Digital Commons Network^™

Abraham The Seer, Stephen O. Smoot, John Gee, Kerry Muhlestein, John S. Thompson

BYU Studies

A careful reading of the Book of Abraham reveals subtle literary and narrative elements in the text that might otherwise go unappreciated. For instance, a running leitmotif—a recurring theme or concept— throughout the Book of Abraham is that of Abraham as a seer, or someone who sees or otherwise has a visual interaction with divine manifestation (typically or usually aided by a divinatory device such as a seer stone). As seen in both the mention of Abraham’s possession and use of the Urim and Thummim (Abr. 3:1) as well as the repeated use of verbs such as see and show …

The Genre Reading Challenge, Georgina Dibble

The Utah English Journal

When I walked into my own classroom for the first time five years ago, I was met with the stark reality of students with low reading levels, low comprehension, kids who didn't read, didn't like reading, and adamantly believed that they couldn't read. But, fresh out of college, I was also coming armed with the words of Donalyn Miller, Kylene Beers, Kelly Gallagher, and more, ready to transform my students into life-long, independent readers who read just for the pure joy of it. If you're rolling your eyes at my optimism, I don't blame you. But the research surrounding reading …

Fanboys, Pow, & Mount Plot: Mnemonic Devices Used In Teaching Writing, Sarah Anderson, Alexa Bills, Kaitlyn Conlin, Eve Crawford, Natalie Eggli, Jenae Grant, Lilly Hammer, Andrew Isaacson, Kassandra Jimenez, Ryan Mansfield, Brindley Rowley, Samantha Stringham, Meghan Waldenberg, Brady Wallis, Joyce Kinkead

The Utah English Journal

Cicero ( 106-43 BCE) was renowned during his lifetime and influential long after as an extraordinary orator and writer, able to recall long speeches from memory. A technique termed the memory palace, which associates memory with locations-also called method of loci-enabled ancient rhetoricians to deliver stimulating speeches. Retention of information was essential for delivering speeches not just because it was impressive but also due to the paucity of writing materials. Writers and orators relied on wax tablets that could be inscribed with a stylus but could not archive the text; as a result, the information had to be memorized, part …

The Utah English Journal, Volume 50, 2022: Full Issue

The Utah English Journal

No abstract provided.

Reflections On The New Latter-Day Saint Temple In Bengaluru And Religious Gender Norms, Debjani Chakravarty

Mormon Studies Review

There was recent publicity in Utah press about the new Mormon temple that will be built in Bengaluru, India (known as Bangalore until 2014), the first temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in the country. There was a groundbreaking ceremony in December 2020, yet a survey of leading English-language newspapers in India reveals that this event was not widely reported. It was certainly not as widely reported as the groundbreaking of another temple in August 2020: the Ram Mandir, or the Ram Temple, which has been a violently contentious issue in India for the last three …

Contemporary Femininities In Mormonism And In Ireland: Challenging And Confirming Essentialism In Online Spaces, Hazel O'Brien

Mormon Studies Review

How are gender identities negotiated within Irish Mormonism, and does this intersect with trends identifiable within Mormonism more generally? In this paper I use the examples of modern Ireland and modern Mormonism to speculate regarding the nature of gendered identities online. I suggest that Irish and Mormon cultures are both confronting serious challenges to traditional essentialist interpretations of femininity that have long dominated their cultural landscapes. I also suggest that social media (SM) and online spaces are facilitating these challenges. However, I observe that online spaces are also used in Irish Mormonism to conform to hegemonic Mormon understandings of gender …

Racial Spatial Relationships In Claudia Rankine’S Citizen, Thomas Jenson

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

In Citizen: An American Lyric, Claudia Rankine addresses topics from segregation to police brutality to indicate the extreme spatial relationships between racial groups. Her work reveals the geographic mechanisms that confine African Americans to certain locations as well as the coerce them to violently share space with their white counterparts. Drawing upon spatial theory, which exposes the structures of unjust geography, my analysis also considers language as an additional spatial force that harms the black community as much as more physical phenomena.

