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Mormons

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Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities

Limitation, Liberation, And The Latter-Day Saints: The Establishment Of Mormon Womanhood In The Woman’S Exponent, 1872-1890, Meaghan Harrington Jan 2019

Limitation, Liberation, And The Latter-Day Saints: The Establishment Of Mormon Womanhood In The Woman’S Exponent, 1872-1890, Meaghan Harrington

Undergraduate Honors Theses

Navigating the establishment of Mormon womanhood from 1872-1890 in the Exponent shows how Mormon women related to their outer world, their inner world, and themselves. This thesis analyzes the thoughts, feelings, and desires of a complex sociocultural grouping, and asks the reader to question their own attitudes towards gender and culture. The rhetoric of Mormon womanhood in the Exponent and the culture from which it stemmed have implications for understanding both “the rights of the women of Zion, and the rights of the women of all nations.”


From Housewives To Protesters: The Story Of Mormons For The Equal Rights Amendment, Kelli N. Morrill May 2018

From Housewives To Protesters: The Story Of Mormons For The Equal Rights Amendment, Kelli N. Morrill

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

On November 17, 1980, twenty Mormon women and one man were arrested on criminal trespassing charges after chaining themselves to the Bellevue, Washington LDS Temple gate. The news media extensively covered the event due to the shocking photos of middle-aged housewives, covered in large chains, holding protest signs and being escorted to police cars. These women were part of the group Mormons for the Equal Rights Amendment (MERA) and were protesting the LDS Church’s opposition to the ERA. The LDS Church actively opposed the ERA and played an important role in influencing the vote in key states leading to its …


Mormons And Youtube, Ryan Reeder Aug 2017

Mormons And Youtube, Ryan Reeder

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

As the internet’s second-most trafficked site, behind only Google in both the United States and globally, and with 600,000 hours of content uploaded and one billion hours viewed daily by more than one billion monthly users, YouTube’s reach and scope is vast. Growing out of a need to better facilitate the production and distribution of online video, YouTube was able to become dominant through a combination of factors including the implementation of innovative features, an ability to capitalize on popular videos hosted on its site, and good timing in managing to become a key component of the social media revolution. …


Captivity, Adoption, Marriage And Identity: Native American Children In Mormon Homes, 1847-1900., Michael Kay Bennion Aug 2012

Captivity, Adoption, Marriage And Identity: Native American Children In Mormon Homes, 1847-1900., Michael Kay Bennion

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The Indigenes of North America's Great Basin developed a way of life based on the available resources the Basin provided. Their culture and customs provided a stable means of understanding and interacting with nature and men. Their myths elaborated on expectations, hopes, and fears, in real and metaphorical ways, as evidenced by stories of the trickster Coyote. As Great Basin bands contacted Europeans, they adjusted their resource gathering based on new technologies, such as horses and guns, as well as their myths to cope with change. This process entailed some adjustment in their perceptions of the world around them and …


Reclaimed From A Contracting Zion: The Evolving Significance Of St. Thomas, Nevada, Aaron James Mcarthur May 2012

Reclaimed From A Contracting Zion: The Evolving Significance Of St. Thomas, Nevada, Aaron James Mcarthur

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Historians tend to treat Mormon history separately from the larger patterns of western American and U. S. history. The history of St. Thomas, Nevada, the remains of which are within the boundaries of the Lake Mead National Recreation Area, show that this segregated treatment is inadequate. St. Thomas was established in 1865 by Mormon missionaries after the Mormon leader Brigham Young sent them to the Moapa Valley in what is now southern Nevada to grow cotton. The town, like a few other Mormon sites in the region, was abandoned by the LDS Church, taken up by other people, and assigned …


Lilburn W. Boggs And The Case For Jacksonian Democracy, Robert John Walker Dec 2011

Lilburn W. Boggs And The Case For Jacksonian Democracy, Robert John Walker

Theses and Dissertations

Lilburn W. Boggs and the Case for Jacksonian Democracy Robert John Walker Department of Religion, BYU Masters of Religious Education Lilburn W. Boggs was lieutenant governor of Missouri from 1832 to 1836. He was governor of Missouri from 1836 to 1840. Political upheaval was the order of the day as Jacksonian democrats overthrew, through the power of the ballot box, the establishment of the patrician leadership in the United States. Issues of equity, slavery, religion, settlement of the West, and divisive sectionalism threatened the Union of the states. President Andrew Jackson was the representation of the common man and the …


Imagining The Saints: Representations Of Mormonism In American Culture, Jeremy R. Ricketts Aug 2011

