In this study the following hypotheses are examined: 1. Nathan and Ruth Hale have made significant contributions to the L.D.S. Church and to the theatre; 2. The theatres operated by the Hales have demonstrated that it is possible and profitable to run a theatre in accordance with L.D.S. Church standards and ideals; 3. Theatre of this type has an audience, and in fact, is demanded by communities; 4. Artists in the theatre can be a forceful missionary tool for the Church. The following methods were used to ascertain this information: the Hales, actors, directors, and members of the community were personally interviewed; data was gathered by a questionnaire distributed at random to their theatre audiences; a survey of newspaper and magazine article s concerning the Hales and their theatre was made; theatre records wer e checked; personal correspondence with the Hale children, and other acquaintances were utilized. This study includes a biography of Nathan and Ruth Hale and the history and development of the Glendale Centre Theatre . The main sections, People, Producers, Playwrights, and Performers are augmented by an extensive appendix. Because of the Hales, Glendale is a nicer place in which to live.

Recent artists like Norwegian Recycling and E-603 have created a new genre of art within music: digital recycling. These artists take many different well-known and less-known lyrics, music, and spoken word and combine them together. This meshing of multiple pieces of art has new historical roots. The different images, auditory and visual, that these creations produce and often enhance meaning and connections through popular media. These connections interest me most. Through the lenses of post-colonial, gender, and queer theories, I examine Witi Ihimaera's creative work. I splice in different theorists' words, my own thoughts, and images to enhance and accent Ihimaera‘s ―Singing Word‖ (Juniper Ellis 170). According to Ihimaera, the written word and the ―novel is alien to the indigenous form, and that where Maori are going now is probably where it‘s most natural, and that is into theatre or into poetry…and oral storytelling‖ (Ihimaera 170). As the first published playwright in New Zealand and as an English professor at the University of Auckland, Witi Ihimaera is a role model and leader to many other Maori and New Zealand playwrights and writers. I am most interested in understanding what and how he has been influenced as an artist. I craft a document that extends the idea of a written word in a Maori context, in which I explore the major influences on Ihimaera as a theatrical creator and influencer of other Maori artists. Chapter one introduces Witi Ihimaera and my methods. Chapter two includes my research on the Maori culture with the following subsections: the people, their traditions, and their paternal systems of power. Chapter three is my research on the influx of Pakeha authority highlighting the Mormon take over and how that affected author and playwright Witi Ihimaera. iv Chapter four is my research on how Ihimaera‘s homosexuality has influenced his creations and the contemporary Maori Performance. Chapter five contains my conclusions of the connections I find. In addition, I use examples from Witi Ihimaera‘s fictional novel The Uncles Story, as well as many other of his plays and novels, to show examples of influences from Maori culture, Mormonism, and his homosexuality on Ihimaera‘s work.

Thesis (M.A.)--Brigham Young University. Dept. of History. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves [147]-158).

Thesis (M.A.)--Brigham Young University. Dept. of History. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 143-146).

abstract: My dissertation project, Mormons at the World's Fair: A Study of Religious and Cultural Agency and Transformation looks at a pivotal period of transition within the American religious and political national culture (1880-1907). Using Mormonism as an important focal point of national controversy and cultural change, this dissertation looks at the interconnections between Mormon transitions and the larger national transformations then under way in what historians call the "progressive" era. Prominent scholars have recognized the 1893 World's Fair as an important moment that helped initiate the "dawning" of religious pluralism in America. This national response to American religious diversity, however, is limited to a nineteenth-century historiographical framework, which made real religious pluralism in the next century more difficult. Bringing together into one narrative the story of the anti-polygamy crusades of the 1880s, the ambivalent presence (and non presence) of Mormonism at the World's Fair of 1893, and the drawn-out US Senate Hearings and ultimate victory of Mormon apostle and Senator Reed Smoot in 1907, this dissertation offers new insights into the meaning and limitations of American religious liberty, the dynamics of minority agency, as well as a deeper understanding of America's developing national identity. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Religious Studies 2012

The problem of this study is to determine the religious attitudes of the people of Escalante, Utah, according to age groups, with an idea of determining whether the opinions which are held by the people are different for various age groups and to determine if possible, the causes for this difference, if there be any.

The relationship between media and religion has been influenced by many factors in history. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has received a great deal of media attention throughout the world in the past five years. In Italy, the Church National Council of Public Relations worked to provide the media with the necessary information to report accurate news about the Church. This thesis collected the information provided to the Italian media by the Church National Council and analyzed the main topic and the level of accuracy reported by the Italian media on Church-related news. The results show that Italian media tend to use the information provided by the Church only when discussing the Church in Italy, but still report a great deal of inaccurate or misleading information when discussing the Church in the world.

Religious affiliation and its inherent membership in an associated social network as a sociolinguistic factor is examined in the community of Latter-day Saints (LDS) in Cardston, Alberta. Building on Meechan's 1998 findings that the LDS community in the area used Canadian Raising in a different set of phonotactic environments than the surrounding non-LDS English speakers, the study aims to determine if the LDS community uses other Canadian speech features differently or less frequently and if any Utah features (defined as Utah English in the literature, being the language of LDS English speakers in Utah) have continued from the settling of the area by Utahns in the 1880s. The study analyzes the effect of religious affiliation on dialect leveling and general sociolinguistic change. To perform the study, interviews were conducted with 51 informants eliciting items characterized by Canadian and Utahn features. Statistical and inferential analysis shows that one Utah feature, the cord-card merger, survived in a very attenuated form in the speech of older respondents, and Canadian features were generally less prevalent among the LDS. It is concluded that religious affiliation is a factor in the phonology of the region.

This thesis cites many of the parallels and differences between Mormonism and Transcendental Meditation (TM) philosophy as it is expounded by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Areas explored include the following: (1) the technique of Transcendental Meditation as compared with notions of meditation within the Mormon tradition; (2) the issue of whether Transcendental Meditation is a religion; (3) reports of physical transformation as a result of TM and Mormonism; (4) a comparison of L.D.S. Church leaders' and Maharishi's views of America, the laws of the land, social order, modesty, drugs, and strict morality; (5) the ideas of inner and outer morality; (6) the idea of pure Intelligence in TM philosophy as compared with the doctrine of the Spirit of God in Mormonism; and (7) teachings concerning the purpose of life, evolution, and concepts of God.

An investigation was conducted to see if age and gender are related to a preference for a caring versus a justice morality. The World View Questionnaire with 40 word pairs was used to measure a preference for a caring morality. It was found that there was a significant gender difference in the caring score, with the females scoring higher than the males. There also was a significant religious difference in the caring score with religious and especially Mormon subjects scoring higher than non-religious subjects. There was not, however, a significant age difference as was predicted.