This dissertation is a labor history of the Laie sugar plantation between 1865 and 1931. It explores intercultural and race relations that were inherent to colonial and plantation processes in Hawaii. Particular attention is given to the role of religion in advancing the colonial project. In 1865 Mormon missionaries bought approximately 6,000 acres with the hope of creating a gathering place for Hawaiian converts to settle in. The ideal of the gathering was a metaphor the missionaries brought with them from Utah, and it was a metaphor appropriated by Hawaiians and infused with their own cultural meanings, particularly the importance of the land. In order to economically support the gathering place, the missionaries turned to a plantation model. The plantation they developed was unusual in several respects. First, for most of the plantation's history, labor was done predominantly by Hawaiians. On the majority of other plantations, immigrant labor was used. Second, on Laie Plantation the cultivation of kalo was as important as sugar. Both crops were promoted by both Hawaiians and missionaries. Thus kalo production was one of the chief reasons Hawaiians stayed on Laie Plantation. It appears that many of those who gathered to Laie did so because to a large extent they could reconstruct traditional Hawaiian culture and foodways. Finally, the metaphor of the gathering mitigated some of the most onerous aspects of plantation life. The gathering was for Hawaiians and thus for the first thirty years, only Hawaiians were hired to work as laborers. This created a labor shortage that Hawaiians were able to use as they negotiated labor relations and the continuation of their cultural practices. However, in 1897 the metaphor of gathering began to diminish as a guiding ideal in shaping the structure of the plantation. Hawaiians began to be more dissatisfied with plantation work and increasingly had less voice in choices regarding the land. By the early 1900s, Laie began to resemble other Hawaiian plantations in terms of its ethnic makeup, landscape, and emphasis on capital development. After 1920 very few Hawaiians continued to work on Laie plantation.

The gardens of early Mormon pioneers are a unique cultural resource in the western United States, but little guidance has been provided for understanding or providing landscape treatments for Mormon landscapes. Mormon pioneers came to Utah and the Great Basin to escape religious persecution and build their own holy kingdom. In relative geographical isolation, they built towns that have a distinctive character delineating a Mormon cultural region in the West. Self-sufficiency was an important feature of these towns and of the religious culture of early Mormons, both because of their geographical isolation and their desire to be independent of the world, which they viewed as wicked. This emphasis on self-sufficiency made gardens and gardening an important part of every household, encouraged by religious leaders and individual need. The cultural and personal preferences of individuals did influence the style and contents of Mormon pioneer gardens, but perhaps not to the extent that the religious culture of self-sufficiency did. When managing or treating Mormon pioneer landscapes or gardens, it is helpful to start by assessing any historic features that still exist. Then, the property owner or manager can choose one of the standard landscape treatments of preservation, rehabilitation, restoration, or reconstruction, or opt for some combination of these treatments. Because Mormon pioneers brought plants from all over the world, a large selection of heirloom plants may be suitable for historic Mormon landscapes. A few historic plants are no longer appropriate in Western landscapes because of ecological concerns such as invasiveness or water efficiency, but substitutions for these plants can be found by considering the plant's form, function, and meaning in the historic landscape.

This study seeks to answer a fundamental question facing missiologists and historians of Mormonism: given their sustained preoccupation with converting others to Mormonism and their thriving tradition of missionary work, how do Mormons conceive of their mission? By focusing on the theoretical frame in which Mormon missionaries imagined the non-Mormon world, prepared for missionary engagement, and derived their expectations for their mission work, this study aims to illuminate the development of Mormon missionary activities and explain the processes by which Mormons fashioned for themselves a missional character. Beginning with Joseph Smith and the emergence of his missional thought and ending with the institutional shifts of the Mormon Church toward mission programs, this thesis attempts to map the general arc of Mormon mission theory as it developed within the context of early American religious history.