"None That Doeth Good", Walker Wright, Don Bradley

BYU Studies

The First Vision has been a center of both faith and controversy. While millions of Latter-day Saints affirm it as the beginning of the Restoration, others see it as an ever-growing fish tale. The multiple accounts of the First Vision vary in detail, with Joseph Smith’s earliest written account (1832) lacking some of the elements found in his later accounts. However, some of these elements—particularly the appearance of God the Father as part of the First Vision experience—are laced throughout Joseph Smith’s translation of the Bible. These historical threads ultimately culminate in his translation of Psalm 14, which weaves together …

Full Issue

BYU Studies

No abstract provided.

Full Issue

BYU Studies

No abstract provided.

Outside The Earth: Translating And Exploring With Tsiolkovsky, Michael Pilipchuk, Olga Lyanda-Geller

Russian Language Journal

This article describes a study that grew out of research and translation work completed within the framework of a series of innovative interdisciplinary courses called “Russian for Rockets.” While there are currently no language study requirements in most science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines, there is a high demand among STEM majors in U.S. universities for language courses with a strong technical component. In particular, a poll at the Purdue School of Aeronautics and Astronautics conducted in 2018 showed that over 90% of respondents were interested in taking a course in technical Russian.1 This finding resulted in the development …

Full Issue

Comparative Civilizations Review

No abstract provided.

Joseph Smith For President: The Prophet, The Assassins, And The Fight For American Religious Freedom By Spender Mcbride, Jordan T. Watkins

BYU Studies

In Joseph Smith for President, Spencer McBride provides an illuminating and reader-friendly account of Joseph Smith’s presidential campaign. McBride, who is a scholar of American religious and political history and an associate managing historian of the Joseph Smith Papers Project, firmly situates the early history of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints within antebellum contexts. In doing so, he contributes to a body of scholarship that examines the early Saints’ experiences in ways that shed light on and correct assumptions about American historical developments. In one recent example, which addresses some of the same themes, Benjamin E. …

How Did Joseph Smith Translate The Book Of Abraham, Stephen O. Smoot, John Gee, Kerry Muhlestein, John S. Thompson

BYU Studies

Multiple sources associated with the coming forth of the Book of Abraham spoke of Joseph Smith “translating” the text from the papyri he acquired. The Prophet himself used this language to describe his own activity with the text. For example, an entry in his journal under the date November 19, 1835, indicates the Prophet “spent the day in translating” the Egyptian records. In an unpublished editorial that was apparently meant to be printed in the March 1, 1842, issue of the Times and Seasons (the issue that saw the publication of the first installment of the Book of Abraham), Joseph …

Zeptah And Egyptes, Stephen O. Smoot, John Gee, Kerry Muhlestein, John S. Thompson

BYU Studies

The Book of Abraham describes how “the land of Egypt [was] first discovered by a woman, who was the daughter of Ham, and the daughter of Egyptus” (Abr. 1:23). This woman “discovered the land [when] it was under water, who afterward settled her sons in it; and thus, from Ham, sprang that race which preserved the curse in the land.” Thereafter “the first government of Egypt was established by Pharaoh, the eldest son of Egyptus, the daughter of Ham” (vv. 24–25).

The Purpose And Function Of The Egyptian Hypocephalus, Stephen O. Smoot, John Gee, Kerry Muhlestein, John S. Thompson

BYU Studies

Facsimile 2 of the Book of Abraham is a type of document called a hypocephalus. “The term ‘hypocephalus’ refers to a piece of Late Period and Ptolemaic [ca. 664–30 BC] funerary equipment. It is specifically, an amuletic disc, made of cartonnage, bronze, textile, and more rarely, papyrus, or even wood, emulating a solar disc.” The name was coined by modern Egyptologists beginning with Jean-François Champollion and comes from Greek, meaning literally “under the head.” Spell 162 of the ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead specifies that these amulets were to be placed hr tp of the mummy, which has been …

Isis The Pharaoh, Stephen O. Smoot, John Gee, Kerry Muhlestein, John S. Thompson

BYU Studies

The explanation given for Facsimile 3 identifies figure 2 as “King Pharaoh, whose name is given in the characters above his head.” One potential way to identify this figure by Egyptological methods would be to read “the characters [hieroglyphs] above his head.” Unfortunately, the original illustration or vignette from the papyrus is not extant, and so we are forced to decipher the glyphs as they are reproduced in Facsimile 3 by their engraver Reuben Hedlock. While Hedlock appears to have done a fairly commendable job accurately reproducing the facsimiles (at least based on a comparison of Facsimile 1 with the …

Full Issue

BYU Studies

No abstract provided.