Imagining The Saints: Representations Of Mormonism In American Culture, Jeremy R. Ricketts

American Studies ETDs

The purpose of this dissertation is to address how representations of Mormons in American culture reveal not only key aspects of the history of Mormonism in America but also tell us a great deal about American life and thought since the founding of the religion in 1830 to the present day (2011). Representations are powerful vehicles for creating, shaping, reflecting, and naturalizing society's understanding of religious institutions and revealing cultural concerns and anxieties, and the methodology of this dissertation thus focuses on interdisciplinary analytical critiques of diverse texts to better elucidate the complicated but deeply intertwined history of the Mormon …


Walking Backwards Into The Future, Camille Norman Jan 2011

Walking Backwards Into The Future, Camille Norman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Recent artists like Norwegian Recycling and E-603 have created a new genre of art within music: digital recycling. These artists take many different well-known and less-known lyrics, music, and spoken word and combine them together. This meshing of multiple pieces of art has new historical roots. The different images, auditory and visual, that these creations produce and often enhance meaning and connections through popular media. These connections interest me most. Through the lenses of post-colonial, gender, and queer theories, I examine Witi Ihimaera's creative work. I splice in different theorists' words, my own thoughts, and images to enhance and accent …


The Walker War Reconsidered, Ryan Elwood Wimmer Dec 2010

The Walker War Reconsidered, Ryan Elwood Wimmer

Theses and Dissertations

In July of 1853, Chief Wakara's band of Utes clashed in a series of violent confrontations with the Mormon settlers. This conflict is known as the Walker War. Many complex factors contributed to this war. After some earlier violence between Mormons and different bands of Utes between 1847 and 1851, the Mormons continued their quick expansion settling on Ute lands. From 1851 to 1853 Mormon and Ute relations continued to decline as Mormons expanded their settlements occupying Ute hunting grounds. In addition to these land encroachments, new laws were enacted regulating trade between the Spanish and Utes by Brigham Young. …


Violence Across The Land: Vigilantism And Extralegal Justice In The Utah Territory, Scott K. Thomas Mar 2010

Violence Across The Land: Vigilantism And Extralegal Justice In The Utah Territory, Scott K. Thomas

Theses and Dissertations

For years historians of the American West have overlooked Utah when dealing with the subject of extrajudicial violence, while researchers of Mormonism have misread the existence of such violence in territorial Utah. The former asserts that Utah was free from extrajudicial proceedings and that such violence was nearly nonexistent within the contours of the Mormon kingdom. The latter maintains that any violence that existed in Utah was directly connected to the religious fanaticism of the Mormon populace in the region. The reality is that much of the extralegal violence in Utah was a result of the frontier, not the religion …


Markets And The Mormon Conflict: Nauvoo, Illinois, 1839-1846, Catherine Mary Wycoff Dec 2009

Markets And The Mormon Conflict: Nauvoo, Illinois, 1839-1846, Catherine Mary Wycoff

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the development of the economy during the period the Mormons were in Illinois, 1839-1846. It argues that the economy developed similarly to contemporary towns and that the Mormons in Nauvoo participated in the local and regional market. However, the doctrine of the gathering produced explosive population growth, including almost 5,000 immigrants from Britain. The economy was not able to absorb the number and this contributed to the exodus of the Mormons to the west in 1846. The main sources used are surviving account books, diaries, journals from merchants and farmers. The first chapter describes the settlement of …


Pushing The Car Of Progress Forward: The Salt Lake Tribune's Quest To Change Utah For Statehood, 1871-1896, Robert Patrick Mills May 2007

Pushing The Car Of Progress Forward: The Salt Lake Tribune's Quest To Change Utah For Statehood, 1871-1896, Robert Patrick Mills

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The debate over Utah statehood involved several controversial issues that the United States government and the American public wanted resolved before admission would be granted. One strong advocate for such changes in Utah was the widely published newspaper, the Salt Lake Tribune, which continually published anti-statehood and anti-Mormon ideas in the final decades before Utah was finally admitted in 1896. This thesis studies and analyzes the Tribune’s editorials and news stories to better understand which issues opponents of statehood worried the most over and what they wanted to accomplish with their protest. It finds that Mormon political domination was …


Toiling Among The Seed Of Israel: A Comparison Of Puritan And Mormon Missions To The Indians, Christina A. Skousen Dec 2005

Toiling Among The Seed Of Israel: A Comparison Of Puritan And Mormon Missions To The Indians, Christina A. Skousen

