Mormon Studies Commons^™

Review Of Irenaeus, Joseph Smith, And God-Making Heresy, B Y Adam J. Powell, Stephen C. Taysom

Mormon Studies Review

Adam J. Powell’s Irenaeus, Joseph Smith, and God-Making Heresy is not a book for the faint of heart or those allergic to theoretical musings. In just over two hundred pages, Powell manages to produce not only a fascinating comparison between Joseph Smith’s nineteenth-century Mormonism and the religious thought of second-century church father Irenaeus, but also introduces an innovative application of the work of Max Weber and Hans Mol to the question of religious conflict management. This is a book about the dynamic nature of religion—how it makes and remakes itself while colliding with ever-present cultural forces.

Sounding Mormonism, Sharon J. Harris, Peter Mcmurray

Mormon Studies Review

The restoration, or founding of the LDS Church, begins with a sonic battle of wills: “My toung seemed to be swolen in my mouth, so that I could not utter.” In this opening scene of Mormonism, the young prophet-to-be, Joseph Smith, tries but fails to pray aloud as his tongue is tied by the devil.1 When he finally succeeds in speaking, he sees a divine vision, accompanied by an inaugural command: to hear, or more precisely (in the canonical account of that event), “Hear Him!” Thus Smith is called to hear the words of Jesus Christ, who is hovering over …

Front Matter

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

Review Of Why Liberals Win (Even Win They Lose Elections): How America’S Raucous, Nasty, And Mean ‘Culture Wars’ Make For A More Inclusive Nation, By Stephen Prothero, Neil J. Young

Mormon Studies Review

Depending on how one feels about the 2016 election, reading a book titled Why Liberals Win (Even When They Lose Elections) might seem like either a deluded endeavor or much-needed balm. In his latest work, Stephen Prothero argues that liberals stand on the victorious side of history, if not always the ballot box, because they have won every culture war battle since the nation’s founding. Liberals win, Prothero contends, because conservatives launch culture wars to preserve a way of life that has already begun to change, an ill-fated effort that cannot turn back the progressive forces of history that churn …

Review Of Revelatory Events: Three Case Studies Of The Emergence Of New Spiritual Paths, By Ann Taves, Seth Perry

Mormon Studies Review

When Ann Taves’s last monograph came out, in 2009, the journal Religion ran a review of it by Finbarr Curtis entitled “Ann Taves’s Religious Experience Reconsidered is a sign of a global apocalypse that will kill us all.”1 Curtis was worried about the effects of Taves’s unapologetically reductive approach to religion. Taves is well known as a proponent of using cognitive science and related methodologies to explain what really happens when people have religious experiences. This sort of thing, as indicated by Curtis’s title, rubs a lot of people the wrong way.

Minds, Bodies, And Objects, Samuel M. Brown

Mormon Studies Review

As I wander ever more deeply into the semantic labyrinths of early Mormon translation, I find myself confronting ubiquitous objects that matter for more than their mere physicality. Seer stones, interpreters, gold plates, Egyptian papyri, locks of hair, underclothing, and scores more. Mormonism is saturated with such objects, pregnant with what some scholars call “abundance” or “real presence.” Mormons don’t call them “relics,” afraid to conjure (that fraught word!) Catholic altars, corpses, and catacombs. Mormons are no idolaters, so there must be no relics. But we who think academically about Mormons may do well to acknowledge the deep kinship Mormons …

Introduction: Small Means, Great Things, Benjamin Peters, John D. Peters

Mormon Studies Review

Mormonism is a media religion: every contribution to this forum makes this point in some way. Of course, the same could be said of most religions, and yet the Mormon tradition in particular incorporates media. How so?

Full Issue

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

Communing With Compromise: Mormonism And The Early Internet, Gavin Feller

Mormon Studies Review

As an emerging technology, the internet stirred a fascinating brew of excitement, anxiety, and fear for Jew and Gentile.1 It challenged both grassroots and top-down notions of intimacy, authenticity, and control. For Mormonism, a religion whose chronology parallels uncannily the development of electronic communication technologies, the internet joins a host of media dripping with ambivalence. In tracing the contours of Mormonism’s evolving and uneasy relationship with the twentieth-century internet—from early listserv communities to institutional web development—this brief essay presents only a morsel of the richness the religion offers for the study of technology, culture, and power.

