By ChristopherFebruary 19, 2010
In yesterday’s Inside Higher Ed, Kevin Schultz and Paul Harvey explore what they see as the paradox of the current state of American religious history. On the one hand, more historians appear to be engaging religious history than in past years. They note, for example, that according to a recent AHA report, “religion now tops the list of interests that historians claim to have as their specialty” and point to a number of stellar offerings recently published in the field.
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By Ben PDecember 1, 2009
Along with Jared T’s list of recently published and forthcoming book in Mormon history, I thought I would put up my own perspective on the past scholarly year. Not only does this allow me to mention some of the articles that caught my eye in the last twelve months, but it also provides a way to discuss major themes of recent scholarship.
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By Ben PSeptember 30, 2009
No, this post is not meant to address Mormon history myths promulgated in Seminary or Sunday School, but rather the possible historical misconceptions that are accepted and presented among the academy.
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By matt b.September 10, 2009
This review, originally appearing in a slightly different version in Mormon Historical Studies 10:1, is reprinted here with the kind permission of Alex Baugh and Jacob Olmstead, editor and book reviews editor, respectively.
It is a mark of the fascination that Joseph Smith inspires in students of religion and religious history (the present author not excepted) to the present day that, despite the plentitude of biographies, specialized studies, movies, hymns, visual art and all the rest that his life has evoked even only in the past sixty years, this volume is still welcome.
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By matt b.June 23, 2009
Over the past week, four contributors to the Juvenile Instructor have toured, given tours, researched in, peered through the windows of, and otherwise participated in the opening of the new LDS Church History Library and Archives. Their experiences, ruminations, and ponderables are below.
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By matt b.June 18, 2009
This post inaugurates a new series at the Juvenile Instructor, featuring brief conversations reassessing the significance of major works of Mormon history.
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By matt b.June 4, 2009
I
There’s been a lot of enthusiasm for this conference, and every inch of it deserved. Not a cubic zirconium among the presentations, and more than one absolute diamond (Laurie Maffly-Kipp on preparation; Richard Cohen on the Hebrew temple). This was an impressive and a diverse kaleidoscope, and the most interesting thing was the way, one after another, each speaker demonstrated the point Jeanne Halgren Kilde made – that talking about sacred space, at its essence, is talking about the way we experience religion. Space matters because people do things in it.
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By Ben PMay 29, 2009
As one whose ?to-read? pile lends a large shadow over both my desk and nightstand, devotional history books put out by publishers like Deseret Book or Covenant Press don?t usually make the list. However, a couple weeks I decided to download the audio version of a recent ?popular? devotional/historical work.[1] While this post is formatted like a standard book review, I hope that it will serve as a ?springboard? of sorts to discuss the practice of writing history for the faithful masses.
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By Steve FlemingMay 28, 2009
Today while going door to door collection money for our kids’ school with my almost eight-year-old daughter, I asked her what she wanted to do when she grew up. She said “I don’t know, maybe I want to be an artist or a student like you,” and she affectionately kissed me on the arm. While she meant it as a sign of affection I had to interject, “Wait honey, a student isn’t something you do when you grow up, it’s something you do in order to do something else. You see, I want to be a professor.” To this she responded in a very sympathetic voice, “Do you really think you’ll be able to do that?” To which I responded, “Yes, of course.” To which her reply (having lost the sympathetic tone) “Yeah right, in like 10 years or something.”
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By David G.March 28, 2009
Periodically, historians conduct polls among themselves to determine the state of the field. I recently asked a couple dozen youngish historians what were, in their opinions, the top five books in Mormon history/studies today. By “youngish” I mean under 40 and by “historian” I mean someone with academic training in history or a related discipline (I also included a couple ‘nacle participants who do not have academic training in history but are probably better read in Mormon history than most historians).
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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…”
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