Young Women in Mormon homelands, 1975-2000: an oral history project

This research is a case study about the benefits and challenges of participating in a close-knit religious society. It uses oral history and rhetorical analysis to examine the lives of fifty-five young Latter-day Saint (Mormon) women who moved to Mormon homelands from 1975 through 2000. In this study, Mormon homelands primarily refers to regions of North America where Mormons settled from 1847 to 1910. Many of the young women interviewed found safety, belonging, and significant opportunities for personal growth in Mormon homelands; however, obtaining those positives sometimes required what narrators considered to be an unacceptable compromise of charity, self-worth, and individual agency because of the isolation, rules, and regimentation imposed upon them. For some narrators, Mormon homelands became totalizing, meaning they controlled many aspects of individual identity in the name of doing what was best for the group and its members. Narrators resisted this totalism both as adolescents and adults, observing that when they lived in Mormon congregations outside of homelands, they experienced better balancing of individual and community. The LDS church has had significant influence in the American West and is considered to be the largest and most enduring American-born religion. Few scholars have explored the lives of Mormon adolescents in the latter twentieth century. Using Mormon young women as a case study illuminates aspects of religious belonging for youth and fills a gap in women's religious history. Many adult women in contemporary society question the value of organized religion as they engage with issues of power, equality, and agency. This study provides historical context for that discussion because it asked adult women to examine the religious relationships, memberships, and allegiances they once had. As they connected past and present via oral history, these women were able to reflect on what they have gained and lost from participation in religious societies. This study is unusual in that it identifies mechanisms of totalism in ordinary rather than extreme religious contexts, it explores both adolescent and adult religious identity, and it approaches oral history rhetorically.

YOUNG WOMEN IN MORMON HOMELANDS, 1975-2000: AN ORAL HISTORY PROJECT by Heather Joy Stone A dissertation submitted to the faculty of The University of Utah in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Communication The University of Utah August 2018 Copyright © Heather Joy Stone 2018 All Rights Reserved The University of Utah Graduate School STATEMENT OF DISSERTATION APPROVAL The dissertation of Heather Joy Stone has been approved by the following supervisory committee members: Kimberley Mangun , Chair April 4, 2018 Date Approved , Member Glen Feighery April 4, 2018 Date Approved Robin E. Jensen , Member April 4, 2018 Date Approved Natalie Stillman-Webb , Member April 4, 2018 Date Approved W. Paul Reeve , Member April 4, 2018 Date Approved and by , Chair of Danielle Endres the Department of and by David B. Kieda, Dean of The Graduate School. Communication ABSTRACT This research is a case study about the benefits and challenges of participating in a close-knit religious society. It uses oral history and rhetorical analysis to examine the lives of fifty-five young Latter-day Saint (Mormon) women who moved to Mormon homelands from 1975 through 2000. In this study, Mormon homelands primarily refers to regions of North America where Mormons settled from 1847 to 1910. Many of the young women interviewed found safety, belonging, and significant opportunities for personal growth in Mormon homelands; however, obtaining those positives sometimes required what narrators considered to be an unacceptable compromise of charity, self-worth, and individual agency because of the isolation, rules, and regimentation imposed upon them. For some narrators, Mormon homelands became totalizing, meaning they controlled many aspects of individual identity in the name of doing what was best for the group and its members. Narrators resisted this totalism both as adolescents and adults, observing that when they lived in Mormon congregations outside of homelands, they experienced better balancing of individual and community. The LDS church has had significant influence in the American West and is considered to be the largest and most enduring American-born religion. Few scholars have explored the lives of Mormon adolescents in the latter twentieth century. Using Mormon young women as a case study illuminates aspects of religious belonging for youth and fills a gap in women's religious history. Many adult women in contemporary society question the value of organized religion as they engage with issues of power, equality, and agency. This study provides historical context for that discussion because it asked adult women to examine the religious relationships, memberships, and allegiances they once had. As they connected past and present via oral history, these women were able to reflect on what they have gained and lost from participation in religious societies. This study is unusual in that it identifies mechanisms of totalism in ordinary rather than extreme religious contexts, it explores both adolescent and adult religious identity, and it approaches oral history rhetorically. iv When oral history narrators agree to let a complete stranger delve deeply into their lives, they embark on an intense journey to an uncertain destination. In this study, I watched narrators revisit experiences they had not realized were painful until tears began to surface. I saw delight on their faces as they remembered the joys of their teenage years. I felt exhilaration build as they realized that they did indeed have something important to say and that someone was listening. Sharing one's history is a brave, vulnerable, and momentous undertaking. I acknowledge that by dedicating this dissertation to the fiftyfive women who joined me in conducting this research. TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT....................................................................................................................... iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ............................................................................................... viii Chapters 1. INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................... 1 Purpose, Rationale, and Significance ........................................................................ 8 About Mormonism................................................................................................... 15 Overview ......................................................................................................... 15 Significance of Homelands in Mormonism .................................................... 17 Community and Individual in Mormon Theology .......................................... 20 Outline of Chapters .................................................................................................. 22 2. METHODOLOGIES ............................................................................................... 26 Overview .................................................................................................................. 31 Oral History ............................................................................................................. 35 Participatory Critical Rhetoric ................................................................................. 47 Decisions at the Intersection of OH and PCR.......................................................... 55 Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 61 3. THEORY: Totalism as a Means of Social Control ................................................. 63 Totalism Outside of Institutional Settings ............................................................... 64 Voluntary Totalism, Peer Pressure, and Agency ..................................................... 68 Totalism, Religion, and Mormonism ....................................................................... 72 Mechanisms of Totalistic Control ........................................................................... 77 Isolation ................................................................................................................... 78 Rules ........................................................................................................................ 80 Regimentation .......................................................................................................... 82 Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 85 4. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND: MORMONISM IN TURMOIL ........................ 86 Nineteenth-Century Persecution and Separation ..................................................... 89 Priesthood Correlation and YW Programs .............................................................. 92 The Battle for Female Identity ................................................................................. 96 Racial Desegregation and Homeland Mormonism ................................................ 101 Intellectualism and Conformity ............................................................................. 103 Global Expansion and Social Stratification ........................................................... 105 Conclusion ............................................................................................................. 110 5. ISOLATION: INCREASED SAFETY, REDUCED CHARITY .......................... 112 Isolation as a Protective Strategy ........................................................................... 115 Implications of Isolation ........................................................................................ 123 Trading Charity for Safety ..................................................................................... 129 Adult Responses to Homeland Insularity .............................................................. 130 Conclusion ............................................................................................................. 142 6. RULES: COMPROMISING SELF-WORTH FOR ACCEPTANCE ................... 144 Expected Benefits of Living in Mormon Homelands ............................................ 147 Homeland Rules about Family, Income, and Appearance..................................... 151 Implications of Living in a Rule-Based Society .................................................... 160 Trading Self-Worth for Belonging ........................................................................ 168 Adult Responses to Homeland Exclusivity ........................................................... 169 Conclusion ............................................................................................................. 181 7. REGIMENTATION: SELF-ACTUALIZATION OVER AGENCY .................... 183 Regimentation of Young Women in Mormon Homelands .................................... 186 Implications of Living in a Regimented Society ................................................... 195 Trading Agency for Self-Actualization ................................................................. 201 Adult Responses to Homeland Regimentation ...................................................... 203 Conclusion ............................................................................................................. 217 8. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS ................................................................. 218 Totalism ................................................................................................................. 221 Mormonism............................................................................................................ 231 Methodological Innovations .................................................................................. 233 Future Directions ................................................................................................... 236 Appendices A LIST OF NARRATORS ........................................................................................ 242 B SUPPORTING DOCUMENTS FOR METHODOLOGY .................................... 244 BIBLIOGRAPHY ........................................................................................................... 251 vii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am grateful to the late Floyd O'Neil, Director Emeritus of the University of Utah's American West Center. O'Neil and his wife Shauna funded a fellowship that enabled me to purchase recording equipment and travel to gather background information. Professor O'Neil was the first to ask me how this research had affected me personally. At the time, I was too early in the process to have an answer, but I would like to tell him now, if I were able, that doing this research has made me more human, more aware of the people around me, more likely to reach out with kindness. I suspect O'Neil would not have been surprised at my answer because he understood more than anyone how oral history requires people to listen-really listen-to each other, and how much finer the world is when that happens. I am immeasurably grateful to Dr. Kimberley Mangun at the University of Utah. She is an excellent scholar and is able to demystify the research and writing processes so as to teach them effectively. I appreciate that she never let me off the hook when she knew I could do better, even if my excuses were articulate and reasonable. My work is much improved because her standards are so high. From Dr. Mangun I have learned that it is never okay to stop before the job is finished, historians examine all available sources not only the easy ones, and there should be many revisions between first and final drafts. I have also learned from her to respect the narrators and let their voices lead. Mangun treats people with kindness, generosity, and grace. She has spent significant time mentoring me, and has frequently inconvenienced herself on my behalf. I admire her personally and professionally and am grateful to have worked so closely with her. I am also privileged to have had the help of others on my committee. Dr. W. Paul Reeve suggested that Mormonism's dual emphasis on personal development and society building was consistent with the nineteenth-century American context in which the religion emerged, causing me to consider the importance of "place" in Mormon identity. Reeve has been the model Mormon studies scholar in that he has demonstrated how religious research can be both respectable and respectful. Dr. Natalie Stillman-Webb taught me not to waste time or words. She advised me to bring my disparate interests together in my research so I could arrive somewhere important rather than merely wander in the land of ideas. Her feedback on this project has made it more nuanced and narrator focused. Stillman-Webb is an outstanding teacher in both online and face-to-face environments and much of my curriculum development skill came under her tutelage. Dr. Robin E. Jensen brings enthusiasm and rigor to everything she does. She introduced me to women's rhetorical history in a way that familiarized me with larger conversations in that arena yet left room for me to develop my own perspectives. Jensen helped me understand rhetoric as a subdiscipline and pushed me to build upon the work of other rhetoricians. I appreciate the thorough critique she provided at the proposal stage. Dr. Glen Feighery brought a delightful, down-to-earth approach when he reviewed my work as a historian, a journalist, and an interested observer of Mormonism. He challenged me to explain myself more fully and suggested I better separate my voice from that of narrators. He was generous with his time and expertise, including stepping forward to help late in the process. His participation made a significant difference, and I am grateful. ix I would also like to thank Dr. James A. Anderson at the University of Utah for his mentorship. His reassurance that I was indeed an organizational communication scholar came at a critical time in my graduate studies. He helped me gain confidence to take my own path through academia. I am grateful to the Communication Institute at the University of Utah for providing funding; to my colleagues at the Center for Teaching and Learning Excellence for their encouragement; and to my brother and client, Scott Holmes, who trusted me to work in his company and thereby provided me a flexible and satisfying means of financial support during my final years of school. I also acknowledge Stella, who first encouraged me to study LDS young women, and Dr. Claudia Bushman, who introduced me to oral history. I would not have graduated without the timely interventions of friends and family. Seven years is a long time to turn attention away from children, finances, household, health, and marriage. My husband, Kelly Stone, has always supported me in whatever I choose to do. He is a kind and generous appreciator of others, and he makes us all laugh at just the right moments. He has come to believe in this project as much as I do. Kelly has a brilliant mind and was instrumental in helping me figure out how to get these stories on paper. He was there as the central arguments emerged and was part of every revision. Morning after morning, my first words out of bed were something like, "What does this pattern mean?" or "How should I restructure this chapter?" He was late to work far too many times because he stayed to talk until I became unstuck. He set plates of food on my desk, and clean clothes appeared as if by magic in my dresser. Thank you, Kelly. Thanks also to my children, Dillon, McKenzie, Bailey, and Sadie, and to my friend, Jennifer Kolz, who has believed in Dr. Stone since the very first semester. x CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION Jean came of age in the 1980s, the era of big earrings and even bigger shoulder pads, when the perfume commercial Enjoli assured her she could "bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan, and never, never, never let you forget you're a man." 1 Like other girls in her church, Jean was enrolled in the Young Women (YW) organization when she turned twelve. 2 YW is an educational and activity program for adolescent young women who are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS or Mormon). 3 The year Jean entered this gendered church program, second-wave feminist Sonia 1 "Because I'm a Woman," Enjoli perfume commercial from Charles of the Ritz Incorporated, 1978, accessed January 25, 2018, https://youtu.be/_UIktO4Pnlw. Jean, interview with author, July 2, 2014. All contributions from Jean in this chapter come from this source. Narrators are referenced by pseudonyms. 2 "Presidents of the Young Women Organization through the Years," The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed January 25, 2018, https://www.lds.org/ensign/2008/06/presidents-of-the-young-women-organizationthrough-the-years?lang=eng. I refer to the church's membership group for adolescent girls as Young Women (YW). The organization was previously Young Women Mutual Improvement Association (1972-1978), Young Ladies Mutual Improvement Association (1929-1972), Young Ladies National Mutual Improvement Association (1880-1929), and the Young Ladies Retrenchment Association (1869-1880). There is also a Young Men (YM) organization. 3 Style Guide for Publications of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 4th ed. (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2013), 36-7. I use The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the abbreviation, LDS, to refer to the church itself. The nickname Mormon is used for members of the LDS church. 2 Johnson was excommunicated from the LDS church. 4 Jean remembers leaders and parents discussing Johnson's campaign in support of the Equal Rights Amendment. Jean attributes the tremendous pressure she felt as a teenager to steer clear of jobs outside the home to the "backlash against feminism" that coalesced around Johnson. Jean had previously relished the idea of a career, expecting to be both a mother and a professional. When YW leaders told her she could not work outside the home and be a good Mormon woman at the same time, a crisis of identity ensued that lasted many years. While Jean eventually found her way through this dilemma, as an adult she is afraid for her own daughters. She wants to "inoculate" her eleven-year-old before the girl enters YW, protect her by telling her: If there is anything you hear that does not resonate to you, does not feel right, does not make you feel good about yourself, you are wholly free to reject that. You don't have to try and fit yourself into a role someone else has defined for you. Jean felt pressure to conform from official sources: YW leaders and church curricula. However, studies of organizational identification and membership suggest that enforcement of group standards is complicated. While ideals are often established by people in power, they are maintained, interpreted, and adapted by other members of the group. 5 For example, members accept or reject newcomers based on individual interpretations of group ideals. People submit to the constraints of an organization in 4 Sonia Johnson, From Housewife to Heretic (Albuquerque, NM: Wildfire Books, 1989). 5 Clifton Scott and Karen Myers, "Toward an Integrative Theoretical Perspective on Organizational Membership Negotiations: Socialization, Assimilation, and the Duality of Structure," Communication Theory 20 (2010): 79-105; James A. Anderson, and Elaine E. Englehardt, The Organizational Self and Ethical Conduct: Sunlit Virtue and Shadowed Resistance (Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt College Publishers, 2001), 138-56. 3 order to sustain affiliations they value (such as a job), and they gauge whether other members belong by their adherence to those same constraints. 6 Organizational scholars have observed that when group standards become too personally confining, group members find ways to resist. 7 Jean resisted by deciding her patriarchal blessing-a type of prayer from God to a specific individual-trumped the more generic advice she heard from those around her. 8 Her blessing seemed to endorse a career for her, so she learned to selectively ignore input from other sources. Like Jean, many of the fifty-five adult women interviewed for this study still struggle to make sense of what they experienced living as teenagers in Mormon homelands. 9 In this study, Mormon homelands primarily refers to regions of North America where Mormons settled from 1847 to 1910. 10 Mostly, this settlement was in the U.S. Intermountain West, a geographical region bounded by the Rocky Mountains on the 6 Anderson and Englehardt, Organizational Self, 20. Peter Fleming and Andre Spicer, "Beyond Power and Resistance: New Approaches to Organizational Politics," Management Communication Quarterly 21 (2008), 301-09; Todd Norton, "Situating Organizations in Politics: A Diachronic View of ControlResistance Dialectics," Management Communication Quarterly, 22, (2009), 525-54; Anderson and Englehardt, Organizational Self, 196-200. 8 "Patriarchal Blessings," Church History, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, May 31, 2017, https://history.lds.org/article/chl-pb?lang=eng#what-is-apatriarchal-blessing. A patriarchal blessing is a formal blessing directly from God for a specific individual. A member receives a patriarchal blessing from a man ordained to the church office of patriarch. He places his hands on the member's head and offers a special prayer in her behalf. Patriarchal blessings include a "declaration of a person's lineage in the house of Israel and contain personal counsel from the Lord." Patriarchal blessings are usually recorded, transcribed, and permanently archived. 9 For information about nineteenth-century Mormon homelands, see Brandon S. Plewe, ed., Mapping Mormonism: An Atlas of Latter-day Saint History (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press, 2012), 84-97. I am indebted to organizers of the 2018 Mormon History Association annual meeting for introducing me to the phrase Mormon homelands. 10 Plewe, Mapping Mormonism, 132-133. 7 4 east and the Cascade and Sierra Mountains on the west, although a few narrators lived in regions less traditionally considered Mormon homelands such as California, Oregon, and Alberta, Canada. 11 The LDS church is headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, in the center of this region. Narrators moved into Mormon homelands as Mormon young women, and once there, found church behavioral standards were enforced by teachers, neighbors, store clerks, and others in the broader community. Sometimes school teachers and ecclesiastical leaders were the same individuals. Though not everyone in cities where young women lived was LDS, almost every person with whom they regularly associated was. This sequestration may seem farfetched in today's networked world; however, it may not have been unusual for youth of the time, 1975-2000. This study uses oral history to examine life in Mormon dominated communities for fifty-five young LDS women and explore how their experiences in those communities affected them, both as adolescents and adults. When an organization or society influences nearly all aspects of a person's life, scholars call that organization or society totalistic. 12 A totalistic society connects spheres usually kept distinct-such as home, work, and school-thereby preventing a person from varying her identity in each sphere, thus reducing her agency. Society members monitor each other's behavior, and failure in one area of life could result in being judged unacceptable in other normally unrelated areas. 13 For example, employees on a cruise ship may be required to smile at guests or wear certain clothing even when they are not 11 Chapter 2, "Methodologies," provides demographic details about narrators. Erving Goffman, Asylums: Essays on the Social Situation of Mental Patients and Other Inmates (New York, NY: Anchor Books, 1961). 13 Jason Toole, "Student Departure at West Point: An Examination within a Total Institution" (PhD diss., University at Albany, State University of New York, 2017). 12 5 on shift. 14 If they do not perform properly, coworkers might report them, and bonuses will be withheld. Because the ship serves as both residence and employer, staff members cannot control their off-duty lives the same way they could were they able to leave work each day and return to private homes. In any group, some compromise of individuality is necessary because doing things other people's way is a normal cost of sustaining relationships and working together. Ordinarily, the constraints a group imposes on an individual are not unduly burdensome because group membership is voluntary and no single affiliation influences all facets of life. Compliance with collective standards is temporary and limited. However, membership in a group or society can become onerous if one's complete life is enacted within a single prescriptive environment and all socialization is with others in that environment. The more all-encompassing or totalistic an organization or society is, the more control it exercises over its members. 15 Many narrators who participated in this study said they encountered this kind of comprehensive control when living as Mormon teenagers in Mormon homelands from 1975 through 2000, though most did not use the word total. Pervasive cultural, social, and religious practices in homelands seemed to direct young women into certain behaviors and ostracize or eject those who did not conform. Specifically, narrators were encouraged to avoid and fear non-Mormons, to comply with a myriad of homelandspecific rules about how to be properly Mormon, and to follow daily regimens that 14 Sarah J. Tracy, "Becoming a Character for Commerce: Emotion Labor, SelfSubordination, and Discursive Construction of Identity in a Total Institution," Management Communication Quarterly 14, no. 1 (August 2000): 90-128. 15 Goffman, Asylums. 6 encouraged acting and thinking en masse. This study suggests that isolation, rules, and regimentation in Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000 functioned as totalizing mechanisms for narrators, in that they governed nearly all aspects of narrators' identities. Mormon homeland societies seemed to provide safety, a sense of belonging, and opportunities for personal development for narrators; however, narrators' oral histories suggest that in many cases, those benefits came at the expense of charity toward others, self-worth, and personal agency. For example, safety was often ensured by cultivating a fear of people who were different, belonging came when a young woman acknowledged the superiority of homelanders, and personal development opportunities often required a young woman to subordinate her individual preferences to those of the group. Some narrators have struggled to reconcile the totalizing homeland Mormonism they encountered as young women with their understandings of LDS doctrines and with the less totalizing Mormonism they have experienced in other locations. Many believe homeland Mormon societies were insular (standoffish and withdrawn), exclusive (snobbish and self-righteous), and collective (emphasizing group over individual), and that such characteristics contradict Christian teachings about how people should treat each other. Some narrators have left the religion. Many have retained membership and belief, yet decry what they call "Mormon culture." Some have concluded insularity, exclusivity, and collectivism are inherent in all Mormonism, while others insist their experiences as young women were atypical. This study suggests that what the women are responding to both as adolescents and as adults is totalism, not Mormonism. Though critics may argue that religion in general and Mormonism in particular are always 7 totalistic, narrators' experiences with Mormonism outside of Mormon homelands indicate otherwise. This research examines how young women benefitted from, submitted to, and resisted the totalizing control they felt in homelands. It also examines how narrators have continued to respond to control as adults by seeking religious diversity, championing equality, resisting homeland authority, and rejecting prescribed gender roles. A great risk of totalism is that it can readily happen in any organization or community, often without group members recognizing their own complicity. Catherine Wessinger notes, "Well-meaning people can be so committed to an idealistic goal that they carry out coercive . . . actions against others to make them remain in the group and conform." 16 Any society can become imbalanced and begin to deal with its members together rather than individually. Some environments have that imbalance from inception, while others become imbalanced over time. Educational, religious, and humanitarian societies may be more prone to totalism than other societies because of the responsibility they have assumed to help make their members into better people. This study demonstrates that even a society founded on a strong commitment to individual agency can encourage policies, practices, and traditions that oppressively favor the group. 17 Samuel E. Wallace says, "We allow totality to develop in an institution . . . so that it may do the dirty work for us good people." 18 Instead of totalism, Wallace advocates for 16 Catherine Wessinger, "The Problem is Totalism, Not ‘Cults': Reflections on the Thirtieth Anniversary of Jonestown," Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple, The Department of Religious Studies at San Diego State University, accessed January 19, 2017, http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=31459. 17 "Agency and Accountability," Gospel Topics, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed January 25, 2018, https://www.lds.org/topics/agency?lang=eng. 18 Samuel E. Wallace, ed., Total Institutions (New York, NY: Aldine Publishing Company, 1971), 4. 8 "vital" institutions and societies that are "fully responsive to the needs of all their users." 19 An indicator that homeland societies from 1975 through 2000 were not as vital for some young women as they could have been is the intensity and advocacy with which narrators approached this project. For many, the past does not seem to have stayed in the past, meaning that narrators appeared to revisit and reimagine their adolescent experiences in Mormon homelands, rather than only describe them. Perhaps narrators' experiences with totalism in Mormon homelands will help scholars better understand how group expectations can become heavy-handed for young women in religious communities. While talking about totalism after the fact did not change these women's experience of it, telling their stories seemed to be an act of rhetorical agency that helped them imagine and potentially create a more "vital" future for themselves and others. Purpose, Rationale, and Significance For this research, I used oral history and rhetorical analysis to examine group membership and identity among young women in Mormon homelands in the last quarter of the twentieth century. I conducted oral histories with fifty-five women who relocated as Mormon teenagers to predominantly Mormon communities from 1975 through 2000. 20 I hoped to learn about social life for young women in these tightly knit religious societies. I spoke to newcomers because I thought practices and paradigms that seemed natural to those already in homelands would be more visible and memorable at the point of 19 Wallace, Total Institutions, 5 (italics added). One woman was a homeland native who did not relocate during her adolescent years. She transitioned from a not-Mormon home to a Mormon college environment. Nine of the interviews were conducted by the author as part of an earlier pilot study. 20 9 entrance. The benefits and challenges encountered by narrators may not be specific to newcomers. This research is similar to other coming-of-age historical and religious studies in that it began with broad life experiences of a single group rather than a specific theoretical frame; 21 however, no scholar has yet explored the lives of Mormon adolescents. 22 The LDS church has had significant influence in the American West and is considered to be the largest and most enduring American-born religion. 23 Using Mormon young women as a case study may illuminate aspects of religious belonging for youth and help scholars better understand how church affiliation affects identity. This research fills a gap in women's religious history. Many women in contemporary society question the value of organized religion as they engage with issues of power, equality, and agency. This study provides historical context for that discussion because it asked adult women to think back to their youth and examine the religious relationships, memberships, and allegiances they once had. As narrators transported their experiences to the present day through the rhetorical process of oral history, they considered what they have gained and lost from their participation in religious societies. I studied the last quarter of the twentieth century in part because organizational and individual pressures converged in interesting ways for the LDS church and its 21 For example, see Melissa Rose Klapper, "A Fair Portion of the World's Knowledge": Jewish Girls Coming of Age in America, 1860-1920 (PhD dissertation, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, 2001). 22 A book chronicling the history of Mormon young women produced by the LDS Church History Department is said to be forthcoming, per sources known to the author. 23 "America's Changing Religious Landscape," Pew Research Center, May 12, 2015, http://www.pewforum.org/2015/05/12/americas-changing-religious-landscape/. See also Jan Shipps, Mormonism: The Story of a New Religious Tradition (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1985). Shipps argues that Mormonism is an entirely new religious tradition, not a denominational form of Christianity, and as such, is important to the academic study of religion. 10 homeland members during this time. Public clashes with feminists and intellectuals suggested Mormon homelanders may have felt besieged by political and social trends. 24 Also in this time period, church headquarters in Salt Lake City, Utah, launched extensive missionary programs, and by 1996, Mormonism claimed a larger membership outside the United States than inside it for the first time in church history. 25 In an effort to administer projected growth and preserve integrity of doctrine, the church in the 1970s had restructured its departments, centralized curriculum production, and created an organization better prepared to assimilate and integrate members from varied cultural backgrounds. 26 For someone exploring tensions between individuals and groups, the latter part of the twentieth century shows rich potential because the homeland church encountered so many challenges to Mormon identity in a relatively short period of time. Another factor in choosing this time period was curriculum development patterns within the LDS church related to young women. New lesson manuals for all Young Women (YW) classes were produced between 1973 and 1978, and the manuals remained largely unchanged for the next four decades. 27 Manuals were distributed to congregations worldwide for use in every YW classroom. YW leaders probably presented lessons 24 Martha S. Bradley, Pedestals and Podiums: Utah Women, Religious Authority, and Religious Rights, (Salt Lake City, UT: Signature Books, 2005); Leonard Arrington, Adventures of a Church Historian (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1998). 25 "Chapter 48: The Church Comes out of Obscurity," Church History in the Fullness of Times Student Manual (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2003), 628-45; Deseret Morning News 2004 Church Almanac (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Deseret News, 2004), 574-9. 26 Matthew Bowman, The Mormon People: The Making of an American Faith (New York, NY: Random House, 2012), 184-215. 27 All thirty-one YW manuals published 1969-2012 were examined by the author at the Church History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah, July 2014. Minor modifications occurred, but topics and pedagogical approaches were constant. 11 without significant adaptation because manuals contained word-for-word instructions, detailed stories, scriptural references, and exercises. This meant all young women in my study, regardless of where they moved from or where they moved to, likely received the same core church instruction, minimizing curricular variation for narrators. I ended the study in 2000 because the cultural context seemed to change around this time. The "mainstreaming" of internet technologies brought access to information and opportunities for virtual community, both of which helped usher in a different era of socialization for youth. 28 Second-wave feminism, desegregation, and intellectualism were no longer fresh movements. The church's organizational restructuring and global missionary initiatives had matured, and Mormonism's emphasis seemed to shift-or begin to shift-from assimilation of new members and cultures to greater acceptance of diversity. For example, the new church President Gordon B. Hinckley ordained in 1995 quickly gained a reputation for being neighborly rather than isolationist. 29 In 2004, the first apostle born outside of North America since 1952 was ordained to the top leadership quorum. 30 In 2010, the church launched a massive advertising campaign featuring the voices and faces of diverse Mormons in an apparent effort to showcase its commitment to individuality. 31 New church research facilities were opened and a long time apologetics 28 Rob Spiegel, "When Did the Internet Become Mainstream?" Ecommerce Times, November 12, 1999, https://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/1731.html. 29 Joseph Walker, "Wallace ‘Ambushed' by Cordial, Warm, Thoughtful Gordon B. Hinckley," Deseret News, April 9, 2012, https://www.deseretnews.com/article/865553729/Wallace-ambushed-by-cordial-warmthoughtful-Gordon-B-Hinckley.html. Hinckley agreed to be interviewed by Mike Wallace on "60 Minutes," the first Mormon prophet to ever appear on the show. 30 "President Dieter F. Uchtdorf," Ensign, April 2008. 31 "‘I'm a Mormon' Campaign," Mormon Newsroom, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed January 29, 2018, https://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/-i-m-a-mormon-campaign. 12 publication was restructured. 32 The lines between homeland and mission-field were blurring, and the phrase "mission-field" seemed to fall from common use. By the beginning of the twenty-first century, communications from church leaders to young women began to be less role oriented and gendered. For example, in 2001, a pocket handbook was updated and widely distributed to both girls and boys. 33 The church began teaching young women and young men together in Youth Devotionals and Youth Discussions. 34 In 2002, a new YW general president emphasized the value of young women independent of their being mothers or wives. 35 There appears to be a pivot in church discourse around the turn of the century: the organization and its homeland members seemed less fearful of outsiders and more comfortable with individual differences. It is worth noting, however, that narrators' stories suggest there is also a 32 "Historic Sites," The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed December 23, 2017, https://www.lds.org/locations/temple-square-church-historylibrary?lang=eng&_r=1; "About the Farms Review," Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship, accessed December 23, 2017, https://publications.mi.byu.edu/past/farms-review/about-frb/. The new Church History Library opened in 2009 with expanded research facilities for scholars. In 2006, The FARMS Review was restructured into the newly formed Neil A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship at Brigham Young University, and in 2011, its editorial mission was changed from apologetic research to a survey of Mormon scholarship. 33 For the Strength of Youth: Fulfilling Our Duty to God (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2001). 34 "Timeline of Young Women General Presidents," Young Women, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed October 21, 2016, https://www.lds.org/callings/young-women/leader-resources/timeline?lang=eng. 35 "Susan Winder Tanner Young Women General President," Liahona, November 2002. "Presidents of the Young Women Organization through the Years." Susan Winder Tanner prioritized helping every young woman know she is a daughter of God and that he loves her. "If young women know of God's love for them, it will influence and shape all of their thoughts, feelings, and actions." While not contradictory to previous messages, this was a shift in emphasis from organizational and familial responsibility to individual development. By contrast, the preceding president is known for adding the words "strengthen home and family" to the YW theme and hosting a worldwide YW event titled "Turning Hearts to the Family." 13 continuity-that despite the historical, social, and organizational changes described, some aspects of Mormonism and Mormon homelands may still be similar to how they were from 1975 through 2000. This research deployed oral history interviewing as a rhetorical field method in keeping with the participatory critical rhetoric (PCR) methodological approach. 36 Oral history interviews can recover the recent pasts of people, such as Mormon young women, who are not represented in community power structures and who may not think their stories are important. 37 Approaching oral history rhetorically allowed me to consider how these women constructed their stories as adults and what their expressions of rhetorical agency indicated about present-day lives and relationships with Mormonism. PCR sends rhetoricians into the field to study emerging, ephemeral rhetorics, but oral history interviews are still an underutilized primary source for PCR scholars and other rhetoricians. Debra Hawhee observes that new topics, sources, and subjects challenge or "hack" existing rhetorical theories and practices, both in the sense of destroying them and repurposing them. 38 Rhetorical oral history has potential for this kind of disruption because when a narrator speaks to a researcher, together they create a rhetorical event with one layer in the past and one in the present. This duality may challenge scholars' perceptions. For example, oral history cannot neatly be classified as either contemporary 36 Michael Middleton, Aaron Hess, Danielle Endres, and Samantha Senda-Cook, Participatory Critical Rhetoric: Theoretical and Methodological Foundations for Studying Rhetoric In Situ (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2015), Kindle. 37 Kathryn Anderson, Susan Armitage, Dana Jack, Judith Wittner, "Beginning Where We Are: Feminist Methodology in Oral History," Oral History Review 15 (1987, Spring): 112. 38 Debra Hawhee, "The New Hackers: Historiography through Disconnection," Advances in the History of Rhetoric 15, no. 1 (2012): 119-25. 14 or historical. Because the body is the archive, a corporeal, contemporary presence mediates access to the historical record, making an oral history interview both a contemporary and historical primary source. 39 Examining the stories they told as well as the storytelling process adds richness to findings. This research demonstrates to communication scholars what a fertile space for research an oral history interview can be, and invites participatory critical rhetoricians to more closely examine how history can aid in interpretation of emerging, emancipatory rhetorics. It also invites oral historians to engage more rhetorically in their research. Oral historians and PCR scholars align in asserting that capturing/creating new texts is important, especially when the people whose voices are being heard have been omitted from the historical record. Some PCR oral history projects have turned to existing oral history archives to supplement other in-field activities, but this project gathered original oral history texts. Fifty-four interviews totaling nearly one hundred audio hours and 2,791 transcript pages will be donated to the Aileen W. Clyde Twentieth Century Women's Legacy Archive at the J. Willard Marriott Library at the University of Utah. 40 Narrators have given permission to make their stories public; this will further legitimize the research population and allow other scholars to build on my work. Though several Mormon women's oral history projects have emerged in the last few years, there 39 Joan Anim-Addo and Yasmin Gunaratnam, "Secrets and Lies: Narrative Methods at the Limits of Research," Journal of Writing in Creative Practice 5, no. 3 (2012): 392; William Cutler, III, "Accuracy in Oral History Interviewing," in Oral History: An Interdisciplinary Anthology, ed. David K. Dunaway and Willa K. Baum, 99-106 (Walnut Creek, CA: Altamira Press, 1996). 40 For information about the archive, see http://lib.utah.edu/collections/clyde.php. One narrator has not given permission for her story to be archived. 15 is no known institutional archive of adolescent Mormon women's experiences. 41 About Mormonism Overview The LDS church is a Christian denomination founded by Joseph Smith, Jr. in New York in 1830. 42 Early congregations formed in New York, Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois, and missionaries proselytized in Europe and Asia. In 1844, Smith was killed by a mob, and Brigham Young assumed church leadership. 43 Soon thereafter, Young launched a full-scale migration. Approximately 70,000 Mormons came to the then-Utah Territory between 1847 and 1869, and church headquarters was established in Salt Lake City, Utah, where it has remained since. 44 Today, the LDS church reports approximately 41 Claudia L. Bushman and Caroline Kline, Mormon Women Have Their Say: Essays from the Claremont Oral History Collection (Salt Lake City, UT: Greg Kofford Books, 2013). The Mormon Women Oral History Project (http://www.mormonwomenohp.org/) has produced thematically edited summaries of 143 life story interviews of Mormon women who talk about topics such as priesthood, marriage, temples, and church involvement. A book has been published by project directors with essays about the collection. Some narrators mention adolescent years and the Mormon life cycle is covered, but adolescence is not a focus. Anonymized summaries of interviews are available in bound print format in the Honnold-Mudd Library Special Collections at Claremont Graduate University in Claremont, California. When the author viewed the collection in person October 7-11, 2016, the collection did not contain unedited transcripts or raw audio files of the type usually associated with oral history. Another archive, The Mormon Women Project, says it is "the source for collecting and sharing the stories of Mormon Women." It has produced over 250 short, qualitative interviews with adult Mormon women. Full transcriptions of interviews and photographs of participants are available on https://www.mormonwomen.com/. This collection does not feature full life story interviews and does not focus on adolescence. 42 Unless noted, church history facts are from Matthew Bowman, The Mormon People: The Making of an American Faith (New York, NY: Random House, 2012). 43 Though he did not formally become church president until 1847. 44 Plewe, Mapping Mormonism, 82; W. Paul Reeve, "The Mormon Church in Utah," in The Oxford Handbook of Mormonism, Terryl Givens, ed. (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2015). 16 sixteen million members, with more than half residing outside the United States. 45 The church is governed by two leadership quorums comprised of fifteen men called apostles, who are believed to have been called by God and are specially ordained to perform their duties. 46 The top leadership quorum is The First Presidency and is made up of the president and two counselors. The remaining twelve men serve in the second leadership quorum, the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. Both quorums are lifetime appointments. Other general leaders oversee Young Women, Young Men, Sunday School, Relief Society (women), and Primary (children) organizations on rotating assignments. 47 Mormon congregations are assigned by geography: members attend worship services and social activities with other Mormons who live in the same area. Without formal permission of the general leaders, members are not usually allowed to switch congregations. In regions such as Mormon homelands that contain many members, congregations may encompass only a few city blocks, while in other areas, a congregation may take in an entire city. In Mormon homelands, geographically based assignments ensured that young women in this study often lived, attended school, and worshiped with the same people. LDS congregational units, called wards, are grouped together into larger units, 45 "Worldwide Statistics," Mormon Newsroom, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, accessed January 29, 2018, https://www.mormonnewsroom.org/facts-andstatistics. 46 All information about church governance comes from "Organization of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints," Gospel Topics, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed January 29, 2018, https://www.lds.org/topics/churchorganization?lang=eng&old=true. 47 Mormons distinguish between "general" leaders who govern church-wide and "local" leaders who oversee congregations or groups of congregations. 17 called stakes. 48 Wards and stakes function under the direction of church headquarters, so there is centralized reporting, budget authorization, policies, and instructional materials. However, each unit is staffed by volunteer members who run the daily operations of that unit, so interpretation of policy can vary from congregation to congregation. Local leaders are unpaid and do not have professional training in church administration, factors that may contribute to inconsistency across congregations. The lay status of local leaders and those leaders' strong authority within their own congregations is part of why it was possible for young women in this study to have such different experiences of Mormonism inside and outside of homelands. Conversely, the aspects of centralized governance may explain why narrators expected a common experience with Mormonism regardless of location. Significance of Homelands in Mormonism Mormon homelands have theological, historical, and practical significance for church members. Richard V. Francaviglia has noted Mormonism is the only major religion to claim a historical narrative connecting the Old World and the New World. 49 The effect of this narrative is to move North America from the periphery, where it is found in most Judeo-Christian traditions, to the ideologically center position it occupies 48 In areas with very few Mormons, smaller units called branches are grouped into mission districts rather than stakes. 49 Richard V. Francaviglia, "Geography and Mormon Identity," in The Oxford Handbook of Mormonism, Terryl Givens, ed., 425-438 (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2015). Mormon scripture tells of refugees from Jerusalem settling in North and South America. Mormons believe Jesus Christ later visited those settlements contemporaneous with his New Testament appearances in the Old World. See the books of 1 Nephi, 3 Nephi, and Ether in the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2013). 18 in Mormonism. 50 Mormons believe North America is "the promised land" where Jesus Christ will come to usher in the millennium.51 It is "choice above all other lands." 52 Apostle Ezra Taft Benson told Mormons, "This consecrated land has been placed under the everlasting decree of God." 53 More than being an American-born religion historically, Mormonism is an American centric religion theologically. The Intermountain West region of North America took on particular importance in the late 1840s when Mormons fled there after encountering religious persecution in eastern and central United States. 54 Converts from every location "gathered" together in "Zion." 55 Zion was used by early church leaders to describe the regions in Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois where early members gathered, and eventually came to mean Utah and the rest of the Intermountain West. The word is a biblical reference to "the pure in heart" and to a city of believers who were so perfect that they were taken up into heaven. In Mormonism, pioneers who gave up homes, property, extended family, and stability to assemble with fellow devotees are widely celebrated. 56 Francaviglia argues, "Identity in Mormon faith is more bound up in geography than is the case in most other faiths." 57 He claims Mormonism in North America and the Intermountain West presents a "classic case study of how religious 50 Francaviglia, "Geography and Mormon Identity," 432. 1 Nephi 18:8, Book of Mormon. 52 Ether 2: 10, Book of Mormon. 53 Ezra Taft Benson, "A Witness and a Warning," Ensign, November, 1979. 54 Francaviglia, "Geography and Mormon Identity," 433-435 55 Plewe, Mapping Mormonism, 174-5; For information about the Mormon Zion, see, "Zion," Bible Dictionary, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed December 23, 2017, https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bd/zion?lang=eng. 56 "How to Commemorate the Pioneer Sesquicentennial in Your Personal Life," Church News, March 8, 1997; "Celebrating the Sesquicentennial," Ensign, October 1997. 57 Francaviglia, "Geography and Mormon Identity," 428. 51 19 homelands are created." 58 Mormon migration to Zion slowed in the twentieth century after Elder George Q. Cannon in 1898 encouraged converts to stay in their home countries, possibly in response to the restrictions of the United States Immigration Act of 1891. 59 However, many of the faithful still came to the Intermountain West throughout the twentieth century. By 1970, there were approximately one million members in Utah and Idaho. 60 As Mormonism gained followers during the second half of the twentieth century, church President Harold B. Lee recognized the impracticality of gathering all believers to a central location. 61 In a 1973 general conference speech, Lee instructed members worldwide to build up Mormonism in their own cities and countries instead of migrating to traditional Mormon homelands. 62 He promised that local congregations ("stakes of Zion") would be a refuge to newly converted Saints, and he advised members to shelter in place. 