A personal mode of discourse is central to Latter-day Saint culture. This mode is both pervasive throughout the culture and significant within it. Two specific genres-the personal experience narrative and the personal testimony-illustrate the importance of this discourse mode in LDS culture. Understanding the LDS personal mode of discourse is essential to properly understanding Mormonism. The personal orientation in LDS discourse mirrors a tendency towards personal expression which has become common throughout Western culture. This tendency has important roots in the Protestant religious movement. In particular, Puritanism represents a significant point of origin for American personal expression. Such expression has been further encouraged by the democratic climate of America and has become an important part of American religious discourse. However, LDS personal discourse cannot be explained by merely reducing the Latter-day Saint tradition to outside influences. Latter-day Saints, while deriving influence from many points, have fashioned a tradition of using personal expression in their religious discourse which deserves independent consideration. Within Latter-day Saint culture, the LDS tradition of personal discourse has special significance because it draws upon a host of doctrinal and cultural associations that are religiously significant to Latter-day Saints. LDS doctrines about the necessity of personal revelation and the importance of pragmatic action legitimate a religious focus on personal experience. Likewise, cultural encouragements towards personal religious involvement and spiritual expression foster a culture of personal expression. Because of these philosophies and commitments, LDS audiences respond powerfully to personal discourse. A personal style of discourse is important in mediating authority in the LDS religion. Personal expression is a means through which official LDS doctrine is conveyed. This mode of expression also allows individual Latter-day Saints to locate their identities within the structure of the LDS religion. Culturally-encouraged genres of personal expression allow LDS speakers to enact their religious beliefs. These genres reinforce fundamental LDS doctrines and serve an acculturating function in LDS culture. They teach Latter-day Saints how to experience, interpret, and speak about the world in ways consistent with the Latter-day Saint community's doctrines and commitments.

In 1852, the leadership of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints made the pivotal decision to publicize the doctrine and practice of plural marriage—something they had worked to keep out of the public eye for years. This decision came in response to federal and social pressures. They quickly moved to announce and defend plural marriage among Church members as well as broader society, including those in the federal government. Orson Pratt was chosen by Brigham Young to be the face and the voice of the Church concerning plural marriage, both in Salt Lake City among members and in Washington D.C., where he preached sermons and published a periodical on the subject. This thesis a) demonstrates why Orson Pratt was the ideal candidate for such an undertaking; b) assesses the motivation for and context of the public unveiling and defense of plural marriage; c) analyzes Pratt’s rhetoric of the first public treatise on the subject given to a Latter-day Saint congregation at a special conference on 29 August 1852; and d) compares the rhetoric and reasoning between Pratt’s sermon to the Saints and his persuasive periodical written to the nation from Washington D.C. titled The Seer. Pratt’s rhetoric is incisive and carefully tailored to his audience. Important nuances in argumentation arise as he publishes the Seer and strives to convince his fellow citizens that plural marriage is right before God, improves society, and that the Saints should be allowed to practice polygamy as an expression of religious freedom. Orson Pratt ultimately fails to make a difference in the national opinion of plural marriage, but is successful in establishing a foundation of principles and reason that would be employed by the Saints to defend the practice of plural marriage for decades.

The following thesis is a study of the founding years of the Mormon supplementary religious education between 1890 and 1930. It examines Mormonism's shift away from private denominational education towards a system of supplementary religious education programs at the elementary, high school, and college levels. Further, this study examines the role that supplementary religious education played in the changes between the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries. During the 1870s and 1880s, Utah's territorial schools became an important part of the battles over polygamy and the control of Utah. As the Federal Government began to wrest control of the schools from the Mormon community, the Church established a system of private academies. Economic problems during the 1880s and 1890s, however, made it difficult for the Church to maintain many of these schools, necessitating the Mormon patronage of the public schools. As a result, in 1890 the Church established its first supplementary religious education program, known as the Religion Class program. The Religion Class program suffered from a variety of problems and was criticized by both Mormon and non-Mormon officials. Despite the failings of the Religion Class program, the need for supplementary religious education became increasingly important during the first two decades of the twentieth century. In 1912, the Granite Stake established the Church's first high school seminary. Within ten years, the seminary program replaced the majority of the academies and became the Church's preeminent educational program. During the 1920s, the Church began extending supplementary religious education to its students in colleges and universities through the establishment of the institute program and the near-complete abandonment of its private colleges and schools. The successive establishment of these three programs demonstrates a shift in Mormon educational priorities and attitudes throughout this period. Whereas the academies and the Religion Class program emphasized a general fear of Americanization, the seminary and institute programs accepted the public schools and much of the Americanization that accompanied them, while at the same time providing means for the continued inculcation of Mormon values into the lives of Latter-day Saint youth.

