University of New Mexico UNM Digital Repository English Language and Literature ETDs Electronic Theses and Dissertations 6-24-2015 Memory, History, and Forgetting in the Sandra Allen Collection of Papers on Mormonism: A Feminist Rhetorical Historiography of Institutional Intervention in the Equal Rights Amendment Valerie Kinsey Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalrepository.edu/engl_etds Part of the English Language and Literature Commons Recommended Citation Kinsey, Valerie. "Memory, History, and Forgetting in the Sandra Allen Collection of Papers on Mormonism: A Feminist Rhetorical Historiography of Institutional Intervention in the Equal Rights Amendment.edu/engl_etds/ 2 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Electronic Theses and Dissertations at UNM Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in English Language and Literature ETDs by an authorized administrator of UNM Digital Repository. For more information, please contact disc@unm.
Kinsey Candidate English Department This dissertation is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication: Approved by the Dissertation Committee: Susan Romano, Co-Chairperson Chuck Paine, Co-Chairperson Roxanne Mountford Sharon Oard Warner ii MEMORY, HISTORY, FORGETTING IN THE SANDRA ALLEN COLLECTION OF PAPERS ON MORMONISM: A FEMINIST RHETORICAL HISTORIOGRAPHY OF INSTITUTIONAL INTERVENTION IN THE EQUAL RIGHTS AMENDMENT by VALERIE L., Humanities, Stanford University, 1998 M., Creative Writing, University of New Mexico, 2005 DISSERTATION Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy English The University of New Mexico Albuquerque, New Mexico May 2015 iii DEDICATION To Sandra Webb Allen iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS With humble gratitude, I wish to acknowledge Dr. Susan Romano, dissertation co-chair, advisor, mentor, and friend. Susan, you are steadfast, brilliant, insightful, and generous to a fault. Whatever this project is, was, will become is because of you.
My deepest thanks. I also acknowledge Dr. Chuck Paine, whose love of language and teaching rubs off on all of his students. He has challenged and inspired me throughout my long tenure in graduate school.
I hope he knows how much I value his insight and dedication. To the two other outstanding women on this committee: thank you for being role models. You both have integrity in spades, and I am proud to know you. Sharon Oard Warner: Thank you for teaching me about writing and life and the unavoidable, glorious connections between the two.
Roxanne Mountford: your scholarship and professional vision are inspiring. Thank you for serving on my committee. A million thanks, also, to Dr. Daniel Cryer for his friendship and thoughtful commentary.
Our weekly meetings encouraged me to keep moving. I learned much from you, Dan, and for this, I am most appreciative. I owe a debt of gratitude to my colleagues in the Rhetoric and Writing Program at the University of New Mexico, especially my dear friend Mellisa Huffman. Your dedication to your work astounds.
My darling, thoughtful husband, Donnie: You have done everything – everything! – to see me through this project. I love you immensely. To my children, Kinsey and Dash, who bring me joy and hope. To Mom and Dad who always thought I could do this.
Finally, I want to acknowledge the Mormon women, past and present, whose words, ideas, and stories have enriched my life. In addition to Sandra Allen, I want to acknowledge Dr. Kimberly Thomas-Pollei and Dr. Joanna Brooks for sharing their thoughts on Mormon feminism.
v MEMORY, HISTORY, FORGETTING IN THE SANDRA ALLEN PAPERS COLLECTION OF PAPERS ON MORMONISM: A FEMINIST RHETORICAL HISTORIOGRAPHY OF INSTITUTIONAL INTERVENTION IN THE EQUAL RIGHTS AMENDMENT by Valerie L., Humanities, Stanford University, 1998 M., Creative Writing, University of New Mexico, 2005 Ph., English, University of New Mexico, 2015 ABSTRACT This dissertation leverages archival theory, public memory theory, feminist historiography, and rhetorical theory to argue that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- day Saints reinterpreted the Mormon past to engender identification and foster political action during the Equal Rights Amendment ratification period (1976-1982). Chapter One provides readers with an orientation to the Sandra Allen Collection of Papers on Mormonism and argues that its creator, Sandra Allen, marshaled her understanding of archiving, history writing, and institutional archives to make her history public. Chapter Two: On Memory uses theories of public memory to explain why the Mormon Church built the Nauvoo Monument to Women (MTW). The chapter posits that public monuments are pedagogical: They argue in the epideictic register for what should be by praising a past.