63 Over the next two decades, many Mormons did not heed this instruction, continuing to bring their families to Utah or send a son or daughter to church-owned Brigham Young University 58 Francaviglia, "Geography and Mormon Identity," 430. George Q. Cannon, Conference Reports of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1898), 4; Jeff Turner, "The End of the Gathering: Mormonism and Immigration Regulation," Juvenile Instructor, May 12, 2017, https://juvenileinstructor.org/the-end-of-the-gatheringmormonism-and-immigration-regulation/; "1891: Immigration Inspection Expands," U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, accessed May 18, 2018, https://www.cbp.gov/about/history/1891-imigration-inspection-expands. 60 Plewe, Mapping Mormonism, 207. 61 Harold B. Lee, "Strengthen the Stakes of Zion," Ensign, July 1973. Lee said, "This greatly expanded [worldwide] church population is today our most challenging problem." 62 Lee, "Strengthen the Stakes." 63 Shelter in place is a term borrowed from crisis management discourse. It means to prepare one's immediate vicinity to be safe in the event of natural or political crisis, and then when such crisis occurs, to stay locked up and away from the external turmoil. It seems an apt metaphor to describe the church's new messaging when it abruptly stopped encouraging members to migrate. 59 20 or what was then called Ricks College. The young women in this study came to homeland communities in the midst of this shifting role for homelands. The edict to stay put had been issued again by Lee, but homeland pride was very much intact. That pride may have affected how homelanders in this study viewed newcomers, and also helped account for newcomers' preconceptions about life in Mormon homelands. I was struck by how strongly place of residence factored into narrators' understandings of their Mormonism. Community and Individual in Mormon Theology The young women in this study grew up in a religion that seems to encourage individual sanctification via group membership. Church members are taught their purpose on earth is to learn to become literal deities in their own right. 64 Yet they are also told connection to others in family, church, and community is required in order to reach that divine aspiration. In 1972, Elder Theodore M. Burton explained that LDS theology teaches that God gives everyone "general salvation," meaning he saves everyone from physical death by resurrecting bodies after death and reconnecting spirits with bodies. 65 Burton then told members that to receive "full salvation" or "exaltation," they must be baptized, marry, and participate in other activities that cannot be done by oneself. In 64 Mormons expect to be transformed into gods or goddesses based on worthiness. Church President Lorenzo Snow taught that "As man now is, God once was: As God now is, man may be." Latter-day saints claim every person is "divine in origin, nature, and potential." "Becoming Like God," Gospel Topics, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, https://www.lds.org/topics/becoming-like-god?lang=eng (accessed October 21, 2016). 65 Theodore M. Burton, "Salvation and Exaltation," General Conference, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, April 1972, https://www.lds.org/generalconference/1972/04/salvation-and-exaltation?lang=eng. 21 2008, LDS apostle (now President) Russell M. Nelson reiterated that "salvation is an individual matter" but exaltation requires others. 66 Exaltation, as Nelson defined the word, refers to obtaining the top tier of heaven and becoming a god. Nelson said, "Each of us is born individually; likewise, each of us is ‘born again' individually, and whether a person obtains heaven is based on that person's individual choices." 67 However, in order to be exalted rather than merely saved, members must participate in baptismal and temple rituals that cannot be performed by one person alone, and they must be "sealed" (connected after death) to their spouses. 68 Mormons are expected to establish and sustain a harmonious balance between their own needs and the requirements of their membership group. They have organizational and familial structures that enable them to assist each other so that all may be exalted together. Group and individual exist to serve each other; neither is foremost, and both are necessary. This theological paradox makes Mormons an excellent research population with which to explore the strategies people use to sustain organizational membership. Outline of Chapters In this chapter, "Introduction," I have introduced the purpose, significance, and scope of the research, including why I chose to interview women who moved into Mormon homeland communities as adolescents from 1975 through 2000. I provide an overview of Mormonism and explain aspects of Mormon theology and identity that are relevant for this study. I introduce rhetorical oral history and the totalism theories that are 66 Russell M. Nelson, "Salvation and Exaltation," Ensign, May 2008. Nelson, "Salvation and Exaltation." 68 Nelson, "Salvation and Exaltation." 67 22 relevant to my interpretations. Chapter 2, "Methodologies," explains how rhetorical oral history is a blend of oral history (OH) and participatory critical rhetoric (PCR) methodologies. It explores the intersection of oral history and PCR and offers three ways oral historians can benefit from considering OH rhetorically. It explains how my research answers PCR's call for rhetoricians to utilize field techniques when undertaking rhetorical studies, but argues that oral history interviewing is different from other sociologically oriented field techniques commonly used in PCR in that it encourages explicit advocacy and it takes place in private rather than public settings. Finally, it details practical decisions I made in order to blend methodologies from differing epistemological traditions. Chapter 3, "Theory: Totalism as a Means of Social Control," explains how institutions, organizations, and societies that encroach on most aspects of individual identity are called totalistic by scholars. The stories suggest that narrators in Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000 experienced three mechanisms of totalistic control-isolation, rules, and regimentation. This study of Mormon homelands provides insight into voluntary totalistic control, totalism in ordinary rather than extreme religious contexts, and totalism involving adolescents. Chapter 4, "Historical Background: Mormonism in Turmoil," summarizes major historical events affecting Utah and the United States during the latter part of the twentieth century, particularly the 1975-2000 years under study. It examines circumstances and paradigms within the LDS church and the Young Women (YW) organization during this same time period that might have encouraged totalism in homeland societies. I suggest the social control narrators in this study encountered can be 23 understood as an individual and organizational response to pressures facing members and the church in Mormon homelands. Chapter 5, "Isolation: Increased Safety, Reduced Charity," provides findings about narrators' experiences with insularity and safety in Mormon homelands. Some narrators found homeland societies in this period to be insular, meaning standoffish and withdrawn. Homelanders were described as being unkind to non-Mormons and overly concerned about young women becoming corrupted by outside people and ideas. NonMormons seemed to be dehumanized and young women depicted as helpless. Charity toward self and others may have been sacrificed in the name of safety. This chapter describes how isolation, a mechanism of totalism, can create insularity. Isolation was perceived to be implemented in homeland societies via homogenous Mormon social circles, fear of "the world," and surveillance. The chapter explains how narrators responded to isolation when they were young women and how, as adults, they have rejected self-righteousness, refused to isolate their own children, and sought out religious diversity partly in protest of the lack of charity they encountered as adolescents. Chapter 6, "Rules: Compromising Self-Worth for Acceptance," provides findings about narrators' experiences with belonging and exclusivity in Mormon homelands from 1975 through 2000. Some narrators thought homeland societies in this period were exclusive: it was difficult to gain acceptance from other Mormons, and homelanders acted morally superior to newcomers. This chapter explains how rules served as a mechanism of totalism for narrators. There were seemingly endless rules, mostly unwritten, about how to fit in to homeland society: a person must have the correct family size, structure, and origin; her family must possess wealth; and she must look and act like 24 other homelanders. Failure to comply with rules branded one as less righteous. The chapter describes narrators' responses to rule-based homeland societies, and considers adult narrators' resistance to homeland authority and desire to crusade against injustice as reactions to the strict rules of their adolescence. An overemphasis on rules seemed to create an exclusive culture where difference was seen as wrong, individual needs could not be met, and rule-enforcers wielded absolute power. Newcomers felt they had to acknowledge the group's authority and accept the group's standards for value. Self-worth may have had to be sacrificed if one wanted to belong. Chapter 7, "Regimentation: Self-Actualization over Agency," provides findings about narrator's experiences with collectivism and self-actualization within Mormon homelands. Some narrators said homeland Mormons prioritized maintenance of the communal society over the needs of young women and other individuals. Narrators felt this collectivism was rationalized on the grounds that improving oneself required group pressure, so it was everyone's duty to sustain the group. This chapter explains how regimentation-a third mechanism of totalism-was implemented in homeland societies via programs and prescribed life paths. Narrators said they were expected to participate in all church YW programs and follow the same linear course of wifehood and motherhood as everyone else regardless of individual preference. Those who fulfilled duties to Mormon homelands were celebrated, while others who chose alternate pursuits were snubbed. Some narrators felt active participation was seen as more important than spiritual conversion, and failure to comply with regimens was labeled selfish. Individual agency may have been sacrificed in the name of personal development. This chapter describes narrators' adolescent responses to regimented homeland societies, and explains 25 how adult narrators now opt out of church activities and programs that do not suit them and refuse to accept assigned gender roles in part because of their experiences as young women in Mormon homelands. Chapter 8, "Discussion and Conclusions," summarizes the three mechanisms of totalism narrators experienced in homelands from 1975 through 2000: isolation, rules, and regimentation. It describes how those mechanisms appeared to control young women in ways that were at odds with the tenets of the LDS religion. It explains how totalism theory gives a name to what many narrators experienced in Mormon homelands but have had difficulty articulating, and it considers how totalism can be disrupted via individual and organizational action. It offers several questions Mormons might ask when seeking to build a more charitable, inclusive society where both communal and individual priorities are honored. It also describes the methodological contributions this project has made to oral history and participatory critical rhetoric, including demonstrating the value to scholars of taking a co-interpretive, rhetorically minded approach to oral history interviewing. Finally, it situates this study in a larger research trajectory that explores how people can sustain group affiliations without having to make unacceptable compromises of individual identity, and it identifies possibilities for future research. CHAPTER 2 METHODOLOGIES Olivia knew by my hairstyle that I was not a Stalwart Young Daughter of Zion (SYDOZ-her pejorative nickname for a Mormon woman). 69 "Like, I'm sorry . . . . Your hair is adorable, but it might make them feel kind of icky because it's not quite a Mormon hairdo. It pokes a little," she insisted. And a SYDOZ would never earn a PhD. "See, you're not a SYDOZ," she repeated at least seven times over ten minutes, as she tried to explain exactly who was a SYDOZ and why SYDOZes were so difficult to be around. Olivia used my physical body and identity as interpretive devices. I grew uncomfortable as she contrasted my hair, face, and clothes with the look she had come to associate with women in Mormon homeland communities. I am frequently unsettled in my research because I am a rhetorical oral historian who works with living sources. I sometimes long for an archival text that will not critique my appearance. Rhetorical oral history is the methodological technique I used for this research. It is an intersection of two established methodologies, oral history (OH) and participatory critical rhetoric (PCR), both of which engage primarily with living sources. OH is a 69 Olivia, interview with author, June 17, 2017. All contributions from Olivia in this chapter come from this source. 27 decades-old subdiscipline of history, with its own journal and professional association. 70 PCR is the critical form of rhetorical field methods, an emerging subdiscipline of rhetoric that has coalesced over the last ten years. PCR is described in a 2015 textbook, 71 a special issue in the Culture Studies↔Critical Methodologies journal, 72 and numerous individual articles. 73 Despite the commonality of working with living sources, OH and PCR conduct research from different epistemological paradigms. OH is primarily concerned with establishing and expanding the historical record. It asks such questions as what happened, who did it, and when was it done. It extends traditional historical inquiry by recovering missing voices, allowing affective and embodied sources, and sharing authority with historical actors in ways archival research cannot. 74 PCR is primarily concerned with 70 The Oral History Review is the journal of the Oral History Association. Both can be accessed at http://www.oralhistory.org/. 71 Michael Middleton, Aaron Hess, Danielle Endres, and Samantha Senda-Cook, Participatory Critical Rhetoric: Theoretical and Methodological Foundations for Studying Rhetoric In Situ (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2015). 72 Culture Studies↔Critical Methodologies 16, no. 6 (2016). 73 Aaron Hess, "Critical-Rhetorical Ethnography: Rethinking the Place and Process of Rhetoric," Communication Studies 62, no 2 (April-June 2011): 127-152; George F. McHendry, Jr., Michael K. Middleton, Danielle Endres, Samantha Senda-Cook, and Megan O'Byrne, "Rhetorical Critic(ism)'s Body: Affect and Fieldwork on a Plane of Immanence," Southern Communication Journal 79, no. 4 (September-October 2014): 293-310; Michael K. Middleton, Samantha Senda-Cook, and Danielle Endres, "Articulating Rhetorical Field Methods: Challenges and Tensions," Western Journal of Communication 75, no. 4 (2011): 386-406; Samantha Senda-Cook, "Rugged Practices: Embodying Authenticity in Outdoor Recreation," Quarterly Journal of Speech 98, no. 2 (2012): 129-152. 74 Kristina Minister, "A Feminist Frame for the Oral History Interview," in Women's Words: The Feminist Practice of Oral History, eds. Sherna Berger Gluck and Daphne Patai (New York, NY: Routledge, 1991), 27; Jeff Friedman, "Oral History, Hermeneutics, and Embodiment," Oral History Review 41 (2014): 290-300; Michael Frisch, A Shared Authority: Essays on the Craft and Meaning of Oral and Public History (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1991). 28 how people use words and other rhetorical symbols to meaningfully interact with ideas, persons, places, and objects. It examines expression and perception. PCR extends traditional rhetorical inquiry by asking scholars to reflexively participate in the creation and use of the rhetoric they study. 75 I drew on both OH and PCR methodological approaches to carry out this research. I conducted oral history interviews with narrators for the purpose of better understanding history, and I examined the interview process and the rhetoric produced from it to see how narrators made sense of past and present lives. OH scholars have not yet undertaken an explicitly rhetorical approach to interviewing. My research extends oral history by introducing three relatively new practices. First, I considered pre- and post-interview interactions to be primary source material rather than only the interview. Second, I invited narrators to explicitly cointerpret their stories during their interviews. Third, I analyzed narrators' contemporary circumstances in greater depth than is normally done in OH. PCR scholars have endorsed oral history as a PCR technique, and Danielle Endres, a primary inaugurator of PCR, has conducted oral history interviews as part of her rhetorical fieldwork. 76 However, oral history interviewing is greatly undertheorized compared with other PCR techniques, all of which emerged from social science rather 75 Danielle Endres, Aaron Hess, Samantha Senda-Cook, and Michael K. Middleton, "In Situ Rhetoric: Intersections between Qualitative Inquiry, Fieldwork, and Rhetoric," Culture Studies↔Critical Methodologies 16, no. 6 (2016): 511-524; Sara L. McKinnon, Jenell Johnson, Robert Asen, Karma Chávez, and Robert Glenn Howard, "Rhetoric and Ethics Revisited: What Happens When Rhetorical Scholars Go Into the Field," Culture Studies↔Critical Methodologies 16, no. 6 (2016): 560-570. 76 Danielle Endres, "Environmental Oral History," Environmental Communication 5, no. 4 (2011): 485-498. 29 than from history. 77 PCR is characterized by some as a blending of rhetoric and social science. 78 This conception overlooks oral history's epistemological origins and ignores the ways in which OH interviews differ from the shorter, more structured interviews borrowed from social science and commonly utilized in PCR research. My research engages with two of the differences between oral history interviewing and other PCR techniques: 1) the explicit advocacy of PCR, which may be at odds with foundational practices in OH that are believed to safeguard narrators, and 2) the private setting of oral history interviewing, which may challenge PCR's premise that a primary purpose of PCR is to observe a public as it forms. PCR has staked a claim to oral history interviews; however, it has barely begun to build a house upon that claim. My research may raise a wall or two of the eventual fully developed PCR/OH structure. Rhetorical oral history was an excellent methodology for this research because it allowed me to engage as an insider with a fairly closed community. I am a Mormon woman of similar age to the women I interviewed. That commonality was mostly a strength in this research because a shared understanding of Mormon vocabulary, practices, culture, and doctrine helped build relationships and engender trust between narrators and interviewer. The privacy of OH interviewing makes it effective for topics that are controversial or painful, and Mormon homeland societies' treatment of young women turned out to be both for many narrators. Oral history's narrator-led structure enabled narrators to speak safely about the ways in which they felt their individuality was 77 Middleton et al., Participatory Critical Rhetoric, introduction. Common PCR techniques are observation, participant observation, conversational interviews, and focus groups. 78 Endres et al., "In Situ Rhetoric: Intersections." 30 overrun in Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000, and led me to consider totalism theory. Oral history interviews resemble extended conversations, a familiar communicative format for Mormon women, and the explicitly reflexive structure of rhetorical oral history enabled me to examine and disclose my standpoint throughout the research process. Finally, OH's ability to be archived had tremendous appeal to narrators, and I believe aided in recruiting. Mormons are taught to document their individual lives for posterity, and the recordings and transcripts were cherished by narrators. Every narrator in the study gave permission for her interview to be housed at the University of Utah Marriott Library in the Aileen H. Clyde Twentieth Century Women's Legacy Archive. Many narrators felt silenced in homeland societies as young women and are craving to now be heard by their church and other members of it. This chapter provides an overview of my research, including who was interviewed and how and why they were selected. Then it describes how the research furthered the OH subdiscipline's goals of bringing living and nonlogocentric sources into the historical record and sharing control of that record with previously overlooked historical actors. It argues that my study's rhetorical approach extended OH practice and theory by examining the entire communicative process rather than only the interview, being more explicitly co-interpretive, and exploring both the past and the present. Then it explains how the research aligns with PCR's call for rhetoricians to conduct their work reflexively and in situ and challenges the explicit advocacy and public focus of existing PCR studies. Finally, it presents three decisions I had to make about research practices in order to complete this study. Blending these two methodologies complicated the recruiting/scheduling process, the use of theory, and the presentation of the research. 31 Overview I conducted interviews with fifty-five women who moved into Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000, when they were between the ages of twelve and nineteen. 79 Nine of the fifty-five interviews were conducted in an earlier pilot study. Due to constraints of space, not all narrators are cited in this dissertation, but all interviews were analyzed. See Appendix A, "List of Narrators," for more information. Interviews averaged an hour and forty-four minutes in length, and one woman was interviewed in two sessions, so I collected more than ninety-seven audio hours. All interviews have been professionally transcribed and audited for accuracy, resulting in over 2,800 pages of stories. For primary texts, this research utilized the audio recordings, transcriptions, twenty-four field notes recorded or written by me, answers on the prescreening application and interview data sheet, interactions with narrators and potential narrators via email and telephone, and responses to postings of the call. For secondary background information, I reviewed Young Women (YW) program and curriculum materials and speeches from YW and other church leaders from the study period. Forty-eight narrators moved to homelands when they were in secondary school, and seven came to attend college. Girls join the LDS church's YW organization at twelve years of age, and at eighteen they graduate to the adult Relief Society organization. I initially accepted applicants who moved to attend college in addition to those who moved during secondary school. However, after receiving hundreds of volunteers, I tightened the 79 One women was a homeland native who did not move in during her adolescent years. She transitioned from a not-Mormon home to a Mormon college environment. 32 criteria for the remaining interviews and only spoke to those who moved during YW years. 80 I disqualified women who relocated before 1975 and after 2000. 81 I used selective sampling, also called theoretical sampling, to choose narrators based on demographic characteristics, availability, a likelihood information would be obtained, and emergent themes from secondary research. 82 Though case study research never aims to be mathematically representative, I believe seeking diversity in my sample makes the findings more relevant for scholars and Mormons. 83 Research about group membership and identity seems more trustworthy if it includes as much participant variety as possible. I sought to include narrators with varying levels of affiliation with the LDS church as adults, 84 and actively recruited in former Mormon 85 and Mormon 86 80 There were plenty of potential narrators who fit this demographic, presumably because of the gathering to Zion narrative common in Mormon discourse and the existence of church-owned universities and colleges in the Intermountain West. 81 I also disqualified the one man who applied. 82 Melanie Birks and Jane Mills, Grounded Theory: A Practical Guide (Los Angeles, CA: Sage Publications, Inc., 2011), 69-73. 83 Combining selective sampling with a push for diversity is the approach taken by Alistair Thomson in his vast oral history study of Australian life, The Australian Generations Project, archived by the National Library of Australia at http://artsonline.monash.edu.au/australian-generations/australian-generations-oralhistory-project-interviews/. After his initial recruitment calls, Thomson realized nearly all his narrators were "rich, white, middle-aged women" and did not adequately represent the diversity of Australia. The research team began tracking potential narrators by demographic category and changed the recruitment strategy to attract interest from other population groups. The completed study draws on a very diverse set of voices. This information came from a personal conversation with the author at the Oral History Association annual meeting in Long Beach, California, on October 14, 2016. 84 Narrators needed to consider themselves LDS at the time of their moves, though not at the time of the study. 85 For example, I posted on the Recovering Former Mormon (http://www.exmormon.org/) bulletin board and in Ex-LDS Worldwide Meetup Group. 86 For example, I posted in Facebook and LinkedIn groups such as Aspiring Mormon Women, Exponent II, LDS Mamas, LDS Singles, LDS Professionals, and LDS Worldwide. I did not post to church-sponsored groups or websites. 33 communities and publicized the call to people associated with the Intermountain West. 87 Most calls were posted in online venues; a few were distributed via email, personal contact, referral, announcement, or other non-internet-centric means. Over four hundred potential narrators responded to the call by completing an online application that requested basic demographic information. Those selected for an interview also completed a data sheet and consent form. See Appendix B, "Supporting Documents for Methodology," for a copy of the call, application, data sheet, consent form, and a field note. I attempted to preserve the same religious affiliation ratio in the interviews as was present in the applicant pool. When asked if they were Mormon, fifteen percent of narrators interviewed marked "no" on their data sheets, seventy-eight percent marked "yes," and seven percent selected "somewhere in between." 88 I recruited narrators who currently reside both in and out of traditional Mormon homelands. Narrators are from four countries, with most currently living in the United States. Narrators in the U.S. come from sixteen states. I also solicited narrators from each decade under study. Five narrators moved from 1975 through 1979, eighteen in the 1980s, thirty in the 1990s, and two in 2000. To qualify for the study, women needed to have moved as adolescents from any community where Mormons comprise a minority to any community where Mormons comprise a majority. Most narrators lived as adolescents in the Intermountain West states generally considered to be Mormon homelands, that is Utah (thirty-eight), Idaho (seven), 87 For example, I posted in higher-education alumni groups on LinkedIn and social action Facebook groups such as Utah Women Unite. 88 One woman marked both "yes" and "somewhere in between." She was counted in the "somewhere in between" category based on the content of her interview. 34 Nevada (two), and Arizona (two). However, other areas in the U.S. and Canada have large concentrations of Mormons and are considered by religious insiders to be Mormon homelands, even though their settlement occurred later than the initial wave of Mormon pioneers to the Utah in the middle 1800s. Therefore, I allowed potential narrators to decide for themselves whether the places they lived as young women were Mormonmajority/homeland communities. As a result, a few narrators whom I interviewed lived in California (two), Hawaii (one), Oregon (one), Virginia (one), and Alberta, Canada (one). Most narrators who live in Utah were interviewed in their homes, though a few chose to meet at their offices or mine. Interviews with those outside Utah used a conference calling or internet audio conference service. 89 As a PCR scholar, I recognize a phone interview and an in-person interview are different rhetorical settings. However, I chose to allow multiple formats in this research so as not to exclude women who currently reside outside of Mormon homeland communities. I conducted interviews using best practices for OH research as recommended by the Oral History Association Code of Conduct; these practices form the basis of oral history's exemption from federal oversight. 90 Specifically, oral historians relinquish as much control as possible to narrators. The women I spoke with were able to discontinue or extend interviews as desired; they could add, delete, or change any portions of their stories during or after interviews; and permission was secured before I used or distributed 89 Thirteen interviews used FreeConferenceCall; four used Skype. "Principles and Best Practices for Oral History, Adopted 2009," Oral History Association, accessed January 15, 2018, http://www.oralhistory.org/about/principles-andpractices/; Linda Shopes, "Oral History, Human Subjects, and Institutional Review Boards," Oral History Association, under "Resources-Information about IRBs," accessed January 15, 2018, http://www.oralhistory.org/about/do-oral-history/oral-historyand-irb-review/. 90 35 their interviews. Questions were open-ended, and narrators were allowed to meander. Memory scholars have demonstrated that while recalling past experiences can be helpful to narrators, it can also be harmful emotionally, socially, mentally, physically, and even financially. 91 Safeguards built into oral history research check overzealous interviewers while allowing for extended communicative exchange. Primary source materials were backed up in triplicate on the day they were collected. Audio files were recorded in 16-bit .WAV format suitable for long-term preservation. Printed and electronic copies of each woman's transcript, data sheet, and consent form are organized into folders to be delivered to the archive. Oral History This section describes how my research aligns with OH methodological priorities of recovering missing voices from history, allowing affective and embodied sources, and sharing authority. It also explains how my research extended OH methodologies to consider rhetorical aspects of narrator/interviewer interaction. Specifically, I included pre- and post-interview interaction in my analysis, invited explicit co-interpretation, and analyzed the present as well as the past. Oral history interviewing gives voice to less visible rhetors. It privileges banal social contexts, invites multiple perspectives, and allows nonliterate narrators to 91 Shoshana Felman and Dori Laub, M. D., Testimony: Crises of Witnessing in Literature, Psychoanalysis, and History (New York, NY: Routledge, Chapman, and Hall, 1992); Priscilla Hayner, Unspeakable Truths: Transitional Justice and the Challenge of Truth Commissions, 2nd ed. (New York, NY: Routledge, 2011). 36 participate. 92 Oral history research has been shown to be particularly resonant with women because it allows them to define the communicative environment in which they speak. 93 Kristina Minister proposes that oral histories can acknowledge and resist "our gender-based communication system." 94 She says linear, productivity-oriented communication styles found in other research settings may not honor values, relationships, and other aspects of life many women narrators believe to be important. Marjorie L. DeVault suggests, "Language itself reflects male experience, and . . . its categories are often incongruent with women's lives." 95 She says oral history offers women an opportunity to talk in a woman's world rather than a man's world, potentially enabling them to invent their own discursive means and strategies. 96 My research was consistent with the OH practice of documenting the ordinary in a communicative style that is not measured by progress toward a specific goal. Narrators in my study talked in sweeping, roundabout flows that cycled between their adolescence and adulthood. In fact, several narrators seemed constrained until I gave them permission to talk about their lifetime experiences with Mormonism rather than only their youthful interactions. Their stories could not be comfortably expressed in a linear fashion. Many narrators were concerned about wasting my time, and I found myself assuring nearly 92 Endres, "Environmental Oral History," 485-498; Phaedra C. Pezzullo and Stephen P. Depoe, "Everyday Life and Death in a Nuclear World: Stories from Fernald," in Public Modalities: Rhetoric, Culture, Media, and the Shape of Public Life, eds. Daniel C. Brouwer and Robert Asen (Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 2010), 85. 93 Sherna Berger Gluck, "Women's Oral History: Is It So Special?" in Thinking about Oral History: Theories and Applications, Thomas L. Carlton, Lois E. Myers, and Rebecca Sharpless, eds., 115-141 (Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press, 2007). 94 Minister, "A Feminist Frame," 27. 95 Marjorie L. DeVault, "Women's Talk: Feminist Strategies for Analyzing Research Interviews," Women and Language 10, no. 2 (1987): 33. 96 DeVault, "Women's Talk," 33-36. 37 every woman that I really did want to hear her whole story, however she wanted to tell it. One woman told me about each of her children in great detail because she said she wanted that information to be preserved for her family history. 97 Another woman extended our session to a second interview seemingly because she wanted to be sure I had a complete picture of her interaction with a particular LDS leader. 98 Narrators talked about what they wore as teenagers, YW activities, and what classes they took in school. Oral history intentionally counters what is sometimes called the great men, great events school of history, and my research was no exception. The narrators in my study comprise the type of overlooked population OH seeks. Young Mormon women from 1975 through 2000 had little or no involvement in creating LDS church curricula or policy. Narrators were not powerful, influential, or well-known in their communities. Some narrators had previously documented their experiences in journals or privately to their families, but their voices had never been made public, and certainly not in aggregate. Many narrators and potential narrators tell me a main reason they wanted to participate was because they felt young women's stories should have a place in Mormon history. One applicant says, "I appreciate you giving this generational group a voice." When I sent the transcriptions and audio files to narrators for their review, I included information about the scope of the project. Several narrators responded with excitement that they were part of such a large group of women who would now be heard. Violet's email to me captures both the inadequacy and the power some narrators felt as they participated in this study: 97 Kimberly, interview with author, June 24, 2017. All contributions from Kimberly in this chapter come from this source. 98 Mary, interviews with author, August 1 and 3, 2017. 38 Wow! My morning to-do list just got thrown out the window by me sitting reading this transcript! Several emotions-first, ugh-so many incomplete sentences and ideas I never finished, and cringe-worthy wording of comments/ideas. But, despite all of that, I really appreciate and treasure having this interview in writing-thank you! This is MY story, my experiences and defining moments in my life that have made me who I am today. 99 Oral history methodology allowed so-called ordinary Mormon women to be noticed by history. Oral history also allows scholars to explore aspects of experience such as values, perceptions, and relationships that might be difficult to access using traditional archival sources. 100 Oral history narrators can use bodily movements and words in ways that might not be acceptable or understood in other research environments. 101 In the interviews I conducted, words and emotions did not always align with each other, and OH methodology allowed me to explore that tension. For example, Tamara is an accomplished scientist who is accustomed to speaking calmly and rationally. 102 She told me that fitting into Mormon homelands was not unduly stressful for her and claimed her experience was "not anywhere near as emotional as some people's stories." She agreed to interview with me because she likes to be helpful, not because she had any particularly traumatic experiences to share. However, she cried twice during her interview when she talked about her high school in Layton, Utah, in 1995. Her emotion was intense, but her words were mild. In the field note I recorded after Tamara's interview, I noted the 99 Violet, interview with author, June 14, 2017. All contributions from Violet in this chapter come from this source. 100 Kathryn Anderson, Susan Armitage, Dana Jack, and Judith Wittner, "Beginning Where We Are: Feminist Methodology in Oral History," Oral History Review 15 (1987, Spring): 112. 101 Anderson et al., "Beginning Where We Are." 102 Tamara, interview with author, June 22, 2017. All contributions from Tamara in this chapter come from this source. 39 discrepancy. Tamara's interview demonstrates that transcripts and recordings are distinctly different sources, and it also illustrates the capabilities of OH when it comes to understanding a broader range of human experience than might be accessible through words alone. In oral history, the "body is literally the archive." 103 Oral history is an embodied practice. Several women nursed babies or held toddlers while speaking to me. Others cried, paced, fidgeted, smiled, laughed, gestured, or frowned. Audio recordings do not capture the full range of how narrators use their bodies. 104 However, when transcribed to include hearable contextual cues (such as laughing, crying, etc.) and when combined with field notes recorded immediately following interviews, audio recordings are sufficiently capable of bringing nonlogocentric sources to the research inquiry. PCR scholars analyze "intersectional rhetoric": the ways different "forms of rhetoric-words, images, bodies- work together without privileging one over another." In PCR, rhetoric is a multisensory, multimodal intersectional experience. It . . . [can] not be contained by words alone." 105 Though participatory critical rhetoricians to date have rarely used oral history interviewing as a primary research mode, a PCR approach such as mine is consistent with OH's call for researchers to observe, remember, and value a narrator's entire experience. In oral history, narrators share interpretive authority with interviewers, not 103 Anim-Addo and Gunaratnam, "Secrets and Lies," 392. Doug Boyd, "Audio or Video for Recording Oral History: Questions, Decisions," Oral History in the Digital Age, Institute of Museum and Library Services, accessed March 17, 2018, http://ohda.matrix.msu.edu/2012/06/audio-or-video-for-recording-oralhistory/. Video recordings capture a greater range of experience. However, like many other oral historians, I chose not to use them because of logistical challenges, expense, and the intimidation factor during the interview. 105 Middleton et al., Participatory Critical Rhetoric, 20. 104 40 because historians grant that responsibility but because the interview structure naturally enables it. 106 Narrators assume dual roles as both eyewitnesses and interpreters, the latter being a function traditionally reserved for historians. 107 Narrators do not describe the past; they describe a constructed remembrance of the past. When they speak, they do not merely convey knowledge they already possess, but instead create knowledge via the process of remembering. Historian Ronald Grele claims oral history interviews are a "struggle for interpretive power." 108 Both parties play the role of historian, each trying to order the information according to personal needs, consciously and unconsciously. Narrators often try to frame past experiences as normalized and rational, while researchers seek evidence of tension or oddity. 109 Stories told to interviewers are "conversational narrative[s] jointly created" in the social, political, and cultural milieu of the present moment. 110 Kathryn Anderson notes that "an oral history interview is the one historical document that can ask people what they mean," 111 and because of this, oral history research allows historical actors to wield discursive power more directly than does archival research. 112 106 Frisch, A Shared Authority. Felman and Laub, Testimony. 108 Ronald J. Grele, "History and the Languages of History in the Oral History Interview: Who Answers Whose Questions and Why?" in Interactive Oral History Interviewing, eds. Eva M. McMahan and Kim Lacy Rogers (Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1994), 3. 109 E. Culpepper Clark, "Reconstructing History: The Epitomizing Image," in Interactive Oral History Interviewing, eds. Eva M. McMahan and Kim Lacy Rogers (Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1994), 19-30. 110 Grele, "History and the Languages of History," 2. 111 Anderson et al., "Beginning Where We Are," 112. 112 Katherine Borland, "‘That's Not What I Said': Interpretive Conflict in Oral Narrative Research," in The Oral History Reader, eds. Robert Perks and Alistair Thomson (New York, NY: Routledge, 2006), 310-321. 107 41 My study shared authority with narrators in the same ways other OH research does, and also in one manner that was unusual: explicit co-interpretation. A common practice in oral history is to ask narrators to interpret their experiences. In my research, several narrators used the phrase Utah Mormon to describe others or because they themselves were characterized by the phrase. I asked each narrator who used the phrase to tell me what Utah Mormon meant. My question was more than a simple request for a definition; rather, it was an invitation for the women to interpret the social, cultural, and historical context of the phrase for me. I was asking narrators to become historiographers and make decisions about what concepts were included in the permanent record. I have also shared authority at the presentation phase of my research by inviting narrators to participate in a semipublic audio exhibit of the work. Six narrators plan to accompany me to co-present this study at a Mormon History Association annual meeting. 113 Two other narrators want to help prepare the script for the exhibit, though they are unable to attend in person. Presenting findings to the research population is consistent in ethos and practice with OH's commitment to shared authority, as is involving narrators in that presentation. This research extends OH theory and practice in three ways. First, it admits preand post-interview interactions as primary sources. Second, it encourages narrators to cointerpret rather than interpret. Third, it bridges past and present. Initially, I approached this research as an oral historian rather than a critical rhetorician, and that epistemological 113 Heather Stone and Narrators from the Mormon Young Women Oral History Project, "Young Women's Experiences with Insularity, Exclusivity, and Collectivism in Mormon Homelands, 1975-2000," Mormon History Association Annual Meeting, June 89, 2018. 42 difference channeled my initial assumptions as to texts and rhetors. This means I considered the primary evidence to be the oral history interviews, and I carefully prepared to find, collect, and preserve those interviews. However, early in the research process, I realized the oral history interview was not the only primary source material the project was generating. After I posted recruiting calls, a flurry of conversation ensued in online forums among current and former Mormons, mostly in Facebook communities and bulletin boards. One person joked that it was perverted to ask young women for their oral history. Others shared abbreviated versions of stories about living in Mormon homelands and reacted to each other's experiences. People who knew they did not fit study parameters asked to participate anyway. Former Mormons demanded to know if the research was sponsored by the LDS church. Nearly four hundred people provided contact information and applied online to give a two-hour interview to a stranger in the ten days before I disabled the form. After receiving hundreds of comments on the "Anything else you want to say?" field of the application, I finally acknowledged that the interaction potential narrators were having with me and each other was source, not pre-source. It was not preparation for the main event. It was the main event, or at least part of it. The entire communicative process of an oral history interview-selection, recruiting, prescreening, scheduling, interviewing, reviewing, approving, and archiving-became primary source material when oral history was viewed through a participatory critical rhetoric lens. Fortunately, I recognized this and preserved screen shots of online interaction before it was no longer available. Unlike oral historians, PCR scholars are accustomed to studying an assemblage of sources from a broad range of word and non-word artifacts (such as Facebook 43 comments or "likes"). 114 As a rhetorical oral historian, I could not afford to ignore the pre- and post-interview interaction with the community being studied. If I did, I might miss critical insights. For instance, the quantity, intensity, and tone of these potential narrators was a first clue that adolescent experiences in Mormon homelands were still salient decades later. Rhetorical oral history expands oral historians' notion of shared authority by encouraging co-interpretation. As discussed earlier in this chapter, oral historians believe in sharing authority by inviting narrators to both describe and interpret their experiences. Interpretation acknowledges the narrator's position as the storyteller and involves the researcher ceding control of the documenting of history. I extended this OH practice of interpretation by asking narrators to co-interpret. Co-interpretation is when both participants collaboratively interpret. To further clarify: in a co-interpretive scenario, the researcher draws conclusions about what the narrator is saying and invites the narrator to critique, analyze, reject or otherwise question those conclusions. Together and individually, narrators and researcher come up with insights about the interview process and content, and those insights are made explicit. Co-interpretation allows researchers to voice their on-the-spot ideas when narrators are still present to help evaluate those ideas rather than gathering information to be made sense of in solitude after the interview. I found it necessary to proceed with caution when co-interpreting. Specifically, I was careful not to take a particular religious or political stance in my interpretive statements. For example, I did not engage with questions of whether the LDS church was 114 Michael K. Middleton, Samantha Senda-Cook, Aaron Hess, and Danielle Endres, "Contemplating the Participatory Turn in Rhetorical Criticism," Culture Studies↔Critical Methodologies 16, no. 6 (2016): 574. 44 true or whether feminism helped or hurt women. I tried not to offer advice or voice value judgments about how a narrator should feel or behave. 115 I confined my on-the-spot conclusions to questions about why and how. For example, I co-explored why a person in a narrator's story may have acted a certain way or how a narrator's specific experience might connect to her culture or environment. My practice of co-interpretation encouraged analysis in front of and in conjunction with narrators during the interview itself. It was one such co-interpretive exchange with a narrator named Violet that started me thinking about collectivism in Mormon homeland communities, an idea that eventually suggested totalistic organizational theory as a way to understand and interpret narrators' experiences. Early in the interview, Violet had complained about how women in her church congregation assumed they knew her because she appeared to fit the married-Mormon-housewife mold. Later in the interview, she told about her young women years. She was annoyed that the only question other teens asked when she moved in to Bountiful, Utah, from England was if she was a Mormon. They didn't inquire about hobbies, favorite foods, or brothers and sisters. Then I offered this observation: Interviewer: Both of those [situations] have to do with being part of a group. It's an interesting-like, I wonder if there's-you didn't want to be lumped into a group. Violet: You're right. You're right. And that's a really great observation. And as I think about myself now, maybe there was part of me that didn't want to be fit into a group because I'm that same way now. I do not like stereotypes. I do not like feeling as though people think I'm a certain stereotype. Later, Violet returned to the subject of groups: Violet: You . . . say . . . I didn't want to be part of [a] group. But yet now, I'm saying, "Oh, stay. Be part of something." 115 I admit that I failed at this in a few instances. 45 Interviewer: Well, I get the impression you're saying stay connected to humans. Violet: Yes, yes. That's right. Stay connected to these relationships and people. Don't get so hung up on the problems that aren't there, or are there. Interviewer: If I'm understanding what you're saying, it sounds like you're . . . saying you can be who you are and still be part of this bigger thing or be connected to other people in some way. Violet. Yes. I agree. Interviewer: And from what you said, that awareness . . . is something you arrived at when you were 13 and you felt it yourself. . . . Am I interpreting that correctly? Violet: I think so. Interviewer: I can see that's almost become a life mission or a passion for you. Violet: Yes, definitely. Absolutely. And I absolutely would have said it was a passion of mine before you walked in the door, but I wouldn't have connected it to being a thirteen-year-old. But I think they are connected. Violet and I used experiences from her adult life to co-interpret her adolescent life. I thought I saw a pattern repeated in the way she responded as a young woman and the way she responded as an adult. When I questioned her about the pattern, she agreed with the connection, and we reflected together on what the pattern meant. It was our dialogic interaction that called attention to group/individual tension, not her remarks alone. We co-interpreted. As a PCR-trained oral historian, I am bridging past and present in ways unfamiliar to OH and PCR methodological traditions. OH emphasizes the study of the past. While it uses a primary source created in the present, OH uses that present-day source primarily to (re)construct history. 116 Oral historians know that narrators live in the present, and they often give a perfunctory nod to narrators' current circumstances at the end of their research write-ups. These mentions can read like a "Where are they now?" spotlight one might see on television: all the heroism took place in the past and talking about the 116 Linda Shopes, "‘Insights and Oversights': Reflections on the Documentary Tradition and the Theoretical Turn in Oral History," The Oral History Review 41, no. 2 (2014): 261. 46 narrator's current situation simply ties up a loose end. Conversely, PCR generally explores contemporary meaning-making. 117 PCR emerged to examine unfolding social movements and help scholars honor ephemeral, embodied, and experiential rhetorical performances. As such, PCR focuses on current events: for instance, participant observation requires a present-day phenomenon to observe. My practice of rhetorical history blends the OH and PCR perspectives. I argue that an oral history interview provides two simultaneous avenues for research: the product of recollection (the story of history) and the process of recollection (the storytelling event). Both avenues interest me. In this study, narrators told me their whole-life experiences with the LDS religion. As they did so, they examined their contemporary worlds. More than one narrator stopped in her retelling to remark on an insight she had just come to about her present circumstances. A memorable example was Jean, who moved to Provo, Utah, in the 1980s, and at the time of our interview was living with her husband and children in Salt Lake City, Utah. Jean entered the LDS church's YW organization the same year the feminist Sonia Johnson was excommunicated. 118 During her interview with me, Jean suddenly realized the cycle of excommunication was repeating itself that very year. Jean's daughter was turning twelve and entering YW within a few months of the excommunication of Kate Kelly, feminist leader of Ordain Women, a group that campaigns for LDS women to receive priesthood ordination. Jean recalled her own confusion and fear after Johnson's excommunication, and she broke down in tears as she 117 PCR scholars do examine archival sources when those sources shed light on present-day actors and motivations. 118 Jean, interview with author, July 2, 2014. All contributions in this chapter from Jean come from this source. 47 saw for the first time that her daughter might share the same pain. Jean had not connected the experiences from her past with the circumstances of our present until she vocalized them to me. This research claims to be about young women from 1975 through 2000, and it is. However, because my approach to oral history was rhetorical, it is also about those women as adults. Many narrators believe that the reception they found in Mormon homelands has affected their religiosity and relationships as adults. They are less willing to be uncharitable, less willing to let someone else decide their worth, and less willing to sacrifice their own desires for the benefit of others. Narrators' connections between past and present enabled richer insight and more in-depth analysis. Participatory Critical Rhetoric This study aligns with participatory critical rhetoric (PCR) methodology in that oral history interviewing is a form of in situ (or on-site) research, which is research undertaken while a researcher is situated in daily life "observing rhetorical performance as it happens." 119 Like other PCR studies, this examination of young Mormon women's lives was also reflexive. This section explains what in situ and reflexive consist of in this study. Then it suggests two ways that this study in general and oral history in particular challenge PCR practices. A defining element of PCR research is the mandate for researchers to examine rhetoric at its place of creation (in situ) in what has been called a "participatory turn" by 119 Endres et al., "In Situ Rhetoric: Intersections," 511. 48 rhetorical scholars. 120 Researchers in the field can watch new rhetorics at their genesis and create and capture primary source material that did not previously exist. 121 PCR proponents claim rhetoricians have been overlooking spontaneous and nondocumented rhetoric such as can be found at sit-ins, political marches, rallies, and other public events. PCR presumes process is as worthy of scrutiny as output, and that some of the most interesting rhetorics are ephemeral. Participatory critical rhetoricians believe observing rhetoric's emergence in situ can provide insight into communal meaning-making that cannot be obtained from archival documents, which are necessarily disconnected by time and medium from their creators' "lived experiences." 122 Oral history interviews are rich sites for watching rhetoric on-site at its genesis. Many times in this research, narrators seemed to be attaching labels to people and circumstances for the first time while I sat in front of them. For example, Kristen, who 120 Sara L. McKinnon, Robert Asen, Karma R. Chávez, and Robert Glenn Howard, eds., Text + Field: Innovations in Rhetorical Method (University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2016); Middleton et al., "Contemplating the Participatory Turn," 571. 