Digital Commons Network^™

Judicial Murder: The Witch-Craze In Germany And Switzerland, Albert Winkler

Swiss American Historical Society Review

Among the most remarkable and puzzling social, religious and legal movements of the late Middle Ages and Early Modern periods of European history were the witch-hunts. Historians have often disagreed on the exact time frame of the witch-craze, but these actions largely spanned three centuries roughly from 1450 to 1750, most of which took place from 1500 to 1650. Some estimates on the number of people accused of witchcraft and those executed for the supposed crime reach into the hundreds of thousands. Professor Nachman Ben-Yahuda has stated, “From the early decades of the fourteenth century until 1650, continental Europeans executed …

Full Issue

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Doctrine And Covenants 21: Metanarrative Of The Restoration, Steve L. Olsen

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

Joseph Smith dictated Doctrine and Covenants 21 at the inaugural meeting of the Church of Jesus Christ on April 6, 1830. The present study examines the literary craftsmanship of the revelation to plumb the depths of its role in the restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ. The analysis explores the meaning of patterns of usage in the text from the most specific (diction, syntax, figures of speech) to the most general (tone, rhetoric, and structural logic). The hypothesis of this study is that Doctrine and Covenants 21 provides a metanarrative of the Restoration — that is, a set of …

Twenty Years After “Paradigms Regained,” Part 1: The Ongoing, Plain, And Precious Significance Of Margaret Barker’S Scholarship For Latter-Day Saint Studies, Kevin Christensen

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

Twenty years ago, the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies published “Paradigms Regained: A Survey of Margaret Barker’s Scholarship and Its Significance for Mormon Studies” as its second FARMS Occasional Paper. The first part of this essay provides an overview of Doctor Barker’s scholarship and its wider reception through early 2022, and then includes a broad survey of Latter-day Saint interaction with her work to the present. Part 2 of this essay (forthcoming) will address specific criticisms and appreciations of Barker’s work.

Full Issue

Swiss American Historical Society Review

No abstract provided.

A Restoration Of Paul’S Understanding Of Faith As A Relationship Of Action, Godfrey J. Ellis

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

Brent Schmidt builds on his earlier book on relational grace by tackling the topic of relational faith. For those interested in historical trends in religious thought, this book provides intimate details of Greek and Latin terms and the gradual corruption of the original Pauline concept of faith by Augustine and other early and influential thinkers and theologians. Leading the reader through the conceptual reworking of the idea of faith by examining both well-known and lesser-known reformers, but somewhat skirting the faith-works debate, Schmidt ends up nevertheless convincingly demonstrating two facts. First, that faith as concrete action, not just as abstract …

Review Of R. Gordon Shepherd, A. Gary Shepherd, And Ryan T. Cragun, Eds. The Palgrave Handbook Of Global Mormonism. Cham, Switzerland: Springer International Publishing, 2020., Melissa Wei-Tsing Inouye

Mormon Studies Review

At 868 pages, this volume is more comprehensive than any that have come before, with thirty-one chapters written by forty-two authors on three restoration traditions, discussing over forty countries and even more ethnic and cultural groupings. The editors have brought together not only scholars from the fields already well represented within Mormon studies (history, religious studies, sociology, anthropology, studies of gender, race, and culture) but also scholars with provocative perspectives from geography, demography, and corporate research. There is a pleasing mix of new and familiar names.

Reviewing a book such as this one could easily consume the allotted space with …

Review: Samuel Morris Brown. Joseph Smith’S Translation: The Words And Worlds Of Early Mormonism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020., Douglas J. Davies

Mormon Studies Review

Why do we write books? Why did Joseph Smith write his, and why does Samuel Brown write on Smith writing his? I suppose this regressive query may sound mildly absurd coming from one academic to others, largely alert to career, pride, obligation and, optimistically, to the love of shared knowing. Perhaps I have written too many myself, read far more and—just now—for whatever reason, find this rhetorical question springing to mind. By contrast, it is usually easy to answer the question of how someone has written their book, ascertain its genre, and comment on its single disciplinary driver or, as …

It Takes Two, Jenet Jacob Erickson

BYU Studies

In 2006, Canadian fathering scholar Andrea Doucet shared an illuminating moment from her extensive research with single dads. After a long evening discussing these fathers’ experiences, Doucet asked, “In an ideal world, what resources or supports would you like to see for single fathers?” She expected to hear that they wanted greater social support and societal acceptance, more programs and policies directed at single dads. Instead, after a period of awkward silence, one dad stood and said, “An ideal world would be one with a father and a mother. We’d be lying if we pretended that wasn’t true.” Nods of …

End Matter

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

A Register Analysis Of Public Prayers, Lindsey Newton, Brett Hashimoto

BYU Studies

Prayer, as defined by scholars Corwin and Brown, is “a form of ritual language . . . [that] affords humans the possibility to communicate with non-human others.” As a linguistic register (that is, a variety of language defined by an area of use, such as academic research articles, text messages, sermons, or blog posts), it denotes communication with an unseen being, primarily in a religious context. However, “despite the importance of religion and ritual in anthropology, prayer, a key component of religious practices and institutions, has received very little empirical attention.” This is partially because the complexity of religion as …