By providing an explanation of the historical context in which the MTW was erected, the chapter demonstrates that the Mormon Church sought to assuage feelings of resentment among women. Its statues, physical location, and dedication suggest the MTW is less a representation honoring the past than a means of representing women’s ideally embodied roles. Chapter Three: On History argues that Mormons draw from and build upon their history as means of self-identification. Church leaders foster this identification by calling upon members to contribute to history by producing personal journals, books of remembrance, and genealogies.
The process of creating home archives engenders an ongoing practice of self-discipline, wherein members perform Mormon ethe. Chapter Four: On Forgetting examines the discourses that brought about and ultimately suppressed a “Golden Age” of Mormon history. By offering a history of Mormon historiography, the chapter argues that the Church silenced professional historians. At the same time, the family history methodology the Church forwarded conceals structural inequality.
The chapter asserts that the Mormon Church silenced counter-memories to prevent them from gaining purchase among stakeholders. After summarizing the major arguments presented, the dissertation’s conclusion offers heuristic derived from the Roman god, Janus, as a tool for imaginative speculation on theorizing resistance to institutional rhetorics. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS DEDICATION. V TABLE OF CONTENTS.
VI LIST OF FIGURES. 1 “RELEASING” THE RHETORICAL TRADITION. 9 INVERTING LOCAL HISTORIES. 13 EXTENDING FEMINIST RHETORICAL HISTORIOGRAPHY.
19 ENGAGING THE “MATERIALIST TURN”. 29 LOOKING THROUGH THE ARCHIVE. 34 The Personal Journals: Sandra Allen and the Work of Pro-Family. 37 LOOKING AT THE ARCHIVE: ARCHIVE AS TEXTS.
43 Locating the Sandra Allen Collection: The Physical Space. 44 Order and Arrangement of Materials in the Sandra Allen Collection. 48 (Re)Making the Archive and My Material Contexts of Reading and Writing. 53 LOOKING THROUGH –AND BEYOND THE ARCHIVE TO INTERPRETATION OF MORMONISM.
60 A RHETORICAL HISTORY OF THE SANDRA ALLEN COLLECTION. 67 The Migrant Archives: An Archaeological Analysis. 68 Moving The Archive: Radical Recontextualization. 70 Mobilizing the Sandra Allen Collection: Allen Makes the Materials Move.
87 CALLS FOR EQUALITY: RACE AND GENDER IN THE INSTITUTIONAL CHURCH. 92 The Accommodation and Peculiarity Thesis. 95 Mormon Women’s Bodies as Retrenchment Battleground. 98 PUBLIC MEMORY, PUBLIC REMEMBRANCE AND THE MONUMENT TO WOMEN.
106 Origin of the Monument to Women. 107 Monument to Women in Nauvoo as Site of Public Remembrance. 111 The Site: A Pilgrimage to Historic Nauvoo. 116 The Statues: The Mormon Ideal Embodied.
120 Dedicating the Monument to Women: A Pedagogy in Women’s Place. 157 HISTORICAL RECORD KEEPING IN THE CONTEXT OF MORMONISM. 160 MATERIALITY: DOCUMENTS INTO MONUMENTS. 161 vii Material Monument to Mormon Identity: Little Cottonwood Canyon.
164 The Other Monument to Women: Women’s Historical Documents as Site of Remembrance. 167 DISCIPLINING HISTORICAL PRODUCTION. 172 Genealogies: Constructing a Biological Hierarchy. 173 Books of Remembrance: Identification with Ancestors.