121 Samantha Senda-Cook, Michael K. Middleton, and Danielle Endres, "Interrogating the ‘Field,'" in Text + Field: Innovations in Rhetorical Method, eds. Sara L. McKinnon, Robert Asen, Karma R. Chávez, and Robert Glenn Howard (University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2016), chap. 1, Kindle. Senda-Cook et al. have theorized the field as an active participant in the research, meaning it is not simply "a location, backdrop, or context," but instead a "compelling factor in the creation, execution, and consequences of rhetoric." In this study, I followed other principles of PCR field research, but I did not attend to field this way, meaning I utilized a mix of interview settings and formats-in-person, telephone, Skype, my office, narrators' homes-without theorizing as to how these varied fields might affect findings. This is in keeping with oral history methodology that acknowledges interview context but does not position field as an actor. Future research could reexamine this archive to more carefully consider the role of field. 122 Jennifer C. Dunn, "Going to Work at the Moonlite Bunny Ranch: Potentials of Rhetorical and Ethnographic Methods for Cultural Studies," Culture Studies↔Critical Methodologies 16, no. 6 (2016): 527; Middleton et al., Participatory Critical Rhetoric, chap. 5. 49 moved to Provo, Utah, in 1987, was attempting to describe the difference between Mormonism in Pennsylvania and in the homelands. 123 After working through her ideas about religious institutions, she eventually devised the term "social institution" to describe the way the LDS church in Utah regulated friendships. While "social institution" is not an unusually clever phrase, watching it emerge started me thinking about regimentation and how it was manifest in homeland societies, which ended up being an important direction for the study. PCR formally introduces reflexivity to the rhetorical tradition. 124 Middleton et al. argue that when PCR researchers are in situ, it is easier for everyone-including themselves-to examine their political motivations. Researchers are encouraged to keep field notes, and those notes are admitted as primary sources. 125 This research required reflexivity about my perspectives, my identity in the communities I approached, my choices about whom to speak with, and my interpretations. After completing a pilot study that mostly interviewed devout Mormons, I wanted to ensure this dissertation included narrators with a wider range of affiliations with Mormonism. For a participatory critical rhetorician practicing reflexivity, decisions to adjust the recruiting process are revealers of researcher politics and positionality. To me, adding diversity meant adding more former Mormons, whereas, if I were a former Mormon, I would have struggled to add current Mormons; former Mormons would have been easily assembled. I am a Mormon woman who was raised in a Utah Mormon homeland and taught from the same YW 123 Kristen, interview with author, July 7, 2014. All contributions from Kristen in this chapter come from this source. 124 Middleton et al., Participatory Critical Rhetoric, 35-36. 125 Endres et al., "In Situ Rhetoric," 518. Per Endres et al., qualitative researchers have long considered reflexivity to be important. 50 lesson materials as women in my study. I have experienced many of the same cultural and historical events as narrators. Rather than considering researcher identity a limitation, PCR views it as something to be observed and reflected upon. The discomfort I felt when recruiting in communities antagonistic to my church was also relevant in a PCR study, as was the discomfort some potential narrators felt about me. Three former-Mormon groups rejected the research call when I answered the religious screening question because they did not allow Mormons to enter their community. (I had decided to disclose religious affiliation if asked.) One moderator requested more information, then chose to allow my post, but instructed me to explicitly state that I had his permission so people in the group did not protest my presence. After all interviews were conducted, I removed myself from the former-Mormon groups because I felt uneasy about having them visible as part of my online identity. By contrast, I have continued as a member of nearly all the pro-Mormon groups. Endres et al. claim that reflexivity is itself a rhetorical process, important for understanding the communities, topics, movements, and histories being studied. 126 Reflexivity can help rhetoricians "attend to formerly disregarded moments of persuasion and identification." 127 The recruiting process introduced me to the classifications of faithful Mormon ("TBM" or true blue Mormon), doubting Mormon, Mormon in transition, recovering Mormon, and former Mormon that potential narrators used to identify themselves and others. It helped me understand how strong outsider/insider boundaries can be in Mormonism and contributed to my perceiving exclusivity and 126 127 Endres et al., "In Situ Rhetoric," 518-519. Middleton et al., "Contemplating the Participatory Turn," 574. 51 insularity as totalistic mechanisms in Mormon homeland communities. 128 It is surprising that more PCR researchers don't use oral history as a primary source. 129 However, oral history is still an underutilized and underexamined PCR technique, and in some ways, one that complicates definitional aspects of PCR. Endres acknowledges two differences between oral history interviews and other types of qualitative interviews: oral history is whole-life focused, and oral history interviews can be preserved beyond research conclusion per Institutional Review Board regulations designed to protect research subjects from harm. 130 My research suggests that oral history may also challenge PCR practices because PCR is advocacy oriented and OH is recorded in private rather than public settings. Advocacy is a defining characteristic of PCR. Middleton et al. claim that a "politicized rhetorical perspective" is at the "core of a shift to in situ rhetorical criticism." 131 PCR places a critic at "the scene" where immanent politics are enacted so that a critic can become an "activist-scholar." 132 McHendry et al. speak of "a rhetorical critic's commitment to social action while doing field research." 133 In PCR, researcher 128 For a discussion of boundary maintenance in totalistic religious communities, see Helen Rose Fuchs Ebaugh, Out of the Cloister: A Study of Organizational Dilemmas (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1977), 41. 129 For examples of rhetorical studies using oral history, see Christopher A. House, "Religious Rhetoric(s) of the African Diaspora: Using Oral History to Study HIV/AIDS, Community, and Rhetorical Interventions," International Journal of Communication 7 (2013): 2027-2045; Endres, "Environmental Oral History"; Pezzullo and Depoe, "Everyday Life and Death"; and Suhi Choi, "Silencing Survivors' Narratives: Why Are We Again Forgetting the No Gun Ri Story?" Rhetoric & Public Affairs 11, no. 3 (2008) 367-388. 130 Endres, "Environmental Oral History," 490-494. 131 Middleton et al., Participatory Critical Rhetoric, 34-35. 132 Middleton et al., Participatory Critical Rhetoric, 35. 133 McHendry et al., "Rhetorical Critic(ism)'s Body," 294. 52 activism, while not uncritically undertaken, is believed to be emancipatory to participants or at least supportive of their cause. Yet, researcher advocacy may not have an emancipatory effect in oral history interviews. I argue that the explicit advocacy of PCR may be at odds with foundational practices in oral history that are believed to safeguard narrators. 134 One of the most convincing arguments oral historians made when they secured exemption from federal IRB oversight was that oral history narrators are inherently protected because they are allowed to take the subject position in all research activities. 135 PCR advocacy shifts subjectivity to researchers for at least the advocacy portion of the engagement, and that shift may harm oral history narrators. For example, a desire to advocate for change may distract an oral historian from her responsibilities to listen without controlling, causing a departure from the OH practice of allowing narrators control over their own stories. 136 If a researcher advocated for a political position or ideology in an oral history setting, the interview could easily turn from a life story exploration to a debate. Note that co-interpretation is not the same as advocacy because co-interpretation does not take a position or attempt to persuade narrators to take any particular action. I straddled the line between OH and PCR in terms of advocacy in my interview with Megan, who moved from Florida to St. George, Utah, in 1996 and who now lives in 134 "Principles and Best Practices for Oral History." Shopes, "Oral History, Human Subjects, and Institutional Review Boards." 136 Though oral historians believe they are participants in a shared experience, participation in PCR carries a responsibility for activism, while participation in oral history generally does not. 135 53 Draper, Utah. 137 Megan repeatedly brought up her regrets about not having chosen a profession that interested her and not having gotten enough schooling to pay for a higher standard of living. Without considering the potential reduction of Megan's agency that might occur if I lobbied her to take a specific action, I found myself encouraging Megan to enroll in school. While I was not pushy, our exchange demonstrates that control of the interview shifted briefly from her to me: Interviewer: I mean, you talk like it's too late, by the way. Megan: It's not too late. I know that. (Chuckles) Interviewer: You're like what, 34, did you say? (Chuckles) Megan: Yeah, right? I know it's not too late. I just still don't know what to do. (Chuckles) Interviewer: Well, and you might be busy with this stage of life. I mean, honestly. And I'm not saying you gotta go do something different, but, you know. Megan: I know. But I got 30 years of working at least, I'm sure. Interviewer: I'm 48, and I'm in a PhD program, so these things can happen, right? (Chuckles) It's not necessarily too late to do something different. Megan: Right. When an oral historian takes control of the conversation to persuade a narrator to take a certain action, that persuasion is inconsistent with OH methodology. However, it is wellaligned with PCR, where the researcher accepts a continuous responsibility to help enact positive social change. Participatory critical rhetoricians have considered ethical implications of advocacy, including relationship maintenance, representation, and power. 138 However, their considerations do not engage with the ethical standards already in place for oral history interviewing, and I think more work needs to be done in this area. Rhetorical scholars generally use PCR in public rather than private settings. 139 137 Megan, interview with author, June 21, 2017. All contributions from Megan in this chapter come from this source. 138 McKinnon et al., "Rhetoric and Ethics Revisited." 139 Middleton et al., Participatory Critical Rhetoric. 54 PCR methodology was invented in part to observe rhetoric as it forms in open, communal situations such as political demonstrations. Most other PCR techniques, such as participant observation and focus groups, involve multiple actors who engage with each other and the researcher. Even conversational interviewing in a PCR setting usually takes place alongside of a public event when a researcher pulls a participant out of the main flow to ask a few questions. Oral history, on the other hand, is decidedly private. Narrators cannot interact with each other unless other narrators give permission and the researcher facilitates. Several narrators in this study wanted to read each other's stories or meet together. One woman asked if she could arrange a "potluck," a common Mormon social event. 140 However, unless I provide names and contact information for other narrators, she will not be able to do so. Oral history narrators share stories in private and retain control over whether and how those stories can be shared publicly. PCR scholars attempting to utilize oral history need to consider the implications of conducting research in private settings. Specifically, researchers need to be cognizant of how privacy might increase researcher power. In public protest situations such as marches or rallies, researchers' authority over participants is minimized because the researcher is one of the crowd. She moves her body in the same ways and for the same purposes as everyone nearby does, meaning that she might hike a trail with environmental demonstrators, 141 protest with those who are homeless, 142 or distribute safety information at dance raves with other motivated citizens. 143 She is often there to 140 Olivia, interview with author. Senda-Cook, "Rugged Practices." 142 Michael K. Middleton, "‘SafeGround Sacramento' and Rhetorics of Substantive Citizenship," Western Journal of Communication 78, no. 2 (March-April 2014): 119-133. 143 Hess, "Critical-Rhetorical Ethnography." 141 55 engage multiple participants rather than a specific one. As such, she may be less threatening than a researcher who is only there to inquire and not to join in, and she is unlikely to silence participants' voices with her presence. In oral history interviews, however, a researcher is inherently more invasive. She is present only to gather information from a specific person. She brings recording equipment; schedules, starts, and ends interviews; asks questions; and controls the final write-up. Narrators cannot melt into a nearby crowd if questions become too onerous, or call on members of that crowd to supplement or clarify their statements. They cannot seek protection of others if the interviewer becomes offensive or annoying. For these reasons, OH codes of conduct require researchers to consciously pass control to narrators and facilitate the interview so that narrators retain control throughout. Unfortunately, researchers accustomed to using public PCR techniques may not recognize the power they wield to intimidate or silence narrators. Since PCR has claimed oral history interviewing as a rhetorical field method, PCR scholars need to do more to examine power in private versus public research settings, including how the absence of other participants might obligate a researcher to take unfamiliar actions to protect narrators. Decisions at the Intersection of OH and PCR In his 2012 book, James A. Anderson insists, "One's chosen methodologies are not an overcoat one puts on lightly." 144 He argues that methodologies are never neutral, and a researcher cannot unselfconsciously borrow techniques from one research tradition 144 59. James A. Anderson, Media Research Methods (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2012), 56 while embracing the world views of an entirely different tradition, at least not if that researcher intends to be trustworthy. Anderson does not claim a researcher participates in only one research tradition throughout her career, merely that each discrete project needs congruence of methods and epistemological assumptions. My study juxtaposes research practices not commonly used together. I have examined organizational communication using OH to generate primary sources and PCR to analyze those sources. Like Anderson, I am sensitive to the potential for incoherence that could arise from this combination. Fortunately, OH and PCR share many epistemological assumptions. Researchers in both subdisciplines seek insight and understanding rather than prediction or control. The research is case-oriented instead of universal in that it does not attempt to generalize beyond the evidence directly available in the specific situation under study. Both OH and PCR are open-ended and unpredictable and recognize an infinite number of possible perspectives rather than a single correct answer, even when describing material facts that are generally agreed upon. This section explains three points in the research when I had to navigate the influence of dual methodologies and make decisions about my allegiances: recruitment/scheduling, use of theory, and presenting the findings. When it came to the recruitment and scheduling stages, I chose to adopt a process that more closely resembled social science than oral history. Specifically, I was systems oriented and data focused. I wrote the call and created a spreadsheet to track placement of it. I created an email account to centralize communication, built an online application form, and tested it with several people before linking it to the call. I used Google Forms to automatically transfer applicant responses to a spreadsheet, and then sorted and analyzed by demography to determine whom to contact for a potential interview. I 57 contacted potential narrators via email and invited them to use the Doodle online scheduling program to sign up for an interview slot. I confirmed interviews via email and sent reminders the day before each interview. I sent email regrets to those I chose not to interview. An oral historian might call what I did being organized rather than being social scientific, and she would be right in that many oral historians are organized. They are conscientious with tracking, consent forms, and backups, and precise in their communication with narrators. Nothing about OH methodology prohibits a scholar from being organized. However, one of the key differences between what I did in the recruitment stage of my study and what oral historians usually do is that I thought of women as participants rather than narrators and acted as if it were my job to manage their participation. I adopted a worldview that identified myself as researcher and them as research subjects, and I gave myself the responsibility of moving those subjects through a process defined by me. Oral historians do not manage their narrators. Neither do rhetoricians. However, PCR scholars using social scientific techniques sometimes do. This social science mindset was effective for the recruiting process because it enabled me to interact with large numbers of potential participants without losing data or wasting time. OH did not provide sufficient guidance for managing an oral history project of the magnitude I undertook. Oral historians do not ordinarily have hundreds of potential applicants within a ten-day period, and a single interviewer does not typically conduct so many interviews for one project. However, I had to shift gears to a more historical epistemology once I began interviewing so as to allow interviews to be open-ended, meandering, and people-focused. I had to begin thinking of participants as narrators 58 instead in order to build relationships with them and encourage co-interpretation. Another area of methodological dissonance was in the use of theory in analysis. Historians have a skepticism of theory that is not always shared by participatory critical rhetoricians. Oral history prefers to develop new theory organically from examination of evidence rather than use evidence to test and validate theories already in mind. Many historians believe applying theoretical frameworks in advance of evaluating primary sources makes a researcher likely to follow assumptions at the expense of evidence. 145 Linda Shopes observed that abstract academic phrases do not juxtapose well with the concrete and specific everyday language of oral history, and it is difficult to weave theory and narration together in such a way that honors narrators' voices. While the protheorists have gained some ground, oral historians remain uneasy about whether, when, and how to introduce explanatory interpretive models. Oral historians have conceded that theory can be useful as long as interviews stay "at the center of our work . . . [with] theory to explain, not the other way around." 146 Rhetoric, on the other hand, is not unsettled by theory. Critical rhetoricians, especially, have embraced theory to add depth and relevance to case-specific interpretation. They believe power relations between individuals and groups can often be more fruitfully interrogated when connected via theory to larger themes. Rhetoric assumes that theory, like all forms of language, is socially constructed, and should therefore be wielded critically to help examine subjects, researchers, the discipline, and society's ways of knowing. PCR methodology does not ask theory to dominate evidence; 145 Wm. David Sloan and Michael Stamm, Historical Methods in Communication, 3rd ed. (Northport, AL: Vision Press, 2010). 146 Shopes, "‘Insights and Oversights.'" 59 indeed, most PCR studies are well-supported with references to primary sources. However, it is fairly common practice in PCR to engage with theory early in a study. I chose to adopt oral history's perspective about theory. I allowed themes to emerge from evidence rather than in an a priori way from theory. I immersed myself in the stories and notes, listening and reading repeatedly, searching for patterns or anomalies. I considered word, sentence, paragraph and genre, and silences/absences as well as what was obviously present. 147 I searched for connections to contemporary and past events and other passages of text and considered affective and embodied aspects of the interview. Research findings about insularity, exclusivity, and collectivism emerged from this process, and together those three aspects of Mormon culture suggested totalism. Only then did I study totalism theory to better understand whether that was indeed what the interviews suggested. In part, my theoretical choice was based on OH's belief that an oral historian's job is not merely to discover what a narrator intended by her remarks. Meaning is not necessarily already in place, waiting to be revealed. 148 Shoshana Felman and Dori Laub suggest, "One does not have to possess truth in order to effectively bear witness to it." 149 Sometimes people tell stories to search for truth that has previously eluded them rather than because they own that truth and want to convey it. The rhetorical act of revisiting helped narrators in this study reimagine and reconstruct their pasts, and my choice to use 147 For more on silences in rhetorical analysis, see Thomas Huckin, "Textual Silence and the Discourse of Homelessness," Discourse & Society 13, no. 3 (2002). 148 Umberto Eco, Richard Rorty, Jonathan Culler, and Christine Brooke-Rose, Interpretation and Overinterpretation, Stefan Collini, ed. (Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 1992). 149 Felman and Laub, Testimony, 15. 60 theory at the end rather than the beginning of that process allowed that construction to take center stage. OH and PCR have very different presentation styles in that OH privileges narrative, while PCR is expository. So as not to disrupt the narrative, OH writing discourages too-frequent use of headings and mandates footnotes rather than in-text style citation. PCR is classification oriented and expects headings and subheadings to separate distinct ideas and delineate the parts of whatever typology is proposed. OH uses Chicago or Turabian citation styles, while PCR ordinarily complies with the American Psychological Association (APA) style. Primary sources are essential in both methodological traditions, but in OH those sources are quoted, summarized, and cited as evidence of a rigorous and comprehensive research process, while in PCR those sources are used sparsely to illustrate a particular insight. The voices of narrators are loud in oral history, while PCR writing foregrounds the researcher. History writing is expected to be clear, engaging, and accessible to readers from many disciplines and the public, while PCR writing permits more specialized terminology and is generally geared to a disciplinary audience. Both OH and PCR present claims as local rather than general and connect each assertion to evidence. Both traditions acknowledge the limitations of the researchers' arguments and the inconclusiveness of the research process. Neither one presents findings as the one right answer. I struggled to sustain only one presentation style in this dissertation. For the most part, I used a narrative, historical style. My findings chapters include numerous stories from narrators, some retold by me and others quoted in narrators' own voices. To minimize interruption of the narrative, I footnoted sources and separated ideas with signal 61 sentences rather than using an abundance of headings and subheadings. I settled on source material rather than data. Each chapter begins with an engaging anecdote, and I strove to minimize specialized jargon. However, the very genre of dissertation writing insists upon exposition. This is not a novel or a work of creative nonfiction. I am required to explain my methodologies and theories and the historical context of the narrators' experiences, and that content does not lend itself to engaging narrative. Further, I know my evaluators come from multiple disciplines and may expect to see the conventions of their disciplines represented on the page. I have done my best to manage the competing priorities of the two methodological traditions that I blend in this research, being reflexive and transparent about my decisions and hoping in so doing to be seen as trustworthy and rigorous. Conclusion Blending two methodological traditions is complicated, and requires awareness of the paradigmatical differences as much as the practical ones. However, sometimes a project requires a researcher to push against disciplinary boundaries. This was just such a project. I needed a life-story method that would allow deep exploration of adolescence, but also place that adolescence in adult context. I needed an open-ended method that would allow me to probe Mormon homeland societies without having a clear idea of what I might find. I needed to be able to honor individual experience but also find patterns across a group and connect homeland Mormonism in 1975-2000 with homeland Mormonism in the present day. I needed rhetorical oral history. Oral history alone would not have provided sufficient contemporary perspective; rhetoric alone would have sent 62 me to the archive rather than to living sources. The next chapter explains totalism theory, traces scholarship on totalism since Erving Goffman first articulated it as a sociological phenomenon in 1961, and describes ways in which organizations and societies have been found to be totalizing. It considers why people might voluntarily submit to totalism and suggests that totalism research has largely ignored ordinary religious contexts and settings involving adolescents, and proposes that this study fills that gap. Finally, it situates isolation, rules, and regimentation-the three totalizing mechanisms found in narrators' stories-in the broad context of totalism research. CHAPTER 3 THEORY: TOTALISM AS A MEANS OF SOCIAL CONTROL Sociologist Erving Goffman inaugurated academic work on totalism. 150 He conducted long-term, embedded research at St. Elizabeth's Hospital for the mentally ill in 1955-56 and coined the term total institution to describe closed worlds such as in-patient hospitals, boarding schools, monasteries, prisons, and military training camps. Goffman suggested that in these institutions daily life is regimented, inmates are surrounded primarily by other inmates, and no one is allowed to leave the premises; individuality is systematically suppressed and social control is nearly total. A defining characteristic of totalism is the imbalance it promotes between group and individual. That imbalance is the result of the group's governance of most facets of individual identity. Scholars have extended Goffman's totalism theory by demonstrating that totalism can occur in groups that are joined voluntarily, in settings where barriers-to-exit are psychological not physical, and in less formally structured societies. Scholars have also identified that Craig A. McEwen, "Continuities in the Study of Total and Nontotal Institutions," Annual Review of Sociology 6 (1980): 143-185; Lawrence J. Friedman, Identity's Architect: A Biography of Erik H. Erikson (Cambridge: MA, Harvard University Press, 1999), 252. Psychologist Erik H. Erikson introduced totalism eight years earlier than Goffman in a paper presented at a conference on totalitarianism. However, his research veered from totalism to identity and ultimately had less impact on totalism theory than Goffman's. Today, Goffman is widely considered the father of totalism theory. 150 64 individuals being totalistically controlled have more options for exercising agency than Goffman initially claimed, and indeed, are never fully totalized. Totalism theory offers insights as to how narrators could have been controlled in Mormon homeland societies. It also helps explain why that control seemed benign and even necessary to homeland Mormons at the time, including to some of the young women themselves. Totalism gives a name to and validates what many of these women experienced. This chapter explains how totalism can arise in societal rather than institutional settings and suggests that Mormon homeland totalism was not sponsored by specific organizations or individuals. Then, it explores the nature of control in voluntary totalistic societies such as Mormon homelands, examines totalistic religious environments, and considers what scholars have said about Mormonism and totalism. Finally, it examines how the three mechanisms of control described by narrators in this study (isolation, rules, and regimentation) have been observed in other totalistic contexts. Totalism Outside of Institutional Settings Goffman provided the impetus for several generations of researchers in many disciplines to ask how groups could overrun individuals. Since his book, Asylums, was published in 1961, researchers have used the theoretical framework of totalism to examine residential institutions such as medical facilities, 151 schools, 152 homeless Benny Goodman, "Erving Goffman and the Total Institution," Nurse Education Today 33 (2013): 81-82. 152 Tammy McGuire, "Spiritual Labor and Spiritual Dissonance in the Total Institution of the Parochial Boarding School" (PhD diss., University of MissouriColumbia, 2006); Sim Van Der Ryn, "College Live-In," in Total Institutions, Samuel E. Wallace, ed. (New York, NY: Aldine Publishing Company, 1971), 68-86. 151 65 shelters, 153 and prisons. 154 Scholars have analyzed totalism in voluntary organizations such as corporations,155 churches,156 and gyms. 157 Totalism research has also been conducted in macrosocieties such as military and police units,158 legal systems,159 Elise Briggs Riker, "‘Love is Messy': On Value-Laden Rescue Institutions as Transformative Services" (PhD diss., Arizona State University, 2015); Louisa R. Stark, "The Shelter as ‘Total Institution': An Organizational Barrier to Remedying Homelessness," American Behavioral Scientist 37, no. 4 (February 1994): 553-562. 154 Maria Virginia G. Aguliar, "The Youth Facility as a Total Institution: A Focus on Experiences of Mortification," International Social Science Review 92, no. 2 (2017): article 3, https://digitalcommons.northgeorgia.edu/issr/vol92/iss2/3/; Ronald Paul Hill, Justine M. Rapp, Michael L. Capella, and the Gramercy Gentlemen, "Consumption Restriction in a Total Control Institution: Participatory Action Research in a Maximum Security Prison," Journal of Public Policy & Marketing 34, no. 2 (Fall 2015): 156-72; Brittany L. Peterson and Lacy G. McNamee, "The Communicative Construction of Involuntary Membership," Communication Quarterly 65, no. 2 (2017): 192-213. 155 Kristen Lucas, Dongjing Kang, and Zhou Li, "Workplace Dignity in a Total Institution: Examining the Experiences of Foxconn's Migrant Workforce," Journal of Business Ethics 114 (2013): 91-106; Edith Lilian Greenblatt, "A Paradox in Paradise: Depletion and Restoration of Personal Resources, Emotional Labor, and Burnout in an Idyllic Total Institution" (PhD thesis, Harvard University, 2001); Oded Shenkar, "The Firm as a Total Institution: Reflections on the Chinese State Enterprise," Organization Studies 17, no. 6 (1996): 885-907; Sarah J. Tracy, "Becoming a Character for Commerce: Emotion Labor, Self-Subordination, and Discursive Construction of Identity in a Total Institution," Management Communication Quarterly 14, no. 1 (August 2000): 90-128. 156 Matthew Wade, "Seeker-Friendly: The Hillsong Megachurch as an Enchanting Total Institution," Journal of Sociology 52, no. 4 (2016): 661-676; Phyllis Abel Gardner, "Peoples Temple: An Analysis of Alienation in a Total Institution" (PhD diss., Texas Woman's University, 2007); Thomas Robbins, Dick Anthony, Madeline Doucas, and Thomas Curtis, "The Last Civil Religion: Reverend Moon and the Unification Church," Sociological Analysis 37, no. 2 (1976): 111-125. 157 Marcelle C. Dawson, "CrossFit: Fitness Cult or Reinventive Institution?" International Review for the Sociology of Sport 52, no. 3 (2017): 361-379. 158 Jason Toole, "Student Departure at West Point: An Examination within a Total Institution" (PhD diss., University at Albany, State University of New York, 2017); Olly Owen, "Government Properties: The Nigeria Police Force as Total Institution?" Africa 86, no. 1 (2016): 37-58. 159 Richard Delgado, "Religious Totalism: Gentle and Ungentle Persuasion under the First Amendment," California Law Review 1, no. 100 (1977): 1-98. 153 66 communities, 160 and nations. 161 Recent scholars' understandings of totalism are more nuanced than Goffman's analysis, and one of those nuances is that totalism can occur in less formally organized, noninstitutional settings such as was found in Mormon homeland societies. Goffman conducted his totalism research on inmates who resided under the same roof or compound. 162 Scholars have since demonstrated that totalism does not require this kind of communal living. Totalistic control can be maintained symbolically, socially, or psychologically, not only physically. 163 Olly Owen argued that the Nigerian police force training programs totalistically controlled officers even though those officers resided in individual residences rather than communally. 164 Owen described how police training programs remade "personhood" by specifying acceptable "values, language, allegiances, and bodily regimentation" with the kind of force a residential institution such as a prison might have exerted. 165 Further, police officers were successfully separated from wider social intercourse by virtue of the psychological and social expectations put upon them rather than by physical constraints. Similarly, Mormon homelands could have been totalistic without having tangible walls. Anna Odrowaz-Coates, "A Gated Community as a ‘Soft' and Gendered Total Institution," International Sociology 30, no. 3 (2015): 233-249. 161 Stewart Clegg, Miguel Pina e Cunha, and Arménio Rego, "The Theory and Practice of Utopia in a Total Institution: The Pineapple Panopticon," Organization Studies 33, no. 12 (2012): 1735-1757. 162 Goffman, Asylums, 6. 163 Owen, "Government Properties"; Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities (London, England: Palgrave MacMillan, 2011), 1; Helen Rose Fuchs Ebaugh, Out of the Cloister: A Study of Organizational Dilemmas (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1977), 41. 164 Owen, "Government Properties," 37-58. 165 Owen, "Government Properties," 38. 160 67 Totalism also does not require formal organizational structure. It can occur in groups that are self-organized or ad-hoc and that are with or without civic/legal endorsement. 166 For instance, Sarah J. Hatteberg studied collegiate athletics and determined that athletes in four different sports experienced totalistic surveillance as a group, even though those athletes were not members of the same team. She observed, "Insularity and strict timetables [were] carried out, ostensibly, to further institutional goals," though there was no single formally designated institutional authority responsible for the behavior of the whole group. Coaches had responsibility for their own teams, and the college athletic department had accountability for athletic success generally. Hatteberg found totalistic control crossed organizational lines, with members of a team being disciplined or monitored by coaches from other teams or by athletic department personnel who were not part of a team's organizational structure. Participation in athletics seemed to put a student athlete into an informal group that could be totalistically controlled. Similarly, in my study, narrators experienced totalism by virtue of their common identities as young Mormon women residing in Mormon homelands. Totalism can occur in societies or nations rather than institutions or organizations. John W. Bennett found totalism in the communal sect of the Hutterian Brethren in the northern Great Plains of Canada. 167 The Brethrens' distributed religious communities shared a loose geographical proximity but residents were primarily connected by ideology and culture rather than physical or organizational structures. Political Mary Jo Hatch, Organizations: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2011), 14-16; Alexander Korchak, Totalistic Organizations: From Mafia to Global Terror (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2002), xii. 167 John W. Bennett, "Communal Brethren of the Great Plains," Total Institutions, 154-164. 166 68 philosophers have applied totalism theory on an even more macroscale, using the phrase totalitarianism to describe nations or civilizations that exercise complete control over their citizens. 168 Societal and national totalism often do not have a distinct sponsor; rather, totalistic societies emerge organically in response to social, cultural, and political conditions. 169 My research examines totalism in a noninstitutional setting. Narrators' experiences suggest they were controlled by Mormon homeland societies rather than by formal organizations or institutions: it seems that cultural, social, and religious practices in these societies combined to make young women feel totalized. I suggest totalism in Mormon homeland communities from 1975 through 2000, rather than being formally commissioned by the LDS church or initiated by specific individuals, arose as a multifaceted community response to the historical and culture milieu in Utah and the United States in the latter twentieth century. Voluntary Totalism, Peer Pressure, and Agency Susie Scott enlivened totalism theory by introducing "reinventive institutions" to the totalism lexicon. 170 Scott observed that a consumer-oriented, self-improvement mindset has popularized a form of totalism in which people voluntarily submit themselves to the surveillance of peers in order to transform or "reinvent" their identities into something believed to be better. 171 Scott argued that educational camps, therapeutic Leonard Schapiro, Totalitarianism (New York, NY: Praeger Publishers, 1972); Korchak, Totalistic Organizations. 169 Goffman, Asylums; Korchak, Totalistic Organizations. 170 Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities. 171 Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 2. 168 69 and rehabilitative clinics, and religious/spiritual communities all provide examples of reinventive totalistic institutions where people surrender to total authority to obtain a personal goal. The curtailment of liberty that is incurred is thought to be offset by attainment of an ideal that would be unreachable without social pressure. Goffman described this form of voluntary totalism many years before Scott did, calling it a "training station" or "retreat from the world," but he offered little analysis on how voluntary totalism differed from involuntary totalism. 172 In a reinventive institution, group members actively participate in their own identity transformation. 173 People who join and stay in a reinventive institution do so because of commitment to a cause, goal, creed, or vision, not because they are prohibited from leaving. 174 In a reinventive institution, members are subject to "performative regulation" rather than the "collective regimentation" proposed by Goffman. 175 Performative regulation is a combination of personal agency and community pressure, while collective regimentation uses external authority and community pressure, with agency playing little or no role. 176 Scott acknowledged the value of reinventive institutions to those who reside in them, but cautioned that enrollees are likely not as free as they believe themselves to be. 177 Once people submit to reinventive social control, they may not be cognizant of the ways they are being coerced into conforming or the negative implications related to self-image and relationships that may occur. For instance, Goffman, Asylums, 4-5. Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 28, 38-39. 174 Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 3. 175 Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 9, 30. 176 Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 6, 9. 177 Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 4-5, 234-245. 172 173 70 members of reinventive institutions must admit their own inadequacy and acknowledge the supremacy of the group in order to reap the benefits. Totalism for narrators in Mormon homeland communities was a complicated blend of choice and control. Mormonism itself is a voluntary commitment, so young women or their parents could supposedly have rejected specific Mormon practices or left the faith altogether if they felt too constrained, though religious groups are hard to leave. 178 Even in voluntary communities, social control can be more burdensome than expected. 179 Much has been written about why people cede determination of their own lives, especially when doing so can cause material or psychological harm. 180 George F. McHendry revealed the assault on self that he and others experienced when submitting to airport security protocols, and speculated as to why travelers continue to succumb. 181 Often, people believe the benefits of being part of a community outweigh the negatives of being constrained by that community. Realistically, most narrators in this study felt they had little control in Mormon homelands as young women. They could not choose where they lived or attended school. In many cases, they were not permitted by parents and leaders to withdraw support for Amorette Hinderaker, "Severing Primary Ties: Exit from Totalistic Organizations," Western Journal of Communication 79, no. 1 (January-February 2015): 92-115. 179 Dawson, "CrossFit: Fitness Cult or Reinventive Institution?" 180 Gardner, "Peoples Temple"; James R. Lewis, ed., Violence and New Religious Movements (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2011); McGuire, "Spiritual Labor and Spiritual Dissonance"; Toole, "Student Departure at West Point"; Catherine Wessinger, "The Problem is Totalism, Not ‘Cults': Reflections on the Thirtieth Anniversary of Jonestown," Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple, The Department of Religious Studies at San Diego State University, accessed January 19, 2017, http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=31459. 181 George F. (Guy) McHendry, Jr., "Thank You for Participating in Security: Engaging Airport Security Checkpoints via Participatory Critical Rhetoric," Culture Studies↔Critical Methodologies 16, no. 6 (2016): 548-559. 178 71 Mormonism or decide which church and community activities to attend. However, the girls' parents mostly came to Mormon homelands voluntarily. 182 Many were seeking performative regulation from the homeland society: they wanted their daughters to have friends who would pressure them into complying with Mormon behavior standards. Both parents and young women seemed to feel that if every aspect of a young woman's life was immersed in Mormonism, that young woman's identity would be transformed ("reinvented") spiritually. Any potential loss of individuality was either not critically examined or was considered a normal and acceptable constraint. After surveying the first two decades of research on totalism, Craig A. McEwen concluded that individuals are never as subsumed by totalistic societies, institutions, and organizations as Goffman claimed. 183 Goffman framed inmates as largely unable to do anything about the oppression they experienced. However, McEwen argued that those living in repressive societies have been creative and successful at "prevent[ing] organizations from making substantial inroads on their psyches." 184 Group members have used "personal and sociocultural characteristics" to resist organizational pressures in a variety of ways. 185 Organizational communication scholars have suggested resistance is an ever-present aspect of organizing. 186 This study examines ways narrators offered material and rhetorical resistance to totalizing control. Some refused to cooperate as adolescents, questioning even in their youth the pressure they felt in homeland societies Some came for family or economic reasons. McEwen, "Continuities," 168-169. 184 McEwen, "Continuities," 169. 185 McEwen, "Continuities," 169. 186 Fleming and Spicer, "Beyond Power and Resistance"; James A. Anderson and Elaine E. Englehardt, The Organizational Self and Ethical Conduct: Sunlit Virtue and Shadowed Resistance (Orlando, FL: Harcourt College Publishers, 2001). 182 183 72 and the ideological presumptions that helped sustain that pressure. More often, however, narrators did not challenge the performative regulation of homeland societies until they became adults. In their interviews with me, narrators described actions they have taken recently to create materially different environments than those they encountered as young women in Mormon homelands. In addition, for many narrators, articulating their stories for this study seemed to be an act of resistance that bolstered self-worth and clarified aspects of their adolescent experiences that had formerly gone unexamined. Totalism, Religion, and Mormonism Religions are totalizing to some extent because they seek to regulate multiple facets of followers' identities, and they leverage a community of devotees to help transform believers into more ideal people. 187 It is not uncommon for religious practices to influence or govern family and friend relationships, dress and appearance, leisure pursuits, professional endeavors, and place of residence, in addition to aspects of life more traditionally considered spiritual such as place and manner of worship. However, religions generally regulate performatively rather than collectively, meaning they solicit voluntary obedience rather than forcing compliance. 188 Narrators' experiences suggest the LDS church generally operates in this performative manner. Some religions are more totalistic than others. Scholars have noted that religions involving communal living are, not surprisingly, more all-encompassing, and therefore Susie Scott, "Religious and Spiritual Communities," in Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 54-87 (London, England: Palgrave MacMillan, 2011); Samuel E. Wallace, "On the Totality of Institutions," Total Institutions, 1-7. 188 Scott, "Religious and Spiritual Communities," 54-87. 187 73 more likely to suppress individual agency. 189 For example, Helen Rose Fuchs Ebaugh examined how Catholic religious orders totalized nuns who participated in them, and how that totalization has reduced over time as nuns have been allowed to work and live outside of convents. 190 Scott observed that religions that isolate members from the wider society or that are "intolerant of other values and belief systems" are also known to be more totalizing, whether communal or not. 191 Samuel Hardman Taylor et al. argued that any religion that involves itself in members' daily lives outside of worship services can be unduly constraining, 192 and they suggested Mormonism is this kind of obtrusive religion. Taylor, Amorette Hinderaker, and their co-authors have conducted five studies together and individually-including Hinderaker's dissertation research-that examined Mormonism from an organizational socialization disciplinary paradigm. 193 They focused primarily on the relationships Mormons forego when opting out of the religion; 194 they also offered a case study comparing the socialization process when entering a Mormon congregation to the socialization stages observed in corporations and other secular Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 63. Fuchs Ebaugh, Out of the Cloister. 191 Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 62-63 192 Samuel Hardman Taylor, Jordan Young, Sydney Summers, Johny T. Garner, and Amorette Hinderaker, "Entering the Fold: Exploring the Encounter Stage in the Socialization Process within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints," Journal of Communication & Religion 38, no. 3 (Fall 2015): 67-88. 193 Amorette Hinderaker, "Leaving the Family: Exit from Totalistic Organizations" (PhD diss., North Dakota State University, 2013); Amorette Hinderaker, "Whom I Have Called: The Ordain Women Movement and the Narrative of Dissent in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saint," Southern Communication Journal 82, no. 2 (2017): 152-163; Amorette Hinderaker and Johny T. Garner, "Speaking Up on My Way Out the Door: A Close Examination of Church Exit and Members' Dissent," Journal of Communication & Religion, 39, no. 3 (Fall 2016): 21-40; Taylor et al., "Entering the Fold"; Hinderaker, "Severing Primary Ties." 194 Hinderaker and Garner, "Speaking Up on My Way Out the Door"; Hinderaker, "Severing Primary Ties." 189 190 74 organizations. 195 Their research acknowledged a peculiarity of Mormonism that is relevant to my study: geographically based congregation assignments and the challenges for congregants who cannot change worship communities without moving residences. 196 Hinderaker and her colleagues' body of work is the first published communication research to connect totalism to a religious organization, 197 and the only research in any discipline to examine Mormonism and totalism together. My study extends those of Hinderaker and her colleagues because it identifies specific totalizing mechanisms by which narrators felt controlled. It considers implications of totalism on young women's identities and explores how individuality can be exerted both materially and rhetorically. It also demonstrates that totalism is not universally manifest across Mormonism. Hinderaker claims Mormonism is "far more institutionalized than other faith organizations" and "more totalistic than many other mainstream religions," 198 implying Mormonism is totalistic without variation across congregations, geographies, demographic groups, and time periods. By contrast, the experiences of narrators in my study indicated that while Mormonism in homeland communities was sometimes totalizing, Mormonism practiced in other locations was much less so. Even in homelands, the degree of totalizing control narrators experienced varied widely. My findings complicate Hinderaker et al.'s depictions of Mormon totalism as monolithic. Taylor et al., "Entering the Fold." Taylor et al., "Entering the Fold," 70. Taylor et al. are some of the few communication scholars to acknowledge that socialization in a faith community happens on two levels: institutionally and congregationally. They compare congregational socialization to a job transfer. 197 I am aware of a dissertation project in progress in the Communication department at Ohio University that associates Mormonism and totalism. 198 Hinderaker, "Severing Primary Ties," 94. 195 196 75 My research also brings an underrepresented communication perspective to the study of totalism. Besides the work of Hinderaker and her co-authors, only two other communication studies have involved totalism: Sarah J. Tracy's exploration of "emotion labor" and identity in a totalistic workplace, and Brittany L. Peterson and Lacy G. McNamee's analysis of how communicative practices constructed inmate identity in a prison. 199 In existing communication studies, totalism theory is peripheral rather than central, meaning the research settings were described as totalistic but characteristics and implications of totalism were not examined. My research is one of only two known studies of totalism and adolescent women in any discipline, and the only one conducted in a religious setting. 200 It provides a valuable examination of totalism in ordinary rather than extreme religious contexts. Most of the scholarship on totalism and religion to this point concerns New Religious Movements (NRMs) and religious totalism. 201 New Religious Movements is a contested label used by scholars to describe groups that have arisen in the United States since the mid-1960s to provide meaning or spiritual direction. 202 These groups are sometimes 199 Hinderaker, "Whom I Have Called"; Hinderaker and Garner, "Speaking Up on My Way Out the Door"; Taylor et al., "Entering the Fold"; Hinderaker, "Severing Primary Ties"; Tracy, "Becoming a Character for Commerce"; Peterson and McNamee, "Communicative Construction of Involuntary Membership." 200 Briggs Riker, "‘Love is Messy'"; Fuchs Ebaugh, Out of the Cloister. The other study is with adolescent women at a shelter for unwed mothers. Some women in Fuchs Ebaugh's 1977 examination of Catholic religious orders are in late adolescence, but her focus is on adult nuns. 201 Gardner, "Peoples Temple"; Lewis, Violence and New Religious Movements; Scott, "Religious and Spiritual Communities"; Wessinger, "The Problem is Totalism, Not ‘Cults;'" Wade, "Seeker-Friendly: The Hillsong Megachurch." 202 Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 60; David Bromley, "New Religious Movements," in Encyclopedia of Religion and Society, ed. William H. Swatos, Jr. (Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press, 1998). 76 called cults or alternative religions. Some NRMs have been benign or beneficial to followers, 203 while others have led to dramatically public examples of psychological and physical harm, such as the mass suicides of The People's Temple of the Disciples of Christ followers in Jonestown, Guyana, in 1978. 204 When violence occurs or when other evidence indicates individual agency has been manipulated or repressed beyond socially acceptable levels, scholars claim these groups have demonstrated religious totalism. 205 The term religious totalism is generally applied only to situations where devotees of NRMs have committed mass suicides or physically harmed outsiders. This study does not consider the LDS church a New Religious Movement because of its 178-year life span and large worldwide membership. 206 Further, the study does not use the phrase religious totalism to describe what narrators encountered. Instead, I use totalism without the religious modifier. The phrase religious totalism carries a connotation of extremity that does not reflect narrators' experiences and could hinder a nuanced analysis of homeland Mormonism by encouraging readers to assume individuality was wholly overrun. While some narrators felt materially and psychologically harmed by their experiences in Mormon homelands, those narrators did not encounter the full-scale destruction of individuality found in incidents such as Jonestown that are typically labeled religious totalism. 207 Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 63; Wade, "Seeker-Friendly: The Hillsong Megachurch." 204 Gardner, "Peoples Temple"; Lewis, Violence and New Religious Movements. 205 Wessinger, "The Problem is Totalism, Not ‘Cults.'" 206 Some experts consider the LDS church an NRM, while others do not. 207 Gardner, "Peoples Temple"; Lewis, Violence and New Religious Movements. 203 77 Mechanisms of Totalistic Control Authority in totalistic societies is what Goffman calls echelon authority. In echelon authority systems, any member of the [ruling or] staff class has . . . rights to discipline any member of the inmate class." 208 Rather than have a direct supervisor, members are subject to a supervisory group, all of whom frequently critique "dress, deportment, and manners." 209 In totalistic societies, relatively few people hold authority positions and are part of this supervisory class. (There are more inmates than guards; students outnumber teachers.) Control is not sustained by numerical advantage, especially in voluntary totalistic environments; rather, it is maintained by structural characteristics of the organization or society. Policies, procedures, and information flows serve to reduce individuality and minimize resistance. This study builds on extant research on totalism and narrators' interviews to identify three mechanisms of control that narrators seemed to encounter in Mormon homeland societies: isolation, rules, and regimentation. First, some narrators said they were isolated from outsiders in the name of safety. This isolation was sustained by Mormon social circles, fear of the outside world, and surveillance. Second, inflexible rules-mostly unwritten ones about family, income, and appearance-governed nearly every social interaction. Many narrators felt difference was considered wrong in homeland societies, individual needs were not met, and rule-enforcers had absolute power. To be accepted narrators felt they had to submit to the group's determinations of value, a trade of self-worth for belonging. Third, most narrators said their lives were 208 209 Goffman, Asylums, 42. Goffman, Asylums, 41. 