My paper examines the ethics of representing Mormons in serious American fiction, viewed through two primary texts, Bayard Taylor's nineteenth-century dramatic poem The Prophet and Maureen Whipple's epic novel The Giant Joshua. I also briefly examine Walter Kirn's short stories “Planetarium” and “Whole Other Bodies.” Using Werner Sollors' and Matthew Frye Jacobson's writings on ethnicity as foundational, I argue in that Mormonism constitutes an ethnicity, which designation accentuates the ethical demands of those who represent the group. I also use W.J.T. Mitchell's theories of representation as the basis of my arguments of the ethics of representing ethnicity. As ethical theorists, Emmanuel Levinas and Edward Said inform the theoretical framework of my project, and I place their theories both in opposition to and harmony with each other in terms of what it means to be truly “Other” and the responsibility of those who view, represent, project, or accept otherness as essential to being. I also borrow from Wayne C. Booth, particularly in his practical application of ethics theory. I employ Terryl Givens, Michael Austin, Bruce Jorgensen, and Gideon Burton to help bring the theory into the field of Mormon studies. In applying all these theorists to Taylor and Whipple I examine Taylor's exoticizing, “Othering” Mormons, creating an “Oriental” version of the rise of Mormonism, parallel to some of his Middle Eastern travel writing. Taylor also makes the remarkable ethical step of being the first non-Mormon to “take Mormons seriously” in literary fiction. I demonstrate how his use of classical literary forms and themes moves the ethical treatment of Mormons forward in an unprecedented way. Maureen Whipple relies on some of the sensational, romantic tropes in common use, but overall she also moves forward ethical representation of Mormons in serious literature, being the best-received of “Mormondom's Lost Generation” of literary writers. In conclusion I argue that these texts, along with the more problematic Kirn stories, help create a positive ethical climate for Mormon representation.

Mormonism is among the most studied religious phenomena of American history. Yet little attention has been devoted to one of its most telling and, at the time, most famous chapters, the “Temple Lot Case” of 1891-1896, a legal battle over sacred space, cultural memory, group identity, and judicial intervention in religion. The suit involved three rival Mormon sects: Granville Hedrick’s Church of Christ, based in Independence, Missouri; Joseph Smith III’s Reorganized Church, based in Lamoni, Iowa; and Brigham Young’s LDS Church, based in Utah. In previous decades, the churches had forged distinct identities from one another, stemming from their divergent interpretations of Mormonism’s founding prophet, Joseph Smith Jr. (1805-1844). The “Hedrickites” lionized the teachings of Smith’s early years, the “Josephites” emphasized the moderate teachings of Smith’s middle years, and the “Brighamites” institutionalized the controversial semi-secret teachings of Smith’s final years. In 1891, the Reorganized Church filed suit in the Eighth Federal Circuit Court for possession of the Temple Lot Smith dedicated at Independence in 1831. The Hedrickites owned it, the Josephites thought they had a better claim to it, and the Brighamites sought to prevent the Josephites from obtaining it. The Reorganized Church presented evidence demonstrating it was the rightful successor of Joseph Smith’s church; the Hedrickites and Brighamites countered with evidence of their own. The case produced an array of notable witnesses, including elites from Mormonism’s founding generation, leaders from its divided second generation, and figures from Missouri’s colorful past. Newspapers from the New York Times to the Anaconda Standard followed the suit closely. The present work is the first book-length study of the Temple Lot Case. It offers one of the most in-depth treatments of a U.S. religious property suit to date. It chronicles the establishment and fragmentation of arguably America’s most successful native-born religion. It examines the contestation of an American sacred space. And it traces the differentiation of collective memory and identity among competing religious siblings. / text

The following thesis is a study of how communities of Washington County, Utah developed within one of the most inhospitable deserts of the American West. A trend of reliance on public works programs during economic depressions, not only put people to work, but also provided an influx of outside aid to develop an infrastructure for future economic stability and growth. Each of these public works was carefully planned by leaders who not only saw the immediate impact these projects would have, but also future benefits they would confer. These communities also became dependent on acquiring outside investment capital from the Mormon Church, private companies and government agencies. This dependency required residents to cooperate not only with each other, but with these outside interests who now had a stake in the county's development. The construction of the Mormon Tabernacle and Temple in St. George during the 1870s made that community an important religious and cultural hub for the entire region. Large-scale irrigation and reclamation projects in the 1890s opened up new areas for agriculture and settlement. And in the 1920s and 1930s the development of Zion National Park and the construction of roads provided the infrastructure for one of the county's most important industries, tourism. Long after these projects' completion they still provided economic and cultural value to the communities they served. Some of these projects provided the infrastructural foundation that allowed Washington County communities to have greater security and control over their economic future. Over time the communities of southern Utah created dramatic reenactments and erected monuments of these very projects to celebrate and preserve the story of their construction. During the first decade of the twenty-first century Washington County has become one of the fastest growing areas in the country, and as a result public works programs continue to be important to support this growth.