Theses and Dissertations

Substantial comparative analyses of Puritanism and Mormonism are lacking in historical scholarship, despite noted similarities between the two religions. This study helps to fill that void by comparing the Puritan and Mormon proselytization efforts among the Indians that occurred at the respective sites of Massachusetts Bay Colony and the Southern Indian Mission. In my examination of the missionization attempts that took place at these two locations, I analyze a common motive and method of the two denominations for attempting to Christianize the Indians. The Puritan and Mormon missionaries proselytizing in Massachusetts Bay Colony and the Southern Indian Mission shared an …


Latter-Day Saints In Popular National Periodicals 1970-1981, Adam H. Nielson Aug 2003

Latter-Day Saints In Popular National Periodicals 1970-1981, Adam H. Nielson

Theses and Dissertations

The public image of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the product of several factors. This thesis investigates that image as presented in national periodicals from 1970 to 1981. During this time "Mormons" and "Mormonism" was a popular topic as the religion gained notoriety, and as an awareness of its peculiar beliefs and practices increased.

The rationale for using national magazines to assess public image is the assumption that they "reflect prevailing points of view" and help "formulate public opinion." Since popular attitudes are one of the factors that influence how the Church is accepted in the …


The "Unidentified Pioneers": An Analysis Of Staffordshire Mormons, 1837 To 1870, Stephen G. Arrowsmith Jan 2003

The "Unidentified Pioneers": An Analysis Of Staffordshire Mormons, 1837 To 1870, Stephen G. Arrowsmith

Theses and Dissertations

The evidence presented in this thesis advocates an increased level of scholarly interest in English working-class Mormon converts. To illustrate who these people were, and what their roles were as part of Mormon story, this regional study introduces and makes available over twelve hundred Staffordshire Mormons, and asks questions of the collected statistical information. The conservative Staffordshire Mormons clearly assisted the establishment, and continuation, off a Zion in the American West. Much of the data confirms previous scholarship; however, those with “differing visions” of Mormonism (for example, the RLDS Church) attracted Staffordshire converts in larger numbers than previously suggested. The …


A History Of The Latter-Day Saints In The Columbia Basin Of Central Washington 1850-1972, Rick B. Jorgensen Nov 2002

A History Of The Latter-Day Saints In The Columbia Basin Of Central Washington 1850-1972, Rick B. Jorgensen

Theses and Dissertations

The Columbia Basin of Central Washington has a relatively recent Latter-day Saint history among the regions of the western states. Most of the sparsely populated rural areas in the west that have large concentrations of Latter-day Saints were originally established as "Mormon" settlements. The basin referred to lies between the Snake and Columbia Rivers and now has thousands of Latter-day Saints who have chosen to inhabit the historically barren land and call it their home. A brief visit or casual observance of the area leads many to question what were the major factors and characteristics leading to the twentieth century …


The Japanese Missionary Journals Of Elder Alma O. Taylor, 1901-10, Reid Larkin Neilson Jan 2001

The Japanese Missionary Journals Of Elder Alma O. Taylor, 1901-10, Reid Larkin Neilson

Theses and Dissertations

On 14 February 1901, the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced the opening of the Japan Mission and the selection of Elder Heber J. Grant as its first president. The idea of sending Mormon missionaries to Japan had earlier been entertained by President Brigham Young and several other church leaders and lay members.

Until 1854, Japan was closed to western nations and their religious influences. Finally, Commodore Perry forced the Japanese to open their borders and minds to the economic and political entreaties of the United States. In time, other western nations and their …


Dating Behavior Of Latter-Day Saint Male Returned Missionaries: A Process Of Managing Desires, Nancy C. Mclaughlin Jan 2000

Dating Behavior Of Latter-Day Saint Male Returned Missionaries: A Process Of Managing Desires, Nancy C. Mclaughlin

Theses and Dissertations

Each year thousands of Latter-day Saint males return to their homes after serving a two year religious mission. According to Latter-day Saint doctrine and cultural beliefs, these young men are expected to resume a normal life including dating and involvement in romantic relationships. Research and Latter-day Saint doctrine related to the dating behavior of returned missionaries (RMs) is reviewed. Most previous research has emphasized the quantitative analysis of single aspects of RMs dating behavior such as dating frequency and social status. In an attempt to add to this field of research, this qualitative analysis explored the attitudes and experiences of …


Lds Life Tables: A Comparison Of Long-Lived Populations, Christopher R. Layton Jan 2000

