Job posting: Historical Director for Better Days 2020

Better Days 2020 is using important upcoming suffrage anniversaries to celebrate Utah women’s illustrious heritage and expand knowledge of that history as they look to improve the future of women in Utah.Better Days is a great example of public history and how that history has the potential to make a difference and they need a historical director. 2020 will be the 150-year anniversary of Utah women becoming the first in the nation to vote, the 100-year anniversary of the 19th amendment and US women’s suffrage, as well as the 55-year anniversary of the Voting Rights Act expanding access to disenfranchised minorities. Even if you don’t need a job, check out their efforts. Martha Hughes Cannon is on her way to Washington in 2020 and Better Days 2020 is on the move. Apply for a chance to become part of something important.

Ministering, Home Teaching, and Visiting Teaching

?Home teaching has been described as the pivot around which all other church activities are to be correlated.?

• Marion G. Romney, ?Church Correlation: Address to Seminary and Institute Faculty,? June 22, 1964. Church History Library and Archives.

For a hundred years, the practice of what was first called ?ward teaching? and later ?home teaching? saw two Mormon men visit families in their congregation, carrying to them a message from church leadership and reporting back on any needs they found. ?Visiting teaching,? for decades after the founding of the Relief Society in 1842, saw women of the Relief Society engage in a similar practice.

It is hard to underestimate the importance of home teaching to the initial vision of the framers of the Mormon correlation movement of the 1960s and 1970s. Exploring the reasons for its importance shed some light on the announcement at the church?s General Conference this past weekend that home and visiting teaching are to be replaced with ?ministering.?

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Series Preview: Introductions to Mormon Thought (University of Illinois Press)

A few months ago I had lunch with Joseph Spencer, a professor of ancient scripture at BYU and author of a number of books on Mormon theology and scripture. Our conversation there led us to what has been formally announced: a new book series, titled Introductions to Mormon Thought, which the University of Illinois Press will be publishing in coming years. Below, a description that Joe and I have worked up.

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Call for Applications: Face-to-Face Mentorship Event

The Mormon History Association will be hosting a mentorship event this year at our annual June conference and is seeking applications from students and early career scholars to participate. Successful applicants will be paired with an advanced scholar in Mormon history and discuss their research interests and career trajectory. We welcome applications not only from those seeking traditional academic appointments but those interested in digital humanities, publishing, and public history. This is an amazing opportunity to have a one-on-one conversation and to receive specific advice about your unique place in the field of Mormon history.

The goals of the event are:

• to introduce current research and receive feedback
• to support students with information and advice on their career goals
• to foster talent early career scholars in the field of Mormon history
• to help inform people about career options

Each applicant should be clear about their accomplishments thus far, their research interests, and what they could gain from this event. Applications should be up to 500-700 words and should include:

• key research questions and methodology of the applicant’s research
• scholarship that informs the applicant’s research
• professional goals and trajectory
• optional: identify up to five people in the field of Mormon history who the applicant feels would be helpful mentors and briefly state why *hint* check the MHA program to see who will be attending the conference
• Up-to-date CV

Applications will be reviewed by members of the MHA Board.

Please direct questions and applications to Hannah Jung (or in the comment section below) , MHA Student Representative, at  mha.face2face@gmail.com. Deadline for applications is May 1st.

Contextualizing quorum changes

Quorum. You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

First, let’s take a step back, but not all the way back. Mostly because this isn’t a book. Let’s go to 1964. At this time, each stake and mission generally included a High Priests quorum, at least one Elders quorum and at least one Seventies quorum. In the years leading up to this time, church policy was that if there were not at least 49 elders (a majority of the scriptural 96–D&C 107:89) then a “unit” en lieu of a quorum was to be organized. But why would that matter? I imagine that the majority of Elders quorums in the church today don’t have 49 members. The answer goes back to the definition of what a quorum is, namely, “the number (such as a majority) of officers or members of a body that when duly assembled is legally competent to transact business” (to quote Miriam-Webster).

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Roundtable: Tobler on Mueller’s *Race and the Making of the Mormon People*

I’m happy to confirm reports that readers of Max Mueller’s recent book, Race and the Making of the Mormon People, which we are discussing this week, will find a rich, multilayered, and searching account of theologies and important narratives of race in early Mormonism. This is a serious book, and a critical contribution to a growing body of scholarship on the functions of race in the Mormon tradition. As Mueller claims, it is one of the first to consider questions of race and Mormonism from the inside out. This means that it nicely complements recent scholarship like that of Paul Reeve and others, which has generally taken the opposite tack. Perhaps the most innovative element of the book, in my view, is how it brings consideration of both “red” (Native American) and “black” (African-American) constructions of race together. In some ways, the early Mormon logic of race in relation to these two groups seems incongruous, but Mueller works hard to show there are important aspects of continuity, as well. He has categorically synthesized early Mormon conceptions of race as well as anyone might expect to do.

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Roundtable: Johnson – Accessibility and Nuance in Stapley’s *The Power of Godliness*

The particular danger of a roundtable in a digital format is in the overlapping repetition, forgive us for that. (Check out Tona and Joey‘s prior posts.) Though I had an opportunity a few weeks ago to respond to Jonathan Stapley?s The Power of Godliness in person, today I want to focus on the eminent accessibility of the nuanced liturgical history that Stapley crafted. Though I want the initial chapter on the cosmological priesthood to be more specific as he lays out the foundation of his argument, it is fulfilled over time in consecutive chapters. I appreciate that in each chapter Stapley outlines a dense history with complex transitions over time in a nuanced, compact, and entirely relatable manner. This would not be possible without the body of Stapley’s earlier work. (There will be rejoicing amongst my future students when they realize that there might be a more concise version of Stapley and Kris Wright?s spectacular but to them seemingly interminable 88-page JMH article on female ritual healing.) This accessibility matters both historically and devotionally.

