Faithful Transgressions In The American West: Six Twentieth-Century Mormon Women's Autobiographical Acts
by Laura Bush
Utah State University Press, 2004 eISBN: 978-0-87421-495-6 | Paper: 978-0-87421-551-9 Library of Congress Classification PS153.M66B87 2004 Dewey Decimal Classification 810.99287
ABOUT THIS BOOK | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
ABOUT THIS BOOK
The central issue Bush finds in these works is how their authors have dealt with the authority of Mormon Church leaders. As she puts it in her preface, "I use the phrase 'faithful transgression' to describe moments in the texts when each writer, explicitly or implicitly, commits herself in writing to trust her own ideas and authority over official religious authority while also conceiving of and depicting herself to be a 'faithful' member of the Church." Bush recognizes her book as her own act of faithful transgression. Writing it involved wrestling, she states, "with my own deeply ingrained religious beliefs and my equally compelling education in feminist theories that mean to liberate and empower women."
Faithful Transgressions examines a remarkable group of authors and their highly readable and entertaining books. In producing the first significant book-length study of Mormon women's autobiographical writing, Bush rides a wave of memoir publishing and academic interest in autobiography and other life narratives. As she elucidates these works in relation to the religious tradition that played a major role in shaping them, she not only positions them in relation to feminist theory and current work on women's life writings but ties them to the long literary tradition of spiritual autobiography.
REVIEWS
Faithful Transgressions in the American West is a resonant literary concept, with provocative implications for any reader or writer of autobiography... Bush models an impressive ability to read historical texts closely and carefully, identifying tone, rhetorical strategies, the use of imagery, and the creation of selves'skills that would benefit any historican or reader of history. —Lavina Fielding Anderson
Lucidly written and cogently argued, Bush's important and ground-breaking study helpfully contributes to rethinking the practice of both women's and western life narrative. Its central concept of "faithful transgression" investigates the inscription of gendered roles in Mormon tradition and the interventional work of women's writing within that tradition. —Julia Watson
I've read a number of manuscripts on Mormon women's writing in the past few years, and this is definitely the best one. It should be appealing to a general audience and to scholars. —Melody Graulich
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
Acknowledgments
Preface: Gender Trouble and My Hybrid Life
Introduction: Autobiographical Constructions of the Mormon Self(s)
Chapter 1: Narrating Optimism, Faith, and Divine Intervention
Mary Ann Hafen, Recollections of a Handcart Pioneer of 1860:
A Woman's Life on the Mormon Frontier
Chapter 2: Defending and Condemning a Polygamous Life
Annie Clark Tanner, A Mormon Mother
Chapter 3: Truth Telling about a Temporal and a Spiritual Life
Juanita Brooks, Quicksand and Cactus:
A Memoir of the Southern Mormon Frontier
Chapter 4: Remedying Race and Religious Prejudice
Wynetta Willis Martin, Black Mormon Tells Her Story
Chapter 5: A Home Windswept with Paradox
Terry Tempest Williams, Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place
Chapter 6: Training to Be a Good Mormon Girl While Longing for Fame
Phyllis Barber, How I Got Cultured: A Nevada Memoir
Conclusion
Appendix
A The Articles of Faith of the Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints
B Official Declaration 1
C Official Declaration 2
D The Family: A Proclamation to the World
Notes
Works Cited
Library of Congress Subject Headings for this publication: American prose literature Mormon authors History and criticism, American prose literature Women authors History and criticism, American prose literature West (U, S, ) History and criticism, Women authors, American Biography History and criticism, Women authors, American Homes and haunts West (U, S, )Women pioneers Biography History and criticism, Mormon women Biography History and criticism, West (U, S, ) Biography History and criticism, Women West (U, S, ) Intellectual life, Women and literature West (U, S, )Autobiography Mormon authors, Autobiography Women authors
REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
If you are a student who cannot use this book in printed form, BiblioVault may be able to supply you
with an electronic file for alternative access.