Lds Life Tables: A Comparison Of Long-Lived Populations, Christopher R. Layton

Theses and Dissertations

This research estimates the life expectancy of members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) in Utah. We create gender-specific life tables for four groups: total Utah, active LDS, less-active LDS, and non-LDS. Male life tables are based on data from 1991-1995; female life tables are based on data from 1994-1998. Life expectancy at birth is 75 years for all utah males, 79.8 years for active LDS Utah males, 71.6 years for less active LDS Utah males, and 71.5 years for non-LDS Utah males. Female life expectancy at birth is 80.4 years for all Utah females, 83.9 …


Representing Culture: Reflexivity And Mormon Folklore Scholarship, David A. Allred Jan 2000

Representing Culture: Reflexivity And Mormon Folklore Scholarship, David A. Allred

Theses and Dissertations

When writing about a culture, ethnographers can convey important insights about society. However, ethnography can also misrepresent culture. To address this fact, reflexive ethnography attempts to influence both the methodology and the rhetoric of writing about culture. Reflexivity seeks to acknowledge the bias of the researcher. To include the voice of the cultural insiders, and to more closely represent the dynamics of cultures that always have an element of hybridity. However, reflexive ethnographies can also be unwieldy and impractical. Therefore, one must find a pragmatic application of reflexivity.

Reflexivity can have application to Mormon folklore studies. The most important Mormon …


Dance And Doctrine: Shaker And Mormon Dancing As A Manifestation Of Doctrinal Views Of The Physical Body, Lindsy Stewart Cieslewicz Jan 2000

Dance And Doctrine: Shaker And Mormon Dancing As A Manifestation Of Doctrinal Views Of The Physical Body, Lindsy Stewart Cieslewicz

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis compares the dancing of the Shakers (The United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearance) and the Mormons (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints or LDS Church) during the nineteenth century, as it was influenced by their doctrinal beliefs about the human body. Specifically, it examines how the role of the physical body in achieving mortal happiness and immortal salvation was viewed by each group and how these beliefs were reflected in their dancing. It describes the different forms of dancing performed by each religious group and how dance functioned as worship and recreation for the …


Religiosity And Physical Fitness: A Study Of Middle-Aged Mormon Men, Janette Olsen Jan 1999

Religiosity And Physical Fitness: A Study Of Middle-Aged Mormon Men, Janette Olsen

Theses and Dissertations

Research has related both physical fitness and religiosity to health. This study combined these ideas and examined the relationship between religiosity and physical fitness among middle aged Mormon men (n=110). Mormons are an ideal population for study because of their strict health code. Fitness variables were grip strength, waist/hip ratio, body mass index (BMI) and estimated maximal oxygen uptake (VO2max). A questionnaire assessed level of religiosity and separated subjects into two groups: highly religious (n=35) and less religious (n=14). Moderately religious subjects (n=61) were omitted. A one way ANOVA (between-groups design) found no significant differences in fitness variables between groups. …


The Mormon Influence On The Political Geography Of The West, Michael Madsen Jan 1999

The Mormon Influence On The Political Geography Of The West, Michael Madsen

Theses and Dissertations

The vast colonization of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or Mormons, in the nineteenth century had a profund impact on the populating, culture, economy, and environment of much of the American West. This thesis examines the political geographic influence of the Mormons in the West and, more specifically, in the lands ceded by Mexico to the United States in 1848. This land comprises all or portions of the following states: California, Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, Arizona, and New Mexico.
The original organization of the Mexican Cession at the hands of Congress in 1850 was drastically influenced by …


Religiosity And Life Satisfaction Among Lds College Students, Po Nien Chou Jan 1999

Religiosity And Life Satisfaction Among Lds College Students, Po Nien Chou

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between religiosity and life satisfaction among Latter-day Saints (LDS) college students. The scales used were the religiosity scale by Chadwick and Top (1993), and the life satisfaction scale by Neugarten, Havighurst and Tobin (1961). The analysis was based on data obtained from 222 students (55.5%) who responded. A prediction model was used to develop a regression equation. Pearson correlation analysis was used to evaluate the correlation between religiosity and life satisfaction. The regression equation is as follows: life satisfaction = 1.436815592 + 0.045915152 (spiritual experiences) + 0.042888274 (integration in congregation). …


The Influence Of Religiosity In The Construction Of Meaning From Advertising Messages Intended To Promote Lifestyle Values, Lillian Billing Jan 1999

The Influence Of Religiosity In The Construction Of Meaning From Advertising Messages Intended To Promote Lifestyle Values, Lillian Billing

