Mormons, Musical Theater, and Belonging in America

Mormons, Musical Theater, and Belonging in America PDF Author: Jake Johnson
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 025205136X
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints adopted the vocal and theatrical traditions of American musical theater as important theological tenets. As Church membership grew, leaders saw how the genre could help define the faith and wove musical theater into many aspects of Mormon life. Jake Johnson merges the study of belonging in America with scholarship on voice and popular music to explore the surprising yet profound link between two quintessentially American institutions. Throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, Mormons gravitated toward musicals as a common platform for transmitting political and theological ideas. Johnson sees Mormons using musical theater as a medium for theology of voice--a religious practice that suggests how vicariously voicing another person can bring one closer to godliness. This sounding, Johnson suggests, created new opportunities for living. Voice and the musical theater tradition provided a site for Mormons to negotiate their way into middle-class respectability. At the same time, musical theater became a unique expressive tool of Mormon culture.

Mormons, Musical Theater, and Belonging in America

Mormons, Musical Theater, and Belonging in America PDF Author: Jake Johnson
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 025205136X
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 224

Get Book Here

Book Description
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints adopted the vocal and theatrical traditions of American musical theater as important theological tenets. As Church membership grew, leaders saw how the genre could help define the faith and wove musical theater into many aspects of Mormon life. Jake Johnson merges the study of belonging in America with scholarship on voice and popular music to explore the surprising yet profound link between two quintessentially American institutions. Throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, Mormons gravitated toward musicals as a common platform for transmitting political and theological ideas. Johnson sees Mormons using musical theater as a medium for theology of voice--a religious practice that suggests how vicariously voicing another person can bring one closer to godliness. This sounding, Johnson suggests, created new opportunities for living. Voice and the musical theater tradition provided a site for Mormons to negotiate their way into middle-class respectability. At the same time, musical theater became a unique expressive tool of Mormon culture.

Images of Ancient America

Images of Ancient America PDF Author: John L. Sorenson
Publisher: Research Press (UT)
ISBN: 9780934893282
Category : Book of Mormon
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
"Describes and displays many aspects of the civilization that arose in southern Mexico and northern Central America (Mesoamerica) thousands of years ago" in order to "help readers envision the lives of the people in the Book of Mormon"--jacket.

The Mormon Image in the American Mind

The Mormon Image in the American Mind PDF Author: J.B. Haws
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199897646
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 425

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Book Description
What do Americans think about Mormons - and why do they think what they do? This is a story where the Osmonds, the Olympics, the Tabernacle Choir, Evangelical Christians, the Equal Rights Amendment, Sports Illustrated, and even Miss America all figure into the equation. The book is punctuated by the presidential campaigns of George and Mitt Romney, four decades apart. A survey of the past half-century reveals a growing tension inherent in the public's views of Mormons and the public's views of the religion that inspires that body.

An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon

An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon PDF Author: John L. Sorenson
Publisher: Shadow Mountain
ISBN: 9780877476085
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 415

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Book Description


Reconstruction and Mormon America

Reconstruction and Mormon America PDF Author: Clyde A. Milner
Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press
ISBN: 0806165863
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 267

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Book Description
The South has been the standard focus of Reconstruction, but reconstruction following the Civil War was not a distinctly Southern experience. In the post–Civil War West, American Indians also experienced reconstruction through removal to reservations and assimilation to Christianity, and Latter-day Saints—Mormons—saw government actions to force the end of polygamy under threat of disestablishing the church. These efforts to bring nonconformist Mormons into the American mainstream figure in the more familiar scheme of the federal government’s reconstruction—aimed at rebellious white Southerners and uncontrolled American Indians. In this volume, more than a dozen contributors look anew at the scope of the reconstruction narrative and offer a unique perspective on the history of the Latter-day Saints. Marshaled by editors Clyde A. Milner II and Brian Q. Cannon, these writers explore why the federal government wanted to reconstruct Latter-day Saints, when such efforts began, and how the initiatives compare with what happened with white Southerners and American Indians. Other contributions examine the effect of the government’s policies on Mormon identity and sense of history. Why, for example, do Latter-day Saints not have a Lost Cause? Do they share a resentment with American Indians over the loss of sovereignty? And were nineteenth-century Mormons considered to be on the “wrong” side of a religious line, but not a “race line”? The authors consider these and other vital questions and topics here. Together, and in dialogue with one another, their work suggests a new way of understanding the regional, racial, and religious dynamics of reconstruction—and, within this framework, a new way of thinking about the creation of a Mormon historical identity.

Mormon Faith in America

Mormon Faith in America PDF Author: Maxine Hanks
Publisher: Infobase Learning
ISBN: 1438140371
Category : RELIGION
Languages : en
Pages : 217

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Book Description
Examines the history, cultural, social, and political influence of the Mormon faith in the United States.