177 PERSONAL JOURNALS: ENGENDERING DULL DAILY REINFORCEMENT. 179 Construction of Ethos in the Personal Journal: Audiences Addressed. 180 The Personal Journal’s Relationship With/In Time. 227 INTRODUCTION TO TWENTIETH CENTURY MORMON HISTORIOGRAPHY AND THE “GOLDEN AGE”.
231 Institutional Efforts to Staunch “Professional” Histories. 245 Family History: A Church-inspired Methodology. 248 WOMEN, ERA, AND THE INSTITUTIONAL ETHOS OF SILENCE(ING). 293 JANUS AS HEURISTIC.
298 CIRCULATION: TRADE AND WAR. 324 viii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Nevada Pro-Family Coalition anti-ERA advertisement. 3 Figure 2: Pro-Family Coalition logo on cookbook. 39 Figure 3: Allen journal entry.
42 Figure 4: Sandra Allen Self-Portrait. 80 Figure 5: Sandra Allen, Pride in New Mexico. 82 Figure 6: Sandra, Cheryl, and Carol Carlson (obscured). 83 Figure 7: Relief Society Certificate of Donation.
87 Figure 8: Joseph and Emma Smith, Nauvoo Monument to Women. 120 Figure 9: 1933 Relief Society Monument, Nauvoo. 124 Figure 10: Woman and Her Talents, Nauvoo Monument to Women. 126 Figure 11: Joyful Moment, Nauvoo Monument to Women.
127 Figure 12: The cover of one of Allen's journals. 163 Figure 13: Entrance to the LDS Granite Mountain Vault at Little Cottonwood Canyon, Utah. 165 ix PREFACE When transcribing Sandra Allen’s original writings, I have attempted to maintain her exact phrasing and punctuation. Given that her personal journals were handwritten and unedited, Allen made on occasion what English teachers might call “common errors” in spelling and punctuation.
My overall approach to editing has been to apply a light touch evenly. I have made adjustments only when I felt the omission of a word, a misspelling, or misplaced punctuation mark caused a stumbling block for readers. Some might find my editorial decisions idiosyncratic, and I would have little to say in my defense. I applied my best judgment at the time.
Edits are indicated with brackets. As an outsider to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I have undoubtedly misused, misinterpreted, or failed to recognize the nuance associated with some terms. As a general rule, I refer to members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- day Saints as Mormons and the organization as the Mormon Church for brevity’s sake. My understanding is that the preferred name is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and that those inside the community tend to refer to other members as LDS.
Mormons also refer to themselves as Saints as in, Saints of Latter-days. In keeping with what I perceived to be common usage, I use Saints to refer to the early followers of Joseph Smith, Jr. Mormon appears to have been intended and interpreted as a slight given that Smith’s followers called themselves Saints. My perception is that Mormons have appropriated this term and made it their own; I would not use it if I believed it caused offense.
Native Americans are called Lamanites. Mormons refer to non-Mormons as Gentiles. x The term Gentiles is derived from the Bible, and is used to refer to non-Jewish peoples. At the risk of oversimplifying, Mormons see themselves as the theological descendants of a Jewish man who came to what is now called America in Biblical times.
Many phrases Mormons use stem from their belief that they are the inheritors of this religious tradition: Utah is called Zion, for example. Like Jews, Mormons build temples. These temples are sacred spaces wherein certain rituals are enacted. Except in extraordinary circumstances, like the dedication of a new temple, Gentiles are not allowed to enter.
Temples should not be confused with churches. Mormon women tend to refer to one another using the title Sister; if they are on familiar terms or view themselves as commensurate in hierarchy, they use Christian names as in Sister Emma. For acquaintances and those who occupy a “higher” position, they tend to use surnames, as in Sister Smith. A wider range of titles is used for men.
As a general rule, Mormon men in good standing constitute the lay clergy, or in Mormon terms, “hold the priesthood.” Titles may be general or refer to institutional positions and communicate rank. Groups of Mormon men are referred to as Brethren.