I am taking a very laid-back readings seminar this summer at the UI revolving around the question of race and the city. I was pleasantly surprised yesterday when the discussion turned to questions relevant to those who frequent this blog. I thought I might offer a short narrative, in part to let those who have never had the “privilege” of a attending a graduate seminar know how random they can be, and also to present some questions raised in my mind as a result of the discussion.The topic for this particular session focused on the racial and class dynamics inherent in the conception and reality of the suburb. One of the books that we read by Dolores Hayden talked about recently planned communities like Seaside, Florida where the Truman Show was filmed. For those of you who didn’t know, the city where Truman lived actually exists as an idealized upper-class community by the ocean. The book also talks about Disney’s idyllic residential development in Florida named Celebration where people can live in sanitized bliss. As we spoke about the class and racial implications involved in the creation of such planned communities, my Professor mentioned the Florida town of Ave Maria of which I had never heard. (more…)

There are quite a few reasons I have not been the best of perma-bloggers here at JI during the past six months.  And, I know it has caused my fellow bloggers at least a tiny bit of grief (and perhaps even full-blown frustration?), and I do apologize.  I really do.

 But, as I was talking to Ben at work this morning, and finding myself a bit embarrassed at yet another good-natured question about my JI sabbatical, I felt that it would be a good time to come clean.  So, here’s my confession: (more…)

In his dissertation on the popular historical consciousness of Mormons in the American West, Eric Eliason suggested that the “commemoration of the cooperative and purposeful Mormon pioneer migration has achieved a particularly well-developed form” among modern Mormons — “the July 24th Days of ‘47 celebration in Salt Lake City . . . [and] similar Pioneer Day events [that] claim the public space of Main Street in over 80 Western communities.” (more…)

Continued from Part 1. (more…)

Today I had the privilege of attending the 2008 Bushman Seminar, entitled “Joseph Smith and His Critics” (for a preview of the conference by Stephen Flemming, one of the participants, see here). I brought along my laptop to take notes, though they not very detailed. What follows is a combination of my notes and my reflections on the proceedings. They are very scattered and random, but I hope they give at least a little sense of what was said. (more…)

By Steve Fleming

I spent a chunk of my time in this year’s Bushman seminar insisting that I would not make any attempts at an empirical case about the subjects I was writing on (Swedenborg and DC 76 and Joseph Smith and magic). I would simply state how I saw the issue as a believer. In fact, that’s sort of how I’ve approached my scholarship: I’ve published articles with “academic” language in academic journals (Church History, RAC) and articles with “confessional” language in confessional journals (the Religious Educator). Though the academic articles come across as more sophisticated they are easier to write since in academic journals one does not speak of absolute truth but in confessional journals one does. (more…)

Stephen J. Fleming is a PhD. candidate at UC Santa Barbara in Religious Studies and a 2008 Bushman fellow. Steve received his B.A. in history from BYU and his M.A. from UC Stanislaus, also in history. He has been published in Church History and Religion and American Culture, as well as various Mormon journals. Steve has been gracious enough to share his thoughts on this year’s Bushman Seminar.

What is our obligation?

(more…)

I just received word that the next issue (47:2) of BYU Studies “will be a special issue of important documents about the Mountain Meadows Massacre, some never before seen.” (more…)

2009 Springfield Illinois Conference
Call for Papers
Mormonism and the Land of Lincoln:
Intersections, Crosscurrents, and Dispersions

(HT: Justin) (more…)

America has often been described as a Christian nation, and whatever currency the title holds presently, it was certainly applicable during the first century and a half of the nation’s life. This is not to say that it was not a Christian nation before 1776 or 1789, as it indeed was, nor does this imply that the Founding Fathers held orthodox Christian beliefs, as many of them did not, but it does suggest that the United States was born and nurtured in a thoroughly Christian religious environment. (more…)

The Mormon Church has always placed an emphasis on education: the Kirtland School of the Elders, the School of the Prophets, the Hebrew School, etc. This idea continued into Nauvoo, where, as part of the Nauvoo Charter, they founded the University of the City of Nauvoo. This institution was fairly functional until the Saints migrated West, whereupon it obviously became dormant. (more…)

(Just in case you didn’t already read about this here, here, or here).