The North America Model for the Book of Mormon

The North America Model for the Book of Mormon PDF Author: William Peter Midgley
Publisher: Page Publishing Inc
ISBN: 1682134806
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 190

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Book Description
HAVE YOU EVER WANTED TO? Sit at the edge of the waters of Mormon Cross the river Sidon at the city and valley of Gideon Climb mount Antipas Follow the path Coriantumr used to attack the city of Zarahemla Journey to the city of Judea in Manti with the 2000 stripling soldiers Explore the land of the Nephite kings, Zeniff, Noah and Limhi Stand where king Benjamin spoke to the people from the tower Visit the shores of the east sea and west sea at the narrow neck Waters of Mormon - NC Mount Antipas - NC East sea near the narrow neck - NY You can now. The search for the lands of the Book of Mormon has been an object of interest and conjecture ever since it was published in 1830. Many serious and well researched studies have been conducted for locations from South America, to Central America, to North America and beyond. Substantive theories have been generated and extensive academic treatises and books have been written and websites created to promote a wide range of models attempting to address the sites and locations of where the events took place. Each model has its proponents and its detractors, and each has credible scriptural, scientific and archaeological evidence to support elements of each model. The North America Model for the Book of Mormon, From Jerusalem to Cumorah, locates events, not just generally, but with specificity in many cases. It is based on the contemporarily written word, the preferred source for historical research. Since the Book of Mormon is true, what better source would there be? It is time to unravel the geography of the Book of Mormon from Jerusalem to Cumorah that has been hidden in plain sight since 1830. The North America Model indicates how close the historical and geographical footprint of the wars, contentions and travels of the Nephites and Lamanites may have facilitated the actual founding and preservation of the United States of America in the prophesied land of promise through the paths and trails that the ancient peoples who inhabited the land created and which were used not only by the colonists during the Revolutionary War but also in the course of the Civil War. The legacy of the Book of Mormon is more intimately intertwined with the United States of America, the promised land of liberty, than originally thought. Miamisburg Mound, Ohio - Hopewell Mound Builder Culture 1000/200 B.C. to 4-500 A.D.

The Mormonizing of America

The Mormonizing of America PDF Author: Stephen Mansfield
Publisher: Worthy Books
ISBN: 1617951099
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 288

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Book Description
Stephen Mansfield, the acclaimed New York Times best-selling author, has highlighted the growing popularity of Mormonism-a belief system with cultic roots-and the implications of its critical rise. Mormons are moving into the spotlight in pop culture, politics, sports, and entertainment via presidential candidates like Romney and Huntsman, media personality Glenn Beck, mega-bestselling Twilight author Stephanie Meyer, and The Book of Mormon, the hottest show on Broadway. Mormonism was once a renegade cult at war with the U.S. Army in the 1800s, but it has now emerged as not only the fastest-growing religion, but as a high-impact mainstream cultural influence.

American Universities and the Birth of Modern Mormonism, 1867–1940

American Universities and the Birth of Modern Mormonism, 1867–1940 PDF Author: Thomas W. Simpson
Publisher: UNC Press Books
ISBN: 1469628643
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 247

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Book Description
In the closing decades of the nineteenth century, college-age Latter-day Saints began undertaking a remarkable intellectual pilgrimage to the nation's elite universities, including Harvard, Columbia, Michigan, Chicago, and Stanford. Thomas W. Simpson chronicles the academic migration of hundreds of LDS students from the 1860s through the late 1930s, when church authority J. Reuben Clark Jr., himself a product of the Columbia University Law School, gave a reactionary speech about young Mormons' search for intellectual cultivation. Clark's leadership helped to set conservative parameters that in large part came to characterize Mormon intellectual life. At the outset, Mormon women and men were purposefully dispatched to such universities to "gather the world's knowledge to Zion." Simpson, drawing on unpublished diaries, among other materials, shows how LDS students commonly described American universities as egalitarian spaces that fostered a personally transformative sense of freedom to explore provisional reconciliations of Mormon and American identities and religious and scientific perspectives. On campus, Simpson argues, Mormon separatism died and a new, modern Mormonism was born: a Mormonism at home in the United States but at odds with itself. Fierce battles among Mormon scholars and church leaders ensued over scientific thought, progressivism, and the historicity of Mormonism's sacred past. The scars and controversy, Simpson concludes, linger.

The Mormon People

The Mormon People PDF Author: Matthew Bowman
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 0679644911
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 354

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Book Description
“From one of the brightest of the new generation of Mormon-studies scholars comes a crisp, engaging account of the religion’s history.”—The Wall Street Journal With Mormonism on the nation’s radar as never before, religious historian Matthew Bowman has written an essential book that pulls back the curtain on more than 180 years of Mormon history and doctrine. He recounts the church’s origins and explains how the Mormon vision has evolved—and with it the esteem in which Mormons have been held in the eyes of their countrymen. Admired on the one hand as hardworking paragons of family values, Mormons have also been derided as oddballs and persecuted as polygamists, heretics, and zealots. The place of Mormonism in public life continues to generate heated debate, yet the faith has never been more popular. One of the fastest-growing religions in the world, it retains an uneasy sense of its relationship with the main line of American culture. Mormons will surely play an even greater role in American civic life in the years ahead. The Mormon People comes as a vital addition to the corpus of American religious history—a frank and balanced demystification of a faith that remains a mystery for many. With a new afterword by the author. “Fascinating and fair-minded . . . a sweeping soup-to-nuts primer on Mormonism.”—The Boston Globe “A cogent, judicious, and important account of a faith that has been an important element in American history but remained surprisingly misunderstood.”—Michael Beschloss “A thorough, stimulating rendering of the Mormon past and present.”—Kirkus Reviews “[A] smart, lucid history.”—Tom Brokaw