From Housewife to Heretic

From Housewife to Heretic
Author: Sonia Johnson
Publisher:
Total Pages: 430
Release: 1989
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN:

Within one month, Johnson lost both her husband and her church -- and found her place in history.

Legitimization of Mormon Feminist Rhetors

Legitimization of Mormon Feminist Rhetors
Author: Tiffany D. Kinney
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 245
Release: 2021-11-10
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1793605866

Legitimization of Mormon Feminist Rhetors studies how marginalized groups use rhetorical strategies to craft legitimacy for themselves. Kinney uses archival research to parse the rhetorical devices employed by Mormon feminist women. The author assumes a pan-historical methodology by examining four unique examples of notable Mormon feminist rhetors that stretch across the 191-year history of this religion: Emmeline B. Wells (1828–1921), Fawn Brodie (1915–1981), Sonia Johnson (1936–present), and Kate Kelly (1980–present). Backed by intensive analysis, the author finds that Mormon feminist women take up the ancient rhetorical canons as a heuristic to cultivate a position of authority for themselves: Wells employs arrangement patterns, Brodie engages with memory, Johnson draws upon invention practices, and Kelly applies delivery strategies. Scholars and students of communication, rhetoric, religion, and women’s studies will find this book particularly interesting.

Sonia Johnson

Sonia Johnson
Author: Christine Talbot
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Total Pages: 181
Release: 2024-08-20
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0252047249

Few figures in the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints provoke such visceral responses as Sonia Johnson. Her unrelenting public support of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) made her the face of LDS feminism while her subsequent excommunication roiled the faith community. Christine Talbot tells the story of Sonia’s historic confrontation with the Church within the context of the faith’s first large-scale engagement with the feminist movement. A typical if well-educated Latter-day Saints homemaker, Sonia was moved to action by the all-male LDS leadership’s opposition to the ERA and a belief the Church should stay out of politics. Talbot uses the activist’s experiences and criticisms to explore the ways Sonia’s ideas and situation sparked critical questions about LDS thought, culture, and belief. She also illuminates how Sonia’s excommunication shaped LDS feminism, the Church’s antagonism to feminist critiques, and the Church itself in the years to come. A revealing and long-overdue account, Sonia Johnson explores the life, work, and impact of the LDS feminist.

Sister Saints

Sister Saints
Author: Colleen McDannell
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 313
Release: 2018-10-02
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 019022133X

The specter of polygamy haunts Mormonism. More than a century after the practice was banned, it casts a long shadow that obscures people's perceptions of the lives of today's Latter-day Saint women. Many still see them as second-class citizens, oppressed by the church and their husbands, and forced to stay home and take care of their many children. Sister Saints offers a history of modern Mormon women that takes aim at these stereotypes, showing that their stories are much more complex than previously thought. Women in the Utah territory received the right to vote in 1870-fifty years before the nineteenth amendment-only to have it taken away by the same federal legislation that forced the end of polygamy. Progressive and politically active, Mormon women had a profound impact on public life in the first few decades of the twentieth century. They then turned inward, creating a domestic ideal that shaped Mormon culture for generations. The women's movement of the 1970s sparked a new, vigorous-and hotly contested-Mormon feminism that divided Latter-day Saint women. By the twenty-first century more than half of all Mormons lived outside the United States, and what had once been a small community of pioneer women had grown into a diverse global sisterhood. Colleen McDannell argues that we are on the verge of an era in which women are likely to play a greater role in the Mormon church. Well-educated, outspoken, and deeply committed to their faith, these women are defying labels like liberal and conservative, traditional and modern. This deeply researched and eye-opening book ranges over more than a century of history to tell the stories of extraordinary-and ordinary-Latter-day Saint women with empathy and narrative flair.

Where the Meanings Are (Routledge Revivals)

Where the Meanings Are (Routledge Revivals)
Author: Catharine R. Stimpson
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2014-07-11
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 131760623X

First published in 1990, this collection of essays in literary criticism, feminist theory and race relations was named one of the top twenty-five books of 1988 by the Voice Literary Supplement. The title covers such subjects as black literature; the reconstruction of culture, changing arts, letters and sciences to include the topics of women and gender; and, the nature of family and the changing roles of women within society. As such, Catharine Stimpson employs a transdisciplinary approach, to encourage greater understanding of the differences among women, and thus socially-constructed differences in general. Where the Meanings Are tells of some of the arguments within feminism during the re-designing and designing of cultural spaces, as post-modernism began to change the boundaries of race, class, and gender. It will therefore be of great value to students and general readers with an interest in the relationship between gender and culture, sex and gender difference, feminist theory and literature.

