colonialism, would clearly improve the final result. 

Author Response

Thank you so much for providing such insightful comments. I have extended a bit more the final section on conflicts and have shortened the conclusion as well. 

Regards

Reviewer 2 Report

This sentence in the abstract is not academic enough. It goes better with a christian sermon but not with our type of journal style:

 "So, the medical mission was undertaken for fulfilling both the noble cause 21 of redressal from diseases, health sufferings and develop a sense of reliance on the Holy Spirit".  

The paper is clearly an adaptation of a dissertation. No methodological problems with it but in terms of soundness it needs a second review to make better. For instance, in references, sometimes the author writes the hole name of the author quoted, and in other cases is not like this. Consistency is needed.

The article relies too much on the Canadian Baptist Mission. More references from the World Council of Churches or the Pew Religion Center are perhaps a good solution to make it more broad.

Author Response

Thank you so much for reviewing my article. I have changed the particular sentence that you have pointed out. 

I have referred to the Canadian Baptist Mission Reports because that is perhaps the only Protestant mission that has served Ganjam. Had I worked on Orissa proper, I could have referred to the English Baptists as well. But in Ganjam, which formed the northern part of the Madras Presidency, was essentially a mission station for the Canadian Baptists. 

Regards

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The author has succeeded in addressing all the comments and suggestions from my previous review.