Review Of Natural Born Seer: Joseph Smith, American Prophet, 1805–1830, By Richard S. Van Wagoner, Mark Ashurst-Mcgee, Mark L. Staker

Mormon Studies Review

Around the turn of the century, Signature Books planned a series of three volumes that would cover Joseph Smith’s life in detail. Richard S. Van Wagoner was commissioned to write the first volume of the trilogy, treating the period from Smith’s birth to his move to Ohio. Van Wagoner’s Natural Born Seer: Joseph Smith, American Prophet, 1805– 1830 engages Smith’s family and cultural background, his childhood and formative years, his visionary claims, his translation of the Book of Mormon, and the organization of the Mormon church. Much of the work of Mormon history is done by amateur scholars who contribute …

Review Of What Is Mormonism? A Student’S Introduction, By Patrick Q. Mason; Mormonism: The Basics, By David J. Howlett And John Charles Duffy, Jennifer Graber

Mormon Studies Review

Two introductory texts on Mormonism have much to offer scholars, like myself, who are not specialists in the tradition yet regularly return to it when teaching undergraduate classes in American religions and American history. Mason’s volume, What Is Mormonism? A Student’s Introduction, focuses on the Latter-day Saints and explores the tradition’s historical development, global expansion, daily practice, and function as a response to existential problems. Howlett and Duffy’s book, Mormonism: The Basics, surveys the Latter-day Saints, the Reorganized Latter Day Saints (RLDS, now Community of Christ),

and fundamentalist groups with an emphasis on Mormon history, relations with non-Mormons, ritual life, …

Review Of Administrative Records, Volume 1: The Council Of Fifty, Minutes, March 1844–January 1846, Edited By Matthew J. Grow, Ronald K. Esplin, Mark Ashurst- Mcgee, Gerrit J. Dirkmaat, And Jeffrey D. Mahas., Kathleen Flake

Mormon Studies Review

A long-awaited publication, The Council of Fifty, Minutes, March 1844–January 1846 does not disappoint. It comprises contemporaneous notes, most of them verbatim, of deliberations by a religious council charged with devising a millennial government for the Mormon faithful and the non-Mormon righteous. Minutes gives a uniquely intimate view of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ efforts to account for religious diversity in its idealized kingdom of God to be organized in preparation for Christ’s return. Council members became demoralized by the death of founder Joseph Smith, and the record quickly turns into an account of the Council’s efforts …

Review Of Making Lamanites: Mormons, Native Americans, And The Indian Student Placement Program, 1947–2000, By Matthew Garrett, Sujey Vega

Mormon Studies Review

Matthew Garrett begins his history of the Mormon Indian Student Placement Program (ISPP) with a narrative about his own family’s participation and what it meant for him to find an old picture of a young Native American student among his family photos. Thus, Garrett starts his history through this personal connection. Like many historical monographs, however, it moves toward a more seemingly objective stance that provides information without much reflection. While there is peppered subtle critique of the LDS Church’s representation of Native Americans in its doctrine, the ISPP is rescued from much reproach. The book does provide a much-needed …

Review Of At The Pulpit: 185 Years Of Discourses By Latter-Day Saint Women, Edited By Jennifer Reeder And Kate Holbrook., Beverly W. Palmer

Mormon Studies Review

In At the Pulpit—an annotated collection of fifty-four discourses given by Mormon women between 1831 and 2016—editors Jennifer Reeder and Kate Holbrook clearly achieve their stated goal of “representing the varied ways that Mormon women have addressed public audiences” (p. xxvii). The earliest speeches included in this book were delivered in the American Midwest until the mid-1840s; after 1852 these addresses were almost entirely given in Utah (exceptions being Liverpool, England, in 1861; Chicago in 1893; Washington, DC, in 1895; and Mexico City in 1972). The fact that speakers came from places like New Zealand and South Africa, for example, …

Review Of Real Native Genius: How An Ex-Slave And A White Mormon Became Famous Indians, By Angela Pulley Hudson, Elise Boxer

Mormon Studies Review

Real Native Genius: How an Ex-Slave and a White Mormon Became Famous Indians adds to the growing body of literature that probes the intersection of race, gender, sexuality, and religion in the study of Mormonism. Author Angela Hudson considers how Mormons constructed ideas of “Indianness” and how the reinforcement or subversion of those ideas “influenced nearly every aspect of antebellum culture, often in surprising ways” (p. 3). She uses the lives of “professional Indians” Warner McCary and his wife, Lucy Stanton, as a lens to explore not just how they, as non–Native Americans, accessed indigeneity, but how they constructed and …