The Reader's Companion to U.S. Women's History

The Reader's Companion to U.S. Women's History
Author: Wilma Mankiller
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Total Pages: 724
Release: 1998
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 9780618001828

Covers issues and events in women's history that were previously unpublished, misplaced, or forgotten, and provides new perspectives on each event.

Feminists Who Changed America, 1963-1975

Feminists Who Changed America, 1963-1975
Author: Barbara J. Love
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Total Pages: 559
Release: 2006-09-22
Genre: Reference
ISBN: 0252097475

Documenting key feminists who ignited the second wave women's movement Barbara J. Love’s Feminists Who Changed America, 1963-1975 will be the first comprehensive directory to document many of the founders and leaders (including both well-known and grassroots organizers) of the second wave women's movement. It tells the stories of more than two thousand individual women and a few notable men who together reignited the women's movement and made permanent changes to entrenched customs and laws. The biographical entries on these pioneering feminists represent their many factions, all parts of the country, all races and ethnic groups, and all political ideologies. Nancy Cott's foreword discusses the movement in relation to the earlier first wave and presents a brief overview of the second wave in the context of other contemporaneous social movements.

What It Was All About

What It Was All About
Author: Steven H. Propp
Publisher: iUniverse
Total Pages: 324
Release: 2015-12-07
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1491784237

The year is 1970: The Supreme Court has legalized abortion, Equal Pay for Equal Work is now the law, and Affirmative Action programs attempt to redress past injustices and inequities. Women are coming together nationwide in consciousness-raising groups, sharing their knowledge and experiences with each other. A group of six women in Stentoria, California bond through such a group, and support each other as women in this new Movement are forming collectives; publishing their own books and periodicals; creating an exciting new genre of Womens Music; as well as starting their own bookstores, to make these new materials readily available to the community. New spiritual movementsfocused on the Divine Feminine principleare also beginning. Even some men are sympathetic and supportive of these ideals. But as the 1980s arrive, the situation changes: the backlash against the womens movement in politics and the media seemingly turns into a full-fledged war, specifically targeting the gains that women have achieved. Opposition from traditional religions hardens, and womens reproductive rights come under renewed attack; the Equal Rights Amendment fails, even as women themselves debate controversial questions: such as banning pornography, and how to view a rising Third Wave of the womens movement. Ominously, the threat of AIDS seemingly brings the era of sexual freedom to a close. The six women deal with all these issues, as well as personal challengesincluding balancing work and family responsibilities. As the new century begins, they reflect about what the womens movement ultimately accomplished. In a world now characterized by growing economic inequality, increasing low self-esteem for some women (exemplified by cosmetic surgery and extreme makeovers), legalized same-sex marriage, and media attention to Transgender issues, this book may help you to appreciate not only how far weve come, but how far we have yet to go.

Faith in America

Faith in America
Author: Charles H. Lippy
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 870
Release: 2006-09-30
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0313049610

Over the last 25 years, there has been much talk of the presumed decline in religious participation in America. In addition, from the 1960s on, surveys that mark the influence of religion in American life have shown a mixed response. Many suggest that religion is losing influence in the culture as a whole; others indicate that while organized religion may be experiencing challenges, spirituality is on the upswing. At the same time, however, there have been signs that religious life in the U.S. is extraordinarily healthy. But religion in America has changed, to be sure, in a number of ways. And it has changed us and our culture in return. This timely set looks at the major forces that are changing the shape of religion in American life. With an influx of immigrants from Asia, Latin America, and other regions, the diversity of religion has grown to include Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, and other faiths. Latin American and African American communities have experienced changes in the ways they practice their faith and in turn influence American culture in general. Women have entered the clergy in record numbers, and the push for allowing women and gays to enter the clergy in religions that limit or prohibit their roles is on the increase. In addition, gay couples are leading the same-sex marriage movement, and other social issues such as abortion, stem-cell research, end of life care, etc., are still being debated. Interest over how people actually live out their religion or spirituality has mushroomed in recent decades, thanks in part to the information revolution and popular culture. What folks do when they gather together to worship, and where they come together, has changed dramatically with the advent of the Internet and the role of sports in American life. So much has changed, and faith in America has become more important than ever—as part of our culture, our way of life, and the way we relate to each other and the world around us. The essays found in these pages shed light on our understanding of these transformations and help us comprehend the enormous role of religion in our society and in our world.