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Sealings and Adoptions

After talking to some folks about some material in my recent book, a friend suggested I write a short primer on nineteenth-century sealings based on my work.

First some nineteenth-century premises:

• Heaven is comprised of people sealed together in various ways. People called this construction variations of “the priesthood.”
• All sealings, regardless of type, are durable, and bestow a measure of “perseverance” (the unpardonable sin notwithstanding).
• All of the various temple rituals can be performed outside of the temple except child-to-parent/adoption sealings.

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“Consider Three Things”: Writing a Prospectus and Forming a Committee

This is the fifth in a series of posts on selecting a finishing exams and finding a doctoral dissertation topic. All of our five participants have participated in Mormon Studies in the past, but not all of them chose to pursue a Mormon Studies topic for their dissertation. If you’d like to contribute a post that addresses this topic in future, please send me an email at joseph [dot] stuart [at] utah [dot] e dee ewe.

When writing your prospectus and choosing a topic, I would encourage you to consider three things:

1. How do you want to be categorized in your field?
2. What is the thread that ties your analysis together?
3. Who are the people that you trust to help you do your best? And are those people invested in you and your wellbeing?

On the first point: I do not want to be pigeonholed as a religious historian. I am interested in much more than religion. My dissertation will be framed in terms of race and gender, though religion will form a major component of my analysis.

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“Be confident in your identity and your ability”: Finding a Topic You Love and Staying the Course

This is the fourth in a series of posts on selecting a finishing exams and finding a doctoral dissertation topic. All of our five participants have participated in Mormon Studies in the past, but not all of them chose to pursue a Mormon Studies topic for their dissertation. If you’d like to contribute a post that addresses this topic in future, please send me an email at joseph [dot] stuart [at] utah [dot] e dee ewe.

We are grateful for this post from Cassandra Clark, a Ph.D. Candidate in History at the University of Utah.

Let me start by saying, choosing a dissertation topic is not for the weak of heart.  On top of the pressure to come up with an original idea, there are always those people who complicate to the process by sharing clichés like, ?Choose a topic that you love because you are going to get sick of it after studying it for a decade? or ?you will hate your topic before the end.? There is even the one that goes something like, ?be prepared to gain the dissertation fifteen.? Well, maybe that isn?t a cliché? Is it just me?

Those platitudes don?t apply to everyone.  I have worked on my topic for several years and have yet to grow weary of it.  While I am eager to complete my graduate degree, I am still enthusiastic about my topic, the time period, and the people I study.  I can?t necessarily say that I like all of the people–mainly because many of them were raving racists–but I can say that they are intriguing.

I decided on my dissertation topic during my first year as a Ph.D. student at the University of Utah. One afternoon while digitizing sources at the Church History Library for the Utah American Digital Archive (UAIDA) I stumbled upon the transcript of an oral interview that referenced the DNA testing of Native Americans orchestrated by the LDS Church during the twentieth century. I have always loved to learn about medicine, genetics, and other science-history related subjects which is why this particular interview caught my eye.  I consulted with Matt Basso who suggested that I look into eugenics in Utah.  Mainly, I needed to establish a foundation before I dove into the DNA aspect of this particular issue. Little did I know that at the time several scholars were also interested in eugenics and Mormonism and I found myself struggling to stay ahead of the topic.  Frustrated, I decided to broaden my research scope to consider how people living in the intermountain west incorporated scientific race theories into their society and culture.

I rarely settle upon a topic before I do a preliminary scan of the available primary sources. Mainly, I want the sources to speak to me and provide me with direction. I consulted with archivists in Arizona, Utah, Wyoming, and Colorado and to locate materials.  My efforts paid off as I discovered that many individuals living in the intermountain west were obsessed with heredity, nature and their relation to brain function. I questioned how perceptions of the natural world influenced their definition of the ?normal? and ?abnormal? brain and how these ideas influenced whiteness.

The answer to this question became my dissertation topic. Instead of being the central focus, Mormons are a part of a broader conversation about race science and its tie to the environment.  I find that including members of the LDS Church in a larger exchange of ideas is more rewarding and an essential component of the history of the LDS Church, the intermountain west, and the nation. I am looking forward to continuing my research on DNA testing and the LDS Church once my dissertation is complete.

My decision to expand my topic was not without stumbling blocks. I have two daughters who I provide for, and I want them to have the best opportunities possible while avoiding debt.  At any given time, I am working two to three-part time jobs that prevent me from scheduling extended archival visits. My research trips are typically limited to five-day stints two to three times a year where I sit scanning documents like a fiend while streaming The Office with the occasional chat with an archivist. Researching on a tight schedule has slowed my progress, but none-the-less, I am inching closer to the finish line!

My advice to the graduate student wrestling with a dissertation topic is to listen to the sources.  Write for yourself. Be confident in your identity and your ability. Do not compare yourself to others. Never listen to anyone who judges your talent or your journey. Trust your instinct.  And finally, discuss your research with anyone who will listen.  Some of the best ideas come from sharing your research with others.