78 highly regimented. This regimentation included mandatory participation in church sponsored activities and an expectation that every woman would follow the same preprogrammed life path. Narrators were told that adhering to the collective program would ultimately benefit them and everyone else because the group would help shape Mormons into more ideal people than they could become on their own. Young women were expected do their duty and sacrifice individual choice for the improvement of self and others. Totalism research suggests that isolation, rules, and regimentation each provide potentially significant levels of identity constraint, as demonstrated in the following sections. Isolation Totalistic societies sever relationships between members and outsiders, both physically and symbolically. 210 Visits are curtailed and sometimes prohibited altogether. People's only socialization is with other members of the society, and they are discouraged or prevented from maintaining associations with people they knew before entering the group. 211 Those being controlled are told that such measures are necessary for their own good. Communications to and from relatives and friends outside the society are limited. 212 Whatever information members of a totalistic society do receive is filtered Goffman, Asylums; Wade, "Seeker-Friendly: The Hillsong Megachurch," 672; Owen, "Government Properties," 40; Fuchs Ebaugh, Out of the Cloister, 41. Owen's work with the Nigerian Police Form challenges this assumption of isolation. He demonstrates that totalism can occur even in a group that has a mission to interact with the public rather than remain secluded from them. Wade's analysis of the Hillsong Megachurch advances the same argument. 211 Hinderaker and Garner, "Speaking Up On My Way Out the Door," 26-27. 212 Robert Jay Lifton, Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of "Brainwashing" in China (New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1963), 420. 210 79 through an authority figure within the society. 213 Robert Jay Lifton argued, "The most basic feature of the thought reform environment . . . is the control of human communication, . . . [which is called] milieu control." In voluntary reinventive societies, prohibitions on outside contact may be reduced; however, society members are still encouraged to socialize primarily with each other. 214 A person who is mistreated by someone in an insular totalistic society has no options available for reporting that mistreatment or changing her situation. 215 Entry and exit to the society are restricted. Samuel E. Wallace says, "Low probability of escape should be accepted as one of the basic indications of totality." 216 Even in voluntary totalistic societies, once a person has joined, it is difficult to leave. 217 Defectors rarely, if ever, return. Totalistic societies foster a fear of outsiders. They tell members that people outside of the society do not trust, like, or understand them. This fear is an essential part of establishing and sustaining isolation and is often accomplished by dehumanizing outsiders. Dehumanization is the cognitive and discursive act of determining that a person or population group is "not like me in any way." 218 The implication is that if I am human, and this person is unlike me, then he or she must be inhuman, or at least inadequate compared to most humans. This categorization precludes empathy because it Goffman, Asylums, 119-20; Lifton, Thought Reform, 420-422. Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities. 215 Goffman, Asylums. 216 Wallace, Total Institutions, 6. 217 Hinderaker and Garner, "Speaking Up on My Way Out the Door"; Hinderaker, "Severing Primary Ties"; Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities. 218 Karen Stollznow, "Dehumanisation in Language and Thought," Journal of Language and Politics 7, no. 2 (2008): 184. 213 214 80 assumes a lack of common ground. W. Paul Reeve claimed dehumanization occurred in nineteenth-century Mormonism when fearful Mormon settlers massacred a wagon train that had become an "enemy in need of elimination" rather than a group of individuals. 219 Dehumanization can occur in ordinary societies and nonviolent circumstances, even though the concept is usually applied to extreme situations such as genocide and war. 220 In Mormon homeland societies, some narrators were taught that non-Mormons were dangerous and that they themselves were helpless and needed protection. They were isolated from former friends and discouraged or prevented from socializing with people who did not seem properly Mormon, and they were under constant surveillance by peers and adults. Chapter 5 examines narrators' isolation in Mormon homelands and demonstrates that narrators were often expected to forego charity to sustain that isolation. Rules Since totalism is a method of reforming or neutralizing an inferior population segment, one way totalism is maintained is by the establishment of strict rules that determine who is acceptable and who is not. 221 Totalism requires a "universally accepted code of personal morality . . . or ethical orientation," and inflexible and pervasive rules exist to ensure members "adopt and exemplify" that morality. 222 Totalistic societies believe there is "one path," and those who are on that path are better members of society 219 W. Paul Reeve, "The Mormon Church in Utah," in The Oxford Handbook of Mormonism, Terryl Givens, ed. (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2015), 46. 220 Stollznow, "Dehumanisation," 184. 221 Stark, "The Shelter as ‘Total Institution,'" 555; Goffman, Asylums, 48. 222 Wade, "Seeker-Friendly: The Hillsong Megachurch," 671. 81 than those who are not. 223 People are supposed to embrace both the group's definition of the right path and its criteria for how to determine if one is on the path. Sameness of appearance and behavior indicates compliance with rules and therefore signifies superior virtue. For example, the Hutterian Brethren believed that uniformity of clothes and possessions is what kept their religious communities together. 224 Whenever one of their societies failed, "the first symptoms [were] always individual purchases of consumer goods, especially clothes." 225 Any society pressures newcomers to adopt popular styles and mannerisms, but in a totalistic society, those who do not succumb to the pressure are considered morally unsuitable rather than merely different. Scott argues that "distribution of civil rights [is] linked to the respective moral status" of people in totalistic societies: 226 those who do not meet group norms receive few privileges and their oppression is considered proper and necessary by people in charge of enforcing rules. Rule-based totalistic societies are exclusive and hierarchical, meaning everyone is presumed to be either a rule-follower, rule-breaker, or rule-enforcer. Rule-breakers are swiftly punished, rule-followers are lauded even if they act in ways that would be unacceptable outside of the totalistic environment, and rule-enforcers have unlimited power. Rule-breakers and rule-followers are both part of an "inmate class" that is distinct from the "staff class" occupied by all rule-enforcers. 227 In order to survive, members of the inmate class must subordinate their individual value systems to the judgment of the Lifton, Thought Reform, 434. Bennett, "Communal Brethren," 160. 225 Bennett, "Communal Brethren," 160. 226 Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 15-16. 227 Goffman, Asylums, 67-70. 223 224 82 staff class. In extreme totalitarian societies, those who are morally inferior may be considered nonpeople whose very right to exist is challenged.228 Lifton explained how political criminals in China during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in the 1960s were executed if they could not demonstrate that they had reformed ideologically and morally within two years. 229 Narrators felt some Mormon homelanders from 1975 through 2000 believed themselves to be morally superior to newcomers based on their compliance with unwritten rules of Mormon-ness. These rules related to such things as prior residence in Mormon homelands, ancestors' importance in Mormon history, compliance with a typically Mormon appearance or family structure, and achievement of a proper level of financial success. Chapter 6 discusses exclusivity in homeland Mormon societies and examines how narrators said difference was considered wrong, individual needs were not met, and rule-enforcers held absolute power. It also examines how some narrators thought they had to give up their self-worth in order to be accepted. Regimentation In totalistic institutions, each person follows the same linear, preprogrammed schedule. This is most extreme in prisons or reform schools, where everyone utilizes one training curriculum, mealtimes never vary, and people sleep and wake on a precise schedule that is the same for those around them. 230 Even during free periods, only certain Lifton, Thought Reform, 433-437. Lifton, Thought Reform, 433 230 Peterson and McNamee, "Communicative Construction of Involuntary Membership," 204-205; Goffman, Asylums. 228 229 83 activities can be done at designated locations. Participation in group activities and programs is closely monitored and sustained with physical and psychological rewards and discipline. For example, employees at Foxconn, a Chinese corporate residential compound, were required to march together and chant slogans or credos, 231 and the company mandated attendance at team and organization activities. 232 Those who did not comply received tangible punishments (such as curfews) and intangible punishments (such as being called disloyal). Not only does tight daily programming restrict the number of physical spaces those in charge need to monitor, but it makes any deviation immediately visible to both peers and authority figures. There is little room in the program for individual or situational adaptation. In totalistic societies that are not formally commissioned, daily life has controls but also has somewhat more variety; however, life courses are highly regimented. A person is expected to move through her assigned educational, occupational, and relationship tracks in the proper time frames. For example, in Hutterian communities, children are educated at home until age three, then sent to the colony's nursery school until age six, then instructed by the public school teacher until eighth grade. 233 They return to their families at the age of fifteen and are baptized at twenty. Similarly, student members of Hillsong church are not permitted to enter into a relationship during their first semester of college without permission from church authorities, and they are Lucas et al., "Workplace Dignity," 100-101. Ironically, Foxconn Technology Group required employees to attend, costume themselves in company shirts, and hold signs at a company suicide prevention rally after the high suicide rate was determined to be the result of a coercive company culture. 232 Lucas et al., "Workplace Dignity." 233 Bennett, "Communal Brethren," 160-161. 231 84 expected to observe a three-month hiatus between relationships. 234 In the United States Military Academy at West Point, every cadet is supposed to complete the program in eight semesters. Those who take longer receive pejorative nicknames and other mistreatment. 235 In voluntary reinventive totalistic societies, cooperation with regimentation is secured by making society members believe they will be personally improved if they allow society to determine their schedules, activities, and priorities. 236 For example, people who attend fitness camps think they will achieve greater weight loss in a shorter amount of time if they give instructors authority to force attendance at classes, workouts, and nutrition counseling sessions. The society claims to produce a transformation that would be impossible without group pressure and it persuades individuals to sacrifice their agency for self-actualization. 237 In this kind of totalism, preservation of the group is considered a duty from which all will ultimately benefit. Individual choices that diminish the group's authority are severe offenses. Thus, withdrawing oneself from the group is frowned upon, while encouraging others to withdraw is considered a significant betrayal. Narrators found daily life in Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000 to be highly regimented, with a greater emphasis on active participation than on spiritual conversion. Young women were expected to attend church services and mid-week Young Women (YW) activities, participate in summer camp and regional training conferences, and take part in a goal-setting program. In addition, narrators felt pressured to follow Wade, "Seeker-Friendly: The Hillsong Megachurch," 671. Toole, "Student Departure at West Point," 9. 236 Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 30-31. 237 Scott, Total Institutions and Reinvented Identities, 4, 142. 234 235 85 prescribed paths of wifehood and motherhood for the support of the collective society regardless of personal interests. Chapter 7 discusses collectivism and the obligations narrators felt to support socially mandated activities and identity paths. It explains how some narrators felt they had to give up their agency for the promise of self-actualization. Conclusion The three mechanisms of social control and the strategies of identity reinvention narrators encountered in homeland Mormon societies during this period were similar to those that have been observed in more obviously totalistic environments. Mormon young women's language, appearance, and behaviors seemed to be channeled in specific, socially acceptable ways. Many times, narrators believed homelanders thought they were weak or inadequate, needing protection and training to become contributing members of Mormon society, a construction of identity often found in totalistic societies. Mormon homeland totalism was not as extreme as that found in New Religious Movements, though it was distressing and harmful to some who encountered it. Mormon homeland totalism did not seem to be initiated by the LDS church or any specific individual, and young women and their parents may have helped establish or strengthen it, as often happens with voluntary totalism. The following chapter explores the historical context in which Mormon homelands felt totalizing to narrators from 1975 through 2000. An analysis of major social and cultural happenings in twentieth-century Mormon homelands demonstrates that this geography and time period afforded a convergence of many factors that scholars have identified as likely to encourage totalism. CHAPTER 4 HISTORICAL BACKGROUND: MORMONISM IN TURMOIL In 1869, polygamist and LDS church President Brigham Young assembled his many daughters into a Young Ladies Retrenchment Association so they could band together to fend off worldly influences. 238 Earlier that year, the transcontinental railroad had come to Utah, bringing hundreds of Gentiles (non-Mormons) and their dangerous foreign perspectives to this Mormon homeland territory. 239 Young asked his daughters, as charter members of an organization that became church-wide, to support each other by voting "to retrench . . . everything that was bad and worthless, and improve in everything that is good and beautiful." 240 He enjoined them to forego extravagance in clothing, 238 Carol Cornwall Madsen, "Retrenchment Association," in Encyclopedia of Mormonism (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University, 2007). 239 Lamar C. Berrett, "Salt Lake Valley," in Encyclopedia of Mormonism (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University, 2007); Thomas K. Hafen, "City of Saints, City of Sinners: The Development of Salt Lake City as a Tourist Attraction 1869-1900," Western Historical Quarterly 28, no. 3 (Autumn, 1997), 343-377. Some Mormons saw an opportunity to redeem their public image and benefit economically from these outsiders. 240 Irene Hewette Ericksen, "Auxiliary Organizations," in Encyclopedia of Mormonism (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University, 2007); "Retrench," Noah Webster's 1828 Dictionary, http://webstersdictionary1828.com/Dictionary/retrench.The organization was part of the Senior and Junior Cooperative Retrenchment Association that included adult women and eventually, young women who were not Young's daughters. In a contemporaneous Christian-oriented dictionary (selected over Oxford English Dictionary for this study because of its explicit connection to Christianity and to the United States), to retrench meant to cut off, pare away, abridge, or curtail. The 87 speech, and eating so as to be better examples to others inside and outside of the fledging church. 241 After this spirited injunction, one of his daughters removed the ruffles from her dresses to show her priorities were with God, though a male friend told her she looked like she was wearing "a yard of pump water." 242 Forming new organizational structures to help the community oversee and protect its young women was not unique to Brigham Young's time. During what has been called the second Mormon retrenchment in the last half of the twentieth century, the LDS church undertook a far-reaching reorganization of departments, reporting relationships, and communication. 243 This was called Priesthood Correlation and it brought adult and biblical example given was "And thy exuberant parts retrench," a scripture indicating that the physical body needs discipline. When Brigham Young applied this word to young women, he may have held a prevailing view of the time that female bodies were dangerous and immoral. 241 The church was thirty-nine years old. Brigham Young was the second president, and he had held office for twenty-two years. 242 Zina Young Card, "Our Stories: A Willing and Obedient Daughter," Young Women, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed October 21, 2016, https://www.lds.org/callings/young-women/leader-resources/history/ourstories?lang=eng. I have chosen to use official church sources when reporting membership numbers, facts about organizational structure, and policy decisions. I also use official sources to examine church rhetoric. I use a wide variety of other sources, including academic ones, to explore all other topics. 243 For a church perspective on correlation, see Harold B. Lee, "The Correlation Program," Improvement Era 66 (June 1963) and "Chapter 43: An Era of Correlation and Consolidation," Church History in the Fullness of Times Student Manual (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2003), 562-78. For an academic perspective, see Bowman, The Mormon People, 184-215. For more about the sociological context of latter twentieth-century Mormonism, see Armand L. Mauss, The Angel and the Beehive: The Mormon Struggle with Assimilation (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1994) and Armand L. Mauss, "The Mormon Struggle with Assimilation and Identity: Trends and Developments Since Midcentury," Dialogue 27, no. 1 (Spring 1994): 129-149. 88 young women's organizations under central control, 244 reducing autonomy of women and young women and making it easier for other congregants to monitor and guide them. 245 Church leaders and members may have thought "retrenchment Mormonism" was necessary in the latter part of the 1900s because homeland Mormons-and Mormon women in particular-were encountering many unsettling new ideas, just as they had toward the end of the 1800s. 246 The Women's Liberation and Civil Rights movements threatened the church's sociopolitical insularity, and advancements in mass communication technologies made the ideologies of those movements increasingly accessible. The emerging academic study of religion and Mormonism brought unprecedented critiques of church history and practices. The church's intense missionary efforts outside of the United States, combined with the 1978 policy change removing race as a criterion for ordination, introduced an element of otherness the homeland Mormon population had not usually encountered. Homeland Mormons may have felt besieged and more in need of their community of believers than ever before. In 1981, the First Presidency declared "perfecting the saints" to be a core purpose for the church, formalizing the responsibility congregants had to help each other maintain righteous behaviors. 247 Faith-based societies of many denominations expect members to monitor, 244 Changes not directly related to the women's organizations were also part of the Priesthood Correlation program. See Lee, "The Correlation Program" for additional information. 245 For an analysis of this issue, see Tina Hatch, "‘Changing Times Bring Changing Conditions': Relief Society, 1960 to the Present," Dialogue 37, no. 3 (Fall 2004), 65-98. Others claim women received significant benefits from centralized organizational structures. 246 Bowman, The Mormon People, 190-3, 298. 247 Spencer W. Kimball, "A Report of My Stewardship," Saturday Morning Session, April 1981 General Conference, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. "New Handbooks Introduced during Worldwide Training," Church News, November 12, 2010. 89 support, encourage, and discipline each other. This is also true in secular groups such as work teams and classrooms. While no research can precisely explain why Mormon homeland societies seemed totalizing for some narrators in this time period, understanding the historical and cultural contexts in which the homeland church and its members operated may provide some insight. This chapter briefly summarizes nineteenth-century Mormon experiences of persecution and separation. Then it offers details about Priesthood Correlation, explores movements in twentieth-century American society that likely affected Mormons organizationally and individually, and discusses trends within Mormonism that may have converged with societal factors to encourage totalism from 1975 through 2000. Nineteenth-Century Persecution and Separation Early Mormonism has a history of persecution, migration, and separation from mainstream society. The first Mormon prophet and church President, Joseph Smith Jr., was killed by a mob fourteen years after he started the LDS church, in part because of his countercultural teachings about marriage and eternal family relationships. 248 Prior to fleeing to the Intermountain West, groups of Mormons had many violent clashes with their Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois neighbors. 249 In 1838, the governor of Missouri signed what has come to be known as The Extermination Order, authorizing residents to The other three elements of the mission are redeeming the dead, proclaiming the gospel, and caring for the poor and needy. The first three components of the mission were introduced by President Kimball at a general conference meeting. Caring for the poor and needy was added as a fourth element in the church's leadership handbook in 2010. The First Presidency is the highest governing body of the church. 248 Bowman, The Mormon People, 88-90. 249 Bowman, The Mormon People, 54-58, 60-61. 90 forcefully drive Mormons out of the state and kill those who refused to leave. 250 Both Mormons and Missourians suffered harm in subsequent disputes. The bulk of the church members abandoned their homes, businesses, and farms and resettled in Nauvoo, Illinois, where they remained for approximately five years before again being violently expelled. 251 This started a mass migration of about 12,000 people who relocated from Illinois to what became the Utah Territory under duress over an eight-month period. 252 By the time church leader Brigham Young led the vanguard company of believers to Salt Lake City, Utah, in 1847, Mormons had been religious refugees three times, lost their prophet to martyrdom, and been the subject of state-sanctioned attack. It is in this context that Young's remarks to his fellow travelers his first day in the Salt Lake Valley should be heard. Young reportedly said, "I am determined to cut every thread . . . and live free and independent, untrammeled by any of their detestable customs and practices." 253 Presumably, their referred to residents of the states where Mormons had experienced persecution, as well as to the local and federal governments that had encouraged the conflict rather than protected devotees to the new religion. The Mormons, under the forty-year leadership of Young, went on to create what historian Leonard Arrington has identified as the "Great Basin Kingdom," a religious society isolated 250 William G. Hartley, "Missouri's 1838 Extermination Order and the Mormons' Forced Removal to Illinois," Mormon Historical Studies 2, no. 1 (2001): 5-27. The order was rescinded in 1976 by Missouri Governor Christopher Bond. 251 W. Paul Reeve, "The Mormon Church in Utah," in The Oxford Handbook of Mormonism, Terryl Givens, ed. (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2015), 3839. 252 Reeve, "The Mormon Church in Utah," 38. 253 As reported in Roland O. Barney, ed., "28 July 1847," The Mormon Vanguard Brigade of 1847: Norton Jacob's Record (Logan, UT: Utah State University Press, 2005). 91 geographically, politically, and economically from the rest of North America for at least two decades. 254 This isolation began to dissipate after the transcontinental rail line was completed through Utah in 1869. 255 The greater access brought by the railroad delivered outside social influences and enabled increased interference from the U.S. Congress, whose members were not pleased with LDS teachings about polygamy and theocracy. 256 In 1887, the Congress passed the Edmunds-Tucker act, which disincorporated the church, disenfranchised women voters, and enabled federal seizure of church property, including the three temples then in operation in Utah. 257 In 1890, then-prophet Wilford Woodruff issued a manifesto instructing Mormons to stop practicing polygamy. 258 In 1893, church leaders accepted presidential amnesty for their past polygamy, and in 1896, the Utah Territory was admitted as the forty-fifth U.S. state. 259 Scholars have observed that narratives of persecution and withdrawal are woven deep into Mormon identity and still manifest themselves in church culture more than a hundred years after the most active mistreatment ended. 260 The church's nineteenth254 Leonard J. Arrington, Great Basin Kingdom: An Economic History of the Latterday Saints 1830-1900 (Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 1958). 255 Bowman, The Mormon People, 119, 152. 256 Reeve, "The Mormon Church in Utah," 43-45. 257 S. George Ellsworth, "An Introduction," in Utah's Road to Statehood, eds. Bradford R. Cole and Kenneth R. Williams, Utah Manuscripts Committee and the Utah Statehood Centennial Commission, accessed May 18, 2018, https://archives.utah.gov/community/exhibits/Statehood/intronew.htm. 258 "The Manifesto and the End of Plural Marriage," Gospel Topics, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed May 18, 2018, https://www.lds.org/topics/themanifesto-and-the-end-of-plural-marriage?lang=eng. 259 Bowman, The Mormon People, 150. 260 For examples, see Jared Farmer, "Crossroads of the West," Journal of Mormon History 41, no. 1 (January 2015): 159; John Durham Peters, "Mormonism and Media," in 92 century history may provide context for the isolation, rules, and regimentation many narrators encountered in Mormon homelands. Priesthood Correlation and YW Programs The LDS church began centralizing governance and control under a Priesthood Correlation initiative that was fully implemented by the end of the 1970s. 261 This "era of correlation and consolidation" was made necessary by growing church membership, increased societal threats to the family, and a redundant and complex administrative structure that had emerged rhizomatically. 262 On September 30, 1961, senior church apostle Elder Harold B. Lee asked the General Priesthood Committee to review all units, curriculums, and programs to ensure they were coordinated with priesthood leadership. 263 Leaders were concerned that many church programs were not working "harmoniously with the Priesthood" to "prepare a people worthy to establish Zion on earth." 264 Suborganizations such as Young Women (YW) needed more oversight to fulfill their appointed purpose of helping members keep God's commandments. The Oxford Handbook of Mormonism, Terryl Givens, ed. (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2015), 410. 261 "Chapter 43: An Era of Correlation and Consolidation," 562-78. 262 Deseret Morning News 2004 Church Almanac, 582. Church membership doubled between 1950 and 1964, reaching 2.2 million. 263 "Correlation Announced," Church History, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, accessed October 21, 2016, https://history.lds.org/event/correlationannounced?lang=eng. Lee was a member of the top church-wide leadership quorum, known as the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. The General Priesthood Committee is a group that worked under the direct supervision of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles to coordinate and consolidate church administrative functions. 264 Priesthood with a capital letter has three meanings in Mormonism: 1) the authority to act for God members believe their religion has, 2) male persons who are given such authority via a prayer ritual performed by other men, and 3) top church leaders. All three are probably intended here. 93 Over the next fifteen years, the church followed a pattern of professional bureaucratization. 265 Budgets were centralized. New priesthood committees were tasked with creating, producing, and distributing curricula for each age group of members. Four general priesthood committees took over home teaching, genealogy and temple, missionary, and welfare programs church-wide. 266 The teaching year was set to January 1 for all regions, and every church unit was prohibited from scheduling activities on Monday nights, which were to be reserved for Family Home Evening. 267 The Public Communications Department, the Physical Facilities Department, and the Historical Department were formed to assume the function of several previously independent programs. 268 The church built a large central administration building and relocated staff from rented buildings disbursed throughout Mormon headquarters in Salt Lake City, Utah. Leaders consolidated magazines so there was one publication for each life stage (children, youth, and adults). 269 They streamlined aspects of the church's educational system and appointed a new commissioner of education. 270 Critics of Priesthood Correlation have observed that what began as an effort to ensure members in all locations could learn necessary doctrine may have become a system that regulated daily minutiae; 265 Jill Mulvay Derr and C. Brooklyn Derr, "Outside the Mormon Hierarchy: Alternative Aspects of Institutional Power," Dialogue 15 (Winter 1982): 21-43. 266 Home teaching is a church program of visiting all members in their own homes once each month. Genealogy is the study of past ancestors and family lineage. Latter-day Saint temples are places where members go to make covenants with God and be eternally connected (called sealed) to living and dead relatives. 267 Family Home Evening is a program started by the Priesthood Correlation Committee to encourage parents to provide gospel instruction in their homes. The Committee provided a manual. 268 "Chapter 43: An Era of Correlation and Consolidation," 562-78. 269 "Chapter 43: An Era of Correlation and Consolidation," 562-78. 270 "Chapter 43: An Era of Correlation and Consolidation," 562-78. 94 further, some of those regulations seemed to be specific to Mormon homelands and useless or irrelevant elsewhere. 271 In 1972, YW became an "auxiliary" organization under the direction of the Priesthood Correlation Committee. 272 This realignment decreased women's authority in budgets, curriculums, and programs. In the 1970s, YW lesson manuals began to be published by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Priesthood Correlation Committee rather than by YW. The new, correlated manuals were organized around twelve themes (e.g., "Fulfilling Women's Divine Roles") aimed at teaching girls how a proper woman should behave in the home, the family structure, and in society. 273 The books underwent minor changes five times from 1983 to 2012; however, structure and topics stayed fairly consistent. This curriculum remained the mainstay of church instruction for LDS young women worldwide with almost no modification until 2013. 274 With their linear structures, proscriptive language, and Utah-centric examples, the 271 Bowman, The Mormon People, 184-215. Ericksen, "Auxiliary Organizations." "Timeline of Young Women General Presidents," Young Women, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed October 21, 2016, https://www.lds.org/callings/young-women/leaderresources/timeline?lang=eng. There are two types of church units: priesthood quorums and auxiliaries. Auxiliaries "are complementary to priesthood line organization and exist primarily to assist the priesthood." YW is one of five auxiliaries. The others are Young Men (adolescent boys), Relief Society (adult women), Sunday School (all adults), and Primary (children.) Auxiliary leaders are considered "general officers" of the church, but not "general authorities." 273 Laurel Manual 2, The Lord is the Strength of My Life: Young Women (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1984). The other eleven themes were Living as a Daughter of God, Contributing to Family Life, Learning about Priesthood, Learning about Genealogy and Temple Work, Being Involved in Missionary Work, Increasing in Spirituality, Living a Virtuous Life, Maintaining Physical Health, Developing Socially and Emotionally, Managing Personal Resources, and Developing Leadership Skills. 274 Heather Whittle Wrigley, "Church Announces New Youth Curriculum for 2013," Church News, October 4, 2012. 272 95 YW manuals did not encourage critical thinking about the organization, the lesson topics, or the religious education process. LDS young women were expected to see the curriculum, and the church organization presenting it, as benevolent mentors guiding young women to develop Christian identities. While this construction of erudite church and humble member is expected in the genre of devotional curriculums, it was more pronounced in these new centrally issued books than in previous ones created by YW leaders and was more in keeping with totalism. 275 At a time when much of the United States was actively critiquing institutional intrusion into individual freedom, LDS discourse presented an unequivocal message to young women that the organization knew best. The texts could be seen as a salvo against the contemporary second-wave feminist argument that women were the same as men. For example, one chapter argued for women's responsibility to become mothers under the title "Combating Satan's Attack on Women's Divine Roles." 276 During the last quarter of the twentieth century, the correlation-directed YW also produced My Personal Progress, a goal setting program still in use focused on helping young women gain skills and develop character. 277 Alexander Korchak, an expert in processes by which regular societies can become totalistic, claims bureaucracy-with its accompanying centralization and reduction of 275 For comparison, see The Laurel Manual (Salt Lake City, UT: The Young Women's Mutual Improvement Association, 1970). 276 Laurel Manual 2, 18-21; "Overview: Young Women," The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed December 23, 2017, https://www.lds.org/youth/learn/yw?lang=eng. In 2013, these proscriptive manuals were replaced by student-led discussion topics that are the same for boys and girls. 277 "History of Young Women Recognition," The Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, accessed October 21, 2016, https://www.lds.org/callings/youngwomen/leader-resources/history/history-of-young-women-recognition?lang=eng. Young Women Personal Progress. All Personal Progress books since first publication were examined by the author at the Church History Library in Salt Lake City, UT, July 2014. 96 autonomy-can move a society toward totalism. Because bureaucratic administrations "blend . . . individual responsibility with collective responsibility," they make it easier for individuals to coerce each other without violating personal moral codes. 278 However, bureaucracy does not usually become totalizing. There must be another factor present as well: society members must believe they are under attack from outsiders. From Korchak's perspective, an initiative such as Priesthood Correlation would not inherently be totalizing, even if it reduced individual accountability and increased group overreach in the way bureaucracies often do. It would likely never become too controlling unless society members felt ideologically, financially, legally, or physically threatened. The following sections describe feminist, racial, and intellectual pressures that might have caused homeland Mormons to feel they and their religion were under attack and thus make them more likely to respond by totalizing. Homelanders in the last quarter of the twentieth century existed in a context when free love, civil rights, feminism, and anti-war protests dominated U.S. discourse and challenged the authority of governments, corporations, schools, and other institutions. Perhaps these threats accelerated church bureaucratic control, encouraging homeland societies to become more insular, exclusive, and collective toward young women. The Battle for Female Identity By the 1970s, the second-wave feminist movement, as historians now characterize it, had been gathering momentum for more than a decade. In 1961, Eleanor Roosevelt 278 Alexander Korchak, Totalistic Organizations: From Mafia to Global Terror (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2002), 26. 97 headed a President's Commission on the Status of Women, which helped spur the passage of the Equal Pay Act of 1963. A year later, "sex" became a last-minute addition to the antidiscrimination provisions of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. 279 This act legally mandated equality in schools, workplaces, and public facilities. During this same decade, Betty Friedan wrote The Feminine Mystique, an immensely popular book that positioned domesticity as oppressive. 280 With others, Friedan started the National Organization for Women to advocate for women's civil rights. August 1970 brought the fifty-year anniversary of woman suffrage, broader media coverage of women's issues, and greater cohesion between rights-oriented and liberation-oriented activists. 281 Two years later, Congress passed Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972 and the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) to the U.S. Constitution. 282 Title IX became a major disrupter in women's primary, secondary, and postsecondary sports and affected other areas of educational equality. The ERA advanced to the state ratification process; thirty-eight states needed to vote yes within seven years in order for it to pass into law. 283 279 Susan Ware, American Women's History: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford, Great Britain: Oxford University Press, 2015), 103. 280 Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique. (New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company, 1963). 281 Ware, American Women's History, 103-4. Rights-oriented activists such as Betty Friedan focused on obtaining legal protections against discrimination and legal access to benefits of a civilized society, such as healthcare. Most considered themselves moderates who believed in marriage and family but who wanted respect and opportunities in the broader society. Liberation-oriented activists such as Shulamith Firestone focused on overthrowing cultural and societal norms of behaviors for women. Liberationist feminists were critiqued by moderates for advocating lesbianism, rejecting feminine clothing, and eschewing connections with men. 282 Section 1 of the proposed amendment read: Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex. 283 The initial deadline was extended to June 1982. The proposed amendment failed when it did not receive sufficient support from state legislatures. 98 By the time the Supreme Court legalized abortion in 1973, the feminist movement was in full swing and the country was sharply divided. At its zenith in 1981, the ERA had sixty-three percent support among Americans who had heard of it; however, in each of the preceding years, opposition and support were more evenly distributed. 284 At the heart of the feminist controversy was whether women were helped or hurt when lawmakers viewed them as no different from men. 285 Critics of the Amendment argued that blurring distinctions between sexes exposed women to hardships such as military combat for which they were not biologically suited and therefore deserving of protection from. 286 Some religious groups argued that treating women the same as men violated God-given gendered assignments. 287 Proponents claimed that rigid sex classification was a hegemony imposed by men in power in order to keep individual women from pursuing whatever paths suited them, a construct invented by mankind not deity. 288 The battle coalesced around identity: whoever won the argument about the true nature of women hoped to drive policy decisions. By 1976, the ERA had been ratified by thirty-four of the thirty-eight needed states. 289 The Amendment progressed through the first twenty-two state legislatures in a single year, and though it encountered popular resistance, passage seemed almost certain. 290 Feminism had gained grassroots support in many communities and groups of 284 Bradley, Pedestals and Podiums, 393. Bradley, Pedestals and Podiums, 79-90; Ware, American Women's History, 105-9. 286 Ware, American Women's History, 108-9. 287 Ware, American Women's History, 108-9. 288 Ware, American Women's History, 105-6. 289 Five states later rescinded their affirmative votes. 290 "The History behind the Equal Rights Amendment," The Equal Rights Amendment: Unfinished Business for the Constitution, The Alice Paul Institute, accessed October 21, 2016, http://www.equalrightsamendment.org/history.htm. For an example of 285 99 Mormon women started feminist magazines and formed feminist groups. 291 Around this time, the LDS church went public with its opposition to the Amendment, recruiting female members to attend the International Year of the Woman meeting in Utah. 292 Attendees were supposed to argue against the Amendment and decry feminism as an affront to womanhood. 293 Many who attended the convention were horrified at the shouting, name calling, and anger they witnessed by people on both sides of the issue. 294 Meanwhile, church member and author Helen Andelin continued to promote her theory that women were happiest when they took care of their husbands, and her book, Fascinating Womanhood, sold hundreds of thousands of copies. 295 The decade of the ERA campaign was divisive for the United States of America, the state of Utah, and church members. Mormons on both sides became disillusioned and popular resistance, consider Phyllis Schlafly and her STOP ERA organization. Ware, American Women's History, 107-108. 291 Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, "Mormon Women in the History of Second-Wave Feminism," Dialogue 43, no. 2 (Summer 2010), 45, 59. The Exponent II magazine was started by a group of Mormon feminists from Boston. "Hoping to assert their right to disagree, a group of women in Provo, Utah, organized the Alice Louise Reynolds Club as a forum for discussing social issues." They met quietly for years in a conference room at Brigham Young University, a church-owned school. 292 "The Church and the Proposed Equal Rights Amendment: A Moral Issue," Ensign, March 1980. 293 "Chapter 44: The Church Lengthens Its Stride," Church History in the Fullness of Times Student Manual (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2003), 579-90. Bradley, Pedestals and Podiums. The First Presidency distributed a letter opposing the Amendment. In a manual currently used at church-owned schools, the church claims partial responsibility for defeat of the Amendment: "In various areas of the United States, groups of Latter-day Saints organized to work with legislators and in other ways mobilized public opinion to defeat the amendment." This is borne out in the research of Martha Sonntag Bradley, who studied the intersection of the LDS church and second-wave feminism. 294 Bradley, Pedestals and Podiums, 189-222. 295 Helen B. Andelin, Fascinating Womanhood (Santa Barbara, CA: Pacific Press, 1963); Julie Debra Neuffer, Helen Andelin and the Fascinating Womanhood Movement (Salt Lake City, UT: The University of Utah Press, 2014). 100 frustrated. One poll administered by the Mormons for ERA group after the Amendment failed claimed forty-seven percent of the group's previously active members no longer attended church. 296 Some Mormons had begun to doubt whether they could "shape the new feminism to [their] own needs." 297 Church leaders published an eighteen-page, wellresearched argument against the Amendment. 298 Church opposition to the ERA and feminism became painfully personal to many when vocal ERA supporter and church critic Sonia Johnson was called before a church court and deprived of her membership. 299 In a previous statement about excommunication and ERA not connected to any specific member, church leaders explicitly classified excommunication as an organizational issue rather than a moral one, saying, "The mission of the Church is to save, but when those of its members publicly deride it, demean its leaders, and openly encourage others to interfere with its mission, then it may exercise its right to dissociate itself from them." 300 Some church leaders and members seemed to view second-wave feminism as both an organizational and individual threat. A defensive tone pervades church-wide YW sermons of the latter twentieth century. For example, one YW president invoked a wartime trope when she said, "Never before in the history of the Church has there been such a need for young women who are willing to sacrifice popularity if necessary, suffer loneliness if required, even be rejected if needed, to defend the gospel of Jesus Christ." 301 Elder Harold B. Lee insisted, "The safety of the Church lies in the members keeping the 296 Bradley, Pedestals and Podiums, 398. Ulrich, 51. 298 "The Church and the Proposed Equal Rights Amendment." 299 "The Church and the Proposed Equal Rights Amendment." 300 "The Church and the Proposed Equal Rights Amendment." 301 Ardeth G. Kapp, "Stand for Truth and Righteousness," Women's General Meeting, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, October 1988, italics added. 297 101 commandments." 302 As in Brigham Young's time, homeland church leaders may have thought retrenchment of women members would preserve the organization so the organization could in turn save its members. Racial Desegregation and Homeland Mormonism Around the time the LDS church mounted a campaign against feminism, the official policy of not allowing Mormons of black 303 descent to receive priesthood ordination was rescinded. 304 Some black church members had received the priesthood in the 1800s. However, as the religion moved toward Americanization in the early twentieth century, leaders banned future granting of the priesthood to black members. 305 Integrated worship services had always been and continued to be permitted. 306 However, because priesthood ordination is a requirement for leadership positions and for temple 302 "Chapter 43: An Era of Correlation and Consolidation," 562-78. "Race and the Priesthood," Gospel Topics, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, accessed October 21, 2016, https://www.lds.org/topics/race-and-thepriesthood?lang=eng. This study uses the word black because that was the term in use by Mormons at the time. Mormons applied the label to people in many countries and with different ethnic origins so a single nationalist-oriented term such as African-American would not be accurate. Throughout the twentieth century, several interpretations of the black classification were used by church leaders. For example, in 1952, President David O. McKay clarified that only blacks of African descent were prohibited from ordination; Pacific Islanders, black Fijians, and Australian Aborigines were allowed. Distinctions such as this are why I have chosen not to use the phrase people of color. 304 "Priesthood," Gospel Topics, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed October 21, 2016, https://www.lds.org/topics/priesthood?lang=eng. Priesthood is "the power and authority that God gives to man to act in all things necessary for the salvation of God's children." In Mormonism, priesthood authority is given by ordination from one worthy man to another (age twelve and older). 305 W. Paul Reeve, Religion of a Different Color: Race and the Mormon Struggle for Whiteness (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015). 306 "Race and the Priesthood." Congregations are generally organized on geographical lines, which the church says encourages integration. 303 102 participation, the priesthood ban effectively blocked black men and women from taking equal part. 307 The U.S. Supreme Court had outlawed segregation in public schools with Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, but churches were not subject to this legal decree, and Mormonism had not yet desegregated. Though black women and men did not receive fair treatment in most of America during the 1970s, they did have greater legal protections than previously, and the LDS church may have stood out because of its outdated segregation practices. In 1978, church President Spencer W. Kimball announced priesthood ordination would be extended to all male members who followed behavior standards irrespective of "race or color." 308 By removing the ban on black priesthood participation, Mormonism positioned itself for tremendous growth outside of Mormon homelands and opened the door for increased cultural diversity. Altering admission criteria for any membership group changes the composition of that group, bringing people with unfamiliar cultural, social, and geographical backgrounds. Formal Priesthood Correlation programs were in place by the time the racial ban was lifted, but pressure to sustain rather than relax central control may have been encouraged by the racial policy change. Interviews with narrators indicate that some homeland Mormons felt a responsibility to be exemplars of Mormonism and to resist adaptation of Mormon practices and traditions to cultural or individual preference. 307 Church members attend the temple the first time to make covenants and perform symbolic rituals (ordinances) for themselves. When they enter the temple subsequent times, they do the same work vicariously for dead persons. To participate in or administer ordinances for themselves or others, men must have the priesthood. Women, who do not have the priesthood, can participate in ordinances but cannot administer them. Black men and women were both prohibited from entering temples, and black men were not ordained to the priesthood. 308 Official Declaration 2, Doctrine and Covenants. 103 It is reasonable to assume this attitude toward young women and others among homeland members may have been exacerbated by the new racial integration suddenly possible in Mormonism. A society struggling to assimilate newcomers without losing its own identity is more likely to forbid and restrict individual behavior in totalizing ways. Intellectualism and Conformity The LDS church's interactions with scholars of Mormonism during the latter part of the twentieth century could be interpreted as another manifestation of the homeland siege mentality. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, academics founded the Mormon History Association (MHA), two journals (the Journal of Mormon History and Dialogue), and two magazines (Exponent II and Sunstone). Active church member Leonard Arrington was hired by the church as the first professionally trained LDS church historian. 309 The Mormon History Association became an affiliate of the American Historical Association, allowing Mormonism scholars greater academic recognition. Religious studies emerged as an academic field of study in the 1980s, helped along by a 1963 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Abington School District v. Schempp, which allowed religion to be taught in public schools so long as the tone was analytic and informative rather than proselytizing. 310 Church-owned Brigham Young University and other institutions created centers for the study of religion or religious history, and Mormonism 309 Leonard J. Arrington, "Reflections on the Founding and Purpose of the Mormon History Association, 1965-1983." Journal of Mormon History 10 (1983): 91-103; Ronald W. Walker, David J. Whittaker, and James B. Allen, Mormon History (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2001), 65-6, 90-1. 310 Richard Lyman Bushman, "The Commencement of Mormon Studies," in New Perspectives in Mormon Studies: Creating and Crossing Boundaries, ed. Quincy D. Newell and Eric F. Mason (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 2013), 209. 104 and other religions gained an academic home. 311 However, in the 1980s, the church abruptly distanced itself from academic scholarship, particularly from research that questioned official church narratives about Mormon history. Though Arrington claimed his work supported the cause of Mormonism, he and his team of academically trained historians were transferred off church payroll. 312 The Church Historian's Office restricted public access to church history archives, church authorities issued public cautions about intellectualism, and leaders eventually excommunicated six scholars. 313 Senior apostle Elder Boyd K. Packer told church educators it was impossible to be faithful and critical at the same time and that the church would only allow evaluation from those who were faithful, so scholars would never be able to provide viable organizational critique. 314 Fearful for their church memberships and concerned for their careers, Mormon scholars adopted a variety of survival strategies. Some sought alliance with universities. Some argued publicly for peace. 315 Others seemed more pugnacious. 316 Still others stayed out of sight in newly 311 For example, in 1980, Brigham Young University created the Joseph Fielding Smith Center for Church History (now LDS History). 312 Leonard Arrington, Adventures of a Church Historian (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1998), 214. 313 Boyd K. Packer, "The Mantle is Far, Far Greater Than the Intellect," Symposium on the Doctrine and Covenants and Church History, Church Educational System of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Salt Lake City, UT: August 22, 1981); Ezra Taft Benson, "God's Hand in Our Nation's History," Fireside Speech, Brigham Young University (Provo, UT: March 28, 1976). Arrington, Adventures. 314 Packer, "The Mantle is Far, Far Greater." 315 Eugene England, Making Peace: Personal Essays (Salt Lake City, UT: Signature Books, 1995). 316 D. Michael Quinn, "On Being a Mormon Historian (and Its Aftermath)," in Faithful History: Essays on Writing Mormon History, ed. George D. Smith (Salt Lake City, UT: Signature Books, 1992), 69-112; D. Michael Quinn, "150 Years of Truth and Consequences about Mormon History," Sunstone 16, no. 1 (February 1992): 12-14. 