CALL FOR PAPERS (more…)

As I understand it, when a Mormon speaks of tracting, they mean, “to travel from door to door attempting to present a message.” The OED lists ten variations for the verb tract, none of which match the Mormon version. (The one that says “to lengthen out, prolong, protract (time)…” seems related, however.) What gives? It’s not like Mormons invented the art or are the only ones currently practicing it. (more…)

Last night, a few bloggers from the JI, along with some other friends, informally gathered for some good food (chips and Jared T.’s homemade salsa … mmm) and good conversation. (more…)

 As I’ve mentioned before, I’m currently working with the missionary diaries of an Elder Joseph Brooks who served in Southeast Texas from 1899 to 1902. Elder Brooks’ description of a smallpox outbreak strikes me as interesting. (more…)

In my browsings on Ebay I came across something of a gem, what is apparently an original handwritten letter of George Reynolds, then secretary to President John Taylor. Though the price tag of $199 seems a little steep, the content is interesting. The text, as given in the item listing is as follows: (more…)

Well, it depends on who you ask. As discussed before (see esp. comments 9-12, 25-29), the argument over what was rational and what was absurd was a hot topic in Antebellum America, especially when attempting to describe and understand new religious movements. What many felt was completely asinine, others found fulfilling. This led to confusion on both sides while they tried to grapple with the other’s beliefs. Here, for example, is an editorial written in Europe in 1843 attempting to explain this new Mormon movement stealing away many of their citizens. (more…)

David O. McKay performed his first exorcism when he was 25. It was, he wrote in his journal, a day “long to be remembered.” (more…)

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the Cajuns of southern Louisiana and the Mormons of Utah were, in general, geographically concentrated, relatively isolated, and “white” (though the “whiteness” varied with the describer). Despite significant differences in their situations, I think the groups shared enough attributes to support some comparative analyses. For example, their respective views on alcohol illustrate (more…)

Beginning in the 1830s, Parley P. Pratt produced a tremendous amount of literature describing his people’s persecutions. Pratt wrote not only for his fellow religionists, but also as a means to inform other Americans of the Mormon plight and seek redress.[1] Of the hundreds of pages of his prose, among the most significant included his Extra of the Mormon newspaper The Evening and the Morning Star entitled “‘Mormons,’ So Called”, which is perhaps the most comprehensive contemporary description of the 1833-1834 Jackson County expulsion.[2] Pratt included this Extra as part of his eighty-four page history of the Missouri persecutions that he published in 1839.[3] In turn, this history later formed the basis of parts of Pratt’s autobiography.[4] Beyond his narrative contributions, Pratt also wrote several poems describing his people’s sufferings that he published in 1840 in The Millennium and Other Poems.[5]

Historian Kenneth Winn has described Pratt as the leading Mormon commentator on (more…)

I returned on Sunday from a trip to Korea. My wife and I joined her mother, three younger brothers, and 15 others from the boys’ Taekwondo school in New Jersey on a two-week guided tour of South Korea. I came back with a scruffy beard, an intense longing for an American cheeseburger, and a head full of random thoughts on all things religious in Korea. I thought JI readers might be interested in a few of those thoughts, and that the blog might be a good place to get feedback to some of my rambling reflections.  (more…)

  Continued from Part I   

   Nelson begins his discussion of “occultism in general” by addressing some of the “very old ‘sciences,’ (if I may abuse this long-suffering word a little more in my dire extremity  for a generalazation)” that modern Americans knew simply as “superstition,” namely, witchcraft, necromancy, astrology, and alchemy. Labeling the first two as “black magic” and comparing them to the secret combinations of the Book of Mormon, Nelson warns (more…)

Happy Independence Day. Here’s a discourse given by George A. Smith on the fourth in 1854. Remember that at this time the Saints are struggling with the federal government over the right to self government. Notice how Smith negotiates in his narration his commitment to both an American identity and a Mormon identity.

George A. Smith, “Celebration of the Fourth of July,” July 4, 1854, Journal of Discourses, 6: 364-67.

Gentlemen and Ladies-Fellow-Citizens,-I arise here to address you a few moments upon a subject which has, perhaps, been worn threadbare by orators, statesmen, and divines, for the last seventy years, in the minds of a great portion of (more…)

This is, quite simply, the single most extensive canvass of American religious life ever achieved. (more…)

Literary scholar Lawrence Buell, in his excellent New England Literary Culture, explored one of the most important ideas related to the antebellum Romantic thinkers–an idea that he defines as “literary scripturism.” (more…)

In It Does Not Die, Maitreyi Devi wrote a “she said” to Mircea Elidae’s Bengal Nights, the “he said” semi-autobiographical account of his time in 1930s Calcutta and his relationship with Devi.[1] Unsurprisingly, Devi offered a very different version of events in her narrative. Academia (and even Oprah thanks to James Frey) has long debated the definition of memoir and its highly subjective nature. A comparison of It Does Not Die and Bengal Nights provides many aspects for analysis of events personally subjective and emotive while grounded in history. Can scholarship ever overcome personal opinion or reaction in highly emotionally charged historical events? (more…)