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PEOPLE OF PARADOX: A History Of Mormon Culture Reprint Edition
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Throughout the last century and a half, Givens notes, distinctive traditions have emerged among the Latter-Day Saints, shaped by dynamic tensions--or paradoxes--that give Mormon cultural expression much of its vitality. Here is a religion shaped by a rigid authoritarian hierarchy and radical individualism; by prophetic certainty and a celebration of learning and intellectual investigation; by existence in exile and a yearning for integration and acceptance by the larger world. Givens divides Mormon history into two periods, separated by the renunciation of polygamy in 1890. In each, he explores the life of the mind, the emphasis on education, the importance of architecture and urban planning (so apparent in Salt Lake City and Mormon temples around the world), and Mormon accomplishments in music and dance, theater, film, literature, and the visual arts. He situates such cultural practices in the context of the society of the larger nation and, in more recent years, the world. Today, he observes, only fourteen percent of Mormon believers live in the United States.
Mormonism has never been more prominent in public life. But there is a rich inner life beneath the public surface, one deftly captured in this sympathetic, nuanced account by a leading authority on Mormon history and thought.
- ISBN-100199915989
- ISBN-13978-0199915989
- EditionReprint
- PublisherOxford University Press
- Publication dateMarch 1, 2012
- LanguageEnglish
- Dimensions9.1 x 6.1 x 1.3 inches
- Print length414 pages
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Editorial Reviews
Review
"This is an impressive work of synthesis that engages a broad secondary literature in discussing each aspect of the Mormon intellectual and artistic heritage. While other scholars have produced excellent studies treating Mormon literature or music or visual arts, Givens is the first to offer a comprehensive survey of key aspects of Latter-day Saint cultural life across the full span of Mormon history. ...The breadth of its coverage, the insightfulness of many of its observations, and the effective use it makes of paradox to provide a richly textured portrait of Mormon intellectual and artistic life make it a solid contribution to the growing field of Mormon studies. It deserves to be widely read and discussed, and its superior literary style insures that enjoyment as well as insight will repay its readers." --American Historical Review"Givens has accomplished something quite special with this masterful study of Mormon cultural expression: in deriving his discussion of Mormon culture from details of Mormon theology, he suggests a union of the practical and theoretical elements of religious life with a sincerity and seamlessness rarely achieved in academic study." --Choice
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About the Author
Product details
- Publisher : Oxford University Press
- Publication date : March 1, 2012
- Edition : Reprint
- Language : English
- Print length : 414 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0199915989
- ISBN-13 : 978-0199915989
- Item Weight : 2.31 pounds
- Dimensions : 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.3 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #1,974,732 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #702 in Christianity (Books)
- #1,806 in Mormonism
About the author

Terryl Givens did his graduate work in intellectual history (Cornell) and comparative literature (UNC Chapel Hill). He is Professor Emeritus of Religion and Literature at the University of Richmond, where he held the Jabez Bostwick chair. Givens’s work has been called “provocative reading” by The New York Times and includes some twenty titles, including a two-volume history of Latter-day Saint theology: Wresting the Angel, and Feeding the Flock, a history of the idea of premortal life (When Souls had Wings)--all with Oxford University Press--and several studies of the Book of Mormon. Professor Givens has also been a commentator on CNN, NPR, and in the PBS/Frontline documentary, The Mormons. As of 2019 he is the Neal A. Maxwell Senior Research Fellow at the BYU Maxwell Institute in Provo. With Fiona Givens, he authored The God Who Weeps, The Christ Who Heals, The Crucible of Doubt, and most recently, All Things New: Rethinking Sin, Salvation, and Everything in Between. His biography of Eugene England will be released in 2021 from UNC Press.