105 formed university religious studies departments hoping church defensiveness would eventually dissipate. This climate of fear that played out largely in Mormon homelands may have encouraged some Mormons to follow and enforce rules in a more totalistic manner than they otherwise might have. It may have decreased tolerance for Mormons who espoused unfamiliar interpretations of theology or tradition, and it may have made homelanders more suspicious of local adaptations of Mormonism. When young women moved in from nonhomeland communities, this wariness may have contributed to their being viewed as outsiders despite their baptized status. Amid the organizational and individual tensions of intellectualism, desegregation, and feminism in Mormon homelands, the LDS church continued to grow. The next section outlines the church's missionary efforts, and a possible significance of those efforts for homeland totalism. Global Expansion and Social Stratification In a 1980 postseason tournament football game, the Mormons were up against the Methodists with only four minutes to play. Brigham Young University players had earned a dismal twenty-five points to Southern Methodist University's forty-five. 317 Church-owned BYU had never won a bowl game, and fans had already begun to stream toward the gates while BYU quarterback Jim McMahon screamed at them for disloyalty. In a last-minute comeback, the boys from Utah scored twenty-one points in the final two minutes and thirty-three seconds, including an unbelievable pass that reached tight-end Clay Brown in the end zone for a touchdown as the clock expired. BYU came for the 317 Ryan Tibbetts, Hail Mary: The Inside Story of BYU's Miracle Bowl Comeback (Cedar Fort, UT: Cedar Fort, Inc., 2014). 106 field goal, kicked perfectly, and won by a single point. ESPN lauded The Miracle Bowl as one of the top ten bowl games ever played. 318 It was the beginning of a years-long trajectory of success for BYU football. 319 After the game, BYU equipment manager Floyd Johnson exclaimed, "If that doesn't give you a testimony, nothing will!" 320 A cartoon later depicted a radio announcer saying, "And here's another play for BYU," while a disembodied hand descended from the heavens and passed the football. 321 The Miracle Bowl could be seen as a metaphor for how homeland Mormons may have viewed themselves and the church during the time period of this study. Mormons were the persistent but unpopular underdogs playing against the odds, but God was on their side. When a lot of clean-living, hard-working people pulled together to do God's will, they were unstoppable. This righteous momentum fueled the church's enormously successful missionary efforts in the 1980s and 1990s. The church grew from 5,707 congregations to 22,231 and added nearly eight million members and eighty-five temples between 1975 and 2000. 322 Six temples were completed in 1983; six more were constructed in 1984. 323 General authority assignments were restructured multiple times to 318 "The List: Greatest Bowl Games," ESPN Page 2, accessed October 21, 2016, http://www.espn.com/page2/s/list/bestbowls.html. 319 Lee Benson, And They Came to Pass: BYU's Amazing String of All-American QB's (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book Company, 1988); Lavell Edwards, as told to Lee Nelson, Lavell Edwards: Building a Winning Football Tradition at Brigham Young University (Provo, UT: Council Press, 1980), iii. 320 Tibbetts, Hail Mary. In Mormon parlance, having a testimony means that a person believes The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is God's one true church. 321 Kelly Robert Stone, personal communication at his home, October 20, 2016. The author's husband remembers being shown this cartoon as a teenager growing up in Utah during the 1980s. He has been unable to find an original of the cartoon. 322 Deseret Morning News 2004 Church Almanac, 443-45, 582. 323 Deseret Morning News 2004 Church Almanac, 444, 582. 107 ensure oversight of the additional local and regional units. 324 Two hundred twenty-seven new mission offices were opened, and proselytizing began in Africa, Cambodia, Vietnam, the German Democratic Republic, and Russia. 325 Conversion efforts were stepped up in Central and South America and thirty temples were constructed in this region. 326 The conversion juggernaut was as unstoppable as the football juggernaut. Administrative changes related to Priesthood Correlation prepared the organization for this growth and helped ensure doctrinal consistency as converts joined from countries and cultures not previously represented. However, to Mormons the growth was more than a byproduct of organizational restructuring-it was a heavenly decree, the Mormon version of Manifest Destiny. Proselytizing is a sacred responsibility for Mormons. 327 Righteousness was supposed to spread from Utah to the whole earth. President David O. McKay had taught that every member should be a missionary, 328 and by 1981, missionary work was codified as one of the three key purposes of the church. 329 Church apostle (later president) Elder Gordon B. Hinckley, said: We, of course, all recognize the mandate laid upon the Church by the Lord 324 General authorities are the men in the top leadership quorums of the Church. "Chapter 45: Meeting the Needs of a Worldwide Church," Church History in the Fullness of Times Student Manual (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2003), https://www.lds.org/manual/church-history-in-the-fulness-of-timesstudent-manual/chapter-forty-five-meeting-the-needs-of-a-worldwide-church?lang=eng. 325 "Chapters 43-48," Church History in the Fullness of Times Student Manual (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2003), 562-645. Deseret Morning News 2004 Church Almanac, 582. 326 "Chapter 47: Continued Growth during the Early 1990s," Church History in the Fullness of Times Student Manual (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2003), 616-27. Deseret Morning News 2004 Church Almanac, 443-45. 327 A scripture in Doctrine and Covenants 88:81 reads: "Behold, I sent you out to testify and warn the people, and it becometh every man who hath been warned to warn his neighbor." 328 David O. McKay, Conference Report, April 1959, pp. 121-22. 329 Kimball, "A Report of My Stewardship." 108 himself. It is a mandate we cannot dodge and one from which we cannot shrink. That mandate is to teach the gospel to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people. This was the final charge given by the Lord following his resurrection and before his ascension. It was repeated with the opening of this dispensation. 330 In LDS theology, Christ will return to the earth to establish the kingdom of God (whether that kingdom is spiritual or physical is the subject of some debate), and his children are under covenant to bring as many as they can to a knowledge of Christ before then. 331 The more quickly that conversion proceeds, the more quickly the glorious second-coming of Christ will arrive. For a variety of reasons, homeland Mormons in the period under study were finally in a position to embrace expansion on a grand scale. The church's organizational preparation coincided with worldwide shifts in borders and power related to the close of Cold War hostilities, the collapse of Communism in the U.S.S.R, and the fall of the Berlin Wall. Back home, the church perceived it had won the ideological battles of the 1970s related to gender. The ERA was defeated and Mormon women and young women were redirected to proper feminine pursuits. Black members had been welcomed into the fold not by government but by God, who had delivered a blessing and opportunity that had long been promised. Mormons were satisfied their influence was growing in spite of pressure from the outside world. A Church Educational System study guide for church history contains more than fifty-six laudatory references to growth in six short 330 Gordon B. Hinckley, "Things Will Get Better," Speech at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah on April 8, 1976. Retrieved from https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/gordon-b-hinckley_things-getting-better/ (accessed October 24, 2016). 331 See Doctrine and Covenants section 88 for a Mormon description of Christ's second-coming and the role of missionary work relative to it. 109 chapters. 332 Charts in the book helped members visualize increases in missionaries, congregations, and members. At the turn of the twenty-first century, numerous almanacs and atlases were produced so members could celebrate church progressiveness at their own coffee tables. 333 The battle-readiness of the homeland church combined with rapid growth in other regions may have fostered a divisiveness between members located in Utah and those located elsewhere. During this period, any region outside the Intermountain West was called "the mission-field" by members and leaders. 334 Members who lived in the missionfield were told to stay out of Mormon homelands, even as Priesthood Correlation policies ensured homelanders were the only ones authorized to change policy, write curricula, and steer organizational direction. Congregations worldwide were expected to lionize heroic Mormons who had come to Utah, though they were not invited to come themselves. 335 The homeland was praised with this song from the new correlated hymnbook, "O, Babylon, O, Babylon, we bid thee farewell; we're going to the mountains of Ephraim, [Utah], to dwell." 336 Life at the center was perceived by many as more desirable. 332 "Chapters 43-48," Church History in the Fullness of Times Student Manual, 562- 645. 333 For examples, see Richard Neitzel Holzapfel, Alexander L. Baugh, Robert C. Freeman, and Andrew H. Hedges, On This Day in the Church: An Illustrated Almanac of the Latter-day Saints (Salt Lake City, UT: Eagle Gate Publishers, 2000); Deseret Morning News 2004 Church Almanac. 334 For example, see Karen Thompson, "Moving from Utah to the Mission Field," Ensign, June 1984. 335 "Chapter 48: The Church Comes out of Obscurity." In 1997, Siberian saints pulled handcarts to commemorate Utah pioneers, and Mexican saints gathered in celebration. Pioneer commemorations also took place in Italy and Belgium. 336 Hymns of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1985 (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1985), s. v. "319 Ye Elders of Israel." Among Christians, the wicked biblical city of Babylon represents evil more generally. 110 Erving Goffman notes that totalism requires both social stratification and a sense of moral superiority. 337 Totalistic control is rationalized by a mainstream society when it believes a segment of the population must be trained, rehabilitated, and reformed for their own good and the good of the community. The division between us (homelanders) and them (mission-fielders) in Mormonism during the last quarter of the twentieth century may have provided both the social underclass and the ethical justification for the totalistic behavior the young women in this study experienced. Mormonism has historically "retrenched" young women, identifying them as a population segment needing extra protection and control. Geography-based discrimination combined with missionary zeal may have enabled that retrenchment to be especially totalizing in Mormon homelands. Conclusion The latter part of the twentieth century was a tumultuous period for Mormonism. The LDS church overhauled its administrative structure while fielding criticism about its history and organization from scholars. Homeland members and leaders faced ideological threats from a rapidly changing American society and from policy modifications that expanded leadership and membership criteria. Homeland Mormons, accustomed to using group pressure to influence individual behavior and feeling a divine mandate to help the church grow, may have felt obligated to be good examples to a newly global church membership. In this social and cultural milieu, it is not hard to imagine that Mormondominated societies might have become totalizing in their efforts to protect narrators. 337 Erving Goffman, Asylums: Essays on the Social Situation of Mental Patients and Other Inmates (New York, NY: Random House, 1961), 4, 7, 12. 111 The next chapter describes how many narrators and their parents felt homeland societies were safely isolated from the world outside Mormonism. It also explains how some have come to realize that isolation was sustained by fear. Narrators said they were taught to fear their own inadequacies and to believe that they would suffer unbearably without the protection of the group. They were also taught to dread outsiders who would supposedly cause irreparable harm if allowed to interact with narrators. In Mormon homelands, narrators felt young women were expected to view themselves as helpless and non-Mormons as dangerous, in direct contradiction to LDS teachings about human worth and love. They were expected to trade charity for safety. Many were uncomfortable doing so. CHAPTER 5 ISOLATION: INCREASED SAFETY, REDUCED CHARITY In the eleventh grade, Lynne withdrew permanently from her high school in Arizona during Christmas break. 338 Without telling schoolmates, she relocated to live with grandparents in Spanish Fork, Utah. A close friend had recently swallowed a bottle of pills in an attempt to escape severe bullying at school. The friend survived and was sent to a psychiatric institution for a month with no visitors allowed. When Lynne heard what happened, she started shouting inside her head: "This school did that to her! You guys suck!" Sobbing, she told her mother, "I don't want to go to that school. I don't want to be [there]. I'm so sick of them. My friends are all drinking now. They're all having sex. It's not fun. I'm not having fun." Her mother offered to transfer her to another local school, but Lynne thought switching schools within the state would be just as bad. Then her mother suggested the grandparents in Utah, "kind of joking," and Lynne immediately knew leaving was "what she needed to do." Lynne says, "I fell in love with Utah, met wonderful friends that I'm still friends with up here. I had a great time. I just loved it." Her peers in Arizona still think she left because she got pregnant. 338 Lynne, interview with author on July 9, 2014. All contributions from Lynne in this chapter come from this source. 113 Many narrators relocated to Mormon homelands as adolescents because they or their parents sought protection. They wanted to escape a threatening world and be sheltered by a community of believers. In 1985, Charlotte's parents hauled the family of nine from a predominantly non-Mormon community in Idaho to Springville, Utah, without a job lined up in order to "save her." 339 Her thirteen-year-old friends were all sexually active, and Charlotte says she doesn't know "how long it could've gone on" with her abstaining because she "was very interested in being accepted." The move gave Charlotte a peer group who shared her beliefs and removed her from immediate danger. Sophia's parents worried about "losing" their children to negative peer influences while living in Washington State, so they relocated to Sunset, Utah, in 1996 in order to be in a Mormon culture, also without employment arranged. 340 Sophia says, "They felt like . . . let's go to Zion, let's go where there's lots of members, where we can have lots of support, . . . where we'd be going to school with lots of other members of the church." 341 Sophia was relieved to be "submerged in the Utah culture, and to be surrounded by LDS friends, and to go to school where there was release time available and that sort of 339 Charlotte, interview with author, July 10, 2014. All contributions from Charlotte in this chapter come from this source. 340 Sophia, interview with author, August 4, 2017. All contributions from Sophia in this chapter come from this source. 341 When quoting narrators, I have observed the following conventions: 1) em-dashes (-) represent false starts and incomplete thoughts, and 2) ellipses (. . .) represent significant pauses in narration. Repetitive phrases, filler words, and asides are omitted without notation for greater readability, except when they seem integral to a narrator's message. Other than a few exceptions noted, narrators' sentences are presented without rearrangement. Every effort was made to preserve the content and tone of the original passages. Readers are invited to consult the full interviews, which are publicly archived, to view any citation in context. 114 thing." 342 She believes she had many more opportunities to strengthen her belief in God and Mormonism in Utah than she would have had in Washington. Parents, and in some cases young women themselves, were hoping to reduce proximity to danger by coming to Mormon homelands. Young women seemed to make more righteous and safe choices in communities that supported and even pressured them to do so. Parents often take inconvenient and expensive measures to physically place their children in safer environments, so Mormon parents' desires to protect could be understood as a relatively ordinary reaction to real or perceived danger. However, some narrators now believe homeland protection may have come at the expense of charity toward self and others. In this research, charity means generosity and good will. It is a word with religious overtones, and in Mormonism, is defined as "the pure love of Christ" toward all people. 343 Many narrators are discouraged by what they perceive as an insular homeland culture that was standoffish, withdrawn from, and unkind to outsiders. The unkindness may have arisen from homeland societies' attempts to protect via isolation because isolation is a totalizing mechanism that requires both an enemy and a helpless innocent in order to be sustainable. People not of the faith ("non-Mormons") became the enemy, and Mormon young women were the defenseless victims. To many narrators, it seemed that homeland societies cultivated an outsized fear of non-Mormons, and by 342 Release time is the policy, common in Mormon homeland communities, of allowing students a free period to attend Mormon religious instruction, called seminary, during their school day. Seminary buildings are constructed by the church next to school properties to facilitate student attendance. Outside of Mormon homelands, seminary is instead available as independent study or as a daily/weekly meeting at a distant church building before or after school hours. Allowing religious instruction to be intermingled with secular instruction at the same approximate time and place further blurs boundaries between spheres of identity for students. 343 Moroni 7:47, Book of Mormon. 115 association, anyone who did not look or behave like a homeland Mormon. Young Mormon women were treated as unable or unwilling to protect themselves. These uncharitable characterizations may have been perceived as necessary to ensure the safety that many narrators found. This chapter explores how the totalizing mechanism of isolation was manifest for narrators in Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000. It describes how Mormon social circles, a fear of the outside world, and surveillance may have been used to sustain that isolation, and how young women submitted to and resisted the constraints they felt. Then, it examines the dehumanization and helplessness that usually accompany isolation and suggests that isolation may have encouraged homeland Mormons to be uncharitable. Finally, it discusses narrators' adult reactions to isolation, including their contemporary disdain of self-righteousness, their desires to obtain safety without instilling fear of non-Mormons in their own children, and their attempts to seek out religious diversity. Isolation as a Protective Strategy For a young woman in Mormon homelands, nearly all socialization took place within Mormon social circles, isolating narrators from outside influences. During most of the study period, youth did not have ready or private access to computers and email. Cellular phones were not in widespread use, and social media applications such as Facebook and Snapchat had not yet been invented. When young women moved into Mormon homelands, they were unable to easily maintain contact with previous friends. Their options included incurring long-distance telephone charges or waiting weeks for 116 ground mail exchanges. In daily life, young women were largely separated from the social circles they had inhabited before moving. Their new societies in Mormon homelands were comprised almost entirely of other Mormons, even though the young women knew there were people not of the faith living in homelands. Patty moved from Virginia to Orem, Utah, when she was sixteen. 344 She says, "Everybody was LDS. I mean, at Orem High School circa 1992, you could count the nonmembers on one hand. There were people who were not active, but I didn't know them." Another young woman, Stella, who moved from Southern California to Bountiful, Utah, in 1981, said, "The whole social makeup, the whole social cliques, networks, everything was based on, ‘What ward do you live in?' . . . It was always about the church." 345 Teachers would pray in class, and "some of the assemblies would seem like Sunday school sermons . . . or testimony meetings." She says the LDS church was "a carryover everywhere." Beth, who lived in Mormon communities in Utah as a child and again in Nevada during the 1970s as a teenager, also talked about the pervasiveness of Mormonism. 346 She said, "Everybody was the same. Everybody was a neighbor. I knew what to expect. You had to be careful not to call your schoolteacher, ‘Sister Sund.' It was ‘Mrs. Sund' at school." Though it did happen, narrators rarely had occasion to break the isolation and interact with a non-Mormon. In some cases, narrators were brought to homelands because parents were 344 Patty, interview with author, May 31, 2017. All contributions from Patty in this chapter come from this source. 345 Stella, interview with author, July 8, 2014. All contributions from Stella in this chapter come from this source. 346 Beth, interview with author, June 6, 2017. All contributions from Beth in this chapter come from this source. 117 intentionally seeking to isolate them from non-Mormon society. Leah says when her parents moved from a military installation in Taiwan to Salt Lake City, Utah, in 1982, they "really thought they were moving to a place that would protect and raise their children to-or not raise, but be a-have this cloud-I don't know, bubble of goodness, that nothing bad would ever happen to them." 347 Her parents were so certain their children had been isolated from dangerous outside influences that when Tonya's younger brother began using illegal drugs with other Mormon kids, it took years for the parents to admit that such a thing was possible. In supervised ways, some young women in homeland areas were taken back to their previous communities so they could observe firsthand the dangers from which homeland societies were isolating them. Stacey's sister had struggled with the 1995 move into Mormon homelands. 348 After the family had been in Bountiful, Utah, a couple of years, Stacey's mother took the sister back to Oregon to see her friends. Stacey says, [My sister] could see her friends had really gone off the deep end. They were not even going to school. They were so high. One of her friends was pregnant. And she could see that's not what she wanted. And it was a big turning point for her. She no longer sulked about not being [there] because she could recognize that she did not want that for her life. Once narrators moved to Mormon homelands, nearly every aspect of their social lives was enacted within those homelands. A fear of "the world" and "worldliness" was present in Mormon curricula and discourse of the time period, and that fear seemed to be utilized by homeland societies to 347 Leah, interview with author, June 8, 2017. All contributions from Leah in this chapter come from this source. 348 Stacey, interview with author, August 12, 2017. All contributions from Stacey in this chapter come from this source. 118 further isolate young women from people who were not Mormon or who seemed dangerous. 349 Mormons church-wide were advised by leaders to be "in the world, but not of the world," which meant participate in a society without partaking of any evils found in that society. 350 Young Women (YW) lessons encouraged a fear of the world, in one case equating "philosophies and attitudes of the world" with "deceptions of Satan." 351 A YW lesson for sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds had as its objective, "Each young woman will prepare herself to withstand the worldly pressures that would turn her from her Godgiven responsibilities." 352 The teacher was supposed to decorate a piece of foam rubber to look like a beautiful cake and offer it to the women. When they attempted to taste it, they would realize her subterfuge. Then the teacher was to explain how Satan makes "philosophies and attitudes of the world" look appealing, and how young women can wear the "armor of God" to "defend themselves" against worldliness. 353 Narrators remembered being told by church leaders that worldliness was dangerous. When Beth started YW in the 1970s, her leaders said Mormon women should wear dresses because pants were too worldly. Stella was 349 L. Tom Perry, "In the World," General Conference, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, April 1988, https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1988/04/in-theworld?lang=eng; James A. Cullimore, "To Be in the World but Not of the World," General Conference, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, October 1973, https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1973/10/to-be-in-the-world-but-not-of-theworld?lang=eng; Howard W. Hunter, "Of the World or of the Kingdom?" General Conference, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, October 1973, https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1973/10/of-the-world-or-of-thekingdom?lang=eng. 350 Cullimore, "To Be in the World but Not of the World." 351 "Withstanding Worldly Pressures," in Laurel Manual 2: The Lord is the Strength of My Life, 144-150 (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1984). 352 "Withstanding Worldly Pressures," Laurel Manual 2, 144. 353 "Withstanding Worldly Pressures," Laurel Manual 2, 144-145. 119 told the same thing a decade later. Young women were told they were not supposed to date non-Mormons. 354 Dangers of sexual promiscuity were higher when associating with young men who were in the world rather than in the faith. 355 Also, only Mormon couples can marry in the LDS temple, and a temple marriage is necessary to obtain the highest degree of exaltation. 356 Socialization outside of the faith was often portrayed as risky and undesirable. The warning against worldliness was church-wide during this time period, although this research suggests "in the world, not of the world" may have been implemented more totalistically in Mormon homelands than elsewhere. In homeland societies, being Mormon was perceived as good, and being non-Mormon was perceived as bad. For narrators who had lived in that outside world and personally known nonMormons, this oversimplification felt disrespectful and inaccurate. Unlike homeland peers who had never lived in Mormon-minority communities, narrators had interacted with many people who were "in the world." Some of those not-Mormons were admirable; some less so. Rosemary says, "We tried to be good people and realized that there were other good people in our neighborhood we enjoyed spending time with." 357 Further, narrators did not believe all Mormons were themselves admirable. Since entering Mormon homelands, narrators had encountered many fellow devotees who did not pass 354 "Preparing for an Eternal Courtship," in Laurel Manual 2: The Lord is the Strength of My Life, 140-143 (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, 1984). 355 "Preparing for an Eternal Courtship," in Laurel Manual 2: The Lord is the Strength of My Life, 140-143 (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, 1984). 356 "Preparing for an Eternal Courtship," Laurel Manual 2. 357 Rosemary, interview with author on August 24, 2017. All contributions from Rosemary in this chapter come from this source. 120 muster. More than one narrator observed that non-Mormon youths, few though they were in number, were first to introduce themselves at school, while Mormon teens from church ignored newcomers. When Stella moved to Bountiful, Utah, she hung a photo in her locker of her neighborhood friends from California, and her new peers were quick to criticize the people in the picture: Stella: I hung it in my locker, and it had my Greek Orthodox friend, my Jewish friend, my black friend, the all-American California family, and the two Hispanic twins. All my friends . . . . hanging in my high school locker. And how many kids, every time I opened it, "Do you know there's a black kid in your picture?" "Is that a Mexican?" Interviewer: Wow. Stella: Yes. And what the hell does it matter? "Do you really hang out with him?" "Did they smell different?" No. Interviewer: They asked you if they smelled different? Stella: Yes. "Aren't they dirty?" Who? "The Mexicans. Aren't they dirty?" No. They had more money than we did. Are you serious? "What is she wearing? She shouldn't be wearing that top. It doesn't have sleeves?" Who cares? "Look how short that little girl's skirt is. Does her mom let her go out like that?" Yeah. It was a miniskirt. Late '70s, early '80s. Little blond California girl in a little miniskirt. Yes, her mom let her out like that every day. She was great. A better person than you. Unlike Stella, most narrators did not immediately protest judgments they heard about people who did not follow Mormon practices. Several newcomers initially viewed the criticism as harmless, though they thought homelanders were naïve for believing in stereotypes. However, newcomers discovered relatively quickly that one did not have to be non-Mormon to incur disapproval; one simply had to look, sound, or act differently than other homelanders to be considered dangerous. People who looked like outsiders were viewed as worldly, even if they were Mormon. For example, Patty attended the prom at her homeland high school in 1993 with a Mormon young man whom others had nicknamed "Jeremy the Communist." He was the only one who asked, and she really wanted to attend, so she went with him even 121 though he "did not fit in" with the other Mormon kids. He wore camouflage clothing and had militaristic hobbies. Calling someone a communist in United States and Mormon society in the early 1990s was probably a strong indictment of character, since the LDS church president at the time had frequently taught members that Communism was a "substitute for true religion" and a "secret work of darkness" instigated by the devil. 358 Fear of people who were worldly psychologically isolated young women. Isolation encourages surveillance. When a society believes the outside world is dangerous, that society must be continually watchful. Narrators found nearly every person they interacted with in homeland society monitored and assessed their behavior, something narrators found demeaning and disempowering. Peers, parents of peers, teachers, YW leaders, other adults in the ward, and ward leaders all seemed to feel a responsibility to critique a young woman's adherence to Mormon standards. Narrators were surprised this kind of distributed correction was socially acceptable in Mormon homelands; outside of homelands, such behavior would have been labeled gossip, though in homelands, the surveillance was "always under the guise of caring." 359 Homeland surveillance seemed reminiscent of the echelon authority Goffman observed in totalistic societies, where society members are subject to a "supervisory group" rather than accountable to a single individual. 360 Echelon authority "markedly increases the probability of sanction" and spawns chronic anxiety in those being watched. 361 It also draws all members of society into complicity. 358 For example, see Ezra Taft Benson, "A Witness and a Warning," Ensign, November 1979. 359 Joanna, interview with author, June 21, 2017. 360 Goffman, Asylums, 42. 361 Goffman, Asylums, 42. 122 In homeland society, surveillance seems to have discouraged narrators from interacting with non-Mormons and also from those who enacted Mormonism differently than other homelanders. It may also have over-emphasized outward behavior, since inner conversion cannot be as easily surveilled. Sophia says homeland societies are "too focused on how a person looks when being a Mormon rather than how a person believes when being a Mormon." She insists there is an inappropriate "showiness" attached to sacred ordinances such as baptism and marriage, and claims that in her experience, people outside of homelands do not "nitpick" as much. Kendra says that the surveillance made it seem like Mormonism was not about God. She says, "It was more about following the rules and . . . checking up on people to make sure that they've been to church last week, and things like that." 362 Several narrators remarked that before moving to homelands, Mormonism was only one part of their identity, whereas, once they arrived, it became their whole identity because their Mormon-ness was the thing people were continually surveilling. Surveillance can remove the pleasure from daily activities, and some young women found church involvement to be unsatisfying after moving to homelands. Joanna says, I really liked the church all the way, you know, until-when I moved my junior year, I remember having the first time ever in my life-having a hard time with church a little bit. You know, at times just thinking, like, I don't know if I fit in here, I don't know if I belong here. I feel like I am a punk or a rebel a little bit sometimes, even though I wasn't at all. But I felt like that because my family would sometimes just not go to church one Sunday because we didn't want to go. Or like a lot of times general conference or stake conference, we just wouldn't 362 Kendra, interview with author on June 26, 2017. All contributions from Kendra in this chapter come from this source. 123 go. 363 And it was like a little vacation, a nice time, like to have a vacation from church. But it was very, very frowned upon in Utah. And yeah, that's a big part of it, like I-it was-it kind of went away, you know, my love and devotion for the church. I think that was probably the time in my life that I started going more for other people and for my parents rather than myself. The continual oversight may have discouraged some young Mormon women in their efforts to be righteous. They may have doubted their own capabilities to resist sin because of the pervasive monitoring, even if they had not done anything that violated church teachings. In 1975-2000, Mormon homeland societies seemed to protect narrators by isolation. Narrators were isolated physically and ideologically. Most socialized almost entirely with other Mormons, were taught to fear the world outside of Mormonism and non-Mormons, and were under nearly constant surveillance. Implications of Isolation Totalism scholars have demonstrated that isolationist strategies of social control require an enemy. 364 That enemy must be fearsome enough to scare community members into respecting the outer walls, be those walls physical or virtual. Isolation is most easily maintained when members of the society are perpetually afraid so they willingly become engaged in creating and maintaining the division between us and them. That way, responsibility for enforcing rules of entrance and exit becomes shared among the whole society rather than resting only with designated authorities. Nearly all societies with rigid borders have in common a fear of the other, and in Mormon homeland societies from 363 General conference is a training broadcast to all members church-wide every six months. Stake conference is periodic training for a few congregations at a time. 364 Korchak, Totalistic Organizations; Lifton, Thought Reform. 124 1975 through 2000, narrators felt that other was non-Mormonism. Homelanders, in attempts to isolate and protect young women, sometimes acted as if those not of the Mormon faith were not individuals. Rather, they were depicted as a single monolithic entity called Bad Influence. This was a cognitive and discursive dehumanization: narrators sometimes felt non-Mormons were not given consideration as actual living beings with varied characteristics. Instead, they were not like us and could not possibly have anything in common with Mormons. In the insular culture encouraged by the totalizing mechanism of isolation, Mormons were fighting an abstract enemy of non-Mormonism with its army of nameless, faceless creatures. According to Karen Stollznow, dehumanization sets up a "‘good versus bad' claim" that justifies a society's exclusion or mistreatment of people or groups by depicting them as not equal to mainstream society and therefore not deserving of humane regard. 365 A fear of nonMormons in homeland societies seems to have overridden LDS teachings that everyone is a child of God with unique attributes and talents. 366 Isolation needs an enemy, but it also needs a victim. Some totalistic societies justify social control by claiming a segment of the population will be irreparably harmed without community protection. Benevolent societies in particular can become oppressive when their rhetoric shifts from empowerment to safety. When keeping beneficiaries safe becomes a higher priority than helping those beneficiaries improve themselves, a society starts to reduce individual liberties in increasingly extreme and totalizing ways. In Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000, narrators described how leaders 365 Stollznow, "Dehumanisation," 187. "I Am a Child of God," Hymns of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1985), 301. 366 125 and parents frequently treated young women as helpless victims who would not be safe unless isolated. Two messages related to this were particularly demeaning and disempowering for narrators: proximity inevitably leads to sin, and sinning permanently destroys a young woman. If proximity inevitably leads to sin, then a young woman is continually at risk. The implication is that she has no means within herself to resist sin: it is not in her nature to do so. This helplessness justifies isolation. Narrators felt that homeland Mormon societies distrusted them and doubted their abilities to make good choices when people around them were not doing so. This was confusing and offensive to the young women. Outside of homeland communities, leaders and parents had expected narrators to be righteous when they attended school all day in close proximity to people outside the faith. They had been expected to say no-and in many cases successfully did-when pressured to make sinful choices. Yet, in homeland communities, young women felt YW leaders intentionally kept rules strict because they believed young women would otherwise be unable to resist temptation. For example, when Abigail attended church girls camp in Utah, young women were required to wear full-length pants. 367 It was nearing 90° and Abigail asked if she could wear capris or knee-length shorts. She was used to attending church camp in Oregon, where the climate was much cooler. Her leader said, "Well, if we give you an inch, you'll walk a mile." Abigail was insulted. She thought to herself, "No, I won't. Like, I won't walk around in cut-offs. I really would wear knee-length shorts if that was 367 Abigail, interview with author, June 30, 2017. All contributions from Abigail in this chapter come from this source. 126 allowed." She says, I didn't like the idea that, like, we wouldn't-like, if they gave us a rule we wouldn't stick to it. That was the most frustrating thing. It wasn't even just the rule. It was their attitude about if we give you any leeway, we think you'll walk all over it. And I'm like, no. I'm sixteen years old. I'm not a child. I'm not trying to get away with something. I just don't want to be miserable while I'm camping and hot. I didn't feel like they respected me as, like-and of course, I wasn't an adult. But as a teenager that was old enough to operate a motor vehicle, I can't be trusted to pick out shorts? Narrators had been exposed to a variety of perspectives before moving to homelands and had begun to develop their own moral codes, so it was a shock to be told they were not strong enough, smart enough, or old enough to resist the temptations of the world. Before moving into homelands, some young women may not have liked the constant pressure that came from being different. 368 They may have disliked the environment around them and felt pain or discomfort at the choices of siblings and friends. 369 They even worried about their own abilities to make good choices. 370 But they did not doubt that choice existed, and they did not fear people who were different from them, as nearly every interview indicates. Even Lynne, who fled to homelands of her own accord, came because she hated the way others were behaving, and she did not want to be around people like that. She felt disgust, revulsion, and pity far more than fear. She was appalled at how they treated one of her friends. She felt relief when arriving in Spanish Fork, Utah, but that relief came from knowing she had done something good, that she had exited a situation that was misaligned with her values. She knew she had values, and she knew what it felt like to honor them. Narrators sometimes experienced self-doubt prior to 368 Angela, interview with author, July 3, 2014. All contributions from Angela in this chapter come from this source. 369 Sophia, interview with author. 370 Charlotte, interview with author. 127 entering homelands; however, they did not live with a pervasive distrust of the self. When homeland societies perpetually doubted young women, newcomers balked at this construction of their identities, often without knowing precisely why. Homeland Mormon societies from 1975 through 2000 seemed to suggest that if a young woman sinned, she would be forever destroyed spiritually and socially. Conceptualizing sin as permanent, and by association the sinner as permanently flawed, further justifies isolation as a form of social control. If protectees are eternally sinful, a society is freed from any obligation to attend to those people individually, or indeed, do anything other than guard them en masse. Charlotte, Tori, and other narrators remember hearing a YW lesson that compared a young woman who has had sex before marriage with a piece of chewed up gum no one would ever want. Tori, who moved from Colorado to Clearfield, Utah, in 1993, had been sexually active with her boyfriend prior to the gum/abstinence lesson. 371 She was fairly certain her YW leaders were not aware of her sexual activities when they taught her that she should be discarded like a piece of used gum. As adolescents, some narrators sought to reconcile the demeaning message that the effects of sin are permanent with their understandings of LDS theology. Mormonism teaches that Jesus Christ voluntarily gave up his life as penance for everyone's sins. 372 Since Jesus Christ has paid the price for mortal wickedness and thereby satisfied justice, once a person stops sinning and forsakes the unrighteous behavior, she can be fully restored to purity without having to endure 371 Tori, interview with author, June 7, 2017. All contributions from Tori in this chapter come from this source. 372 "Atonement of Jesus Christ," Gospel Topics, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, accessed February 8, 2018, https://www.lds.org/topics/atonement-of-jesuschrist?lang=eng. 128 eternal damnation. This central doctrine of Mormonism is called the Atonement of Jesus Christ. Narrators said homelanders spoke generically of the Atonement and forgiveness, but when it came to believing a specific person had changed, homelanders seemed unwilling to accept the possibility of true restoration, perhaps because doing otherwise would reduce the justification for isolation. Natalie moved as a teenager in 1993 from Nicaragua to a Mormon-oriented community in Virginia. 373 An exchange I had with her illuminates the frustration she felt about being classified as enduringly unrighteous were she to make a mistake, as well as the difficulties she had voicing her concerns. Natalie: When I was in Young Women, I got the classic whole chewed up piece of gum for chastity. Chewed up piece of gum. Nails banged into a board. 374 I found those asinine and completely unrealistic. They did not make sense to me at all. At all, because of the whole atonement thing. It just did not-those lessons just did not jibe at all. Interviewer: Because you felt like the atonement could fill in the holes, and why are we saying this is a permanent condition? Natalie: Exactly, and I brought that up. I was like, wait a second. You're talking about this like it's a chemical change. This is not a permanent change. It's a physical. Like yes, we can put holes in the boards, but look. You take the nails out. You fill them with spackle. You paint it. Then it's good as new. You know? Not this whole yank the holes out of the boards. The board is never the same. That's ridiculous. Interviewer: So even then, you didn't respond to those? Natalie: When I challenged them as a teenager, I was like, how does this work? Why does it work this way? I was-I felt kind of shamed into just accepting it because I didn't know what-I didn't know really how to respond to that as a teenager. You're being taught by leaders and people that are in positions of trust and authority. You may question it, and talk about it, bring it up with your parents, and have your own discussions at home that reflect differently. But you're still surrounded by people that 373 Natalie, interview with author, August, 11, 2017. All contributions from Natalie in this chapter come from this source. 374 "Nails banged into a board" refers to an object lesson some narrators saw in YW meetings. Leaders pounded nails into a board to demonstrate to young women that if they engaged in improper sexual behavior, they were like a board with nails forced into it and then removed. They were full of holes, splintered, and unusable for productive purposes. 129 repeat it and emphasize that. That's harder-that's hard to break away from. Thinking of unrighteousness as a permanent state may have raised the stakes higher in homeland societies: if the barriers keeping young women isolated ever fell, the young women would be lost forever. Because sin was inevitable and permanent, Mormon homeland societies seemed to believe that young women must be isolated so as to make it through adolescence with their spirits and characters intact. This is not an unusual message for a society to send either its youth or its women, and it is normal for parents to want to protect children by limiting their exposure to things and people seen as unsavory. However, totalism occurs when a desire to protect becomes colonizing and some segment of the population is seen as inferior beings in need of rescue by those who are morally superior. An isolation that is nearly total fosters dependence and discourages young women from making decisions about their own lives. Trading Charity for Safety It is evident from the interviews that safety, spiritual and physical, was one of homeland society's paramount objectives for young women. Isolation was presumed to ensure safety. A person who is isolated is deprived of freedom to choose her own relationships and to come and go as she pleases. To some extent, those constraints are normal for an adolescent. What may not be apparent is the ideological premises young women and other homelanders had to support, even unintentionally, in order for totalizing isolation to seem acceptable, and what those premises precluded. I suggest Mormon homelanders accepted two premises in pursuit of safety: 130 religious affiliation determines usefulness to society, and individuals must acknowledge their inadequacy in order to survive. In homeland societies, non-Mormons were perceived as making a lesser contribution to society primarily because they were thought to be hindering rather than advancing the group objective of keeping young women safe. By assuming safety comes from society rather than self, homelanders were endorsing a view that individuals are less adequate than groups. When taken together, these two premises preclude charity. It is difficult to treat each person with kindness and good will when one has adopted an ideology that assumes anyone who is different is less socially worthwhile than oneself. It is difficult to value self when one has accepted a premise that subservience is necessary for survival. Some narrators now feel that homeland societies required Mormons to sacrifice charity toward themselves and others in order to achieve a group goal of safety for young women, even though being uncharitable was contrary to LDS doctrines. 375 Adult Responses to Homeland Insularity Now that narrators are adults, nearly all have difficulty accepting the totalistic binary of practicing Mormons being righteous and everyone else being dangerous that many encountered in Mormon homelands. They do not like the insular culture they believe they experienced as young women. They resist Mormon self-righteousness whenever they encounter it, refuse to isolate their own children, and stand up for religious diversity. 375 Such as Moroni 7:46 in the Book of Mormon, which reads "If ye have not charity, ye are nothing, for charity never faileth. Wherefore, cleave unto charity, which is the greatest of all." 131 Narrators invent pejoratives such as "Utards" and "SYDOZes (Stalwart Young Daughters of Zion)" to describe self-righteous homeland Mormons. 376 Karen is an LDS woman who came to Provo, Utah, in 1984 from a Mormon-minority town in Idaho to attend Brigham Young University. 377 She thinks her difficulties fitting in at BYU arose because of her own clinical depression and not only from the actions of others, but says that living in Provo taught her, "You need to be careful about having expectations about Mormons based on their Mormonism." She thinks there is a subculture of Mormonism that she has seen in Utah and sometimes in locales outside of homelands: One of the things [subcultural Mormons] do is group together, and they tend to isolate. Not intentionally, but they tend to group together. They're homogenous. They look for people that are like them. And I think it's probably an outgrowth of, you know, all the time where they were so different and had to rely on each other. And it just kind of kept going. It may manifest differently [now], but it's kind of the same. Karen believes that a Mormon homeland tendency to fear outsiders may stem from the 1800s when believers fled persecution and created a safe, Mormon-dominated homeland in Salt Lake City, though this cultural identity seems to manifest in geographies outside of homelands now. Karen has declared one area of the Arkansas community where she currently lives to be "Little Utah" because women there all seem to believe they are living Mormonism better than others. Conversely, Karen's mother taught her that the purpose of doctrine was to help a person know what activities were good for her personally; doctrine was not an excuse to label everyone who believes differently as 376 Korin, interview with author, August 1, 2017; all contributions from Korin in this chapter come from this source. Olivia, interview with author, June 17, 2017; all contributions from Olivia. in this chapter come from this source. 377 Karen, interview with author, July 3, 2014. All contributions from Karen in this chapter come from this source. 132 "evil." She felt her mother was different from "generational Mormons" in homelands who seem to think, "If you don't believe just like me, then there's no value in what you believe." Karen thinks homeland Mormonism often means assuming that others are not living as righteously as you are. Tori observed that when she lived in places outside of homelands, people did not let religion get in the way of friendship the way they did in Utah. She removed her name from LDS church records a few years ago when ward members tried to teach her young son about Mormonism without her permission. She has found coworkers, neighbors, and others to be judgmental of her non-Mormon-ness even in contexts such as the workplace where she thought religious affiliation should have been irrelevant. Two weeks after our interview, Tori relocated to Oregon with her husband and sons. She hopes she will feel less isolated in the Pacific Northwest. Even narrators who enjoy living as adults in Mormon homelands describe a selfrighteousness they have experienced. Lynne's daughters encounter a "chapter of the Utah Mormon Club" whenever they wear bikinis and are chastised by cousins. Lynne has tried to teach her daughters the difference between The Gospel and The Club. She says, "In Arizona, we had The Gospel, not The Club. The Club are the ones who say, ‘I don't know you, but I'm going to judge you by this picture of you in a backless dress.'" She says, "This club mentality is the reason people leave the church." Even though she departed Arizona in late adolescence in order to escape trouble, Lynne insists, "I was happy that I grew up in the world, and I wasn't afraid of people that weren't LDS." She thinks homeland Mormons feel they are better than everyone else. Korin, who moved into homelands in 1984, also thinks homeland smugness is 133 ridiculous. Her children in Texas went to school with Muslim children. They had pepperoni pizza at a school picnic, and she says, "These mothers didn't throw a fit, they just picked the pepperonis off the pizza. And you're telling me this person is a threat? Yeah, I don't think so. That's a pretty broad brush you're painting everybody with." Korin insists that, We LDS people do not have a monopoly on truth. Truth is truth whether we have it in our church building or somebody else has it in their church building. Our non-LDS friends and neighbors are super awesome. We just appreciate each other and appreciate the support of people that think there's a higher power and that there are some basic rules everybody should live by. Korin feels liberated now that she is no longer isolated from non-Mormons. In their interviews with me, many narrators went to great lengths to distance themselves from what they see as Mormon homeland self-righteousness. Stacey has trouble telling any other Mormon she is from Utah: I consider home to be both Utah and Oregon. But I found that by saying that I'm from Utah, which is where most of my family is now and where I go back to visit family, it comes with a certain stigma. And, like, a "Oh, you're a Utah Mormon." And I'm like, "No, no, no. Don't categorize me as a just a Utah Mormon because I'm also from Oregon." So, I'll say, "Well, I'm originally from Oregon, but more recently from Utah, and that's where my family's at now." And that's kind of how I phrase it. When I say I'm from Utah, there's very much a Utah Mormon stigma and it's not a positive one generally. I feel like I'm kind of shortchanging myself by saying that I'm from Utah. Ruth, who lives in Ohio with her husband and children, sums it up by saying, "You can be a Utah Mormon without being from Utah. Utah Mormon just means you're a bad Mormon." 378 Utah Mormon seems to be a rhetorical container narrators have invented to store the resentment, frustration, and anger they feel when homeland Mormons do not act 378 Ruth, interview with author, August 3, 2017. All contributions from Ruth in this chapter come from this source. 134 with the charity they believe a devotion to Christ should ensure. Narrators who have children are as earnest as their parents were in trying to protect those children. However, their approach seems different in that many refuse to isolate young people. Narrators' parents tried to shelter by keeping outsiders away, whereas narrators attempt to safeguard children via an approach one narrator called inoculation. 379 In medicine, isolation involves keeping a contagion apart from the subject, physically restricting access to toxic substances and people as much as possible, while inoculation involves controlled exposure rather than a comprehensive ban. When a person is inoculated, she accepts a small dose of a negative substance into her body so the body will recognize and be resistant to that substance if it reoccurs in large doses. For narrators, spiritual inoculation means educating children about a wide variety of beliefs and behaviors in hopes of developing their internal resilience when it comes to making righteous choices. Narrators believe inoculation is a more empowering approach than isolation because it focuses on building internal strength and counters the homeland message that proximity to sin will inevitably cause one to sin herself. Claudia came to Mormon homelands from Japan in 1992 at the age of fifteen, and now lives in Arizona with her husband and children. 380 She and her family are "active LDS all the way." She hopes, "If I expose my kids to ideas and opinions while they're in my home, where they're in an environment where I can talk to them, and I can discuss it with them, and I can help them work through it," then they will go "out to the world more 379 Jean, interview with author, July 2, 2014. All contributions from Jean in this chapter come from this source. 380 Claudia, interview with author, August 25, 2017. All contributions from Claudia in this chapter come from this source. 