The History of the Soga Family, Race, and Identity in South Africa in the Late 19th and Early 20th Centuries

The history of African Christianity in South Africa in the 19th century would be incomplete without a discussion of Tiyo Soga, the first Xhosa man to be ordained a minister in South Africa. His work as a preacher and translator was key to the spread of African indigenous Christianity in the Cape. In 1866 he completed his translation of The Pilgrim’s Progress into Xhosa, a book that had a greater impact than the Bible on how many Africans learned about Christianity. Less well known is the history of his family, including his parents, his wife, his children, and his grandchildren. While it is possible to reconstruct lives of some of the Soga men, it is difficult to uncover the lives of the women. Tiyo Soga and his wife, Janet Burnside, had seven children, and the four sons (William Anderson, John Henderson, Jotello Festiri, and Allan Kirkland) became prominent figures in Eastern Cape and South African history. The daughters, Isabella, Frances, and Jessie, had less prominent careers. African Christianity was important for all of them, and the sons pursued careers as a doctor, a historian, a veterinarian, and a journalist. The third son, A.K. Soga, was important as both a journalist and an African nationalist.

Against the Return of Fagin Dickens and the Persistence of the Principle of Goodness

Bob Fagin was a boy who helped twelve-year-old Dickens during his traumatic experience at Warren’s Blacking Factory. Taking the cue from the discrepancy between the real Fagin and devilish Fagin in Oliver Twist, I will consider the reasons underlying Dickens’s choice of this particular name for such a villain. At the same time, in light of the scarcely plausible contrast between Oliver’s innocence and the urban decay surrounding him, I will argue that the novel should be interpreted as a social metaphor whose ethical model is The Pilgrim’s Progress. Indeed, as suggested by the novel’s complete title – The Adventures of Oliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy’s Progress – the eponymous hero’s experience can be regarded as a transition from the City of Destruction to the Celestial City where the “principle of good” is ultimately brought into action. However, unlike Bunyan’s motivated and energetic hero, Oliver is a character whose main traits are passivity, innocence, and silence. Although melodramatic and awash with sentimentality, Victorian middle-class readers readily subscribed to the novel’s message based on the final triumph of goodness.

A Healthcare Pilgrim's Progress

Progress is both a noun (forward or onward movement toward a destination) and a verb (to move forward or onward in space or time). Innovation is a noun (the action or process of innovating). They aren’t synonyms. When it comes to the future of healthcare, which is more important? Innovation enables change that maintains an ecosystem. Progress changes the ecosystem. Many new biopharmaceuticals and medical devices are innovative. They can improve both quality of care and quality of life, but do not always represent true progress. Perhaps we need a healthcare technology continuum that considers the value of an innovation (a new molecule, a newly identified receptor, gene therapy, etc.) in the context of progress. Rather than “value-based HTA” we should be thinking about “progress-based HTA. It’s worth repeating that the terms “innovation” and “progress” have separate and distinct meanings. They are, like many generic drugs and biologics, not interchangeable.