Climate Change Risk Perception And Pro-Environmental Behavior: The Moderating Role Of Environmental Values And Psychological Contract Breach, Badar Latif, James Gaskin, Nuwan Gunarathne, Robert Sroufe, Arshian Sharif, Abdul Hanan

Faculty Publications

Purpose – Debates regarding climate change risk perception (CCRP), particularly its scale and impact on social and environmental sustainability, have continued for decades. CCRP is experiencing a renaissance with an increased focus on environmentally relevant behaviors to mitigate the effects of climate change. However, CCRP lacks investigation from the employee perspective. Supported by the social exchange and value–belief–norm theories, this study aims to address the impact of employees’ CCRP on their proenvironmental behavior (PEB) via the moderating roles of environmental values and psychological contract breach.

Design/methodology/approach – The nonprobability convenience sampling technique was used to collect survey data froma sample …

Boomer Peak Or Gen X Cliff? From Svs To Lbms In Georgia English, Margaret E. L. Renwick, Joseph A. Stanley, Jon Forrest, Lelia Glass

Faculty Publications

The late twentieth century in the United States marks the decline of regional vowel systems like the Northern Cities Shift and the Southern Vowel Shift, replaced by supralocal systems like the Low-Back-Merger Shift.We chart such change in acoustic data from seven generations of White speakers (n = 135) in the Southeastern state of Georgia. We analyze front vowels affected by both the SVS and LBMS (DRESS, TRAP), plus PRICE and FACE, known respectively to monophthongize and centralize in the SVS, and LBMS-implicated LOT/ THOUGHT. The SVS is most advanced among Georgians born in the mid-twentieth century, particularly in FACE-centralization. In …

Full Issue

The Bridge

No abstract provided.

Review; Laughter And Civility: The Theater Of Emma Gad, Susan Brantly

The Bridge

When Emma Gad is remembered in Denmark today, it is as the Danish version of Miss Manners, due to her book Takt og Tone: Hvordan vi omgaas (Tact and Tone: How We Act in Society, 1918), which is apparently still in print. However, as University of Texas, Austin professor Lynn Wilkinson so ably illustrates, Emma Gad was much more than that. Gad was a highly successful playwright and cultural mediator in the Copenhagen of Edvard and Georg Brandes. Wilkinson’s book offers a comprehensive look at the life and work of this important Danish woman playwright and seeks to reinstate Gad …

Dannebrog On The Prairie: The Development Of Danishness In The Elk Horn–Kimballton Area Of Iowa, Lise Just

The Bridge

My father’s family comes from a small Danish farming community in Als parish in Jutland, where it was customary for young people to marry the sons and daughters of neighboring farmers. It was a closed community, largely because of a policy known as adscription (restricting peasants to the estate of their birth) that did not allow able-bodied men to leave the parish. This policy was in place for most of the eighteenth century, but in 1788, adscription was abolished. In the same period, the population in Denmark was increasing rapidly, due to, among other things, better hygiene and lower child …

Review; Danish Tutor. Grammar And Vocabulary Workbook, Nete Schmidt

The Bridge

In “How to Use this Book,” the introduction to their new Danish textbook Danish Tutor, authors Anne Grydehøj and Jesper Hansen, both of whom are experienced Danish instructors at University College London, describe their audience:

If you have studied Danish before but would like to brush up on or improve your grammar, vocabulary, reading and writing skills, this is the book for you. The Danish Tutor is a grammar workbook which contains a comprehensive grammar syllabus from advanced beginner to upper intermediate and combines grammar and vocabulary presentations with over 200 practice exercises. (xvii)

They go on to clarify …

Human Connection: A Crucial Ingredient In Vacation Experience, Ondrej Mitas, Moji Shahvali, Peter Ward, Mat Duerden, Marcel Bastiaansen

Faculty Publications

The past decade (2012–2022) has seen a blossoming of research on tourists’ quality of life. Frameworks such as subjective well-being (Diener & Seligman, 2002), the PERMA wellbeing theory (Seligman, 2012) and eudaimonia (Filep & Deery, 2010) have been used to document the numerous positive psychological effects of tourist experiences. One of the most robust findings from this literature is that engaging in tourism triggers emotions. Ranging from the excitement of hobby-focused competitions and tours (Mitas et al., 2012a) to the relaxation of a spa (Strauss-Blasche et al., 2004a), dozens of studies have now documented salubrious emotional profiles over the course …

The Effects Of Relational Poverty: Healing Our Culture, Jenet Erickson

Issues in Religion and Psychotherapy

One of the most vexing challenges of our day is a profound hunger for connection, evidenced by an epidemic of loneliness, violence, relational poverty, and increasing mental health challenges. We are born to be in deep connection with others. As German analyst Frieda Fromm-Reichman wrote, “The longing for interpersonal intimacy stays with every human being from infancy through life, and there is no human being who is not threatened by its loss.” A radical cultural focus on autonomy with the associated ruptures in family stability, decreased religiosity and community engagement have increased loneliness in spite of the seeming “connectivity” of …