135 prepared because they've already come across these issues." She says her husband, who grew up in "white Idaho," was "shook a little bit" when he went on a mission to Cleveland, Ohio, as a young adult and heard things about Mormonism and race that were completely unfamiliar. "He had no good answers for them because he had never seen that perspective" because his homeland experience was insular. As a teenager, Claudia went to parties where people were drinking and decided for herself not to drink. She says, "It was never an issue for me from then on out because it was my personal choice. If you were never confronted with that, then you've never made the choice for yourself." She acknowledges her inoculation strategy is spiritual rather than physical: "I'm not going to say, here's some marijuana, try it (she laughs). But yeah, I want them to, before they leave, to know where they stand and to know somewhat really how they feel about things. And . . . that's hard to do if you've never been exposed to anything." When Jean wanted to keep her twelve-year-old daughter believing all through her time in YW that individual dreams were acceptable even if they differed from the church plan, she used the word "inoculate." She gave her daughter permission to be herself so as to "inoculate her" against people who might make her conform. She wanted her daughter to develop her own internal sense of what was appropriate for her rather than being guided by totalizing practices and people. Jean came to Provo, Utah, in the 1980s with her parents so her mother could attend college. At the time of our interview, Jean lived in the Salt Lake, Utah, area with her husband and daughters and considered herself "devout LDS," though she is less active in the church now. As adults, narrators chafed at homeland attempts to isolate them when they were young. By contrast, narrators want to teach their own children and other young women to 136 be good no matter what others do rather than merely avoid temptation. They hope to embed children in mainstream society, carefully and intentionally, with a parental and church lifeline to extract them at the first indicators of trouble. They do not believe proximity to sin inevitably leads to sin; the world is no longer seen as an evil place that must be avoided. The battle for souls has moved from an external site (a party, the back seat of a car, etc.) to an internal site: the heart and mind. Korin thinks it is harder to raise a child to be "firm in their faith" when that child has grown up in an insular culture and never met people of other faiths. She says, If you're only around your own kind, you don't recognize you might have information other people don't have. If you are lucky enough to live in a place where it's obvious people are making an active choice to participate in the LDS faith community, then you probably will have a better chance of finding out what is different. And so you can make a decision. When everybody is saying the same thing, it's kind of like there isn't a choice. And maybe that's not fair for me to say. I'm not suggesting that people that live in a predominantly LDS place don't have testimonies and their kids don't, but it turns into a cultural-social sort of thing perhaps more than a spiritual thing. Because they don't ever see the difference. They don't know. 381 Narrators believe their children (and people in general) will make healthy spiritual choices, if given freedom to choose for themselves. Even when children have stopped attending or believing in church, narrators try to uphold agency. When Anne's daughter withdrew from church activity, a YW leader "showed up at [their] door every day to get [her] daughter to come back to church." 382 Anne finally threatened the woman with a legal restraining order. She said the leader in a Salt Lake City, Utah, congregation did not understand, "You can't save anybody else. We 381 This quotation has been condensed and some sentences rearranged for readability. Anne, interview with author, July 8, 2014. All contributions from Anne in this chapter come from this source. 382 137 all have to get our own testimonies. We all have to discover this ourselves, and it takes longer for some people." She says Mormons should encourage those who have left church to return "by actually loving, instead of being horrible and stalking" about attendance. Knowing that exiting the church has eternal consequences in LDS theology, I pressed Anne as to her feelings about the situation. She admits, "It was hard for me, but I changed, and I'm now at peace with [my daughter] having her own choices." Several narrators believe an inoculation-oriented approach respects the humanity of all parties. Mormons with unusual practices and people of different faiths are accepted with minimal judgment and are not considered potential contaminants. Young women are not viewed as helpless. Agency is honored. Young women have a chance to develop internal resources-such as conscience and belief in God-that narrators believe will help them be safe and well in any setting, not just when insulated by other Mormons. An inoculation strategy also acknowledges that sin will not forever destroy a person, and it is all right to make mistakes. As adults, narrators disagree with the disempowering homeland interpretation of permanent sin that they encountered in Mormon homelands. Most narrators did not see YW lessons on chastity as theologically contradictory when they were young (though some did); however, as adults, they are bothered by how YW lessons made it seem as though a young woman could not repent of sexual sins. Charlotte insists, "A girl is never like a chewed up piece of gum. I mean, my goodness. At the time I was like, ‘You do not want to be a chewed up piece of gum, oh, my gosh, who will want you?' I mean that was absolutely the message I got, and that is ridiculous." Charlotte wants young women today to understand "how important they are, 138 and what tremendous power is available to them as they keep their covenants." 383 She believes young women need support and encouragement, but not total isolation. Natalie, an LDS woman now living in Virginia, has been frustrated as an adult by the homeland rhetoric she still encounters about sin being irreparable. She talks with some emotion about her "homegrown Mormon" fiancé who ended their engagement when he learned she had previously sinned, even though she had repented and received her temple recommend from church leaders. 384 She said, "I guess he looked down the long hallway of eternity and just got turned off because I wasn't pristine. I wasn't pure. Somehow, the Atonement just didn't apply to me." This adult experience finally allowed her to articulate one of "the things that pisses [her] off the most about church culture . . . that [she] saw in [her] ward in high school": the idea that once a sinner, always a sinner, despite LDS teachings to the contrary. Many narrators now seek the company of non-Mormons as adults. Brynhilda is an LDS woman who moved in 1998 from South Dakota to Rexburg, Idaho, to attend churchowned Brigham Young University Idaho (then Ricks College). She does not want her daughters to attend a church college if they end up being raised in Utah, which is where she now lives. She says, "I think that if you spend your entire life in Utah, um, you need to see what the real world is like." She likes living in Utah more than she expected to, but 383 "Covenant," Gospel Topics, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed February 21, 2018, https://www.lds.org/topics/covenant?lang=eng. Covenants in Mormonism are sacred agreements between God and an individual or group. Mormons believe fulfilling terms of a covenant enables one to receive blessings from God. 384 "Temples," Gospel Topics, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed February 8, 2018, https://www.lds.org/topics/temples?lang=eng. Any church member wishing to enter an LDS temple must receive a certificate of worthiness, called a recommend, from two local ecclesiastical leaders, a bishop and a stake president. 139 still believes there is a danger here "in not having any diversity." She says, I think to be functional as an adult, you need to be able to realize that not everybody thinks the same thing as you, and that's OK, and that doesn't make them evil. And we say that in Sunday School, but that's not the interpretation you always get the rest of the week, you know? [When I was at Ricks], we had one of those honor code sacrament meetings. The girl was speaking about all of the rules and the expectations [of the honor code], and she says, "You know, we have higher standards. And that's what makes us better." And I about fell off my chair, and I thought, "Now I'm in the Hitler Youth." I think sometimes Mormons think we have the corner on goodness. 385 Brynhilda's comparison of homeland Mormonism to Nazi totalitarianism is worth noting. Narrators did not always know why they were uncomfortable in Mormon homeland societies, but they knew the totalism they experienced was unacceptable, as Brynhilda's reference indicates. Tori hopes that in her new home in Oregon she will be able to learn about other people's religions "and just meet new people that had different experiences." She says she found value in religious diversity when she experienced it in Colorado before moving to Mormon homelands, and she is looking forward to enjoying it again. She says she has not found a "lot of cultural value" in Utah because "it was stuff [she] already knew." She thinks living outside Mormon homelands will align better with her belief that religion should not be a determinant of someone's worth. For some narrators, seeking diversity seemed to be at odds with wanting the community and safety of a Mormon community. Several women left Mormon homelands as adults, seeking "a breath of fresh air" but came back later. 386 Many were uneasy about 385 This quotation has been condensed and some sentences rearranged for readability. Rita, interview with author, June 6, 2017. All contributions from Rita in this chapter come from this source. 386 140 living in Mormon homelands again and have intentionally selected cities, towns, and neighborhoods they say are more diverse than those they lived in as adolescents. Some returned to be with extended family or pursue specific career or educational opportunities; however, a few returned in hopes of meeting eligible marriage partners or to raise their children in communities perceived as family-friendly and sociologically and economically healthy. 387 They do not cite safety as a reason for the return, at least not directly. For example, Abigail and her husband bought a house in a diverse area of Salt Lake City, Utah, hoping their offspring could avoid the homogenized experience Abigail had as a homeland teenager. Abigail describes herself and her husband as "active but not orthodox" and explains that an orthodox Mormon is one who will not just do whatever she is told without thinking about it for herself. She explains their housing decision by saying, "I felt more comfortable when there was a little bit more diversity. I just liked it. I didn't necessarily want to be surrounded by people who are all exactly like me." Yet, Abigail's five-year-old son attends kindergarten in an affluent, Mormon-dominated, much less diverse area near his grandmother instead of attending the neighborhood elementary school. I asked Abigail how she reconciled this. She said, "What, that we want our kids to experience, you know, different things and diversity. And then I didn't send him to the diverse school?" We both laughed. Then she said, "Because I'm being kind of snooty. I recognize this irony myself." 387 Hannah, interview with author, June 20, 2017. All contributions from Hannah in this chapter come from this source. Jordyn, interview with author, June 7, 2017. All contributions from Jordyn in this chapter come from this source. Abigail, interview. Rita, interview. 141 Maybe the conundrum of choosing homogeneity while advocating for diversity can be partially reconciled by acknowledging different types of diversity. What Abigail said she "missed most" when she came from Washington State to Toole, Utah, as a teenager was "diversity of thought, people who . . . don't all think exactly the same." She says homeland Mormons have a "hive-mind kind of mentality." Like other narrators who were offended by homeland isolation, Abigail seems more focused on ideological and religious diversity than on economic, racial, or social diversity. I am not claiming she is opposed to other forms of diversity; rather, I am observing that religious diversity emerged repeatedly in our conversation as a key factor she was seeking, while other forms of variation did not. For instance, she seemed willing to accept some degree of economic homogeneity: My main concern was just where the resources are being put. I was very concerned, that if you have that kind of turnover with kids with really high needs and they may not be coming in-they're probably not coming in at the same spot as some of the other kids, that he could get kind of lost in the shuffle. Right? And it just gets really good ratings on Rate My School. [The neighborhood school] gets a four. [The other one] gets a nine. It's just . . . you know. Abigail initially wondered if sending her son to a better school undermined her claims about valuing difference. However, together we co-interpreted her situation as an indicator that Mormon homeland dehumanization of non-Mormons so affected her that she made material commitments to avoid replicating that paradigm (e.g., purchasing a house in a religiously diverse neighborhood), even without exploring fully the possible implications of those commitments in other areas of her life. Narrators such as Abigail seemingly do not possess the knee-jerk tendency to isolate that their parents demonstrated. Even when adult narrators have removed themselves or their children from potentially harmful situations, they have done it 142 mindfully with concern about messages they may be sending to children and others about non-Mormons, diversity, and kindness. Narrators seem to resent the tradeoff of charity for safety they unwittingly accepted as youthful homeland dwellers, and as adults they engage consciously with how to embrace diversity and still preserve safety. They want to be part of the world outside of Mormonism, while receiving protection from the perils of that world should it become necessary. Narrators want to achieve safety and promote religious diversity without being uncharitable. Conclusion The stories indicate that narrators perceived some homelanders as demonstrating a lack of charity toward non-Mormons and toward the young women themselves, and justifying that lack of charity as necessary to ensure safety. Many narrators saw this as an unacceptable theological and personal compromise in the name of safety, and they resisted by rejecting self-righteousness, emphasizing character development over external constraint, and advocating for religious diversity. Fear of difference is a central tenet of totalism, and isolation is a common mechanism societies use to manage that fear because isolation allows a group to stifle individual identity. Even reinventive (voluntary) totalism springs from fear of the individual herself being inadequate. Two unfortunate legacies of isolation are how it dehumanizes one segment of the population to better safeguard another segment, and how it traps those being protected into a perpetual position of weakness. The next chapter describes how narrators sometimes felt tremendous inclusion in Mormon homeland societies, while at other times they felt criticized and excluded. 143 Narrators believed they were labelled as unrighteous when they disobeyed homeland societies' many unwritten rules about appearance, income, and family, even though those rules seemed to have little to do with God's commandments. Many narrators felt pressured to conform many aspects of their identities to homeland expectations, something they now consider an unacceptable tradeoff of self-worth for community acceptance. CHAPTER 6 RULES: COMPROMISING SELF-WORTH FOR ACCEPTANCE When Stella moved from Southern California to Bountiful, Utah, in 1981, she did not realize her legs would be a topic of conversation in her Young Women (YW) classroom. 388 Specifically, she never imagined that whether she covered those legs with pantyhose would be relevant to her spiritual welfare. When a YW teacher told the girls it was "immodest not to wear pantyhose because there was a chance that too much of your leg would show," Stella-with naked legs and never one to put up with what she calls "crap"- looked at her leader and thought, "Yeah, whatever." She piped up with, "Never wore them in Southern California." Her teacher said, "Well, Southern California's a lot more liberal." "Same church," Stella insisted. Her teacher looked at her sanctimoniously and said, "Well, it's lived more righteously here." Narrators found Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000 to be very focused on outward indicators of Mormon identity, including things young women could change (such as appearance) and things they could not change (such as family structure or income level). Homeland societies seemed to have many unwritten rules for how to be Stella, interview with author, July 18, 2014. All contributions from Stella in this chapter come from this source. 388 145 properly Mormon, almost none of which were part of Mormonism in narrators' missionfield congregations. Some homelanders seemed to feel that because homeland Mormonism had more rules, it was a superior implementation of the faith. An emphasis on rules, mostly unwritten, is one of the three mechanisms of totalistic identity control that narrators encountered. Narrators were unaccustomed to having their worthiness questioned by other Mormons, especially peers and adults who did not have ecclesiastical authority over them. They did not want to learn and attempt to follow rules that appeared to have been invented by humans rather than by God, and they did not believe homelanders had the moral authority to create and enforce those rules. Roselyn, who moved from Virginia to Layton, Utah, in 1979, observed that the mission-field wards she attended were faithbased rather than rule-based, meaning members emphasized belief more than behavior. 389 In those congregations, being Mormon meant believing in God and the teachings of the LDS church, getting baptized, and trying to act in a Christ-like manner. Anyone who professed to be Mormon was welcome. Rules existed, but they were written down in canonized sources such as scriptures, and young women knew what was expected. Faith was the focus, not rules. Building faith led to right behavior: when one believed a particular way, she behaved better. Internal faith rather than external action was the best indicator of Mormon-ness. A rule-based society that specified a single right path in so many aspects of life made narrators uncomfortable. Fitting in seemed to come at a compromise of self-worth Roselyn, interview with author, June 14, 2017. All contributions from Roselyn in this chapter come from this source. 389 146 because one had to agree that homeland Mormonism was better than one's own interpretations of the religion. In mission-field congregations, Mormonism was more open to individual adaptation: Mormons did not have to look and act like each other in order to be considered faithful. Karen says when she lived in Idaho before moving to Provo, Utah, in 1984, "If somebody came into our ward, we welcomed them, and they got all mushied over and all that kind of stuff. They just got sucked right in." 390 She anticipated that same welcome in Mormon homelands, but with even greater intensity because there were more Mormons. Instead, she said when she arrived, "It was like I was a strange, weird person from another planet." She had to go through a vetting process in order to be included. In the mission-field, different had not meant unrighteous, as it seemed to in the homelands. The judgmental-ness of Mormon homeland societies was distressing to narrators. Many came expecting to join a community of fellow believers; instead, they found themselves scrambling to follow unwritten and seemingly arbitrary homeland rules in order to prove their worth as humans and Mormons. LDS theology preaches love among followers of God, 391 and most narrators assumed homeland societies would be even more inclusive than mission-field congregations. Frequently, they were not. Many narrators are still attempting to reconcile the exclusivity they experienced in homelands with their understandings of how a Christian community should function. Karen, interview with author, July 3, 2014. All contributions from Karen in this chapter come from this source. 391 For example, see Mosiah 18:21, Book of Mormon, which reads "And he commanded them that there should be no contention one with another, but that they should look forward with one eye, having one faith and one baptism, having their hearts knit together in unity and in love one towards another." 390 147 This chapter describes the acceptance and insider privileges narrators expected to enjoy when they moved to Mormon homelands from 1975 through 2000, and it demonstrates that some narrators did find that acceptance. Then it explains how unwritten rules about family, income, and appearance functioned as a totalizing mechanism to exclude and control narrators in many homeland societies. It examines how narrators responded to those rules, and explores three implications of life in a rule-based society: difference is seen as wrong rather than merely different, accommodation of individual needs is unlikely, and rule enforcers have absolute power. Then it argues that rules in homeland societies sometimes required young women to trade self-worth for belonging. Finally, it examines how narrators have reacted to rule-based Mormonism as adults. Specifically, narrators have become crusaders against injustice and wary of Mormon rules, especially those that originate in Mormon homelands. Expected Benefits of Living in Mormon Homelands In some homeland congregations, young women received the generous reception and insider privileges for which they had hoped. Stacey says when she arrived in Bountiful, Utah, from Oregon in 1995, she made friends and became part of the community. 392 She says, "It felt really safe to know that people understood my values, and I understood theirs." Once she adjusted to her new environment, she enjoyed an easier and more comfortable social life than she had experienced outside of homelands. Camryn never made close friends in the homelands but said the kids were nice to Stacey, interview with author, August 12, 2017. All contributions from Stacey in this chapter come from this source. 392 148 her and always made her feel included, even though she must have seemed like an "alien" to them. 393 She moved to Orem, Utah, from Oklahoma in 1991 at the end of her junior year of high school, and she says her full Southern look did not match the "Seattle grunge" the other kids were wearing. One young woman in Camryn's ward immediately befriended her, gave her a ride to school every day, and introduced her to people. Camryn was amazed the other young woman was so kind. Rita also had a wonderful social experience when she moved into Cedar City, Utah, in 1990 from Chicago, Illinois. 394 She said, "People were very nice and very kind. And I just thought there were so many good things about it." It was her senior year of high school and the other kids all knew each other, but they "accepted [her] with open arms. They weren't super clique-y, like maybe people had been in Chicago. And so it was a really refreshing experience." She noted that she had friends from all "the different . . . stereotypical high school groups" because everyone was just so "open." However, when asked about her siblings, Rita acknowledged that her three younger sisters did not have the same inclusive experience. Many newcomers and their families thought moving to Utah would provide them with greater access to the Mormon doctrine, both because the prophet and apostles were stationed near church headquarters in Salt Lake City, and because more religious instruction materials were available. They believed-along with some homelanders-that a person could possibly be more righteous living closer to the center of the religion. Camryn, interview with author, June 8, 2017. All contributions from Camryn in this chapter come from this source. 394 Rita, interview with author, June 12, 2017. All contributions from Rita in this chapter come from this source. 393 149 Greater access to gospel teachings was one reason so many narrators expected homeland Mormon societies to be kinder than mission-field societies, and also a reason many were disappointed to find homelands so exclusive. Jeanine said her religious conversion happened once she moved into a Mormon community in Stockton, California, because she "had access to more programs, more classes, more other people with testimonies." 395 She moved from Massachusetts as a seventeen-year-old in 1977, and a few years earlier, had lived briefly in Sandy, Utah. She came from a military family and also lived several places outside of homelands as a child. When Roselyn came in 1979 and saw that seminary was taught by professionally trained instructors "for a job" rather than staffed by volunteers, she thought she had "died and gone to heaven." She was astounded that some homelanders did not enroll in seminary: "How can you not take advantage of this [excellent teaching], you know? This is amazing!" Roselyn was eager to be an "insider" when she came to Utah. She was excited to hear general conference live every six months, rather than waiting weeks or months for the printed version. 396 One exchange illustrates how she and her ward members in the mission-field idealized Mormon homelands: Roselyn: In Virginia, anything from Utah was amazing. (Laughs) You know? Jeanine, interview with author, August 4, 2017. All contributions from Jeanine in this chapter come from this source. 396 Ryan Morgenegg, "A Brief History of General Conference," Church News, October 3, 2014, https://www.lds.org/church/news/a-brief-history-of-generalconference?lang=eng. General conference is a two-day training held in Salt Lake City, Utah, semiannually. Local television and radio stations routinely broadcast the conference, with radio broadcasts beginning in 1923 and television in 1949. Homeland members were allowed to go in person to the venue and sometimes were able to shake hands with apostles and general church leaders. Satellite broadcasts to church buildings outside of the Intermountain West began in 1975, and over the next two decades became available in more regions. Internet broadcasting began in 1999. Members could read select conference talks in church magazines, mailed to the homes of paid subscribers. 395 150 It's like if it came from Utah, it was like from Moses' mouth. You know? Interviewer: (Laughs) I'm sorry. I shouldn't laugh. Roselyn: It was. I mean, I realize now what a ridiculous notion that was, but at the time. And I can remember at fifteen, in 1978, they installed an audio system in our chapel that received a satellite broadcast. And on a Saturday night, all the women from the stake, we all came to the chapel dressed to the nines and sat in the chapel and listened to the Women's Conference. That was amazing, to have a live broadcast from Salt Lake City. It was like from Mecca or from Rome, you know? It was like directly from the Vatican or directly from God. Interviewer: Because God was in Salt Lake City? Roselyn: Because God was in Salt Lake City. Newcomers thought they would be entitled to the luxuries lucky homeland Mormons already enjoyed, and they assumed moving to the headquarters of their religion would afford them the same privileged insider status as homelanders then living there. After moving, narrators found gospel resources were indeed available to all near headquarters, but in some homeland congregations, acceptance into Mormon society required compliance with mysterious and unarticulated homeland rules. Narrators had thought it would be sufficient to simply be a Mormon who lived in "the right place." 397 Homeland society was sometimes warm and hospitable for young women and at other times exclusive and unfriendly. Some young women experienced both extremes in homelands, especially if they moved from one homeland congregation to another as adolescents. Occasionally the disparity was within a single congregation with different members of the same family, as happened with Rita and her siblings. Some narrators suggested that whether one was excluded by other Mormons might be due to fortune or When church President Brigham Young entered the Salt Lake Valley for the first time in 1847, he is reported to have said, "This is the right place. Drive on." The phrase has become part of Mormon homeland folklore. For example, see "Bishop Burton Receives Prestigious Community Award," Newsroom, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, March 17, 2011, https://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/bishopburton-receives-prestigious-community-award. 397 151 divine favor. Olivia, who moved from Washington State to Rexburg, Idaho, as a college freshman in 1976, says, "If you live in a ward that's not judgmental, count your blessings. Because I pretty much lived in three that were, and then one I loved." 398 While the women's stories do not indicate exactly where/when an overemphasis on rules and the attendant judgmental-ness was most likely to occur, they demonstrate that such behavior occurred in some homeland societies from 1975 through 2000 often enough for narrators to recount it in story after story. The following section describes rules about family, income, and appearance that made narrators feel excluded. Homeland Rules about Family, Income, and Appearance When they lived outside of Mormon homelands, most narrators seemed to feel supported and loved by other Mormons. Roselyn talked about the LDS people she knew in Virginia: "The kids were really, really close. We were the only Latter-day Saints. And so having kids with the same values and everything, we were just very, very close. A tight-knit community. And we were there for each other, you know? We were supportive of each other." Roselyn stops speaking, chuckles, and says, "Soooo . . . then I moved to Utah." She discovered Mormonism was not the basis for community in the homeland society she moved to. In her experience, homeland Mormons were not by default kind to other Mormons. Olivia, interview with author, June 17, 2017. All contributions from Olivia in this chapter come from this source. Future research could be done to correlate the demographic circumstances of a young woman's move (such as age at move or size of city) to whether she was accepted or rejected. Such research is beyond the scope and methodology of this project, but might be accomplished using this oral history archive or the metadata collected from narrators and filed with the archive. 398 152 Elizabeth moved to Grantsville, Utah, in 1995 from North Carolina. 399 She left a racially-charged middle school where she had been shunned for sitting with black kids at lunch. She is white, but "picked the wrong color, so therefore [she] was punished." When Elizabeth found out she was moving to Utah, she "thought it would be glorious." She admits ruefully in hindsight that was "dumb," but she assumed Mormon kids were going to have to be friends with each other because they were all the same color. She also thought they would befriend her because, "We were both Mormons. Mormons like everyone. That's what they preach in general conference, we should be kind to everyone. And we should be friends with everyone." She pauses, and says, "And you move here, and you're like, you [Utah Mormon kids] just ruined it. You've ruined it!" Elizabeth was "teased and tormented" by her Mormon peers about her accent and her clothing. She says the biggest contradiction to her church's teachings about love and human worth was how those peers determined she was not acceptable to the group without knowing anything about who she was inside. They decided from only her voice and appearance that she was not good enough, in the same way kids in North Carolina made judgments based on color. She expected better from her own religious circle. She thought Mormons would give other people-especially other Mormons-a fair chance at being accepted. She sputtered in the interview with me, trying to find words to express astonishment at the rejection she felt from homelanders: "I was just-you have to like me-you know, there's nothing-you don't know me, so you have to like me until you get to know me, and then you can decide if you like me or not." Elizabeth, interview with author, June 17, 2017. All contributions from Elizabeth in this chapter come from this source. 399 153 Narrators observed that friendships seemed based on different criteria other than a shared faith affiliation. In homelands, being a Mormon was often not sufficient to earn the acceptance of other Mormons; a young woman also had to learn and comply with seemingly endless rules about aspects of life that had little to do with spirituality. Many narrators were surprised to find themselves treated as inferior in homeland societies when they did not agree with homeland determinations about what made a person properly Mormon, or when they did not believe homeland societies had the right to decide which people were worthwhile. For example, numerous narrators discovered unwritten rules about one's family structure, size, and origin that defined their place/status in homelands. The best Mormon family was apparently headed by two parents who were both alive and married to each other. The parents should have several children and many extended family members, all of whom should be active participants in Mormonism and some of whom should be descended from pioneers. When she visited Sandy, Utah, as a preteen, Jeanine remembers an emphasis on the ideal Mormon family. She was shown movies at church 400 and she says, "You'd see a mom and a dad and the kids doing family prayer or doing Family Home Evening 401 or something. There was always that perfect little family, and that's what you were supposed to aspire to, and if you didn't have that situation, you didn't quite feel like you belonged." Jeanine said it felt too idealized to be realistic, even from Jeanine is most likely referring to filmstrips created by the church and commonly shown in Sunday School, YW, and YM (Young Men) classes during the 1970s and '80s. 401 Parents are encouraged to meet together one evening a week (usually Mondays) with their children to study religious topics and engage in activities together. This is called Family Home Evening. Family Home Evening Resource Book (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1983). 400 154 her youthful perspective. Proper Mormon families had large networks of Mormon relatives living nearby. Aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents attended every Mormon-related celebration, such as baptisms, 402 mission farewells, 403 or temple weddings. 404 Sophia thought that huge family participation turned sacred events into spectacles rather than private devotions, but acknowledged that the spectacle was part of securing a position in homeland society. 405 Sophia moved with her family from Puyallup, Washington, to Sunset, Utah, in 1996. Her parents were the only believers in both of their extended families, and she stood out because she was unable to have large numbers of relatives at her religious events. Narrators also felt that Mormons whose ancestors played heroic roles in LDS church history were considered more worthwhile in homeland societies. Sophia says on Pioneer Day, when Mormons commemorate their settlement of the Salt Lake Valley in Utah, other ward members would have pioneer traditions, stories, and recipes. They knew the names of grandmothers who came across the plains to Utah. She always felt out of place: And here I am, my ancestors are from Missouri. I was most likely the ones that Mormons can be baptized after they are eight years old. Visitors can attend. Mormon men (and in the period under study, sometimes women) accepted volunteer assignments to serve proselytizing missions. Before a person left on a mission, he spoke in church. That speech was called a "mission farewell" in Mormon vernacular. 404 Weddings in LDS temples can be attended only by church members who have been endorsed by their ecclesiastical leaders. Non-Mormons cannot view a temple wedding, so for couples with family members not of the faith, temple weddings can be exclusionary. 405 Sophia, interview with author, August 4, 2017. All contributions from Sophia in this chapter come from this source. 402 403 155 were kicking the [Mormon] pioneers out. 406 And I didn't have one of those families that was one of those Mormon Royalty families, you know? Everybody knows the Smith family, or everyone knows the Young family, or whatever. But we weren't ever like that, it was just always our little crew. And we weren't ever known in the Mormon culture or anything like that. Newcomers knew of heroic figures from Mormon history prior to moving to homelands; however, they did not know descendants of those heroic figures were treated like royalty. Emily moved from California to Snowflake, Arizona, as a fifteen-year-old. 407 Snowflake was a small town founded in 1878 by two Mormon men, Erastus Snow and William Jordan Flake, who were called by church President Brigham Young to settle the area. 408 This town and its founders are part of the pioneer legend in Mormon homelands. Emily did not expect to have the cachet of children from the two privileged founding families, but she also did not think she would be considered less righteous because she was not related to Mormon pioneer heroes. When Emily began dating a boy from a founding family, the school librarian told her she was not good enough for the young man because she was from a lesser family. She shares this experience and explains how she started to believe that maybe the librarian was correct about her being less righteous: Emily: I was dating this guy, Brant. His best friend's mother was the librarian, the school librarian. Our class was at the library doing some research project. Interviewer: Okay, so Brant's best friend's mother was the librarian. Emily: Mm-hmm. She pulled me aside. I remember her. She was cutting out these brown football shapes to make a bulletin board for the football team. In my mind, when I think about this, I remember all her football shapes 406 Mobs from Missouri drove early Mormons from their homes in the 1830s, and in 1838, the governor of Missouri signed an executive order saying that Mormons must be "exterminated or driven from the state." Matthew Bowman, The Mormon People: The Making of an American Faith (New York, NY: Random House, 2012), 32-62. 407 Emily, interview with author, June 28, 2017. All contributions from Emily in this chapter come from this source. 408 Jerry Stewart, "History of Snowflake, AZ," The Snowflake, Arizona, Home Page, accessed March 2, 2018, http://www.jerrystewart.org/snowflakeaz/history.html. 156 laid out on her desk, and she was like, "I need to talk to you. I'm concerned because I've heard you've started dating Brant, and he's a real quality person from a quality family. I don't think that you should be dating him. You are ruining his reputation." Interviewer: Wow. Emily: Right? And I think if I had been really secure with myself, I would've been like, "Who are you to say that? There's nothing wrong with me." But I was so insecure that I was like, "She's probably right. There's something wrong. I am not good enough." Because I wasn't from a good family. Interviewer: Wow. Emily: Yeah, and she-this is a grownup. This isn't a teenager saying that to me. I mean, I just cried-not there, but I remember like, "Don't cry. Don't cry. Don't cry." As soon as I got somewhere private. It was humiliating and embarrassing. I was like, "I can't believe people think that." I must not be good enough for somebody who is really righteous. 409 Emily was devastated to have judgments passed on her by a Mormon adult. Family size, structure, and origin were wholly out of narrators' control, yet unwritten rules about those things often determined young women's acceptance by other Mormons in homeland societies. Prejudice against divorced women or nonpioneers might not of itself have been totalizing. People often look down on those who are different. The totalism came when so many aspects of individual identity had to conform to a group norm in order for a person to be considered worthy to be a Mormon. Failure to comply with homeland societies' myriad unwritten rules about family seemed to mean a person was not good enough for her religion (e.g., not righteous enough) rather than merely not acceptable as a friend or neighbor. Some homeland Mormons claimed superior religiosity and seemed to believe they had moral authority to pass judgment on other Mormons' families on behalf of Mormonism itself. Mission-field Mormonism encouraged marriage, childbearing, and connection with extended family and it joined homelands in celebrating Mormon pioneer 409 This quotation has been condensed for readability. 157 heritage. However, narrators found mission-field congregations to be much less specific than homeland societies as to exactly how those things should be enacted. The familyrelated parts of a member's life were left more up to individual discretion, and therefore mission-field congregations were generally less totalizing. Several narrators also described how unwritten rules about affluence excluded them from homeland societies. Some homelanders attempted to convince other Mormons of their superior righteousness by boasting about material possessions. Hannah says she felt members of her homeland ward had a "keeping up with the Joneses attitude." I asked her what she meant by that, and she said spiritual and financial competitiveness. She says the two are linked: homelanders with fancy houses and many possessions thought they were more representative of what a Mormon should be. She felt like some homelanders thought that if a person were not blessed with affluence, she must be sinning. Stella says young women in her Bountiful, Utah, ward were quick to judge her because she did not wear brand-name clothing and her family was poor. At the time, Stella was surprised Mormons would use income to assess other Mormons' worthiness. None of the other young women in her ward were interested in being friends with her. She says, Bountiful? Oh, no. You were done to the nines. It was a big fashion show, and there were certain brands you were supposed to wear. And you were supposed to do your hair this way and you're supposed to do this. Plus, if you didn't grow up in the little neighborhood, so you didn't know all the old stories, and you don't have a dad because your parents are (whispers) divorced-the word that was always whispered. Well, who's that? And what have you got to offer? And why should we hang with you? 410 Because her mother's drop in income coincided with the divorce, Stella found it hard to 410 This quote has been condensed for readability. 158 separate the judgment she felt from living in a single-parent home from the judgment she felt from being less affluent. It was almost as if homelanders assumed a reduced income was a punishment her mother deserved for failing at Mormonism so dramatically as to not keep her family together. Very few narrators had found income levels to be connected to Mormonism in mission-field congregations. They were unaccustomed to their families needing to comply with certain arbitrary rules about monetary success so as to avoid being judged unworthy by other Mormons. This went beyond snobbery; it was totalizing in that narrators felt some homeland societies made this aspect of identity (income and the accompanying decisions related to employment, education, time, etc. that went with it) fair game for control by fellow congregants, inventing and imposing rules for what mattered spiritually, not just socially. Many narrators also felt they were expected to conform their appearances to unwritten rules of propriety in homeland societies. Paula says her sister did well at assimilating in Mormon culture. The sister was "as happy as a pig in the mud" in Orem, Utah, after their family moved there in 1992 from Virginia, whereas Paula was miserable. 411 I asked what she meant by assimilation, and Paula told this story: I remember when we moved to Orem, there was a family across the street that had five girls that were approximately our ages. They gave us a huge bag of those big hair bows. Because we went to church a couple of weeks without the hair bows. And we stuck out like a sore thumb because I mean, you could literally sit in the back and count hair bows, you know? Just like, the baby has a hair bow, the grown women have hair bows. Like it's fast and testimony meeting, 412 you'd see them approaching the pulpit, the hair Paula, interview with author, May 31, 2017. All contributions from Paula in this chapter come from this source. 412 Fast and testimony meeting is a special worship service Mormons hold the first Sunday of each month. Members skip two meals to be more spiritually attuned and then 411 159 bows are flapping on the tops of their heads, and these are women who probably have grandchildren. And that was just so bizarre to me. Like, in Virginia, there were no hair bows. And so we came to Orem, and the first thing we get is this big bag of hair bows, like "Happy assimilation present." And we didn't wear them. Not one of us would wear them. But yeah, it was like, "Hey, you know, you need to look the part. It's super important." 413 It was not just that fashion norms were different in Virginia than they were in Utah. That was to be expected. The totalism arose because fashion norms-like family characteristics and income level-were connected to properly assimilating into Mormonness. To be a good Mormon in the homelands city of Orem at this point in time, Paula and her sisters were expected to look like other homeland women in their congregation. They needed the visible markers of the society. In Virginia, Paula's hair accessories (or lack of) were not specified by her religion. Mission-field Mormonism did not control that part of her individuality. In the mission-field, narrators said they were far less likely to be viewed as unrighteous or inadequate when they looked different from other young women in their congregations. A much broader range of styles could be worn before arousing judgment from other Mormons. In many of narrators' homeland congregations, worth was tied to whether a person figured out and accepted the highly specific yet unwritten rules for appearance that other Mormons set. Young women who agreed to be totalized-who wore the hair bows, so to speak-were considered to be better Mormons. Being perceived as a good Mormon in homelands from 1975 through 2000 was not just about how one dressed, styled her hair, or made up her face: narrators explained take turns standing and expressing beliefs to other members during the service. "Chapter 25: Fasting," in Gospel Principles, 144-148 (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2011). 413 This quote has been condensed for readability. 160 that a person had to sound and act like everyone else as well. After her family moved from a racially and economically diverse neighborhood in Kearns, Utah, to a more homogenous and affluent neighborhood in Murray, Utah, Mary Ann went to a church youth conference with the other young women. While there, she was given inaccurate instructions about social rules from homeland young women who knew they could make her suffer since she was unfamiliar with how things were supposed to be done. She says, "[The girls from church] were trying to tell me all about what the school was gonna be like, and kind of the school customs, and things that would happen at school. And trying to like, prepare me for how to behave." She pauses, then says, "It was all manufactured to make me look foolish when I went to school." The young women knew that if Mary Ann took their advice, the other kids would make fun of her. It was very upsetting for Mary Ann to have trusted other Mormons and then have them betray her. It illustrated the kind of power imbalance that totalism scholars have observed in rule-based societies. Implications of Living in a Rule-Based Society An emphasis on rules can imbalance a society in favor of a group because it categorizes difference as wrong, discourages adaptation to individual needs, and elevates rule-enforcers to unacceptably powerful positions. Narrators' stories indicate Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000 sometimes displayed these characteristics. When rules are everywhere in a society, be those rules written or unwritten, those who do not follow the rules are wrong-doers rather than simply people with different priorities. Emily says it took her two years to "sort of recover" from living in Snowflake, Arizona. She acknowledges that recover is a "weird word" to describe moving away from 161 one's seemingly benign home town, but says she needed to recover from feeling like she had to live her life so as to look good to other people. I ask whether she thought constant scrutiny was normal in a small town or if it was connected to Mormonism. She says she believes the pressure she felt had more to do with everyone having the same values than with the size of the town. If a person was doing something unusual-even if it did not violate church doctrine-that person was considered weird. I asked, Interviewer: Weird or unrighteous? Emily: It seemed like they equated those things. If you were outside of the norm a little bit, like quirky, or you-your clothes were more extreme, which I wouldn't consider them extreme, but they did. You know? I think they equated difference with unrighteousness. To many narrators, rule-based homeland Mormonism was more intolerant than faithbased mission-field Mormonism. Doing things differently was the same as doing things wrong. People who did not know or follow the rules were outcasts. Totalistic societies have few means for dealing with deviance other than to eject or punish it. Observing rules seemed more important than meeting individual needs when it came to helping young women who faced overwhelming situations beyond their control, such as the death of a family member, abuse, or parents' divorces. They would have benefitted from individual accommodation and support from their Mormon homeland community: perhaps a relaxing of behavior expectations or a leader willing to be a comforter rather than an enforcer. Rule-based homeland societies in this study were inadequate at helping some narrators individually in these situations. Regardless of what else was happening in a young woman's life, peers and leaders expected that young woman to behave the same as everyone else her age. Sarah moved to Orem, Utah, when she was fifteen because her mother was dying of cancer and 162 wanted to be near extended family for her final months. Sarah was lonely and frightened. She says she tried to connect with her YW leaders: "I really wanted them to be allies. I desperately needed other moms. I needed mother figures." She remembers going over to one YW leader's house. The leader seemed uncomfortable at having someone from the ward approach her unannounced. Sarah got the impression the woman wanted time to prepare herself, her appearance, and her messaging. Before turning Sarah away, the leader asked her what she needed, and Sarah remembers wailing hopelessly to herself, "I need a family." It was as if the leader found it inconceivable that she could interact with one of her charges in an unscripted, spontaneous way. Sarah felt rule-oriented Mormonism did not encourage leaders to make individual accommodation, even though LDS theology teaches about the value of the one. 414 After Sarah's mother passed away, her dad took the family to a cabin in the mountains for two days so they could go "into deep mourning." While they were gone, adult women from the ward's Relief Society 415 organization came into Sarah's house and made over the bathroom. They installed a new mat, shower curtain, towels, and soap holders, all in a bright yellow, and threw away the family's previous decor. Sarah was horrified when she returned. She felt like these people who would not listen to her or support her when her mother was sick were perfectly willing to come in and impose their rules for appearance on the house. She says, "[It was] like they had gone in and said, ‘Well, this is gross, and we're going to get rid of the stuff that you have, and we're going For examples, see Doctrine and Covenants 18:10, which reads "Remember the worth of souls is great in the sight of God"; Matthew 18:12, which reads, "If a man have an hundred sheep, and one of them be gone astray, doth he not leave the ninety and nine, and goeth into the mountains, and seeketh that which is gone astray?" 415 Relief Society is the LDS church's organization for adult women. 414 163 to replace it with better, nicer, cleaner, shinier, prettier stuff.'" She scoffs, "Because that's what's important." In her opinion, the bathroom facelift was "super judge-y and shallow and disgusting and awful and embarrassing." I asked her what she would have liked ward members to do instead. She says, "Talk. Say anything." She felt homelanders were unwilling to talk to an unpredictable family who might misbehave because of their grief. A few days later-during her mother's funeral service-one of the women who had redone the bathroom chastised Sarah because she was not grateful for the women's bathroom makeover. Sarah felt that peers, YW leaders, and other adults in the ward were eager to judge the family on homeland rules of propriety rather than attempting to understand their individual needs. A dark side of a rule-based society is the hierarchy it creates of rule-followers, rule-breakers, and rule-enforcers, and the nearly unlimited power it grants to enforcers. When a society is organized around rules and rules are emphasized in daily life, compliance with those rules becomes vital to sustaining order and preserving the group. The group asserts a right to decide what is right and wrong, acceptable and unacceptable. People who do not know the rules are lesser because they are not in the know. In Mormon homeland societies, narrators felt some bishops, YW leaders, and parents became enforcers, loyal to the rules above all, even when that loyalty caused extreme material, emotional, or spiritual damage to a young woman. Narrators described how those adults used their positions of authority in the church or family to justify this overreach. When Emily lived in San Diego, she loved attending YW girls' camp each summer. She met with friends from other wards, and her YW camp leaders were caring 164 and fun. She had a very different experience in Snowflake the first and only time she went to camp. The second night of camp, YW leaders awakened Emily abruptly and ordered her to their cabin, where they began questioning her. They had heard someone was planning to set off an explosion to scare the girls, and they assumed it was her. Emily kept insisting fearfully that she had nothing to do with the prank. When I asked why the leaders presumed she was the mastermind, she said it was because she looked different from the other young women: I had blue hair. I had multiple earrings. I didn't dress like everyone else, you know. It was so traumatizing to me that they thought like-it wasn't that I had gotten woken up and interrogated. The thing that upset me was that they thought that I would do something like that, just because I didn't-the only thing-like I was a good-hearted person, but I didn't dress like the people that lived there. That was, to me, was the only thing that . . . . It was really upsetting. Emily wonders why they did not calmly say, "Hey, have you heard anything about this?" rather than stridently insisting, "Tell us about the bomb!" Afterward, she was very upset. She called her mother to come get her, left camp, and never went again. It is not unusual for an adult to assume that a teenager who looks a bit wild might also be a troublemaker. What made this situation totalizing is the degree of power the society gave the YW leaders to take material action based on that assumption. Emily had no recourse but to submit to a midnight interrogation. They had absolute power, and she had none. She was frightened when they finally released her, and that is a main reason she wanted to flee. Tori "lost her virginity" with a boy in the congregation during their sophomore year of high school. They both felt guilty and "wanted to start the repentance process" and went together to confess to their bishop. Tori was not pregnant and believes no one in the ward except the bishop knew about the sexual activity. The bishop told her she had to leave YW, not associate with the other young women, and attend the adult class (at the 165 age of fifteen). Her leadership responsibilities were taken away. 416 Her choice to have unmarried sex marked her as unable to follow her society's rules, and one of society's rule-enforcers swiftly ejected her. She "felt like there was a target painted on me." The young man was not similarly ousted. He stayed in Young Men (YM) and kept his leadership responsibilities. Tori said the bishop and the young man's parents wanted him to "repent" and serve a mission, and she was his "excuse not to go." 417 She feels that she was removed from the group both to protect other young women and to preserve opportunities for that young man. In all Mormon wards, the bishop has ecclesiastical responsibility for members of the congregation. Members who believe they have sinned are encouraged to confess their sins to the bishop so he can help them repent, often by prescribing religious study. 