Good Government Begins With Self-Government, Melissa Wei-Tsing Inouye

BYU Studies

For nearly a thousand years (from around 960 to 1905 CE), becoming a government official in imperial China required passing a battery of multiday, multisubject, anonymously graded written exams requiring decades of intensive preparation. Eighteenth-century European politi- cal thinkers, including Voltaire, admired China’s system for using meritocratic criteria, as opposed to aristocratic birth, to select government officials. The exams tested not only scholars’ abilities in history, philosophy, government, and literature, but also—in theory at least—their personal cultivation of moral virtues such as benevolence and integrity. Good government required goodness.

Sacramental Aesthetics: A Herbertian Reading Of John Dewey, Hayley E. Langton

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

I argue that a Herbertian reading of John Dewey’s aesthetic theory reveals his aesthetics as sacramental and offers a new lens through which to understand the functioning of Herbert’s rhetoric as well as Dewey’s philosophy. In turn, the sacramental qualities of Dewey’s aesthetic theory make a compelling argument for a postsecular interpretation of his work. First, I posit Herbert’s poetry within The Temple as sacramental; second, I discuss Dewey’s theory and the way Herbert follows it in structure; lastly, I highlight the ways in which this reading renders Dewey’s aesthetics as sacramental and outline the implications of this reading for …

Strength In Numbers: A Field Experiment In Gender, Influence, And Group Dynamics, Olga B. Stoddard, Christopher F. Karpowitz, Jessica Preece

Faculty Publications

Policy interventions to increase women’s presence in the workforce and leadership positions vary in their intensity, with some including a lone or token woman and others setting higher quotas. However, little is known about how the resulting group gender compositions influence individuals’ experiences and broader workplace dynamics. In this paper, we investigate whether token women are disadvantaged compared to women on majority-women mixed-gender teams. We conducted a multi-year field experiment with a top-10 undergraduate accounting program that randomized the gender composition of semester-long teams. Using laboratory, survey, and administrative data, we find that even after accounting for their proportion of …

Incorporating High-Fidelity Aerostructural Analyses In Wind Turbine Rotor Optimization, Denis-Gabriel Caprace, Adam Cardoza, Andrew Ning, Marco Mangano, Sicheng He, Joaquim R. R. A. Martins

Faculty Publications

s demand grows for wind turbines with larger blades, the design of future wind turbines must account for multi-physical interactions and an ever-increasing number of design load conditions. One aspect, aerostructural coupling, calls for design tools that are both accurate and computationally efficient. In this paper, we present a combined-fidelity approach that couples high-fidelity computational fluid dynamics and computational solid mechanics simulations, with a conventional aeroelastic turbine modeling tool based on blade element momentum and beam theories. The approach is integrated into a multidisciplinary optimization framework. It takes advantage of the high-fidelity tightly-coupled aerostructural simulations to evaluate the rotor power …

Closed Loop Recycling Of Low Friction Polymers In Fused Granule Fabrication Additive Manufacturing Processes, Neil Thompson, Jason Weaver

Faculty Publications

Plastic waste is a critical worldwide problem that impacts additive manufacturing (AM). Extensive research has explored how plastic waste in AM can be reduced by recycling prints into new filament, with varying success. An alternative to filament-based extrusion is “fused granule fabrication” (FGF), which extrudes from pellets or granules. This method is often used for large area additive manufacturing (LAAM) of polymers. This paper expands upon the knowledge base from previous research on LAAM and examines the extent to which PETG can be recycled and reprinted through the same FGF tool without significant loss to its material properties. The metric …

Reading Rate Gain In A Second Language: The Effect Of Unassisted Repeated Reading And Intensity On Word-Level Reading Measures, Grant Eckstein, Krista Rich, Ethan Lynn

Faculty Publications

Repeated reading is a popular intervention used to help struggling readers by exposing them to the same text multiple times. While the approach has been effective in L1 and some EFL settings, little research has explored its effectiveness compared against a control group or among ESL learners. Our study examined reading rate gains using words per minute and four eye-tracking measures with 46 mid-intermediate ESL learners grouped into three 14-week treatment groups: a control group that read 26 text passages (about two per week) just once through, another that read the same passages twice in each sitting, and a third …