Theses and Dissertations

Religiosity has largely been ignored by consumer research as a factor in the negotiation of meaning from magazine advertisements containing lifestyle messages. A meaning based study was undertaken to seek to identify its presence and emergence within a religious audience. A qualitative methodology employing in-depth, phenomenological interviewing was designed. Six members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, three men and three women, were invited to give their interpretations, thoughts, and feelings towards four magazine advertisements. A second in-depth phenomenological interview was conducted with each participant to provide individual lifeworld contexts. Analysis employed a previously tested conceptual construct, …


Sun, Moon, And Star, Christopher Kimball Bigelow Apr 1998

Sun, Moon, And Star, Christopher Kimball Bigelow

Theses and Dissertations

This fictional novella takes place during the narrator Smoot's two-year mission to Melbourne, Australia. It chronicles the intertwining of the lives and destinies of three main characters: Smoot, a Utah native who struggles with carnality and lack of conversion and spirituality; Babakian, an Australian convert who used to be a punk rocker and has become frustrated with Mormonism's blandness and conformity; and Samantha, a nonmember part-Tongan Utahn with whom Smoot was involved before his mission. Speaking generally, the novella is about how Babakian misuses his creative powers of art and sexuality, how Samantha explores the gospel and changes her life, …


Utopian Marriage In Nineteenth-Century America: Public And Private Discourse, Brenda Olsen Andrus Jan 1998

Utopian Marriage In Nineteenth-Century America: Public And Private Discourse, Brenda Olsen Andrus

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is a rhetorical analysis of utopian discourse about marriage in mid-nineteenth-century America. Although utopian communities are usually approached within the fields of history and sociology, a rhetorical analysis adds to the discussion by uncovering the discursive complexity of marriage beliefs within a rapidly changing culture. Discursive features of the Shaker, Oneida Community and Latter-day Saint texts are outlined and compared according to the following format:

Chapter One examines the textures of conflict within the dominant culture's views of marriage and gender roles in nineteenth-century America, with a brief overview of reform efforts of the day. This chapter provides …


Mormon Culture Meets Popular Fiction: Susa Young Gates And The Cultural Work Of Home Literature, Lisa Olsen Tait Jan 1998

Mormon Culture Meets Popular Fiction: Susa Young Gates And The Cultural Work Of Home Literature, Lisa Olsen Tait

Theses and Dissertations

The few studies of Mormon home literature that have been published to date dismiss it as inferior artistry, an embarrassing if necessary step in the progression towards true Mormon literature. These studies are inadequate, however, because they divorce the texts from their context, holding them up to standards that did not exist for their original audience. Jane Tompkins' theory of texts as cultural work provides a more satisfactory way of looking at these narratives.

Home literature is thoroughly enmeshed in the cultural discourse of its day. Beneath the surface, these didactic stories about young Mormons finding love with their foreordained …


The Impact Of The Physical And Cultural Geography Of Southeastern Utah On Latter-Day Settlement, Sally Timmins Mandurino Jan 1998

The Impact Of The Physical And Cultural Geography Of Southeastern Utah On Latter-Day Settlement, Sally Timmins Mandurino

Theses and Dissertations

The Latter-day Saint settlements in southeastern Utah, namely Bluff, Monticello and Blanding, were impacted by the physical and cultural geography of the area. These geographic elements hindered, and in some cases prevented, the Latter-day Saint colonizers from fulfilling the seven basic principles of Latter-day Saint expansion and colonization in the Great Basin. The impacts of physical geography were the geology, the climate, the soil and the rivers and streams. The impacts of cultural geography were the Navajo Indian Tribe, the Paiute Indian Tribe, and the criminal element. This thesis discusses the geographic elements of the area, how they impacted the …


An Annotated Bibliography Of Literary Mormon Humor, Sherlene Hall Bartholomew Jan 1998

An Annotated Bibliography Of Literary Mormon Humor, Sherlene Hall Bartholomew

Theses and Dissertations

This "Annotated Bibliography of Literary Mormon Humor" includes over five hundred sources, cross-referenced to pertinent commentary and criticism, and divided into seven sections: "Humor in Mormon Fiction," "Humor in Mormon Non-Fiction," "Mormon Criticism Assessing ‘Inside Humor,’" "Gentile Criticism of the Saints' Humor," "Gentile Humor About Mormons," "Mormon Criticism of Gentile Humor," and "Mormon Internet Humor," all made accessible to scholars by a comprehensive index of more than one thousand topics. The author has filed selected photocopied pages of alphabetized, annotated items by author, or chronologically as periodicals, into a twenty-volume Archive of Mormon Humor in Literature, housed at the Center …