Anti-Mormonism as the American Religion

[Part of the Many Images of Mormonism series.]

In one of my favorite images, published in 1884, the decaying tree of American democracy features the branch “Mormonism.”

It has become a common refrain to refer to Mormonism as the “American religion.” Leo Tolstoy supposedly said it, Harold Bloom definitely said it, and religious historians often repeat it. It is meant to invoke the fact that Mormonism was born and raised on American soil, embodied many of the cultural elements found in its surrounding culture, and remains a focal point of America’s religious history. (For the most recent look at this idea you can look, ahem, here.) While this is all well and good, a new theme has also cropped up in recent historiography: the importance of anti-Mormonism in American religion.

While there were earlier precedents, it could be argued that Terryl Givens’s Viper on the Hearth (1997, but recently re-issued) started the systematic study of American (negative) perceptions of Mormonism; indeed, it was the first to invoke a sophisticated analysis in using anti-Mormonism as a case-study in the construction of heresy. A decade later, Givens was followed by three books that built on his work and appeared in quick succession: Megan Sanborn Jones’s Performing American Identity in Anti-Mormon Melodrama (2009), Patrick Mason’s The Mormon Menace: Violence and Anti-Mormonism in the Postbellum South (2011), and Spencer Fluhman’s Peculiar People: Anti-Mormonism and the Making of Religion in Nineteenth-Century America (2012). Each of these books looked at perceivable the same topic through different prisms—theater, southern violence, and the nebulous concept of “religion”—but each shared a common assumption: that how Americans treated and understood Mormons reveals a significant lesson about the development of America’s religious history.

Continue Reading

The Jewish “Gentile” Governor: A Brief Snapshot of an Interaction between Jews and Mormons

In my early years of graduate school, I became interested in a project that compared mainstream American attitudes toward Mormons and Jews during the Progressive Era. One night while looking around on the internet, I came across the name Simon Bamberger, the first Jewish, democratic, and non-Mormon governor of Utah. He served as governor between January 1917 and January 1921. Born in Germany in 1846, he left for New York City as a teenager and eventually migrated to Utah in 1872. Throughout his years in Utah before he ran for governor, Bamberger ran two hotels and built a railway between Ogden and Salt Lake City. As the story goes, Bamberger?s supporters urged him to campaign in a community of Norwegian Mormon converts   where Bamberger was greeted by a Norwegian man who stated:

?If you tink ve let any damn Yentile speak in our meeting house, yure mistaken.? Bamberger replied: ?As a Jew, I have been called many a bad name, but this is first time in my life I have been called a damned Gentile!? The Norwegian man changed his demeanor when he learned Bamberger was a Jew and enthusiastically proclaimed: ?Hear him men, he?s not a Yentile, he?s a Yew, an Israelite. Velcome my friend; velcome, our next governor.?[1]

Continue Reading

Mormons in Speculative Fiction

Last week Nathaniel Givens at T&S reminded us of how many Mormons produce speculative fiction (lots and lots) and some possible reasons why. For the past year or so I have semi-systematically read a hundred or so prominent SpecFic works [1] and have been surprised, not by the fantastical coming from Mormon pens and keyboards, but by the Mormons coming from mainstream desks. [2] Of the novels I read, I noticed six with unambiguous references to Mormons: Stranger in a Strange Land, Hyperion, Contact, Lucifer?s Hammer, The Stand, and Snow Crash. As part of our ?Mormonism?s Many Images? series, I will briefly discuss how these novels utilize Mormonism.

*** Spoiler Alert: Plot points appear below. ***

Continue Reading

Mormonism and McDonald’s

While doing some background research on global Mormonism, I came across two Dialogue articles: Michael J. Cleverely’s “Mormonism on the Big Mac Standard” by and James B. Allen’s “On Becoming a Universal Church: Some Historical Perspectives.”[1] Discussing “America’s role as a catalyst in the spread of Mormonism” (Allen 19) can be tricky, but whatever conclusion you reach on that regard, it is not hard to see American terms in the transmission of the gospel. Allen describes one cultural misunderstanding,

Continue Reading

Southwestern States Mission: Singing

Music played a significant role in missionary efforts in the Southwestern States Mission. In this post I briefly list some of the ways missionaries used music.

