By March 5, 2013
From our friends at the John Whitmer Historical Association:
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John Whitmer Historical Association gives scholarships promising scholars. The purpose of the scholarship program is to encourage and support scholarly participation in JWHA’s central mission — studies of Community of Christ or other denominations of the Latter Day Saint movement — by promising scholars, (particularly students).
By March 3, 2013
Although we may not be able to top black history month, which had a stellar lineup of contributors, posts, and CFPs and then ended with a major change to the LDS scriptures concerning the church’s conscious remembering (literally, re-membering) its early African American priesthood holders and rejecting any revelatory basis for the priesthood ban – and here, let me interject a hearty hallelujah! – we would like to begin (lamb-like) with some thoughts, questions, and considerations for women’s history month in March. My tongue-in-cheek hope would be that, if our mojo is similar, Joseph Smith’s 1842 revelation to the Relief Society recorded in Eliza R. Snow’s Minute Book becomes D&C 139. By April 1st.
By March 3, 2013
Note: This post contains racial epithets.
In my last three posts I have discussed aspects of Mormon missionaries? interactions with and perceptions of African Americans in eastern Texas. In this post I will focus on the missionaries? language and behavior.
By March 2, 2013
Historian/Documentary Editor, Joseph Smith Papers
Job Description
The Joseph Smith Papers seeks a full-time historian/documentary editor with the academic training, research, and writing skills to edit Joseph Smith?s papers. The Joseph Smith Papers is producing a comprehensive edition of Smith?s documents featuring complete and accurate transcripts with both textual and contextual annotation. The scope of the project includes Smith?s correspondence, revelations, journals, historical writings, sermons, legal papers, and other documents. Besides providing the most comprehensive record of early Latter-day Saint history they will also provide insight into the broader religious landscape of the early American republic.
By March 1, 2013
Note: Yesterday?s release of newly revised and edited volumes of LDS scriptures?including the unprecedented header to Official Declaration 2?has derailed a bit our planned wrap-up of the posts from JI?s Black History Month series.
On the last day of Black History Month 2012, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) released a statement, ?Race and the Church: All Are Alike Unto God.? The statement read in part, ?The Church unequivocally condemns racism, including any and all past racism by individuals both inside and outside the Church.?
This ?official statement? came only a day after racist comments from Randy Bott?one of BYU?s most celebrated professors?were printed in a Washington Post story on members of African descent within the Church. Bott rehearsed well-worn theological rationales to justify the ban on black men holding the priesthood, a ban lifted in 1978 after the leading members of the Church hierarchy received a direct revelation to do so. Due to blacks’ supposed descent from the divinely-cursed Cain and Canaan, Bott said the ban was not racist, but a ?blessing.? Blacks, he explained, had until 1978, not been spiritually mature enough to handle the authority of the priesthood. [i]
By February 28, 2013
Journal of Mormon History
Call for Articles
Special Issue on Mormonism and Race
To be published in the summer issue of 2014
Finished papers due July 31, 2013
Special Editors:
Max Perry Mueller: mpmuell@fas.harvard.edu
Prof. Gina Colvin: gina.colvin@canterbury.ac.nz
Goals of the Journal?s special issue on Mormonism and race:
This special issue of the Journal of Mormon History aims to broaden and deepen the conversation on Mormonism and race beyond the historical focus on the ban on black men from the Mormon priesthood, and its emphasis on the U.S. experience. In particular we aim to understand ?race? beyond the black-white (European-African) binary. We welcome articles ranging in historical focus from the Mormon movement?s founding to the present day. Articles exploring international encounters, race and gender, and race and politics, and race and class are of particular interest.
Requirements:
Papers should be original work. Wherever appropriate, concrete evaluation results should be included. Submissions will be judged on originality, technical strength, primary sources, significance, and interest to our readers. Papers should range from 6,000 to 8,000 words. Please submit manuscripts simultaneously to both of the Special Editors listed above. Include separately a brief CV or biography.
By February 27, 2013
My Great Grandfather Antonio Alejo Aguilar with his First Wife
When I was ten years old, my great grandfather died. He was ninety-six years old and had been one of the main objects of my affection since I was a toddler. When we visited his house, he fed us cups of apricot nectar and regaled us with stories of his childhood in Mexico. He told us about sucking the juice out of fresh cactus fruit, sneaking into the kitchen of his house and watching the maids cook, and attending medical school in Mexico City. The stories from his adolescence were much darker. When grandpa was sixteen, he had joined a regiment of federales and had fought in the Mexican Revolution. A cannon ball came close enough to his head to shave off his hair, leaving him mostly bald for the rest of his life. He also watched as Pancho Villa rode into one of the border towns of the United States and Mexico and shot a man he expected of sympathies with the Mexican government while the man?s wife bawled and cried for his life. As a result of the stories that my grandfather told, I thought of him as being completely Mexican. It was only after his death that I was realized how complicated that identity had been for him.
By February 26, 2013
Note: It is a pleasure to have Margaret Blair Young contribute to JI’s monthlong series on issues of Race and Mormonism. Margaret Blair Young has written extensively on Blacks in the western USA and particilarly Black Latter-day Saints. Much of her work has been co-authored with Darius Gray. She authored I Am Jane.
The first staged reading of I Am Jane was on the Nelke theater stage at BYU. It was the climax of a playwriting class, and met some deserved criticism. It was, as I recall, about 120 pages. Too many words. The first draft I wrote used a clichéd convention: rebellious teenager dreams about/ learns about/ re-enacts the life of a heroic ancestor and gains self-respect and courage. But such a play is more about the teen than the character whose life I wanted to explore. And I was researching it even as I was scripting the play.
After I had chiseled away at the script, I thought it ready for its debut, which happened on March 5th, 2000. The play was that month?s Genesis meeting. There was no stage, so we threw a blanket over a trellis to suggest a covered wagon, used the sacrament table for Jane?s death bed, and the clerk?s table for other scenes.
I knew there was more sculpting to do, and revised several times before our performances in Springville?s Villa Theater. During that two-week run, I played Lucy Mack Smith, who let Jane handle a bundle purportedly containing the Urim and Thummin. (This is according to Jane?s life story, which she dictated near the end of her life.)
By February 25, 2013
I spend a lot of my time thinking about food. My kitchen reflects my dual citizenship: I enjoy both Kraft macaroni and cheese and a good Dutch ?mashpot?,1 and now that I live in Germany, I eat the occasional bratwurst. I know firsthand how picking and choosing your ingredients in the grocery store can both reflect and shape your identity. (Not to mention the ribbing you receive for bringing PB&J sandwiches to school here?that combination grosses Dutch kids out and will get you exiled from the lunch table fast.)
I?m teaching a course on food and faith in American culture next semester, and preparing for that got me thinking about (American) Mormon food culture. And when one thinks about Mormonism and food, one thinks about Jell-O. I?ve had so many Mormons tell me they don?t like Jell-O, or that it didn?t really feature in their lives growing up, or that they don?t consider it particularly Mormon. On the other hand, when I first arrived in Provo last summer, my roommates were doing Jell-O shots at a house party (obviously the non-alcoholic kind). And at the dinner that kicked off the summer seminar, Jell-O salad was served. So what?s a non-Mormon like me to think on that score?
By February 24, 2013
Note: This post contains racial epithets.
In the last two weeks? posts, I have established that Mormon missionaries in the Southwestern States Mission (especially those in eastern Texas) had occasion to interact with and observe many African Americans. This week and next I will attempt to better understand the nature of those interactions. Unfortunately, at present, all of my sources were made by missionaries, so the account is one-sided.
© 2025 – Juvenile Instructor
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