By December 27, 2014
Solstice was this week (which is also my birthday), a day which to me always represents a fresh start, the year’s pivot point back towards the light. This dawning feels especially significant, as the start of an unfamiliar new phase: I’ve just begun a sabbatical.
By December 23, 2014
Note: the post below includes images of pejorative racial and ethnic stereotypes from 1912.
Today?s image, ?The Mistletoe Tradition at Salt Lake City,? came to my attention via Bunker and Bitton?s The Mormon Graphic Image, 1834-1914, where it illustrates a period (1908-1914) when portrayals of Mormons declined in frequency and hostility. ?Mistletoe…? comes from the British Punch?s Almanack for 1912—an appendage to the more famous Punch—and Bunker and Bitton only included the Mormon part of the full-page, three-panel gag about cultural exchange in British colonialism. [1] The whole page is below.
By December 22, 2014
Welcome back to our series, wherein we answer questions from our readers about plural marriage. Where possible, I’ve linked to all the available sources for readers, so that others can investigate each question more fully, if they wish.
Apologies for the delay in answering questions (finals, life, etc.), but if you have any more questions, feel free to post them in the comments.
For other posts in this series, see
Samuel Brown and Kate Holbrook (Embodiment and Sexuality)
WVS (D&C 132 Questions)
By December 21, 2014
All the most important links for the past 3 weeks. You know the drill: if we missed anything, let us know in the comments. If you have opinions on the news articles, let us know in the comments.
By December 19, 2014
One of my favorite hyperbolic descriptions of Brigham Young (??In the course of an unusually long life, he was never known to do a generous or unselfish action??) includes the line: ?If we search history for his prototypes, we find him a mixture of Mokanna, the veiled prophet of Kohrassan, and that terrible chief of the assassins, the Old Man of the Mountain.? [1] I recently wrote about the Mormon Mokanna; today I address the other half of the mix. In the mid- and late-nineteenth century, critics of Mormonism sometimes compared Mormons to the ?Old Man of the Mountain,? the leader of what Marco Polo and many since understood to be the fanatically dedicated and fantastically skilled Hashashin / ?Assassins.?
By December 16, 2014
With this post we begin an occasional series entitled ?Images.? We?ll post an image?contemporary photograph, political cartoon, post card, picture of an object, book cover, whatever?briefly describe it, and then invite comment on the image and/or its context. Hopefully we?ll accumulate a small collection of crowd-annotated Mormon-related images. Furthermore, the text descriptions of the images might help researchers find images via text searches.
By December 15, 2014
Just a few books from this last year that should be found on your bookshelves.
It’s that time of year again.
This is the sixth annual installment of my “Restrospect” series, which attempts to overview what I thought were important books and articles from the last 12 months. (Previous installments are found here, here, here, here, and here.) Every year, I wonder if I want to do this post again; every year, I decide it is once again worth it. (Though no promises for next year.) Mostly, it is an excuse to catch up on what has been published and to chart historiographical trends–something that really is only possible when you look at articles as well. I’ll also continue my tradition of offering my selections for MHA’s awards.
The usual caveat: my selections represent my own interests, and I admit I likely have many blindspots. So please fill in the gaps with your comments.
Of course, if you want more substantive engagement with recent scholarship in Mormon studies, you’d read the recent issue of Mormon Studies Review, especially since digital subscriptions are only $10. But you already knew that.
By December 12, 2014
The December 2014 Mormon History Association newsletter (Vol 49, No 4) is available online here. For your convenience, I will hit some highlights.
By December 11, 2014
Last week, Ben highlighted the latest issue of the Mormon Studies Review. This week the Maxwell Institute gave Mormon Studies geeks even more goodness with the release of the first issue of the newly-revamped Studies in the Bible and Antiquity. You can read Carl Griffin’s overview of the entire issue here, but I wanted to take the time to highlight two of the articles included in particular. While much of what Studies in the Bible and Antiquity falls outside of the more narrow interests of JI bloggers, this issue includes a roundtable review of the BYU New Testament Commentary (BYUNTC) that features two prominent historians of Mormonism: Philip Barlow, Leonard J. Arrington Professor of Mormon History and Culture at Utah State University, and Grant Underwood, Professor of History at Brigham Young University and coeditor of the Documents series of the Joseph Smith Papers Project.
Barlow opens the roundtable with some reflections on the aims of the BYUNTC, highlighting five particular questions that the undertaking raised for him, as a believing Mormon and a scholar of Mormonism and the Bible:
By December 8, 2014
Below is a first-draft list of sister missionaries called in the first three years of the formal female missionary program. I needed to know which ?number? an early sister missionary was for another project; I was surprised at how difficult the information was to chase down in digital form. To spare others similar pain, I submit the following list. I also commend the list to any History instructor assigning mini-biographies to classes of undergraduates (and please share the results). While we?re on the subject, check out Matt McBride?s http://sistermissionaries.org/.
Please note, with emphasis, the first-ness of the draft. I have verified very little on the list and am certain there are transcription errors and possibly even wholesale omissions.
© 2026 – Juvenile Instructor
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