Our friends at the Church History Library have asked that we share this forthcoming event with the JI community. I think it will be of a lot of interest to students, independent scholars, and others getting acquainted with the Church History Library, its holdings, and the Church it represents. The event will be all day on January 11, 2019, which will include lunch, a meet and greet with Church History Consultants and MHA Officers, and individualized consultations with Church History Library Employees. Applications are due by December 31, 2018.
The purpose of the event, beyond helping students, scholars, and other specialists become familiar with the holdings of the Library, is to help build connections between the Library’s staff and its patrons. The Library wants to make its collections available to those who will most benefit from them. While some materials are restricted, there are often other resources that patrons may use in the course of their research. The archivists and other specialists will help each participants find materials from the Library to use in their research.
What happens in the West doesn’t stay in the West!
The Western History Association will be holding its 2019 meeting in Las Vegas, October 16-19, 2019. The conference theme is “What happens in the West doesn’t stay in the West” and the organizers are eager to include panels that seek to connect western history and the histories and historiographies of other parts of the nation, continent, and world.
You can access the full call for papers here (https://www.westernhistory.org/2019). The deadline for panel and paper proposals is December 1, 2018. [UPDATE: The deadline for panel and paper proposals for the WHA conference has been extended to December 5, 2018.] The WHA is committed to promoting the full and equitable inclusion of racial and ethnic minorities, religious minorities, people with disabilities, women, LGBTQ people, and people with various ranks and career paths on this conference program. The Program Committee will encourage sessions to include diverse sets of participants, addressing gender diversity, racial and ethnic diversity, sexual diversity, religious diversity, disability-based diversity, and/or LGBTQ diversity.
The Mormon History Association’s annual conference will be in SaltLake City, June 7-10, 2018. The topic for next year’s conference is “Isolation and Integration” and the deadline for proposals is this week—Thursday the 15th. Find the Call for Papers here.
We’re happy to welcome friend of the Juvenile Instructor, Chris Blythe.
Christopher James Blythe is a Research Associate at the Neal A. Maxwell Institute of Religious Scholarship at Brigham Young University. He is a graduate of the Religious Studies program at Utah State University and previously held a predoctoral teaching fellowship in the department.
Over the next few weeks, the three finalists for the Leonard J. Arrington Chair in Mormon History and Culture will have visited Utah State University and soon thereafter the hiring committee will make their decision. Their choice will have a far-reaching impact on the Religious Studies program there and, also, because of the legitimacy and funding that such a hire bestows, on the field of Mormon Studies at large. Currently, there are Mormon Studies chairs at Utah State University (est. 2006), Claremont Graduate University (est. 2008), and the University of Virginia
From our friends at the Harold B. Lee Library at Brigham Young University in Provo, UT:
Job Summary:
The mission of the Folklore Archives Specialist is to 1) identify and acquire, 2) describe and organize, and 3) provide reference service for the folklore materials held in the William A. Wilson Folklore Archives within the L. Tom Perry Special Collections.
Essential functions (include, but are not limited to):
The Mormon Women’s History Initiative Team has asked Colleen McDannell to speak and answer questions on her new book, Sister Saints: Mormon Women since the End of Polygamy, on Thursday, November 8. 2018 at the University of Utah. Please mark your calendars and plan to attend!
With Halloween this week, I thought it would be fun to highlight some work on a spooky topic. In the past year, scholars have published two excellent articles on exorcism in the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I’ve included them below and a link to a podcast by Blair Hodges and the Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship featuring Stephen Taysom.
I have spoken with Amanda Hendrix-Komoto of Montana State University, and she encouraged me to tell everyone that the proposals do not have to focus on Wallace Stegner. Instead, her department is hoping that the received proposals will take a theme from Stegner’s work – family, community, etc. – and examine it in a way that goes beyond Stegner’s original vision of the West.