418 In Tori's mind, the existence of ecclesial authority and a confessor/penitent relationship was not a problem; she met with her bishop knowing he would discipline her in some way. However, she also expected him to comfort, guide, and help her. Instead, he was more focused on sustaining the rules of society than on assisting the individual. He seemed to She was serving as class president for girls her age. Mormons use the word calling to describe volunteer work members do in the congregation. A member is called when a bishop or other leader asks her to serve in a particular responsibility. Members are released from their callings periodically to allow rotation of responsibilities. A bishop can take away a member's calling at any time for unworthiness. 417 He did not serve a mission, and had never wanted to do so. A mission is a rite of passage for young adult Mormons. In their late teens and early twenties, they proselytize at their own expense for eighteen to twenty-four months in a geographic location selected by the church. During the period under study, Mormon males were commanded to serve missions while Mormon females were allowed to go, but not commanded. 418 James A. Cullimore, "Confession and Forsaking: Elements of Genuine Repentance," General Conference, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, October 1971, https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1971/10/confession-andforsaking-elements-of-genuine-repentance?lang=eng. 416 166 view her as dangerous to the welfare of others and so imposed strict punishments on her. He was in a position of unquestioned authority, and she felt she had no option but to abide by his judgments. Tori acknowledges that this could have happened in a missionfield congregation, but feels it would have been less likely. In the late 1980s, shortly after Mary Ann moved to Murray, Utah, she had an experience where she felt those in authority-in this case, her parents and bishop- became enforcers in the service of society and jeopardized her individual welfare in their eagerness to enforce rules. She was raped at the age of fifteen by a Mormon boy after a church dance, and she became pregnant. Six months into her term, she realized she could no longer hide her situation and confided in her parents and bishop. She knew they would be unhappy, but expected they would also offer needed support and help her decide what to do. However, she says it was immediately apparent they were more concerned about preventing embarrassment to the family or ward than they were with helping her. She was sent to a distant relative's home and was forbidden to speak to siblings or other ward members. The bishop and her parents arranged for the baby to be adopted without involving her in the decision. People who have been raped are not considered sinners in LDS doctrine, yet the bishop imposed formal church discipline as is normally done for those who have extramarital sex voluntarily. 419 He put Mary Ann's church membership on probation and assigned scripture study and other spiritual activities as part of her "repentance process." In 2001, the LDS church made its official stance on this more clear by including these words in its handbook for youth: "Victims of rape, incest, or other sexual abuse are not guilty of sin." For the Strength of Youth: Fulfilling Our Duty to God (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2001), 28. 419 167 Mary Ann felt that the adults who were supposed to care for her had determined she was unworthy, and she had no choice but to surrender to their discipline. They acted as if their responsibility to enforce society's rules could only be fulfilled by banishing her as quickly as possible. She says, "I felt like I was my biggest protector. Nobody was really interested in protecting me." Mary Ann's Mormonism had not been the shield she expected it to be: the church-sponsored dance had not been safe, the ecclesiastical leader had acted as enforcer rather than comforter, and the parents whom she was commanded in the Bible to honor declared her guilty and led the charge to see her punished. Mary Ann remembers that her father said, "Well, I'm the priesthood holder and so my say is the final word, and that's the end of the conversation, and you will do as I say." Mary Ann's bishop and her parents, Tori's bishop, and Emily's camp leaders all seemed to have in common a commitment to protect Mormonism and other Mormons from rogue young women who might be dangerous. When rules become more powerful than people, the roles of rule-follower, rule-breaker, and rule-enforcer become group members' most important identities. Other potential identities such as confidant, coach, friend, mentor, or guide become subsumed by the need to punish miscreants. It was unpleasant and hurtful when narrators were rejected by homeland peers, but most came to terms with that rejection in some fashion. They found ways to be themselves and still achieve some measure of social acceptance. However, when rejection came from those in charge, young women were much more totalized because they were inclined to accept the identity of rule-breaker that adults had constructed for them. Some narrators' lives and self-images were destroyed when adults in homeland societies assumed that young women who violated largely unwritten homeland rules were 168 unrighteous, unworthy, unlovable, or deserving of punishment. Some narrators I spoke with still feel betrayed by the authority figures they encountered in Mormon homelands from 1975 through 2000. They feel adult homelanders' judgments were unnecessarily harsh and more severe than punishments given to other members of society, including young men. They feel discipline was meted out punitively by power-hungry leaders who were trying to purify the community and eliminate anyone who did not meet standards. Trading Self-Worth for Belonging When they came to Mormon homelands, some narrators encountered a rule-based society that specified proper behavior in many aspects of life. LDS scripture teaches that a person should not have to "be compelled in all things" or else she will be considered "slothful and not a wise servant" and "receiveth no reward." 420 To narrators, being subject to such detailed but arbitrary rules seemed contrary to this instruction. While the existence of rules was onerous, even more totalizing was the assumption that homeland societies had the right to determine what was valuable for every one of their members. Whoever defines the rules possesses the power to exclude others. In totalistic societies, that power is more intrusive and extreme. When violating a rule takes on a spiritual dimension and rule-breakers are considered unrighteous, failure to comply can have eternal consequences: unworthy Mormons cannot go to heaven, see their families after death, or live with God. In mission-field congregations, narrators felt that criteria for how to be righteous were drawn from scriptures and teachings of apostles and the church president. Young 420 Doctrine and Covenants 58:27. 169 women could readily learn those criteria by reading and listening to materials that were available to all. Essentially, the rules for success were explicit and came directly from heaven. Submitting to the rules required one to acknowledge the supremacy of God and recognize his right to establish rules, something faithful Mormons might be presumed to do as a matter of course. However, when the rules originated from earthly sources such as peers and volunteer leaders in homeland societies, narrators found the process of submission less holy and more demeaning. Narrators did not believe homelanders were more righteous or had greater divine authorization to establish rules. They felt some homelanders acted sanctimonious and presumptuous in trying to specify which characteristics and behaviors were worthwhile for other Mormons. Encountering an entirely new system of rules for being Mormon and enduring criticism for not adhering to those rules was an assault on some narrators' self-esteem. Submitting to unpredictable but powerful rules of homeland societies meant abasing oneself before humans rather than before God and accepting one's position as inferior to the rule-makers. To some narrators, it seemed like the only path to finding acceptance in homeland societies was to allow other Mormons in those societies to become the judges of what made a person valuable. They had to sacrifice self-worth for belonging. Adult Responses to Homeland Exclusivity As adults, many narrators continue to find Mormon homeland societies exclusionary. Some, such as Gwen, have discontinued their association with 170 Mormonism. 421 When Gwen moved from Washington State to Bountiful, Utah, in 1993 as a teenager, she observed that homeland young women thought wealth was an indicator of worth. She did not agree with that measuring system then, and does not agree now. She says, "I still have this streak in me where I just immediately was, like, I'm not one of you, I'm different. No, I'm not like these people. These are not my people." She thinks Mormon homelanders are more concerned with "what people are wearing to church than with asking tough questions about their testimony." Gwen says that had she not moved to Utah, she would likely still be in the church-not because seeing cruel homelanders destroyed her belief in Mormonism-but because she would never have thought so much about her religion if she had not been surrounded by people who professed to be living it better than she was. Coming to Utah forced her to examine Mormon culture and decide for herself if she wanted to be part of the LDS church. She is grateful for that opportunity to establish her own identity and values, even though moving during her sophomore year of high school was difficult. A commonality among narrators was this sense of raised consciousness described by Gwen. Those who continue as faithful Mormons, those who have left, and those who do not view their membership as a binary in-or-out decision all seem thoughtful about Mormonism and their relationship with it. They rarely accept without challenge what they hear over the pulpit or in the news about the LDS church and its members, policies, and teachings. They are wary of Mormon homeland authority and Mormon rules that exclude, whether that authority is official (sanctioned by the LDS church) or unofficial Gwen, interview with author, June 15, 2017. All contributions from Gwen in this chapter come from this source. 421 171 (endorsed by culture, society, or lay members). They do not like to be told what to do by other Mormons, and they criticize Mormons who implement rules unthinkingly without considering the effect on individuals. Nearly all have become crusaders against injustice, fighting for an individual Mormon's right to be different and still be considered worthwhile by other Mormons. Adult narrators brought up LGBTQ rights in many of our interviews, and I believe their contemporary advocacies in this area can be understood in part as a response to having lived in rule-based homeland societies. As adults, many narrators are skeptical about rules and pronouncements that emerge from Mormon homelands, even when those statements are made by general leaders of the church itself. They speak up when they see other Mormons promoting rules that seem extra-doctrinal. Korin, who moved from Ohio to a Mormon-oriented Oregon town in 1984, now lives in Texas with her family. 422 Her son is leaving on an LDS mission soon, and she and her husband are active members. Korin says she has noticed that teachings that "come out of Utah" are sometimes applicable only to homeland Mormons who seem to be caught up in worrying about every little detail. She references a recent talk given in general conference by an apostle who cautioned members about using nonmedicinal healing. 423 When they heard the talk, she and her LDS friends from Texas rolled their eyes and said, "What are those people in Utah up to now?" She says nearly every semiannual conference includes at least one talk that Texas Mormons ignore Korin, interview with author, August 2, 2017 and telephone conversation with author, February 5, 2018. The story about general conference is from the phone conversation. Other contributions from Korin in this chapter come from the interview. 423 M. Russell Ballard, "The Trek Continues!" General Conference, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, October 2017, https://www.lds.org/generalconference/2017/10/the-trek-continues?lang=eng. 422 172 because it is aimed at the Utah-based Mormons who seem to need a lot more direction in everyday life than do Mormons living outside of homelands. A willingness to ignore information and rules that do not seem relevant- especially when they originate in homelands-is a recurring theme in narrators' adult lives. Marie lived in Orem, Utah, for almost two years in the late 1990s. 424 She now lives in Texas. Marie says that in Utah, "People take all the rules really seriously." She has learned that no one cared what she wore to church in Taiwan, Australia, Texas, or Colorado, while in Utah there were rules about wearing your Sunday best and everyone had to look perfect. She feels that in Mormon homelands, people seem to be saying, "Look, my whole family can dress so nice and be so ready on Sunday. Aren't we righteous? Look at you who came to church with your kid in pajamas." In Texas, where she oversees the church class for preteen girls, We got away with doing a ton of stuff because we weren't in Utah. People don't know the rules well, and you can do stuff. But I feel like in Utah, it's like everybody is very by the book with everything, you know? So you didn't really have that much flexibility in things that you do. It's funny. You can kind of tell who in the [Texas] ward is from Utah, though. Like just by how they act and stuff. You can tell which leaders are from Utah because they're stricter and more by the book. And [they're] the ones that aren't doing more fun things. Marie marked "It's complicated" when asked on the data sheet whether she is LDS. She says she has never been overly religious. She dislikes the Mormon culture she sees emerging from Utah, but attends church in Texas and considers herself a member, just one who does things her own way. Ruth is another woman who is selective about what she accepts when it comes to Marie, interview with author, August 26, 2017. All contributions from Marie in this chapter come from this source. 424 173 Mormonism. When I interviewed Ruth in 2017, she was wrestling with how to follow all Mormon rules and still be true to the "new moral consciousness" she has acquired the last few years. 425 She says, "My conscience inspires me to take stances that are slightly alternative to the church's official policy in some areas." When pressed, she says those areas mostly relate to racism and treatment of women and gays. She insists that she believes in Christian ideals but not always the "additional stuff" Mormonism layers on top of those ideals. She says, "People say you can't be a buffet Mormon, but I'm positive that you must be a buffet Mormon" in order to stay Mormon. A buffet Mormon is someone who chooses which parts of the religion to follow and ignores the rest. Several months after our conversation, Ruth and her husband and children stopped attending church, and when I ask if she is still LDS, she says that for the most part, she is not. Adult narrators who continue to believe in LDS doctrine find themselves chafing when homelanders become overly dictatorial about rules. Violet attended a lesson on the Word of Wisdom in her West Bountiful, Utah, congregation. 426 Another class member warned everyone to be careful what shampoos they purchased because he saw a shampoo at the store with tea in it. Violet says her husband nudged her, "because he knows that is something that's going to set me off." She raised her hand, got called on, and made a speech suggesting that rather than worrying about every little rule, Mormons should focus on the principle of taking care of their bodies. The teacher approached Violet after class with a hug and a thank you. Violet says, "We have to be very careful how we try to Ruth, interview with author, August 3, 2017. All contributions from Ruth in this chapter come from this source. 426 The Word of Wisdom is a health code Mormons follow that prohibits drinking tea and coffee. 425 174 stereotype behavior and roles, because it's a very broad spectrum for a lot of us." Violet acknowledges that she is able to challenge people's preconceptions because she is now perceived as a righteous insider who follows homeland rules. She wants to "help others see that there can be good amidst a big mess of religion that Mormonism sometimes is." She wants people to know it is okay to enact Mormonism different from someone else. Mary Ann formally removed her name from the church rolls in 2015. She was hopeful for a while that she could be a "nuanced believer" who encouraged other members to focus on God's major commandments rather than all the strict cultural rules. However, she eventually decided Mormonism was too homogeneous to accept someone who thinks or acts outside the mainstream. Mary Ann is the woman who was raped by an LDS young man at the age of fifteen while she was living in Murray, Utah, in the 1980s. Her bishop and her parents were harsh rule enforcers, and while she did find her way back to Mormonism after the traumas of her youth and was a member most of her adult life, she now believes that the church and culture are not doing enough to safeguard individuals and accept difference. Narrators such as Mary Ann have taken steps to heal themselves from the damage they believe they sustained in Mormon homelands. Many have sought professional counseling, and they refuse to be labeled inadequate by Mormon society any longer; they have reclaimed their self-worth and their right to determine for themselves whether they are acceptable to God and humanity. Women in this study have become champions for the underdog, which seems to mean anyone in Mormon society they believe is being treated unfairly at both local and church-wide levels. Emily tells about standing up for young men who she felt were being judged harshly by their bishop, even though she lost her ward leadership position as a 175 result. Emily was living in Utah County and was a counselor in the ward Relief Society. She attended a meeting where the bishop proposed teaching a special lesson to the youth about avoiding "extreme hairstyles." The bishop asked each leader's opinion, and Emily was appalled to hear they all supported the lesson topic. When the bishop came to her- she was last in line-she said, "I think that's a terrible idea." She said that she did not believe anyone in the ward had an extreme hairstyle (she was the teenager with blue hair), and that the bishop should instruct on a principle such as being humble rather than on a practice such as how a person fashions his hair. She says she told the bishop, Otherwise, the people that you're worried about, you're going to lose them. Those teenagers that you said you won't ordain them to their next office of priest because their hair is too spiky? 427 They're gonna be gone. They wanna feel loved and accepted. What you're telling them is, "You're not welcome here." That's horrible-I don't think you should do that. At the end of the meeting, the bishop asked Emily to stay. He explained his views about hair style and righteousness, but Emily continued to insist, "You don't have to wear your hair a certain way to live the gospel." Then the bishop said, "Well, I just think that if I'm the bishop, people should do what I say because I'm the bishop." She felt sick to her stomach and told him she thought he was overstepping his authority. He told her that he could tell she was "in a really dark place" in her life right then, and that he was going to take away her Relief Society calling, which he promptly did. This zeal to protect may provide context as to why so many narrators expressed frustration with the LDS church's recent actions related to homosexuality in their interviews with me. Many narrators brought up gay marriage and homosexuality even though I did not ask directly about those topics. They discussed church support of 427 Young Mormon men can be given the rank of priest when they are sixteen. 176 Proposition 8, a 2008 California constitutional amendment prohibiting marriage between same-sex individuals. 428 They also voiced concern about what they call "The Exclusionary Policy," which is the LDS church's internal policy change made four and a half months after the legalization of same-sex marriage by the United States Supreme Court in 2015. 429 The church now does not permit baptism of minor children who live with gay or lesbian parents. Part of the policy labels practicing homosexuals as "apostates," a word that has historically been reserved in Mormonism for those who actively resist top church leaders and by implication, God. 430 The "exclusionary policy" seems to remind some narrators of the rejection they felt as young women in Mormon homelands. Many believe the policy is unjust. They do not think Mormon leaders have the right to decide that someone is an apostate merely because one aspect of that person's identity does not align with Mormon rules. Lena, who lives in Pleasant Grove, Utah, says she does not understand the church's "handling of homosexuality, and why somebody could be gay, but that's not okay. That they would have to be celibate. Even though they were created that way, what kind of God is going "Proposition 8," A Brief History of Civil Rights in the United States, Georgetown Law Library, accessed March 10, 2018, http://guides.ll.georgetown.edu/c.php?g=592919&p=4182204. 429 "Policies on Ordinances for Children of a Parent Living in a Same-Gender Relationship," Changes to LDS Handbook 1, Document 2, Revised 11-3-15, accessed March 10, 2018, https://www.scribd.com/doc/288685756/Changes-to-LDS-Handbook-1Document-2-Revised-11-3-15-28003-29. Policy language cannot be verified from official church sources because the hand book containing the policy is only available to acting church leaders. I have reference a leaked version uploaded to the Scribd website by John Parkinson Dehlin, which may not contain the same language as the actual policy. 430 Cassidy Hansen, "LDS Church Formalizes Gay Marriage as Apostasy," The Daily Universe, November 5, 2015, http://universe.byu.edu/2015/11/05/lds-church-formalizesgay-marriage-as-apostasy/. 428 177 to create somebody who can never express themselves to the full . . ." 431 Her remarks suggest that she thinks Mormons are trying to act like God when they judge each other. She says that since she left the church, she feels "so much more free to love and accept people." She says she is now disillusioned with both individual members and the church organization. When they were young, some narrators were ostracized and in rare cases ejected from Mormon society because of things they could not control, such as family origin and parental income levels, and they worry that pattern is now repeating itself for gay and lesbian Mormons and their families. Several narrators said they had to speak out against the policy because not doing so would feel hypocritical and would be a betrayal of their personal commitments to be kind to other Mormons. In their interviews with me, most narrators did not discuss the theological question of whether homosexuality is sinful though they may have had opinions on that; instead, they engaged with the totalism question of whether Mormon society and the LDS church have the right to banish people who do not follow the rules, especially rules some believe were established by humans rather than deity. One narrator, Joanna, who lives in Salt Lake City, resigned from the church with her former husband in 2010 because Mormonism had lost its appeal over the years as she found "more respect and love and genuine friendships" with people who were not LDS. 432 She says, "The more I've learned about that organization [the LDS church] and Lena, interview with author, June 23, 2017. All contributions from Lena in this chapter come from this source. 432 Joanna, interview with author, June 21, 2017. All contributions from Joanna in this chapter come from this source. 431 178 the things they do, and their policies, and the way that they treat people, I don't want to be among their membership." She says she felt "really empowered to be able to just say, no, I disagree with you and leave that way [by resigning]." Now that she is no longer Mormon, she feels much more "community minded" because she serves whomever she wants to whenever she sees a need rather than being assigned to be kind only to certain people in certain ways. Sarah resigned her church membership largely because of the LDS church's actions related to gay marriage. She and her husband were raised LDS. She says both had negative experiences as adolescents with rules in Mormon homelands. However, after their marriage, they lived in Berkeley, California, and worshipped in a ward that she describes as progressive, loving, and not rule-bound. Because of their California encounter with Mormonism, they figured they could continue to be LDS even though they felt Mormonism was sometimes discriminatory and overly conservative. They said to themselves, "Even if we're weirdos in every congregation we go to, and even if nobody else thinks the same thing that we do, that's fine. We can just make our own little-we can just keep plugging on." After California, they moved to Hawaii. When they were in Hawaii, the LDS church circulated a letter from headquarters asking members to donate to support Proposition 8 legislation in California. Sarah and her husband felt it was inappropriate to ask a ward such as theirs where so many people were in "abject poverty" to help fund a political cause so far away, so they participated in a group letter-writing campaign. After he received their letters, Sarah's bishop took away their temple recommends and released them from their callings. He said the stake president would call them for further discipline. Sarah says she was shocked because she 179 expected to initiate a discussion, not be excommunicated. She resigned shortly after. Whether they currently live in homelands or elsewhere, many narrators are refusing as adults to allow homeland Mormonism to specify rules for every aspect of their lives. After leaving Snowflake to attend college, Emily married an abuser who she said was "just like her town" in that he believed in letter-of-the-law compliance with his rules, and he judged her as less worthy when she did not meet his expectations. After years of threats and injuries, Emily finally succeeded in divorcing the man and secured a restraining order against him. Throughout her marriage, she had several times sought help from her ecclesiastical leaders, who sided with the abusive husband and told her she needed to do more to support him so he was not driven to depression and violence. Emily is a faithful person who believes in God and participates in her Mormon congregation. She is employed by the church. She is careful when she speaks of her expectations for, joys in, and disillusionments with Mormonism. She says, "I believe that the doctrines of our church are true, but I think there are so many cultural things that aren't part of the actual real gospel." She feels the most important lesson she has learned is that the church should not direct all aspects of a person's life. She says, The church is a spiritual resource for me, but it's not an emotional resource or a financial resource. Those things I'd have to find outside the church. I can go to therapy with a qualified therapist to help me with my emotional things that I deal with. But I won't go to a bishop for that ever again. That's not helpful to me. I think that my expectation before was the church was this all-encompassing healing thing, and all you need is the gospel to have a good life. I don't see it that way anymore. Emily has not rejected Mormonism; instead, she has rejected Mormonism's totalistic control over her. She believes this will protect her from future abuses of power from untrained, volunteer Mormon leaders. 180 Ironically, Emily is currently waiting to see if Mormon leaders will permit her to be sealed to her new husband in the LDS temple. 433 Because both spouses had been sealed in the temple before, 434 an official clearance from the First Presidency-the highest governing body of the church-was needed. Their clearance was denied with no explanation, and they were told to reapply in a year. Emily believes the denial resulted from her bishop and her husband's bishop writing different information on their respective recommendation forms. The couple had "minor immorality problems" while dating and had visited their bishops and formally repented. Her husband's bishop did not list these past sins on the form because they were already forgiven by God, whereas Emily's bishop was new and wanted detailed information about the activities she had confessed to his predecessor. She says, "It felt so invasive. I wish I wouldn't have answered him honestly." She was aggravated that he was unwilling to accept her word for it that she was living the commandments. She hopes that whatever he writes next year will be satisfactory. She says it feels a little bit like she is a young woman back in Snowflake, Arizona, again, judged unworthy by rules she did not know or understand and at the mercy of a homeland rule-enforcer with all the power. A sealing is an ordinance Mormons perform in temples to connect husband and wife together for eternity. Richard G. Scott, "The Eternal Blessings of Marriage," General Conference, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, April 2011, https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2011/04/the-eternal-blessings-ofmarriage?lang=eng. 434 Emily and her first husband were not married in the temple initially, but went there together and were sealed early in their marriage. 433 181 Conclusion Most, though not all, of the women I talked with believe in God. However, they do not believe God gave untrained, inexperienced, inadequate volunteers power to make rules about other people's worthiness and to separate some Mormons from God and society as a result of their rules. They do not believe that lay church members should create standards designed to make some Mormons feel superior to others. Having to mold so many aspects of one's identity and conform to someone else's capricious rules as young women in Mormon homeland societies felt totalizing. It was demeaning to submit to the judgments of other Mormons in order to be part of a community of Christians where they believed they should have been readily welcomed. Narrators have adopted numerous strategies for reconciling their distrust of Mormon rules with their Mormon and formerly Mormon identities. Some accepted official rules but rebuffed unofficial ones. Others ignored rules they felt did not apply outside of homelands. One narrator submitted to Mormon rules in the spiritual realm of her life, but looked outside the church for direction in other areas. Other narrators became acceptable homelanders in appearance and family structure, and now use their insider positions to dismantle totalizing rules. Some narrators no longer participate in Mormonism or have removed their names from church records. Omnipresent and inflexible rules about how to be Mormon in homeland societies seemed to create a culture that was exclusive and unfriendly to Mormons who were different from the norm. The next chapter describes narrators' perceptions of collectivism in Mormon homeland societies. It explains how programmed daily activity and prescribed life courses regimented many narrators and inhibited them from making choices about their 182 lives and their futures. It argues that regimentation was sustained by persuading young women they could not achieve full righteousness without pressure from society and so it was their duty to take actions that supported the group's priorities, even if those actions were at odds with individual desires. CHAPTER 7 REGIMENTATION: SELF-ACTUALIZATION OVER AGENCY Cara was fourteen when she first heard about Fascinating Womanhood. 435 The book had been published by Helen B. Andelin nearly two decades before Cara and her church friends in Washington State sat together reading it in their sleeping bags at a Young Women (YW) leader's house in 1980. The young women were having an overnight activity in their leader's living room. The leader had found the book somewhere and brought it to show them. She told the young women, "Some of these principles [in the book] are good. Some of them are a little out there." The young women thumbed through the book and read passages to each other, and before long, everyone in the room, including the YW leader, was "hooting with laughter." They thought it hilarious that anyone would ever have taken seriously Andelin's suggestions that women should be completely subservient to their husbands. The YW leader said, "Well, you know, it was a different era. This is the way people were." Cara later discovered that Fascinating Womanhood was written by a Mormon author, had sold first in Mormon congregations, and had been popular in Mormon homelands when she and her friends Helen B. Andelin, Fascinating Womanhood (Santa Barbara, CA: Pacific Press Publishers, 1963). Cara, interview with author, June 22, 2017. All contributions from Cara in this chapter come from this source. 435 184 were mocking it in the mission-field. 436 However, the book had never been endorsed by the LDS church, and was publicly disclaimed by the family relations department at church-owned Brigham Young University. 437 Narrators described wide variation across Mormon congregations when it came to messages about women and young women in the period from 1975 through 2000, as Cara's Fascinating Womanhood story suggests. Though official YW lesson manuals were standardized, local leaders in every area seemed to interpret those manuals individually. In general, narrators said that homeland societies were more rigid in their instructions about women, men, and families than mission-field congregations, with little room for individual adaptation. At the time of this study, Mormonism church-wide expected women to marry young, have children, and care for those children while husbands provided financial support. 438 However, in homeland societies, that life path was more often perceived as the only viable trajectory for a righteous young woman. By contrast, womanhood was enacted with greater diversity in most congregations where narrators lived prior to Mormon homelands. This study does not engage with whether Mormonism of the latter twentieth century was correct in its views about women. Instead, it examines the pressure young Mormon women felt in homeland societies to adhere to the Mormon ideal, and how that pressure was sustained by regimentation. Regimentation is a totalistic mechanism for controlling individual identity. By requiring compliance with strict regimens that govern Julie Debra Neuffer, Helen Andelin and the Fascinating Womanhood Movement (Salt Lake City, UT: The University of Utah Press, 2014). 437 Neuffer, Helen Andelin and the Fascinating Womanhood Movement, 97-98. 438 Ezra Taft Benson, To the Mothers in Zion (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1987). 436 185 all facets of behavior, a society can constrain an individual's movement. To be totalizing, a regimen must manage both space and time, meaning a regimented person must be told where she is supposed to be and when she is supposed to be there. In Mormon homelands from 1975 through 2000, narrators seemed to be regimented by mandatory programs and prescribed roles that specified where they were allowed to situate their physical and spiritual selves in relation to other people and when they were expected to complete certain milestones in their development as Mormon women. These programs and roles were justified as necessary to help young women develop character and become perfected beings over time. Narrators' experiences show that this regimentation sometimes led to a collective culture that favored the group over the individual. This chapter explains how narrators experienced regimentation in homeland societies via mandated programs and prescribed roles. Young women were required to participate in all YW programs and each follow the same linear life-paths of wifehood and motherhood. Then, it explains how narrators thought participation was more important than spirituality to some homelanders and how in homeland societies, failure to follow prescribed life roles was sometimes considered selfish. Then, it discusses voluntary totalism and argues that regimentation in homeland societies required a young woman to sacrifice her agency for eventual self-actualization. Finally, it discusses narrators' responses to homeland regimentation as adults. Specifically, many are opting out of Mormon programs and refusing to accept prescribed gender roles. 186 Regimentation of Young Women in Mormon Homelands Narrators' stories indicate that YW programs and gender roles that were common in Mormonism church-wide became implemented in regimented ways in homeland societies from 1975 through 2000. Specifically, attendance at YW programs was more mandated and gender roles were more prescribed, allowing for less individual adaptation. This may have helped create a collective culture where satisfying the group was seen as more important than satisfying oneself. A majority of narrators I spoke with loved YW. They said they enjoyed spending time with leaders and peers, and they learned and grew because of their involvement in YW. However, several narrators noted that YW was implemented differently in homelands than in the mission-field congregations where narrators had previously lived, and they observed that homeland YW seemed more controlling. Specifically, in homelands, young women were often pressured to participate in every one of the myriad YW programs, and YW activities were sometimes conducted in a regimented fashion, with everyone doing the same thing at the same time with little flexibility. An abundance of programmed activities can suppress individual agency if participation is mandated and participants have little time that is under their own jurisdiction. YW programs during this time period were extensive and time-consuming. The LDS church's YW activity calendar for young women included daily seminary classes, Sunday worship services and lessons, weekday activities called Mutual, monthly stake or regional dances, seasonal team sports such as basketball, periodic Sunday evening firesides, 439 annual youth conferences, and annual girls' camp. Occasionally, youth in a 439 A fireside is a Mormon training event for youth with a speaker and refreshments. 187 ward or stake were asked to practice and stage dramatic performances, called roadshows. In addition, YW provided a goal-setting program for young women, which it revised significantly in 1985 to be more comprehensive and standardized. 440 The program, called Personal Progress, allowed young women to earn rewards such as jeweled medallion necklaces for completing character-building goals in seven areas, called values. These values were faith, divine nature, individual worth, knowledge, choice and accountability, good works, and integrity. 441 Each week in Sunday YW class, young women recited these values as part of a theme that also told them they were daughters of a Heavenly Father who loved them. 442 A new section of Personal progress goals was assigned each year of YW enrollment, from ages twelve through eighteen. 443 LDS YW programs of this era were comprehensive and guided nearly all aspects of a young women's life. This was true in all locations, but in homelands, young women had fewer choices about their levels of participation and less input as to how programs were implemented. To some narrators, the Personal Progress program seemed especially regimented in homelands. Homeland YW leaders and peers acted as if young woman who failed to engage in Personal Progress were less worthy. Some narrators succumbed to this pressure, though others did not. For example, Mira moved to the homelands town of Elko, Nevada, in 1985 from West Germany. 444 She says she loved YW but felt continually guilty for "failing" at the Personal Progress program. Setting goals came Personal Progress (Salt Lake City, UT: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1989). 441 Personal Progress, 6-7. 442 Personal Progress, 6. 443 Personal Progress, 10-11. 444 Mira, interview with author, August 10, 2017. All contributions from Mira in this chapter come from this source. 440 188 naturally to her. However, her goals did not often fit into the Personal Progress structure. For example, Personal Progress required young women to write a plan and obtain a leader's approval before they began working on the goal, and then write a written reflection after the goal was accomplished. As a result, Mira was slow to advance in the Personal Progress program. She tells about a time she organized a dance, but was unable to count her work on the dance as a Personal Progress leadership project because she had not followed program specifications exactly. She said, "I didn't ever feel like I was succeeding at the program." She said she always worried that her YW experience was "incomplete" as a result, even though she believed in God and attended worship, Mutual, and other church activities as instructed. Mira felt inadequate for not following the regimen and being in the right place at the right time in the program. Paula also says the Personal Progress program was not a good fit for her. 445 She knew she was supposed to set goals with the other young women, but she decided to "boycott" the program instead-a boycott her mother, "who was a feminist too"- supported. Paula thought Personal Progress was "wishy-washy," which to her meant that no "real, tangible, actual good skills sets" came out of doing the program, at least not to the level she felt happened with the young men and their church-sponsored scouting programs. She says, I actually made a point of refusing to participate. I went to Young Women. I went to everything. But when my leaders would take me aside, and be like, "Let's talk about your [Personal] Progress, like what's wrong with you? Why don't you have any of these [goals earned]?" [then] I would explain, and my mom always backed me up. She's like, "Yup, you know what, there's absolutely no need to participate in that program if you don't want to." Paula, interview with author, May 31, 2017. All contributions from Paula in this chapter come from this source. 445 189 Paula's mother said the program was not required by doctrine and not based on scripture. Her mother felt the program was "trying to create martyrs out of the women, and the men are getting some other kind of training." Paula was "very faithful, not rebellious," but she did not see any personal value in the program. She resisted the regimen supplied by the program, a resistance made easier by her mother's personal feminist beliefs. A few narrators categorized themselves or their mothers as feminists, a stance which may have been at odds with the LDS church's visible campaigns against the second-wave feminist movement, as described in Chapter 4. Consistently, parents with feminist interpretations of women's identities were able to help their daughters be less totalized by homeland regimentation. Megan saw value in the goal-setting program, but joked that in St. George, Utah, where she moved in 1996, it was "Group Progress" not "Personal Progress." 446 She says it was strange to her since it had not been that way in Florida, but in Utah, all the young women in her class were asked to select the same projects and do them together. Then they would bring their Personal Progress books to the church, and the leaders would sign off everyone's goal at once. She observed that homeland young women also moved through other church programs in lock step. For instance, she was surprised at how structured girls' camp was in Utah compared to Florida. In both places, campers were supposed to meet certification requirements such as building a campfire or reading a compass each year. After certifying three years, young women could be designated as YCLs, youth camp leaders, and help younger girls certify. Megan, interview with author, June 21, 2017. All contributions from Megan in this chapter come from this source. 446 190 In Utah, however, all requirements were done long before camp, usually at weekly mutual activities. Together, young women would learn to tie knots and administer first aid, then they would all tromp into the parking lot to practice starting a fire. To Megan, learning camp skills as a group in a church building rather than individually outdoors felt artificial and useless. She wanted hands-on training and an opportunity to try out the skills at her own pace. She wondered why everyone had to learn the same thing in the same place at the same time. To add to Megan's frustration, camp itself was still very regimented, even though young women had supposedly finished all required lessons beforehand. Campers completed one handcrafted item after another, with little free time. She implies her leaders may have been uncomfortable with women doing actual camping, and so they tried to make camp into a sanitized, home-economics week. She says this approach frustrated her: "If there was a real emergency, we would die, but we'd all know how to make a toilet paper doily." By contrast, her Florida girls' camp was "very adventurous" and included canoe trips and other vigorous outdoor activities. When Megan was nearing the end of her YW enrollment, she decided to try to make a "worthwhile change." She and some other young women and their families "fought and fought" and finally got permission from local homeland leaders to make her last year of YW girls' camp something different. The young women were allowed to go to a more rugged location, and they were granted "all kinds of free time, and they let us wander and hike together and stuff like that. And then we would just come back at a certain time." She says the relaxing of the schedule was wonderful, and she wanted to say to the leaders, "Thank you. Thank you for trusting us. Thank you for, you know, believing in us." Megan was so grateful to escape the strict regimen while still benefitting 191 from the camp program. Many narrators found homeland societies' implementation of YW programs to be confining. They had little freedom to choose whether and how they participated. Mandatory programs that require everyone to do the same thing at the same pace are a hallmark of totalism. Such programs preserve order because they allow many people to be controlled by only a few. They also provide an unobvious means of ensuring all society members support collective goals, because individuals move through classes, activities, and interactions unthinkingly as part of a crowd. Homeland societies may have regimented YW programs partly to steer young women toward wifehood and motherhood without directly inviting those young women to consciously accept those priorities. During the period under study, the LDS church taught its members that there were distinct societal and spiritual roles for men and women. Mormon women were told to prioritize family over career and other pursuits, and assured that doing so would strengthen society and build the kingdom of God. In 1987, church President Ezra Taft Benson said, "A mother's calling is in the home, not in the marketplace" and advised that, "Mothers [are] to spend their full time in the home in the rearing and caring for their children." 447 He called motherhood a "duty" 448 and a "service." 449 Messages about women's obligation to bear and care for children were church-wide, and narrators were definitely aware of them. However, many narrators felt those messages about gender roles were interpreted less flexibly in homeland wards, compared to the mission-field congregations narrators had attended. For example, in the mission-field, narrators often had YW leaders who were childless or employed outside the home, while in the Benson, To the Mothers in Zion, 5. Both quotes are from this source. Benson, To the Mothers, 4. 449 Benson, To the Mothers, 7. 447 448 192 homelands, women with those characteristics were almost never asked to work in YW. Homeland YW leaders were usually young mothers with husbands who provided full financial support. Several narrators observed that only women who were pursuing wifehood and motherhood in the prescribed way and at the proper time were seen as righteous role models. This section describes how narrators felt that homeland societies prescribed rigid gender roles for them and it explains how narrators both embraced and resisted those roles. Mira attended YW in a Mormon enclave in Elko, Nevada. She remembers as a young woman performing a stage production called Debbie: Diary of a Mormon Girl. 450 This musical was created in 1978 by Lex de Azevedo, an LDS composer who also created the popular show Saturday's Warrior about an LDS family. 451 In the play, Debbie graduates high school, goes to college for one year, and then marries an LDS returned missionary. In Mormon vernacular, a returned missionary (or an RM) is a young man who has recently come home from serving a volunteer one-and-a-half to two-year mission. He is a highly eligible catch because he has demonstrated his righteousness, and he is supposed to begin looking for a wife immediately after he returns home. That is his prescribed role. Mira said the fictional Debbie's life was "kind of upheld as ideal, or the template for life, and if you didn't do that, or didn't even want to do that . . ." Her voice trickles off. Then she says, "You know, I hoped to marry, but I had plans, and I wanted to do Lex de Azevedo and Heather Young, "Debbie: Diary of a Mormon Girl," Cast Albums, accessed March 15, 2018, http://castalbums.org/recordings/Debbie-Diary-Of-AMormon-Girl-1978-Original-Cast/20605. 451 "About Lex de Azevedo," Azevedo Music, accessed March 15, 2018, http://www.azevedomusic.com/about/. 450 193 some of my plans before I got married." She muses that she "didn't check a lot of boxes" in terms of thinking the way she was expected to, but she attributes that to the focus her parents had on education "and stuff." She says in YW, "There was a strong emphasis on getting married and preparing for motherhood," but she received a more expansive message at home where she was encouraged to attend college and gain skills to be selfreliant. Mira's parents were well-traveled and the family had lived overseas, and they "sort of had their own family culture of the gospel." Her mother and father were active and believing, but they did not insist that being Mormon required a person to fill any specific role other than that of Christian. Mira felt this was in contrast to the views of most homeland Mormons. When Mira was a junior in high school, she heard about a program at a nearby university where she could complete a year at the college campus in place of her last year of high school. She was excited because she wanted to go to medical school and felt this opportunity would help her complete that goal faster. She presented the program to her school's guidance counselor, "who was an older LDS gentleman." He told her, "Oh, no, you don't need to go there. You just need to go to Ricks College and find a husband." Mira was furious. Her father-who she says has pretty traditional views but was always supportive of her aspirations in spite of those views-was angry that someone would stifle his daughter's dreams. Mira's father was not sure he wanted her to go to medical school either, but had always told her she would eventually "figure out what works for [her] family," and in the meantime, he wanted her to feel free to explore all options. Mira and her family decided to bypass the counselor and work with his supervisor instead. She did not end up going to medical school, which she says was the correct decision for her, 194 but she says the important point is that the counselor "was actively discouraging [her] from even having ambition, having a motivation to go to a well-known, well-respected university." His actions made her feel like "there was actually a worldview, or a limitation-a limited worldview for girls." She says that "rankled, really, really, really." Mira's counselor wanted to regiment where she could place herself, both physically and in terms of her progress on the prescribed Mormon life path. She feels he tried to use his position of authority to force her to interpret LDS gender roles the same way he did. Abigail had a similar experience with a high school teacher in Tooele, Utah, where she moved in 1998. 452 She describes herself as an overachiever who excelled academically. When she did well in her drafting class, the instructor told her, "You're really good at this. Drafting is such a great career for people if they want to be moms because you can do it from home or you can do it part-time and do contract work or whatever." She went on to pursue a career in drafting in large part because of that conversation. However, now that she realizes that drafters play a support role in an organization, she wonders why her teacher never encouraged her to become an engineer or an architect instead. She had the math and science skills. She says that he seemed to assume because she was "a Mormon girl in Utah" that she would be better off doing "this kind of low-level thing you can do flexibly if you want to be a mom." She believes it would have been different had she been in Washington State, where she lived before moving to Mormon homelands. People there were less likely to think all women were obligated to do the same things with their futures. Abigail, interview with author, June 30, 2017. All contributions from Abigail in this chapter come from this source. 452 195 Many other narrators described experiences like Abigail's and Mira's where homeland Mormons discouraged or prevented them from enacting womanhood in individual ways. Prescribing to members what roles they must fill in relation to each other is totalizing; it constrains personal choice and commandeers multiple facets of identity. Narrators were accustomed to receiving counsel from general church leaders on many subjects, but they expected to adapt that counsel for their personal circumstances and preferences. For many narrators, prescribed life roles in homeland societies were too regimented to allow for such variation. Implications of Living in a Regimented Society Regimented societies laud participation: they tend to reward those who adhere to the regimens and brand those who do not as selfish. Narrators' experiences suggest that some homeland societies from 1975 through 2000 followed this totalizing pattern of being overly concerned with participation. Whether young women complied with homeland regimens seemed to be a primary focus. There were many required programs narrators were expected to support and much precision in the ways those programs were implemented, and young women felt duty-bound to accept prescribed one-size-fits-all roles of womanhood. This section explains how regimentation may have caused activity to seem more important than spirituality and how narrators were encouraged to believe that variation from prescribed gender roles was dangerous to society. Several narrators wondered, as Megan did, why homelanders rarely mentioned Jesus Christ in daily conversation. She cites a Mormon scripture that claims, "We talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ," and wonders 196 why homelanders did not seem to follow that injunction. 