Interpretation: Latter-day Saint Perspectives

Interpretation: Latter-day Saint Perspectives
A Conference Sponsored by
Mormon Scholars in the Humanities
and the Mormon Scholars Foundation
May 16–17, 2008
Southern Virginia University

FRIDAY, MAY 16

9:00 a.m. Informal Gathering in the Main Hall Ballroom

9:30 a.m. Welcome by Rodney K. Smith, President of Southern Virginia University, and
George Handley, President of Mormon Scholars in the Humanities

10:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m.

SESSION A, BALLROOM
Chair:
Rodney K. Smith, Southern Virginia University

Presenters:
Nathan Oman, College of William and Mary, “‘The Living Oracles’: Legal Interpretation and Mormon Thought”

Jeremiah John, Southern Virginia University, “Interpretation and Political Theology: A Mormon Reading of John Paul II’s Evangelium Vitae and Laborem Exercens”

James Holt, Parrs Wood High School & University of Chester, “Fostering or Failing Faith? Interpreting Latter-day Saint Theology in the Context of Christian Theology”

12:00 p.m. Lunch (Dining Hall)

1:30–3:30 p.m.

SESSION B, HILLTOP
Chair:
Terryl Givens, University of Richmond

Presenters:
Chad McLane, Brigham Young University—Idaho, “Emerson in Gilgal Garden: An LDS Appropriation of ‘The Sphinx’”

Rosalynde Welch, Independent Scholar, “Attend the Tale: Toward an Art-Centered Aesthetics”

Candice Wendt, Brigham Young University, “Reading ‘The Book of Nature’: An LDS, Ecocritical Perspective of Marriage, Nature, and Interpretation in Shakespeare’s As You Like It”

SESSION C, STONEMETZ
Chair:
James Faulconer, Brigham Young University

Presenters:
Joseph Spencer, San Jose State University, “Thinking the Mormon Hermeneutical Situation: Four Mormon Discourses and the Place of a Uniquely Mormon Hermeneutics”

Justin White, Brigham Young University, “Caressing the Text: Towards a Levinasian Hermeneutics”

Alan Goff, DeVry University, “A Mormon Hermeneutic of Proximity and of Narrative”

FRIDAY, MAY 16 (CONTINUED)

4:00–6:00 p.m.

SESSION D, HILLTOP
Chair:
Jennifer Connerley, James Madison University

Presenters:
Ann Marie McDonald, Pennsylvania State University, Harrisburg, “Giggles in Sacrament Meeting: Laughter and Reformative Satire in Mormon Culture”

Melanie Steimle, Pennsylvania State University, Harrisburg, “Dinner on the Median: The Historical Location of Creative Dating in Mormon Folk Tradition”

Richard Oman, Museum of Church History and Art, “Mormon Pioneer Furniture: An Example of Using Context and Content, Rather Than Style, in Defining Mormon Art”

SESSION E, STONEMETZ
Chair:
Randall Cluff, Southern Virginia University

Presenters:
Neal Kramer, Brigham Young University, “Orson F. Whitney’s Musings on a Mormon Theory of Literary Interpretation”

Genevieve Oliver, Indiana University, “The Religious Reader in the Secular World: Mormon Interpretation and the Literary Significance of Faith”

Shawn Bennion, Purdue University, “The Mormon Renaissance”

6:30 p.m. Dinner (Ballroom); free to those on the program, $15 for others

7:30 p.m. Panel Discussion: “Belief and Interpretation” chaired by Richard Bushman

SATURDAY, MAY 17

10:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m.

SESSION F, BALLROOM
Chair:
Paul Edwards, Southern Virginia University

Presenters:
George Handley, Brigham Young University, “Interpretation as Continuing Revelation in The Book of Mormon”

Benjamin Spackman, University of Chicago, “The Contributions of the Book of Mormon to an LDS Hermeneutic of the Old Testament”

Stanley Thayne, Brigham Young University, “The Sacred Literature Conundrum: Situating the Book of Mormon in the Academy”

SESSION G, STONEMETZ
Chair:
Kary Smout, Washington and Lee University

Presenters:
Ronald Bartholomew, Brigham Young University, “Babylon and Zion: Buckinghamshire and the Mormons in the Nineteenth Century”

Zachary Hutchins, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, “The Mote and the Beam: Applying Christ’s Parable to Critical Paradigms and Poe’s Stories”

David Paxman, Brigham Young University, “The Family in the 18th Century British Novel: An LDS Interpretation, or a Rhetoric Thereof”

12:00 p.m. Lunch (Dining Hall)

SATURDAY, MAY 17 (CONTINUED)

1:30 p.m.–3:30 p.m.

SESSION J, BALLROOM
Chair:
Scott Dransfield, Southern Virginia University

Presenters:
Bruce Jorgensen, Brigham Young University, “Could We Have a Mormon Hermeneutics, and Would It Be a Good Thing If We Did?”

Samuel Brown, University of Utah, “Interpretation and the Truth in Brackets”

Benjamin Park, Brigham Young University, “Losing a Generation: LDS Interpretations of Lost Generation Literature”

Jonathon Penny, United Arab Emirates University, “Mis(sed)readings? Critical Mormonism as Aperture and Aporia”

SESSION I, STONEMETZ
Chair:
T.R. Porter, Southern Virginia University

Presenters:
Jan-Erik Jones, Southern Virginia University, “LDS Interpretation of Omnipotence and Omniscience”

Mark Olsen, Central Connecticut State University, “Interpreting the Implications of Mormon Materialism for the Soul”

Blake Ostler, Independent Scholar, “Interpretive Tradition Rather than Doctrine in the Mormon Tradition”

4:00 p.m.–6:00 p.m.

SESSION J, BALLROOM
Chair:
TBA

Presenters:
Sheila Taylor, Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, “How Might a Mormon Read Julian of Norwich? LDS Interpretation of Non-LDS Religious Texts”

Jenny Rebecca Rytting, Northwest Missouri State University, “Visionary Writing in an Age of Apostasy”

Daniel Muhlestein, Brigham Young University, “The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint and the Limits of Mormon Literature”

SESSION K, STONEMETZ
Chair:
TBA

Presenters:
John Armstrong, Southern Virginia University, “Happiness as the End of Our Existence”

Benjamin Huff, Randolph-Macon College, “Interpreting the Veil: Two Models of Mortality”

Adam Miller, Collin College, “A Hermeneutics of Weakness”

6:30 p.m. Dinner on your own in Buena Vista or Lexington

CONFERENCE REGISTRATION

Contact Professor John Armstrong at [email protected] to register. There is no registration fee. The catered dinner on Friday evening is free to those on the program, $15 for others. Campus housing is available for $25 per night to those requesting it by April 15.