Wallace Stegner and the Changing American West: Reimagining Place, Region, Nation, and Globe in an Era of Instability -A Call for Papers and Other Creative Work-
Center for Western Lands and Peoples Wallace Stegner Chair in Western American Studies College of Letters and Science / Montana State University, Bozeman
By the time of his death, Wallace Stegner (1909-1993) had
become the epitome of the politically engaged western American writer able to
express himself across a range of genres, from fiction to history,
autobiography, and essays. In books such as The Big Rock Candy Mountain,
Wolf Willow, Beyond the Hundredth Meridian, Angle of Repose
(Pulitzer Prize), and The American West as Living Space, Stegner brought
to life and illuminated the West like few other authors. Of uppermost concern
to Stegner were issues of transiency and community, landscape quality and
degradation, family life, the importance of place, and the need for ways of
living that foster stable social bonds and stable economies within the
realities and constraints of western environments.
This is not strictly Mormon history related, but many who are interested in Mormon history will want to hear Dr. Gross speak. Join us!
The Rocky Mountain American Religion Seminar will host Rachel Gross on November 1, 2018 at the University of Utah. She will deliver a lecture on Genealology and American Jewish Religion.
Bilagáanaa niliigo’ dóó Kinyaa’áanii yásh’chíín. Bilagáanaa dabicheii dóó Tsinaajinii dabinálí. Ákót’éego diné asdzá̹á̹ nilí̹. Farina King is “Bilagáanaa” (EuroAmerican), born for “Kinyaa’áanii” (the Towering House Clan) of the Diné (Navajo). Her maternal grandfather was EuroAmerican, and her paternal grandfather was “Tsinaajinii” (Blackstreaked Woods People Clan) of the Diné. She is Assistant Professor of History and an affiliate of the Cherokee and Indigenous Studies Department at Northeastern State University, Tahlequah, Oklahoma. She received her Ph.D. in History at Arizona State University.
She was the 2016-2017 David J. Weber Fellow for the Study of Southwestern America at the Clements Centers for Southwest Studies of Southern Methodist University. She was the 20152016 Charles Eastman Dissertation Fellow at Dartmouth College. She received her M.A. in African History from the University of Wisconsin and a B.A. from Brigham Young University with a double major in History and French Studies. Her main area of research is colonial and postcolonial Indigenous Studies, primarily Indigenous experiences of colonial and boarding school education. Her first book was published by the University Press of Kansas, in October 2018, which is titled The Earth Memory Compass: Diné Landscapes and Education in the Twentieth Century. In this book, she explores how historical changes in education shaped Diné collective identity and community by examining the interconnections between Navajo students, their people, and Diné Bikéyah (Navajo lands). The study relies on Diné historical frameworks, mappings of the world, and the Four Sacred Directions.
Steve Fleming on Study and Faith, 5:: “The burden of proof is on the claim of there BEING Nephites. From a scholarly point of view, the burden of proof is on the…”
Eric on Study and Faith, 5:: “But that's not what I was saying about the nature of evidence of an unknown civilization. I am talking about linguistics, not ruins. …”
Steve Fleming on Study and Faith, 5:: “Large civilizations leave behind evidence of their existence. For instance, I just read that scholars estimate the kingdom of Judah to have been around 110,000…”
Eric on Study and Faith, 5:: “I have always understood the key to issues with Nephite archeology to be language. Besides the fact that there is vastly more to Mesoamerican…”
Steven Borup on In Memoriam: James B.: “Bro Allen was the lead coordinator in 1980 for the BYU Washington, DC Seminar and added valuable insights into American history as we also toured…”
David G. on In Memoriam: James B.: “Jim was a legend who impacted so many through his scholarship and kind mentoring. He'll be missed.”
Recent Comments
Steve Fleming on Study and Faith, 5:: “The burden of proof is on the claim of there BEING Nephites. From a scholarly point of view, the burden of proof is on the…”
Eric on Study and Faith, 5:: “But that's not what I was saying about the nature of evidence of an unknown civilization. I am talking about linguistics, not ruins. …”
Steve Fleming on Study and Faith, 5:: “Large civilizations leave behind evidence of their existence. For instance, I just read that scholars estimate the kingdom of Judah to have been around 110,000…”
Eric on Study and Faith, 5:: “I have always understood the key to issues with Nephite archeology to be language. Besides the fact that there is vastly more to Mesoamerican…”
Steven Borup on In Memoriam: James B.: “Bro Allen was the lead coordinator in 1980 for the BYU Washington, DC Seminar and added valuable insights into American history as we also toured…”
David G. on In Memoriam: James B.: “Jim was a legend who impacted so many through his scholarship and kind mentoring. He'll be missed.”