Mormonism And The Archaeology Of Media, Mason K. Allred

Mormon Studies Review

Mormonism has a legacy of digging up the dead. It had early desires to excavate the past, not only metaphorically (through meticulous record keeping and strong ancestral ties), but literally by actually digging up dead material. Think Alvin, Zelph, gold plates, treasure, spirits, and angels.2

Jell-O Medium, Kate Holbrook

Mormon Studies Review

Lapel pins are a part of the Olympic cultural experience produced to represent the hosting community, and generally one pin becomes more popular than the others. For the 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City, the runaway favorite pin featured green Jell-O, and enthusiasts paid $150 or more for pins that originally cost $7.1 Aminco International, the company that makes Olympic pins, recognized that Jell-O was no status symbol. “We were worried that Utah would be embarrassed about being known as the Jell-O-eating capital of the world,” admitted vice president David Hyman. Yet he somehow came to decide that, “Utahans are …

Review Of The Trek East: Mormonism Meets Japan, 1901–1968, By Shinji Takagi, Emily Anderson

Mormon Studies Review

Shinji Takagi’s The Trek East: Mormonism Meets Japan, 1901–1968 is a sweeping and detailed account of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ struggle to establish and sustain a mission in Japan. Organized both chronologically and thematically, it recounts the hardships and frustrations endured by the first group of missionaries who ventured to Japan between 1901 and 1924—the first attempt at establishing the Japan Mission—and the more successful second attempt initiated during the Allied occupation of Japan and further reinforced during a particularly dynamic period of leadership and activity in the 1960s. While earlier studies of Mormonism in Japan …

A Genealogical Turn: Possibilities For Mormon Studies And Genealogical Scholarship, Amy Harris

Mormon Studies Review

There is a growing scholarly field, crucial to Mormon studies, that scholars of Mormonism have yet to engage with: the history of genealogical practices. Mormon studies contains a robust and mature literature on the history of temple theology and the importance of kin to Mormon teachings.1 The connections between this flourishing scholarship and genealogical practices are largely missing, however. Scholarly history of genealogy is currently enjoying a rebirth—a renaissance that comes at a fortuitous time for Mormon studies.

Review Of Out Of Obscurity: Mormonism Since 1945, By Patrick Q. Mason And John G. Turner, Eds., Matthew A. Sutton

Mormon Studies Review

Patrick Q. Mason opens the introduction to Out of Obscurity with a few short words and phrases. They include Joseph Smith, polygamy, golden plates, The Book of Mormon musical, Mitt Romney, and Proposition 8. Mason’s point is that Americans know a lot about the controversial origins of Mormonism and a lot about the impact that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has had on recent American politics. They don’t know much about what has transpired in between. Mason is exactly right. This book represents the efforts of Mason, coeditor John G. Turner, and thirteen other scholars to explain …

Terryl L. Givens And Reid L. Neilson, Eds., The Columbia Sourcebook Of Mormons In The United States, Reviewed By Max Perry Mueller

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

Royal Skousen And Robin Scott Jensen, Eds., Revelations And Translations, Volume 3, Parts 1 And 2: Printer's Manuscript Of The Book Of Mormon, Reviewed By Paul Gutjahr

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

Mark A. Scherer, The Journey Of A People: The Era Of Restoration, 1820 To 1844; The Journey Of A People: The Era Of Reorganization, 1844 To 1946; The Journey Of A People: The Era Of Worldwide Community, 1946 To 2015, Reviewed By Chrystal Vanel

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

Still The Seed Of Abraham?, David A. Hollinger

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

Thomas Carter, Building Zion: The Material World Of Mormon Settlement, Reviewed By Paul G. Monson

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

Letter To The Editor, David G. Stewart Jr., Matthew Martinich

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

Mormon Scholars And Mormon Families In Family Studies: A Brief Retrospective, David C. Dollahite, Loren D. Marks, Heather Howell Kelley

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

Nathan Thatcher, Paco, Reviewed By Michael Hicks

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

Mormonism And Anthropology: On Ways Of Knowing, Fenella Cannell

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.

Jill Mulvay Derr, Carol Cornwall Madsen, Kate Holbrook, And Matthew J. Grow, Eds., The First Fifty Years Of Relief Society: Key Documents In Latter-Day Saint Women's History, Reviewed By Dave Hall, Susanna Morrill, Catherine A. Brekus

Mormon Studies Review

No abstract provided.