Please have the accessibility coordinator at your school fill out this form.
Faithful Transgressions In The American West: Six Twentieth-Century Mormon Women's Autobiographical Acts
by Laura Bush
Utah State University Press, 2004 eISBN: 978-0-87421-495-6 Paper: 978-0-87421-551-9
The central issue Bush finds in these works is how their authors have dealt with the authority of Mormon Church leaders. As she puts it in her preface, "I use the phrase 'faithful transgression' to describe moments in the texts when each writer, explicitly or implicitly, commits herself in writing to trust her own ideas and authority over official religious authority while also conceiving of and depicting herself to be a 'faithful' member of the Church." Bush recognizes her book as her own act of faithful transgression. Writing it involved wrestling, she states, "with my own deeply ingrained religious beliefs and my equally compelling education in feminist theories that mean to liberate and empower women."
Faithful Transgressions examines a remarkable group of authors and their highly readable and entertaining books. In producing the first significant book-length study of Mormon women's autobiographical writing, Bush rides a wave of memoir publishing and academic interest in autobiography and other life narratives. As she elucidates these works in relation to the religious tradition that played a major role in shaping them, she not only positions them in relation to feminist theory and current work on women's life writings but ties them to the long literary tradition of spiritual autobiography.
REVIEWS
Faithful Transgressions in the American West is a resonant literary concept, with provocative implications for any reader or writer of autobiography... Bush models an impressive ability to read historical texts closely and carefully, identifying tone, rhetorical strategies, the use of imagery, and the creation of selves'skills that would benefit any historican or reader of history. —Lavina Fielding Anderson
Lucidly written and cogently argued, Bush's important and ground-breaking study helpfully contributes to rethinking the practice of both women's and western life narrative. Its central concept of "faithful transgression" investigates the inscription of gendered roles in Mormon tradition and the interventional work of women's writing within that tradition. —Julia Watson
I've read a number of manuscripts on Mormon women's writing in the past few years, and this is definitely the best one. It should be appealing to a general audience and to scholars. —Melody Graulich
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
Acknowledgments
Preface: Gender Trouble and My Hybrid Life
Introduction: Autobiographical Constructions of the Mormon Self(s)
Chapter 1: Narrating Optimism, Faith, and Divine Intervention
Mary Ann Hafen, Recollections of a Handcart Pioneer of 1860:
A Woman's Life on the Mormon Frontier
Chapter 2: Defending and Condemning a Polygamous Life
Annie Clark Tanner, A Mormon Mother
Chapter 3: Truth Telling about a Temporal and a Spiritual Life
Juanita Brooks, Quicksand and Cactus:
A Memoir of the Southern Mormon Frontier
Chapter 4: Remedying Race and Religious Prejudice
Wynetta Willis Martin, Black Mormon Tells Her Story
Chapter 5: A Home Windswept with Paradox
Terry Tempest Williams, Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place
Chapter 6: Training to Be a Good Mormon Girl While Longing for Fame
Phyllis Barber, How I Got Cultured: A Nevada Memoir
Conclusion
Appendix
A The Articles of Faith of the Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints
B Official Declaration 1
C Official Declaration 2
D The Family: A Proclamation to the World
Notes
Works Cited
Library of Congress Subject Headings for this publication: American prose literature Mormon authors History and criticism, American prose literature Women authors History and criticism, American prose literature West (U, S, ) History and criticism, Women authors, American Biography History and criticism, Women authors, American Homes and haunts West (U, S, )Women pioneers Biography History and criticism, Mormon women Biography History and criticism, West (U, S, ) Biography History and criticism, Women West (U, S, ) Intellectual life, Women and literature West (U, S, )Autobiography Mormon authors, Autobiography Women authors
REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
If you are a student who cannot use this book in printed form, BiblioVault may be able to supply you
with an electronic file for alternative access.
Please have the accessibility coordinator at your school fill out this form.
It can take 2-3 weeks for requests to be filled.
ABOUT THIS BOOK | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE