January 22, 2024, at 1 p.m. MST

            Scholars have hotly debated the role that faith should play within Mormon Studies. Richard Bushman, for example, has argued believing scholars should develop their own hermeneutic that recognizes the presence of God in human history. Other scholars have rejected his suggestion, asking what evidence a person would use to identify the hand of God. The role that faith should play in writing history has been particularly contentious within Mormon history. Apologists and critics of the LDS Church have long used history to try to prove or disprove its truth claims. In this webinar, five scholars will discuss the role that faith should play in writing Mormon history and the difference between academic and devotional history.

Participants:

Micah Chang is an assistant professor of American history at Montana State University. His research focuses on how race and religion have shaped American agriculture. He has published on Montana’s Sleeping Buffalo Hot Springs and how to research the history of race as an undergraduate.

Lindsay Hansen Park is a Mormon feminist blogger, podcaster, and the executive director for the Salt Lake City-based non-profit Sunstone. She has served as a historical consultant for several documentaries and TV series, including Under the Banner of Heaven, and the host of the Year of Polygamy podcast. She is currently authoring a history of Juanita Brooks and is the co-host of the Sunstone Mormon History Podcast.

Bryan Buchanan is a bookseller at Benchmark Books. He edited the 2021 essay collection Continuing Revelation: Essays on Doctrine. He is the co-host of the Sunstone Mormon History Podcast and is currently editing the journals of Joseph W. Musser.

Benjamin E. Park is an associate professor of history at Sam Houston State University. The author of American Nationalisms and Kingdom of Nauvoo, he has written for the Washington Post, Newsweek, and Houston Chronicle. He recently published American Zion: A New History of Mormonism with Liveright.

Amanda Hendrix-Komoto is an associate professor of history at Montana State University. She is the author of Imperial Zions: Religion, Race, and Family in the American West and the Pacific. She is currently writing a biography of Ina Coolbrith, Joseph Smith’s niece, the first poet laureate of California, and lover of cats.

Join us on WebEx: https://shorturl.at/iFK36

Password: Pioneer47