[Also: I have divided the footnotes: letters indicate comment or explanation, numbers have only examples.]

Continue Reading

Series Introduction: Mormonism’s Many Images

[Based on the success of previous themed months (February as Black History Month, and March as Women’s History Month), as well as the month-long series of posts on John Turner’s Brigham Young biography last October and November, we at the JI have decided to run a thematic series of posts every month. There will, of course, always be posts not related to that month’s theme, but this approach allows a more efficient stream of content and excuse to invite more guest posts. Future months include themes like “International Mormonism,” “Mormonism and Politics,” “Mormonism Post-WWII,” and even “Mormonism and Childhood.” Each month is directed by two JIers and includes most other permabloggers as well as a slew of guests. This month’s theme, led by Cristine Hutchison-Jones and yours truly, focuses on images of Mormonism both at home and abroad.]

Did someone say something about a ?Mormon Moment??

Continue Reading

From the Archives: The Young Woman’s Journal Reacts to the First Sister Missionaries

Two weeks ago I posted an excerpt from GQ Cannon?s announcement of the decision to formally call female missionaries. Today I look at the response in The Young Woman?s Journal (YWJ). [1] The first official, female, Mormon missionary, Harriet Nye, was set apart on 1898 March 27; Inez Knight and Jennie Brimhall followed on April 1 and Cannon?s speech was on April 6. I looked for references to the call of the first sister missionaries in Volume 9 of the YWJ, which ran January to December 1898 and was edited by Susa Young Gates. [2]

Review: A Pacific Version of Twilight: Lani Wendt Young’s “Telesa: The Covenant Keeper”

I first encountered Twilight when my then fourteen-year-old sister became obsessed with it.  Every Facebook status she posted was about the new film that was coming out or how excited she was to read the next book series.  One of my friends, who has a PhD in Women?s Studies and History and will beginning her first tenure track job in the fall, told me that she personally enjoyed the books but warned me that they had some troubling gender politics.  As people have pointed out in review after review of Twilight, Bella is a weak character whose identity is bound up entirely in her relationship with Edward.  She is constantly bleeding, twisted from accidents that prove that she isn?t able to take care of herself and would simply die if Edward didn?t protect her.  I tried to read the books but couldn?t get past Book Two where Bella dismisses a boy who loves her and would have provided her with stability and continues to pine after Edward.  Book Four is even worse: When Bella and Edward consummate their marriage, Edward is unable to contain his strength and leaves Bella covered in bruises.  My sister?s response: He shouldn?t have felt bad because it wasn?t his fault.

About a week ago, I decided to look for books written by Mormon Polynesian authors.

Continue Reading

Videos Available from the Joseph Smith & Antiquity Conference

A couple months ago, BYU and the LDS Church History Department put on a fascinating conference titled, “Approaching Antiquity: Joseph Smith’s Study of the Ancient World.” Thanks to the wonders of technology, most of the presentations are now available as youtube videos, which you will find below.

While there are many papers that I strongly recommend, those given by Bushman, MacKay, Heal, Wright, Holland, Bowman, and Grey were some of the highlights for me.

(Note: in the first four sessions, the last paper of each session is combined with the panel’s responder.)

Continue Reading

Southwestern States Mission: Songs of Zion

Southwestern States missionaries carried hymn books and sang often [1] but distinguished Mormon and non-Mormon songs: ?After supper we talked, and sang them some of our songs. They in turn sang some of theirs.? [2] Missionaries also referred to ?the songs of Zion.? [3] Despite the distinction, missionaries sold hymn books—even to those unlikely to convert—and copied hymns for appreciative listeners. [4] 

Continue Reading