Front Matter

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

Full Issue

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

“It Must Needs Be”, Eric Dahlin

BYU Studies

After speaking to his son Jacob about Jesus Christ’s redemption of mankind, the Book of Mormon prophet Lehi declares, “It must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things” (2 Ne. 2:11). We often use the word opposition colloquially to explain the difficulties or challenges that we or others encounter. When others experience troubling times, we frequently, as well-intentioned members of the Church, remind them of this sentiment. Our aim is to provide solace for the one who is suffering by pointing out that facing opposition is a common feature of life (even if normalizing the suffering may …

Coming And Going To Zion: An Analysis Of Push And Pull Factors Motivating British Latter-Day Saint Emigration, 1840–60, Samuel Benson

BYU Studies

In 1863, acclaimed British writer Charles Dickens boarded a New York–bound emigrant ship docked at Liverpool. He was not a passenger but an observer; the subjects of his study were more than eight hundred Latter-day Saint emigrants aboard the ship Amazon. Dickens’s stated purpose, as he later wrote in The Uncommercial Traveller, was “to bear testimony against them if they deserved it,” but to his surprise, he instead found “the pick and flower of England.” Dickens lauded the Latter-day Saints’ politeness and their “aptitude for organisation,” and he praised their leader, Apostle George Q. Cannon. By the end …

Full Issue

BYU Studies

No abstract provided.

An Analysis Of Ukrainians’ Language Attitudes And Ideology: A Conflict-Catalyzed Identity Shift, Kateryna Kravchenko, Joseph A. Stanley

Faculty Publications

Literature Review:

• Positions of Russian language have traditionally been strong
• “The State has to ensure the comprehensive development and functioning of the Ukrainian language in all spheres of social life throughout the entire territory of Ukraine” (Constitution of Ukraine, art. 10)
• The majority of Ukrainians (74%) have never experienced discrimination against Russian speakers by Ukrainian speakers, and 67% have never experienced discrimination against Ukrainian speakers by Russian speakers (Masenko, 2009, pp. 117-119).
• After 2014, slight changes in attitudes: more positive views towards Ukrainian, worsening of attitudes towards Russian (Kulyk, 2016)

How Does Religious Faith Impact Positive Youth Outcomes, Michael A. Goodman, W. Justin Dyer

Faculty Publications

This study investigates the protective aspects of religiosity in young adolescents and explores the potential processes involved. Specifically, we examine the influence of three measures of religiosity—religious salience, intrinsic religiosity, and daily religious experiences—on delinquency and anxiety. The study sample consists of 636 families located in the state of Utah. Additionally, we explore how positive youth development (PYD) constructs may mediate the relationship between religiosity and adolescent outcomes. The findings indicate that religious salience and daily religious experiences are directly and indirectly associated with lower levels of delinquency and anxiety. Furthermore, two PYD constructs—character and connectivity—serve as mediators between religious …

Family Home Evening As A Model For Promoting Family Health, Tommy M. Phillips, Jennifer R. Smith, Alice C. Long, Brandan E. Wheeler, Loren D. Marks, Michael Goodman, Trevan Hatch, Sterling K. Wall

Faculty Publications

One hundred thirty-seven married members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with children participated in a study of Family Home Evening and its relation to family well-being. Results support previous research suggesting that regular family-level rituals and sacred practices benefit families, marriages, and parent-child relationships. While this study‟s results cannot demonstrate any sort of causal link, they do provide very strong correlational evidence in support of the power and value of regular family-level routines, rituals, and sacred practices, as seen in LDS observance of FHE. Implications for the full universe of families are discussed.

Front Matter

The Bridge

No abstract provided.

Prairie Roots Run Deep: A Geologically Grounded History Of Elk Horn, Iowa, Warren Watson

The Bridge

Clay Township is located in the southeast corner of Shelby County, Iowa. It is made up of thirty-six one-mile square sections. The top tier of sections one through six are somewhat larger due to a surveying correction. It was one of the last townships in Shelby County to be settled. The first settlers were drawn to the northeast corner of Shelby County in the late 1840s and early 1850s. Once a Dane got a foothold in Clay Township in the 1860s, the area became populated quickly. It was eventually settled by the largest contingent of Danes in America. This is …

Six Objects From Sned: Remembering The Past On Jens Jensen’S Childhood Farm, J.R. Christianson

The Bridge

When Jens Jensen was growing up in Denmark, the past was never very far away. Sometimes it was way too close, like the day one of the great events of Danish history happened right there on their family farm. Jens was only three years old, but it was not something one would forget, even at his age. The day was April 18, 1864, when one of the fiercest battles in Danish history was fought on the hillside where their farm lay. Needless to say, it tore the place apart.