Increase Student Engagement In Online Writing Environments, Jonathan Balzotti, Jason K. Mcdonald, Kevin Haws, Amy Allen Rogers, Matthew J. Baker

Faculty Publications

This case study explores a type of educational simulation, an alternative reality game we call a playable case study (PCS), and how its use influenced student engagement in an online writing classroom. The goal of the simulation was to help students create professional communication artifacts and experience real-world professional communication situations. This article reports the effectiveness of the playable case study as a tool specifically for online writing instruction (OWI). The context of our research was a PCS called Microcore. Acting as interns for a company, students are asked to investigate a serious problem that occurs and present a solution …

Hinterlands To Cities: The Archaeology Of Northwest Mexico And Its Vecinos, Matthew C. Pailes, Michael T. Searcy

Faculty Publications

Tis approachable book is a comprehensive synthesis of Northwest Mexico from the US border to the Mesoamerican frontier. Filling a vital gap in the regional literature, it serves as an essential reference not only for those interested in the specific history of this area of Mexico but western North America writ large. A period-by-period review of approximately14,000 years reveals the dynamic connections that knitted together societies inhabiting the Sea of Cortez coast, the Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts, and the Sierra Madre Occidental. Networks of interaction spanned these diverse ecological, topographical, and cultural terrains in the millennia following the demise of …

Mental Illness As A Vulnerability For Sexual Assault: A Retrospective Study Of 7,455 Sexual Assault Forensic Medical Examinations, Leslie Miles, Julie L. Valentine, Linda Mabey, Nancy R. Downing

Faculty Publications

Background: Persons with severe mental illness (MI) are at a high risk of becoming victims of sexual assault (SA). Vulnerability for SA with any type of MI is unknown. This study aimed to identify the prevalence of preexisting MI and other significant factors in patients reporting preexisting MI at the time of their SA medical forensic examinations (SAMFEs).

Method: A retrospective SAMFE chart review of patients ( N = 7,455) from 2010 to 2020 was conducted. Sexual assault nurse examiners completed SAMFEs. Inclusion criteria included (a) aged 14 years and older, (b) completed SAMFE with SA kit evidence collection, and …

Do People With Apraxia Of Speech And Aphasia Improve Or Worsen Across Repeated Sequential Word Trials?, Tyson G. Harmon, Adam Jacks, Katarina L. Haley, Jessica D. Richardson, Elizabeth H. Lacey, Peter Turkeltaub

Faculty Publications

Purpose:

During motor speech examinations for suspected apraxia of speech (AOS), clients are routinely asked to repeat words several times sequentially. The purpose of this study was to understand the task in terms of the relationship among consecutive attempts. We asked to what extent phonemic accuracy changes across trials and whether the change is predicted by AOS diagnosis and sound production severity.

Method:

One hundred thirty-three participants were assigned to four diagnostic groups based on quantitative metrics (aphasia plus AOS, aphasia-only, and aphasia with two borderline speech profiles). Each participant produced four multisyllabic words 5 times consecutively. These productions were …

Deconstructing Narratives About Artistic Mastery In Art Education, Mark Graham

Faculty Publications

A recurring challenge for art educators is how to include Black voices within the art curriculum. This challenge seems ever more relevant as a pandemic underlined the inequalities and injustices within our culture and society. A critical question for many White visual arts educators is: How do I, as a White educator, bring important issues of race, privilege, ideology, gender, and anti-racism into the art classroom? How can I help students to understand Whiteness as a cultural text and set about destabilizing White identity? How does one make space for an antiracist pedagogy? One way to begin conversations about these …

Factors That Affect Native English Speakers’ Comfort Levels When Communicating With Non-Native English Speakers, Kayla Nymeyer, Dan Dewey, William Eggington, Wendy Baker-Smemoe

Faculty Publications

This study explores native English speakers’ (NESs) self reported comfort levels when speaking with non-native English speakers (NNESs) from different first language (L1) backgrounds and in six different communication situations. NESs (n=122) listened to Spanish L1 and Chinese L1 NNESs with low, mid or high levels of English proficiency and rated their comfort level interacting with them. Results indicated that higher proficiency speakers were rated significantly higher (more comfortable as interlocutors) than Mid which were in turn rated higher than Low proficiency speakers. Spanish L1 speakers were rated higher than Chinese L1 speakers except at low proficiency levels. Ratings for …