453 She said that when she was living as a young woman in Florida, nearly every time church members met together they had a spiritual lesson, even if the purpose of the gathering was recreational rather than devotional. Conversely, in homelands, many church activities did not include a lesson, scripture reading, or other devotions aside from a prayer. 454 She says, "We didn't necessarily go to church to worship or be instructed in any way." When Megan was family home evening coordinator for a young single adult ward in St. George after high school, 455 she was told by local leaders to make meetings less spiritual so people would attend. She wonders, "Why would a bunch of church members meet together and not talk about Jesus, and not have a spiritual moment?" She observed that group participation seemed more important than individual spiritual growth. Totalism scholars have noted that an emphasis on external compliance over internal motivation is a side effect of regimentation, and an indicator that order and predictability are being venerated over individual development. 456 Narrators observed that people who participated in all church programs and followed proper Mormon life-paths were sometimes promoted to leadership positions and respected by other homelanders, even if those people acted contrary to LDS principles in other areas of their lives. Stella says homeland peers who showed up at church each week 2 Nephi 25:26, The Book of Mormon. Prayer was common in both homeland and mission-field Mormonism, according to narrators. 455 A young single adult ward is a ward attended entirely by Mormons who are eighteen or older and are not married. At the time of the study, these wards grouped members into pseudo family groupings and held family home evening in that way. 456 Erving Goffman, Asylums: Essays on the Social Situation of Mental Patients and Other Inmates (New York, NY: Anchor Books, 1961). 453 454 197 were praised for their supposed spirituality, even if they were drinking or having sex on days other than Sunday. This assumption that participation merits a reward sometimes happened in mission-field congregations as well, though less often. Stella believes her abusive father held high leadership positions in their California wards and stakes because he participated in all church activities and always appeared eager and involved. 457 She scoffs at how other members thought he was such a good Mormon because of his external behaviors, yet did not look deeper to see the ways his personal behaviors contradicted church teachings. The church's reoccurring selection of her unrighteous father for authority positions eventually led Stella to conclude that Mormonism was not an inspired religion and is one reason she left the church as a young woman. Mormonism in general stresses participation. A person's devotion to the LDS religion is frequently expressed in terms of church activity rather than personal belief. For example, Sophia, who moved to Sunset, Utah, in 1996 said, "I don't know if I would have stayed active if we would have stayed in Washington." 458 Similarly, Stacey said her parents moved from Oregon to Bountiful, Utah, in 1995 because there were only a few young people in their Oregon ward who were "still active" by the time they finished high school. 459 To Mormons, staying active seems to mean attending communal worship services and congregational social activities, while abstaining from actions contrary to church teachings, such as extramarital sex or smoking. Church attendance is believed to Stella, interview with author, July 8, 2014. All contributions from Stella in this chapter come from this source. 458 Sophia, interview with author, August 4, 2017. All contributions from Sophia in this chapter come from this source. 459 Stacey, interview with author, August 12, 2017. All contributions from Stacey in this chapter come from this source. 457 198 improve conduct, and withdrawing from participation in the congregation is thought by many to foretell a decline into forbidden and dangerous behaviors. This use of activity to describe one's Mormonism was not specific to homelands; the term was used throughout narrators' stories in both mission-field and homeland contexts. What seemed to be specific to homelands was the idea that participation is the most important aspect of one's Mormonism. In homelands, participation did not seem to be an indicator of progress toward a spiritual goal; rather, it seemed to be the goal itself. In homeland societies, some narrators found that variation from prescribed roles of womanhood was considered selfish because it might destabilize the society. Pursuing a career, marrying later, not marrying, or not having children were actions that narrators were told would prevent a woman from fulfilling her obligations to the religion and harm future children and husbands. Some narrators accepted this position, while others believed YW was "curtailing" to young women because it defined women's "potential in terms of what's good for other people." 460 Natalie was one who did not believe defying the regimen was selfish. 461 She was interested in "pursuing a career first." She wanted to see where that took her before she considered having a family. Her mother was a soldier in the British army, and Natalie grew up "around female soldiers and women fulfilling all sorts of roles." She was taught by her Mormon parents that women did not need to follow any specific life course. In contrast, when Natalie moved from Nicaragua to a Mormon area in Virginia in 1993, Ruth, interview with author, August 3, 2017. All contributions from Ruth in this chapter come from this source. 461 Natalie, interview with author, August 11, 2017. All contributions from Natalie in the chapter come from this source. 460 199 most of her male and female church leaders seemed to think that an LDS young woman had an obligation to marry early to a man who had fulfilled a church mission, forego her own schooling to support her husband's education, and have children as quickly as possible. Natalie says, "We had some male leaders who were not supportive of young women, myself included, who expressed interest in going on missions at the time, and who did not express interest in being stay-at-home mothers and really being interested in careers and military and extra-familial things." She got the impression that women were not considered valuable to Mormon homeland society unless they married and had families, and that any alternative actions were viewed as irresponsible and selfish. A worldview that women should care for children was not uncommon in American society from 1975 through 2000; however, the totalizing twist in Mormon homelands was that a woman's individual choice to do otherwise was portrayed as limiting other people's righteousness because it undermined the church society that was supposedly necessary to produce righteousness for everyone. Women who left prescribed paths could weaken the force of those paths on other people, thereby failing to support the organization in its job of transforming and perfecting members. Pursuing one's personal passions was a dereliction of duty because each member's full participation was needed to sustain an organization strong enough to change lives. Individuality might lead to anarchy. In Mormon homeland societies, young women were expected to do their part to build the kingdom of God, and that included accepting homeland regimens for women's lives. Ruth, who moved from New York to Orem, Utah, in 1990, explains how she persuaded herself that doing her duty to the homelands was Christ-like: 200 I can remember distinctly realizing that my lot in life was going to be menial labor. My lot in life was going to be cleaning floors, scrubbing pots, changing diapers, doing loads of laundry. And I created religious justification for why that was a holy and good role. Because inherently I did not want to do those things. I don't really think anybody wants to do those things. But I remember thinking when Jesus came to the earth, he dealt with the dirt, he dealt with the grime, he dealt with the sick, and he dealt with the poor. He did all the menial crap stuff. And that must be-doing all of the menial crap stuff as a woman must be my Savior-like role to fill. Because I can't give blessings and I can't give prophecies, and I can't be a church leader. So my way to be like Jesus is gonna be dirt and grime. While participation in any group entails duty to the group, the strength of that obligation in Mormon homelands seems to have suppressed individuality in totalizing ways. Encouraging others to vary from the regimen of prescribed gender roles was perceived to be a much more grievous offense than resisting privately. Natalie was branded a "feminazi" by the young men in her ward for "standing up for gender equality." She believed that the church should support more choices for women and that men were not superior because they had the priesthood. Feminazi is a term popularized in the 1990s by talk show host Rush Limbaugh. 462 He used the term to refer to "radical feminists" who he felt were seeking to undermine society by encouraging women in that society to have "as many abortions as possible." 463 Natalie was not advocating for abortion; it was unlikely such a position would have occurred to her as a Mormon young woman at the time, and she did not mention abortion in our interview. However, she was taking a public position within her congregation that Mormon society should not require every young woman to make the same decisions about education, work, and family. Her "Feminazi," in The Oxford Dictionary of American Political Slang, ed. Grant Barrett (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2006), 527. 463 Rush Limbaugh, The Way Things Ought to Be (New York, NY: Pocket Star Books, 1992), 55. 462 201 homeland peers' use of the term feminazi implies they believed her stance was destructive to Mormon society in the same way Limbaugh and others thought prochoice positions to be harmful to American society. Natalie says she did not intend to become an agitator, but when she vocalized her concerns about the linear roles of wifehood and motherhood prescribed in Mormon homelands, she was seen as a leader who was attempting to mobilize others to throw off the regimen. She was shut down harshly by the young men who gave her the nickname and by the leaders who did nothing to stop its repeated use during the two years before Natalie graduated from high school and finally moved out of the ward. Trading Agency for Self-Actualization When homeland societies attempted to specify nearly all of a young woman's family, education, and employment options, those societies were totalizing. But the totalism would likely be considered voluntary, meaning members of homeland societies were not forced by an institution or organization to accept the society's regimentation. Rather, they were persuaded that doing so was in their best interests. Young LDS women were taught that they had a responsibility to themselves and their church. In 1989, the general YW presidency said, "There is a great need for every young woman in the Lord's work, and the Lord is counting on you to do your part." Among other things, doing their part was explained as learning "the noble and sacred roles of women" and developing their own "divine attributes." 464 Attributes are individual, while roles are organizational: a role is a description of where one fits in 464 Personal Progress, 5. 202 relationship to other people who are in one's shared group. One cannot adopt a role in isolation. For example, a woman cannot be a mother without a child, nor an employee without an employer. The dual responsibilities of fulfilling organizational roles and developing individual attributes is common in YW discourse of this period and is consistent with LDS teachings that exaltation requires both personal perfection and communal ties. It is also consistent with voluntary totalism. In voluntarily totalistic societies, individuals allow a collective to regiment daily activities and long-term life paths because those individuals believe social pressure is the best way to renovate their identities. People justify their loss of agency by envisioning the satisfaction and fulfillment they will enjoy when they eventually become transformed. As young women, many narrators felt participating fully in strict homeland YW regimens would help improve their character, and as adults, most seem to believe such participation did indeed lead to self-improvement, though they now question whether that improvement was limited to only certain facets of life. Narrators also felt an obligation to sustain the church organization so others could have the same opportunity to utilize church programs for personal growth. They were building the kingdom of God for the benefit of all. Mira says YW made her believe she had "a place in the gospel." She says, "I had a work to do. I was part of a huge organization, and just could really feel this is the Lord's work, and we're helping to move the gospel forward in our own little place." YW gave Mormon young women the dual goals of building the kingdom of God and developing themselves as righteous women in the church. Regimented homeland societies helped further the accomplishment of those goals. 203 When a person submits to the regimentation of voluntary totalism, she sacrifices her right to choose her own activities and hands control of her space and time over to society. She agrees to put her physical body where the mandated programs of society tell her to put it, and to do so in a proper time frame. In addition, she commits to situate herself emotionally, socially, and spiritually into prescribed roles society requires. She honors the group's assessment of her identity because she believes doing so will help the group remake her over time into a more suitable-or in the case of Mormonism, more perfected-person. Regimentation in Mormon homelands from 1975 through 2000 seemed to encourage a collective culture that asked young women to trade agency for eventual self-actualization. Many narrators chafed at being expected to make this trade, some as young women and some as adults. Adult Responses to Homeland Regimentation Narrators have responded to homeland regimentation in a variety of ways. To the insistence that they participate in every program Mormonism offers, narrators have largely said, no, thank you. Narrators told me how they scoff when leaders, members, and official lessons presume that all Mormon women should achieve the same life milestones at approximately the same time. Many narrators are seeking to live a balanced life where they can love and feel loved by other people, yet also embrace their individuality. Ruth calls herself a "Middle Mormon" who, like Buddha, is seeking a "middle path of service and goodness." She, like many other women I spoke with, wants to be Mormon but does not want every choice in her life made by Mormonism. She does not want Mormonism to totalize her identity the way she felt it did in Mormon homelands when she was young 204 and in most of the years since. This section describes how adult narrators have pushed against the kinds of mandatory programs and prescriptive roles that they felt regimented them in their youth by opting out of church activities and programs that do not suit them and by refusing to accept prescribed gender roles. Young women raised in Mormon homelands from 1975 through 2000 were required to participate in a myriad of programs that extended into nearly every aspect of young women's lives. Adult narrators have responded to the mandated participation they experienced in their youth by opting out. Some have left the faith altogether, and they find nonparticipation liberating. Kendra and her husband, also a former Mormon, live three doors away from a Mormon church in Salt Lake City, Utah. 465 She says, "We'll watch them walk by, and we're like, ha-ha, suckers!" Many who are still LDS feel guilty rather than emancipated when they choose not to become involved in certain programs. The tendency to use activity level to gauge worthiness pervades Mormonism, even though narrators believe that tendency is stronger in homeland societies. In totalistic societies, refusing to participate in group activities brands one as an outsider who must be disciplined until she is willing to comply or be ejected. While Mormons do not eject members who fail to attend meetings, only active church members are permitted to receive temple recommends, gain church employment, and hold certain callings. Nevertheless, many narrators who are LDS attend whichever meetings suit them, excuse their children from programs that do not seem focused on an individual child's needs, and resist activity-based measures of spirituality. Kendra, interview with author, June 26, 2017. All contributions from Kendra in this chapter come from this source. 465 205 LDS church services in most parts of the world are held on Sundays in three-hour time blocks. Usually, in the first hour all members sit together for the main worship, called sacrament meeting. For the second hour, adults and teenagers attend Sunday school in age-group classes. During the third hour, men and women separate. The men and boys attend priesthood meetings, while adult women attend Relief Society466 and young women attend YW. Children under the age of twelve spend the last two hours in primary, which involves individual lessons and group singing/instruction. At the time of our interview, Ruth, her husband, and their three children attend only sacrament meeting in their Ohio ward. 467 They leave before the second hour of the block, except on the weeks Ruth teaches the adult gospel doctrine Sunday school class. When Ruth is teaching, her children attend their own Sunday school and primary classes and her husband attends Ruth's class. Ruth says she and her husband came up with this attendance plan so they can better control what religious instruction their children receive. After a particularly frustrating visit to the LDS temple where Ruth's husband realized he disagreed with the roles he saw enacted for women, he said, "We're gonna go to the first hour, but we aren't gonna go to the second and third because that's where all that stuff gets taught. And we can un-teach stuff [they hear] in the first hour [because we'll be there with them]." On the family's ride home from church, the parents say things to their children like, "You know how brother so-and-so said that? We don't believe that. You know how sister so-and-so said that? We think maybe a better way to put it would be this." She says Every adult women in the LDS church is considered to be a member of the Relief Society organization. 467 Seven months later, they no longer attend any of the meetings. 466 206 "We do all of this, like, damage control and re-teaching on the way home from church." Ruth has asked her daughter not to attend any YW meetings. The girl was harmed by male schoolmates in a former city and struggles with what Ruth describes as "church patriarchal culture." As part of reclaiming control of her life, Ruth's daughter does not want any male to ever have power over her again. Ruth believes that if her daughter hears YW lessons about men presiding over the household, she may be traumatized and the messages may skew her ability to build her own happy home someday. Her daughter still attends daily seminary classes because the teacher is a woman Ruth trusts. Ruth knows that she is disrupting herself and her family, and she admits they all have fewer friends in the ward than they used to. She is sad about that because she says being Mormon is a fundamental part of who she is, and she feels like Mormonism is "her best shot at community" because Mormons are her people. She says, she is "trying to create a mental path" that allows her to be LDS, but also accommodates her "new moral consciousness" that is "slightly alternative" to official and cultural interpretations of Mormonism. She is going to significant effort to fit Mormonism to her needs rather than simply participating in everything the way she was taught to do as a young woman in Orem, Utah, in the 1990s. She explains why: Because I'm a Mormon. I mean, like, I can't not be a Mormon. I was raised Mormon. It's who I am, and it's such a defining (gets emotional) characteristic for me. I have to code switch to interact with the real world. And Mormon culture is still my home, and it always will be. So I can't not be Mormon. I mean, I feel like I don't know how to be an adult in the world-I don't know how to be a nonMormon adult in the world. Ruth's total identity has been constructed within Mormonism. When she was a young woman in Mormon homelands, she participated in the programs and accepted the prescribed gender roles, but now does not believe those programs and roles were as 207 necessary as she once thought they were. She has begun the process of basing her spirituality on something other than participation, though it still irks when extended family members call her inactive. ("I'm not inactive! I go to church every week!") But like many narrators, she remains uncertain how to find her way if she is not marching lock step with other Mormon women. Charlotte, who is LDS and lives in Provo, Utah, with her husband and children, feels that members feel too much pressure to from mandated programs. 468 Laughingly, she says, "Now, maybe this goes back to my own experience as a young woman, but you know, my attitude is like, why are we pushing these girls to do Personal Progress?" She says if a young woman is "engaged in wonderful things, [then] who cares, you know?" She says that the purpose of YW programs should be to help people develop a testimony, and that some young women do not need the programs in order to have a testimony. She says, Does this girl need something else? She's in gymnastics, she's swamped with homework, and every time she participates in class the spirit is there. Should we be pushing her on this Personal Progress that she's not doing? I don't think so. Okay, what about this girl, she's not involved in anything, she's a little withdrawn, da, da, da. Maybe we could encourage her to do some Personal Progress, you know? I mean, she's not busy, she needs something, and she's not motivated. She's not making it happen herself, you know? I guess I just kind of have this idea that, you know, if these girls are doing good things, we don't need to push these programs on them. And I think that a lot of times we are just pushing programs. When Charlotte teaches YW lessons in her congregation, she tries to emphasize Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. She asks young women how they are preparing to do the good in the world that God has sent them to do, whatever that good is for them Charlotte, interview with author, July 10, 2014. All contributions from Charlotte in this chapter come from this source. 468 208 individually. She teaches them they each have a mission from God, and he will strengthen them in fulfilling that mission if they make and keep covenants with him. Many narrators expressed a similar belief that Mormonism can sometimes be too focused on programs rather than people-on getting everyone in the same place at the same time-rather than on building individual relationships with God. Several said this seemed especially true in Utah and other Mormon homeland regions. Emily says that after her divorce when she was working full-time and attending school, she thought the church youth programs "felt a little bit unsupportive of family." 469 Leaders in her Highland, Utah, ward were so concerned with whether her children attended church activities but did not bother to find out what the family needed. Emily remembers one frustrating phone call with a YW leader who wondered why Emily's daughter was not at the evening's activity. Emily wanted to say, "If the program wants to be supportive, why don't they pick my daughter up and take her?" She says, "I was a single mom. I would go to work early. I remember coming home just being super sick, exhausted, nothing left, and knowing I still had four hours' worth of school to do when I got home." She says YW feels "less essential now than it did." She loved YW as a young woman, but now thinks maybe the one-size-fits-all approach in YW disempowers young women. Camryn and her husband, a professor at Brigham Young University, are careful what programs, activities, and ideas they endorse in Mormon homelands. 470 Camryn says she has always been "comfortable in [her] own skin," and willing to disregard things that Emily, interview with author, June 28, 2017. All contributions from Emily in this chapter come from this source. 470 Camryn, interview with author, June 8, 2017. All contributions from Camryn in this chapter come from this source. 469 209 did not seem helpful to her. She says her family has never fit in well in homelands, even though they have now lived in Orem, Utah, for fifteen years. She currently resides in a different part of Orem than she moved to from Oklahoma as a young woman in 1991. She says, "We've just never slotted in. So we just made our own way." She says they are "sort of an island family in the middle of Utah that don't participate in the culture." When I ask what it is she does not participate in and how she is different, Camryn answers with a shrug, "Probably [in] ways that are interpreted as having a bad attitude, frankly." She refused to take meals to a wealthy family that she thought was taking advantage of church members' compassion, and she coached her daughter to ignore comments from other preteens about her "immodest" bathing suit. She says, My experience is that the gospel is so beautiful. It's stunning. It's beautiful, and it's good, and it has nothing to do with the culture. So I am totally converted to the gospel, and the culture is completely expendable depending on whether or not I like it. She will not provide a meal because she does not believe in unthinking participation. She does not want other Mormons to impose prescribed gendered expectations on her daughters. Camryn seems easily able to distinguish between what she believes to be culture propagated by humans and doctrine revealed by God. She attributes this to seeing so many cultural variations when she lived in the South and other places as a child. One indicator that a society has become totalistic is that programs seem designed to control people rather than to teach or develop them. Mandatory programs make it simpler to ensure that people are where you expect them to be rather than engaging in some activity that might be deviant. An overabundance of mandatory programs indicates that a society believes its members cannot be trusted to manage their own time and space in ways that benefit the community. 210 As adults, narrators have a complex relationship with the prescribed gender roles they encountered-and in many cases resented-as young women in Mormon homelands. A few narrators are quick to insist that they are no longer bound by the ridiculous notions about women and careers they were taught in their youth. They claim it is crazy for Mormonism to assume that all women should follow the same pathway through life, and they describe how they have abandoned prescribed gender roles and been happy with the results. But for most narrators, challenging the one-size-fits-all Mormon life course is an ongoing and painful process with uncertain outcomes, especially for those who consider themselves faithful Mormons. Erving Goffman demonstrated that when people leave a highly-regimented totalistic life, they have varying degrees of success at creating an identity for themselves that does not include the regimen. 471 They have come to define themselves by society's structures of time and place and are unsure how to proceed without those structures. This seemed especially true for narrators who believed LDS doctrines about gender differences and the importance of family, but did not agree with Mormon homeland's emphasis on rigid gender roles. Megan, who now lives in Draper, Utah, wants young Mormon women to see that they do not need "cookie cutter" lives in order to be righteous. She says, "I don't necessarily think that the Mormon culture in Utah-especially Utah-prepares young women appropriately for the future." She told the bishop of her congregation, "There's nothing I would rather do [in the ward] than to serve the young women. I love it, love it, love it, love it." However, the bishop has not yet asked her to teach in YW, so her emancipatory messages have no release except in a secularized way to the elementary 471 Goffman, Asylums, 127-167. 211 school students she teaches, many of whom are LDS. Wistfully, Megan observes that she will likely never be called to YW if she continues to live in Utah. She explains that YW leaders in her ward are always thin, young, and focused on their homes. They have "cutesy stuff" in their kitchens and "they craft." Megan, on the other hand, displays decorations left behind by the previous owner of her condominium. Making her house look fabulous is "not who I am. Nor do I think that's what really makes a woman or a home." Megan seems comfortable with her identity and life choices, though her voice softens and slows a bit at this point in our interview. It is as if talking to me has caused her to feel that in the homelands, women like her are still the wrong kind of role models for young Mormon women. Or perhaps Megan's somberness is because she always intended to be a stay-athome mother herself, and she knows personally that prescribed life paths set out for Mormon young women do not always work as intended. She fears that young women who are not taught that reality may have the same difficulties she has had. For several years, Megan has worked in a job she does not love for a relatively low wage. She provides the primary income for the family because her husband has a disability that makes employment challenging. She wishes the message of "don't get too caught up your career, you know, or your education" had not been "so deeply implanted" in her mind when she was young. She says she never took her career seriously because her expectation was that she would find a husband and support his career instead. Education was a safe, acceptable job for women. She had hoped to attend the University of Utah and study chemistry, but never did. Long after high school, she was sorting papers and found an unopened letter from that university offering her a scholarship. She "wept for days." 212 She says, "I wish I would have known. I didn't know. I didn't know. The outcome would have been much different. Much different." She is obviously referring to all the professional opportunities she has missed because she thought it was unrighteous to care about such things, not only the scholarship. Megan believes prescribed homeland gender roles have hurt her in material ways. Cara has also been financially responsible for her family even though she was taught that it was wrong to have a career. However, unlike Megan's husband, Cara's husband is a full-time, stay-at-home father, and Cara holds a satisfying, high-paying position as a corporate vice president. Cara says her career was more successful than her husband's in part because he felt so much pressure to support the family that he accepted jobs he did not like simply because they paid well. He was repeatedly laid off because he never chose work that matched his interests and so he was not good at it. Cara, on the other hand, initially did not expect hers to be the primary income, so she accepted positions that were satisfying but low-paying. Because she enjoyed her jobs, she was good at them and received promotions and professional opportunities, and now she is an executive. It seems apparent that Cara also has a drive to succeed that probably furthered her career. She explains how her husband has been excluded at church in the decade since he decided to be the permanent caregiver for their children. She says, "They don't know what to do with a dad who doesn't have a job." Cara laments that men are as pigeonholed as women by regimented notions of gender in Mormon homeland culture. When Cara's marriage was relatively new, her husband had just finished an MBA degree in Pennsylvania. They had a young child, and Cara worked full-time to make ends meet. Months passed without her husband securing employment. She felt he was not 213 searching hard enough and was too particular about pay and status. Finally, she bought one-way plane tickets to Salt Lake City, Utah, for herself and her daughter. She told her husband, "I have quit my job. So the trapeze has been let go of. This is it. You figure it out. And when you've figured it out, let me know, and we'll go from there." She moved into her parents' home, expecting her husband to find a job and send for her by the end of the summer (it was July). He responded to her ultimatum by storing their belongings and moving in with his own parents in Philadelphia. It was a dark time for Cara. She thought, This is over. My marriage is over. I don't have a job. I have this nearly four-yearold kid. I don't know how I'm gonna provide for her. How pathetic am I, living with my mom and dad, sleeping on a futon in the room that I'd lived in my teenage years. And I have not lived with them since I stormed out at eighteen and went to reclaim my life [after the trauma of moving to Utah]. And now I've returned at twenty-seven in this yucky way. Cara's mother had a birthday party for her granddaughter, and Cara sobbed through the entire party because she feared she would never be able to provide for her daughter. That night, Cara went with her mother to a church-wide women's broadcast. Cara figured she could sit in the dark chapel and cry while she listened. No one would be able to see her, and hearing church leaders might bring her some comfort. It was September 1995, and church President Gordon B. Hinckley used this broadcast to announce a document now both beloved and controversial to church members called "The Family: A Proclamation to the World." 472 Among other things, The Proclamation, as it is known among Mormons, clarifies church position on gender roles in families, stating that husbands are responsible to provide and wives to nurture children. The First Presidency and Council of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, "The Family: A Proclamation to the World," Gospel Topics, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed March 15, 2018, https://www.lds.org/topics/family-proclamation?lang=eng&old=true. 472 214 Cara heard Hinckley's words, and cried anew at this further sign of her insufficiency. After reading several paragraphs of The Proclamation, Hinckley spoke "one tiny line that essentially acknowledges, we get it, and not all the time is it gonna work out like this, and in that case, it's okay." 473 Cara says that line "spoke to her." It was as if President Hinckley, representing God, reached out to her through that television screen and said, Guess what, Cara? You're gonna be different, and your path is gonna be different. We know that there are extenuating circumstances and things that are different. It's okay. In those circumstances, the Lord has your back. Get up off your butt, figure it out, make a difference, stand out, find your own way. It's not only gonna be okay. It's gonna be awesome, and you can do it. When the lights went up after the meeting, Cara raised her fist in the air and roared. She felt ready to find employment, move to a house of her own, and earn a living for her daughter and herself. That same evening, at the refreshment table, she met an acquaintance from high school who invited her to interview for a position the next day. Cara got the job, and it was the beginning of her career. Cara and her family were featured on the ABC news show 20/20 for being atypical in Mormon culture. Camera crews filmed her husband making pancakes and driving the children to school in a minivan. They photographed Cara leading meetings dressed in a suit, and both spouses flew to New York for an interview. Cara says, "We sort of felt like we [could] be an ambassador of being active LDS and still carving things out a bit differently." I ask Cara when she became comfortable with her role as full-time provider. She looks away, laughs, and says, "Oh, maybe five minutes ago." Then she tears up and says quietly, "I don't know that we ever will." Her paradigms about what The line is: "Disability, death, or other circumstances may necessitate individual adaptation." The next line may also have been of comfort to Cara: "Extended families should lend support when needed." 473 215 Mormon women and men should do with their lives were deeply embedded in her belief system at a young age, and she sometimes has trouble reconciling her identity as a Mormon with her family's failure to be on the prescribed path. She says, "So, do I feel worthy? Heavens, yes. I feel worthy. I totally feel worthy. Do I feel like I fit? No! No. It's a hot mess." Even though she is proud to represent alternative ways of enacting Mormonism and knows she is doing the right thing for herself and her family, the traditional regimen she knew as a youth is still exercising control over her. Narrators are raising their daughters to have fewer constraints than they did. Mira lives in Virginia with her husband and five children. They are LDS. She is a licensed midwife, but says her husband's income is their primary maintenance. She has never served in a YW leadership calling, but her daughters have been through YW. She says, for the most part, the leaders have been loving and her daughters have benefitted from the program. However, she has made sure leaders were not teaching her daughters that the only righteous choice for a woman was to marry young and have many children because she has noticed a "cultural retrenchment" in Mormonism lately. She does not like the new focus on "purity and hem lengths and really, really traditional roles" for men and women. Mira laughingly explains that she once rewrote the official church handbook used to administer the Young Men and Young Women organizations. A couple years ago, the ward YM president had taught a lesson for all the youth. He showed a PowerPoint presentation derived from the handbook. The slides had "this big emphasis on education for young men, and there wasn't any paragraph about education for young women." Mira was frustrated and decided to write a new handbook that would apply to all young people, whether female or male. Her version did not get bogged down in organizational or 216 familial roles; instead, it advised each young person to build a relationship with Jesus Christ and develop his or her own moral character. She showed her revised handbook to her children and pasted it in her journal. She never gave it to the YM or YM leaders. She would have liked to see the messaging about prescribed roles changed for all youth, but feels good that at least her sons and daughters were taught that there is not a single right way to be a Mormon woman or man, and that devotion to God is what matters. Like many narrators in this study, Mira feels a responsibility to "do" YW better for young women today than it was done for her in Mormon homelands. She says she is "not really informed at an academic level about those different ways of feminism and stuff like that." But she appreciates the current definitions of feminism that uphold everyone for whatever the righteous choices are that they make for their families, whether their partners work, whether the mom or the dad stays home with the kids full-time or part-time, whether grandma helps, or whatever works out for their families. I feel like there's a huge amount of flexibility in the actual teachings of the gospel. There's a dozen or a hundred different ways that a family could organize and still appropriately care for their children. Mira "felt really stifled overall, being a girl and stuff" in Mormon homelands. Even though her own children do not live in Nevada like she did, she worries that the limiting messages that "feed off Mormon culture and have a little doctrine mixed in" might still negatively affect them. She does not want her daughter to feel she has to become Debbie, a Mormon Girl. Some narrators who embraced careers without guilt and who have not received negative feedback from other Mormons have still been stymied by prescribed gender roles in Mormon homelands. For example, Camryn always intended to work even though careers for women were discouraged in Orem, Utah, in the 1990s. She feels like she has 217 "never gotten crap" for that choice in her Mormon congregations and her current Orem ward has several professional women in its ranks. However, Camryn's husband was recruited for a professor position by Brigham Young University three times before he married her. Each time, he was selected as a finalist and then told the school could not hire him because he was an unmarried male. After marrying, he was invited to interview again and was offered the job, which he accepted. He is still employed there. Conclusion Narrators in homeland societies from 1975 through 2000 appeared to lead fairly regimented lives. Homeland societies mandated participation in the many YW programs the LDS church offered for young women at that time. Not only were narrators required to participate, they were required to do so en masse with other young women, as is common in a totalistic environment. Narrators also found they were often expected to comply with prescribed roles for women, men, and families regardless of personal preferences, interests, and talents. Homeland societies seemed to want young women to agree with these prescriptions for their own good and for the good of the church. The final chapter summarizes what isolation, rules, and regimentation in the latter twentieth century might have meant for narrators. It identifies patterns of resistance from narrators' interviews and considers how totalism can be disrupted in a society. It makes recommendations for Mormons. Then, it revisits oral history and participatory critical rhetoric methodologies to reflect on my standpoint and responsibilities of the researcher in a project where historical inquiry and critical rhetoric intersect. It proposes future research that might be done to exploring imbalances between groups and individuals. CHAPTER 8 DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS In a world of superheroes and villains, it is tempting to blame specific individuals or organizations for the totalism some narrators experienced in Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000. Perhaps one could say the fault lay primarily with the LDS church and the Young Women (YW) organization; maybe church policies, patriarchy, curricula, or centralization were the reasons some young women were isolated, rule-bound, and regimented. After all, it is clear from narrators' stories that the LDS church and YW exercised significant control over Mormons in homeland societies during this period. On the other hand, maybe it would be more appealing to focus on individual church leaders and parents who created isolation, enforced rules, and regimented young women. It is evident that wrongs done to some narrators by individuals were reprehensible, and perpetrators should not escape accountability. However, I believe this study demonstrates that it is an oversimplification to place all the blame on individual actors for the negative experiences some narrators had in Mormon homelands. One's behavior in a group is a product of the pressures and 219 expectations of that group and one's individual values and perspectives. 474 The self arises from both identity and interaction with others. 475 I suggest that narrators and their peers, parents, and leaders-while able to exercise individual will-still functioned within the constraints of homeland societies and the family, YW, school, and ward groups of which they were members. I also suggest that the LDS church and YW were not able to exercise full control of narrators because "there is more to us than any organization can declare." 476 Narrators' stories indicate that Mormon homeland totalism from 1975 through 2000 emerged from a complex intersection of events in the larger American society, organizational moves undertaken by the LDS church and YW, and individual members' actions. Narrators' stories also indicate that homeland societies did provide safety, belonging, and opportunities for personal growth. Social control is about individuals' "struggle-to-be within the enablements and constraints" of a group's collective interests. This study illustrates that struggle-to-be. It shows how narrators sought to sustain a sense of self while attempting to blend with the Mormon homeland societies into which they moved. The contest for individuality within the prescriptions and proscriptions of a group is not only a Mormon story or a Mormon homelands story. It takes place any time people make a commitment to work, live, or play together. The question this dissertation addresses is what made group membership total instead of vital for narrators in this case study. Samuel E. Wallace defines vital as attending to the individual interests of each member, and total as subsuming those James A. Anderson and Elaine E. Englehardt, The Organizational Self and Ethical Conduct: Sunlit Virtue and Shadowed Resistance (Orlando, FL: Harcourt College Publishers, 2001) 9-12, 21. 475 Anderson and Englehardt, The Organizational Self, 87-105. 476 Anderson and Englehardt, The Organizational Self, 78-79. 474 220 interests to the prerogatives of the group. 477 In this study, the narrators themselves decided what was total versus vital as they reconstructed their stories. For many of them, the aspects of homeland societies that were totalizing to them as young women are the same ones that continue to bother them as adults. The intensity of narrators' present-day responses suggests they are still attempting to define their religious and community memberships in ways that are vital for themselves, their families, and other congregants. This chapter offers totalism as a name for the suppression of individual identity narrators sometimes felt happened in Mormon homelands from 1975 through 2000, and it suggests isolation, rules, and regimentation as the mechanisms by which Mormondominated societies favored the group. It reminds that totalism is never fully totalizing and all groups are totalistic to some degree. It explains the means of material and rhetorical resistance narrators used to disrupt isolation, rules, and regimentation. It identifies future areas of research and gaps related to totalism. It suggests that even in religious organizations believed by members to be divinely inspired, policies, procedures, and communications are enacted by humans operating within social and cultural contexts. Then it considers implications for Mormonism and its devotees, offering questions members and church leaders might ask to better counter group overreach. It invites narrators, scholars of Mormonism, the LDS church, and Mormons to explore the oral history database the project contributed to the historical record. This chapter also revisits the methodological innovations of taking a rhetorical approach to oral history. It summarizes my claims about co-interpretation, pre- and post- Samuel E. Wallace, ed., Total Institutions (New York, NY: Aldine Publishing Company, 1971), 4. 477 221 interview communication, and bridging past/present, and it encourages oral historians to utilize these three rhetorical practices in their work. It invites participatory critical rhetoric (PCR) scholars to do more oral history projects and suggests two areas where oral history may challenge PCR's self-definitions. It suggests that oral history as a PCR technique needs further critical examination. Finally, it situates this study in my own larger research trajectory and identifies future projects I hope to undertake. Totalism This study claims three mechanisms of totalism were experienced by narrators in Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000: isolation, rules, and regimentation. Each of these mechanisms was sustained by specific practices, and those practices helped create a homeland culture that many narrators found confusing and frustrating. Specifically, some young women in Mormon homelands were isolated in the name of safety, and this isolation seemed to contribute to an insular society that narrators said was uncharitable to outsiders and to young women themselves. Narrators' isolation was nearly total, meaning they had almost no means to escape the ideological and physical boundaries defined for them. They were kept within Mormon social circles, told that non-Mormons and anyone who appeared to be "in the world" was dangerous, and subject to continual surveillance from peers and adults. Some homelanders appeared to believe that young women were helpless in the face of unrighteousness: if a young woman was ever allowed in the vicinity of wrong-doing, she would immediately be drawn to do wrong herself. Further, if a young woman did succumb to sin, she would be permanently damaged, making the stakes of failing to isolate young women very high. 222 Both as young women and as adults, many narrators resisted the ideologies used to sustain isolation. Prior to coming to the homelands, they had seen firsthand that it was possible for a person to act righteously when others around her where doing otherwise. Narrators had also observed that non-Mormons were not a monolithic group whose members can all be categorized in a certain way. They had met people outside the faith whom they admired and respected, and they did not believe outsiders were a constant threat to their safety. Now that they are adults, narrators are very uncomfortable with what they perceive to be Mormon homeland self-righteousness. They advocate for better treatment of non-Mormons and seek out religious diversity in their adult lives. Narrators believe in protecting their own children, but they do not think those children have to be isolated in order to be safe. Instead, they practice an approach one narrator called inoculation, which involves allowing children to experience real-world temptations during adolescence in the hopes that those children will develop the inner strength necessary to make good choices. Narrators have struggled to reconcile the totalizing isolation they experienced in Mormon homelands with their belief that Mormonism teaches its members to be charitable toward everyone. Some homeland societies also totalized narrators via rules, mostly unwritten ones. The rules specified which behaviors and characteristics a person should have to be considered properly Mormon. The rules related to outward indicators of Mormon identity, including things young women could change (such as appearance) and things they could not change (such as family structure or income level). For example, if a young woman did not look the same as others in her ward or could not boast of pioneer ancestry, she was presumed to be less righteous. The rules were often totalizing, meaning that they 223 governed so many aspects of identity that it was difficult for young women to function on a daily basis without being constrained by rules. Narrators did not know homeland societies' rules, and they were unaccustomed to being judged by peers and ward members. They came to homelands expecting to be welcomed into a community of fellow believers; instead, they sometimes found themselves scrambling to learn and follow unwritten homeland rules so as to prove their value to other Mormons. The rules seemed to contribute to an exclusive homeland culture, where narrators said worth was determined by others not by oneself or by one's relationship with God. Prior to moving to Mormon homelands, narrators were used to making more of their own decisions about how Mormonism should be lived. Many narrators resisted homeland society's rules, which they claimed were made by other humans rather than by deity. They decided homelanders were wrong, and family, appearance, and income should not be determiners of righteousness. As adults, many narrators are still reacting to rule-based Mormonism. They are quick to protest rules that seem to brand other Mormons as unrighteous, especially if those rules relate to characteristics many believe a person cannot change, such as sexual orientation. They are wary of Mormon homeland authority, whether that authority is official (sanctioned by the LDS church) or unofficial (endorsed by culture and society). They do not like to be told what to do by other Mormons, and they criticize Mormons who seem to unthinkingly follow rules. A third mechanism of totalism described by narrators in Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000 was regimentation. Regimentation is the control of a person's movement through space and time. In homeland societies, regimentation seemed to contribute to a collective culture where narrators thought group obligations were seen 224 as more important than individual preferences. Homeland societies implemented regimens telling young women where they were supposed to be and when they were supposed to be there, both physically and ideologically. These regimens took the form of mandatory programs and prescribed roles. The LDS church offered a myriad of YW programs such as mutual, girls' camp and personal progress that took up a significant amount of a young woman's time. In some homeland societies, narrators said participation in these programs was mandated and the programs were often administered in a rigid fashion, with everyone completing the same activities at the same time. Participation seemed to be more important than spirituality in homeland societies. Narrators also said they were regimented by prescribed roles in Mormonism that directed them to all take the same linear life-path of wifehood and motherhood, completing each milestone along that path at the expected time regardless of personal circumstance or preference. Homeland societies sustained regimentation by persuading Mormons that they needed the pressure of the group in order to transform themselves into better people. The loss of agency was rationalized as a necessary part of growth. Narrators were told that it was their duty to follow the regimen, because the regimen was necessary to sustain the church, and all members needed the church in order to reach their full potentials. In collective Mormon homeland societies, individuality was seen as a selfish threat to the stability of the organization. Women who left prescribed paths weakened the society and reduced its ability to transform and perfect members. In voluntary totalism, when regimentation is perceived as beneficial to all, agitators who encourage others to resist the regimen are punished more severely than those who resist privately. 225 As adults, narrators are wary of regimentation. Many have become buffet Mormons, who no longer believe that righteousness requires attendance at every meeting and completion of every program. They challenge prescribed gender roles and encourage church members and leaders to stop teaching a one-size-fits-all life-path for young women. They are sensitive to lessons about roles and prefer to hear about identity. This may be because role is an organizational concept that describes one's responsibility to other people, and some narrators believe they were manipulated as adolescents into believing that collective obligations were more important than personal agency. The many homeland societies narrators inhabited exhibited similar patterns in their efforts to protect, reshape, and perfect young women. While individual experiences varied, the women's stories demonstrate that isolation, rules, and regimentation occurred in nearly all of these homeland societies, and often enough to be notable. The stories also demonstrate that these three totalizing mechanisms sometimes occurred in mission-field congregations as well, but their occurrence there was far less frequent. Nearly every narrator insisted that the mission-field congregations she lived in as a child, young woman, and adult were more welcoming to non-Mormons, less judgmental of other Mormons, and generally more willing to permit individual interpretation of religious teachings. Many women who participated in this study told me they did so in an attempt to understand why mission-field and homeland Mormonism were so different from each other. Sarah told me, "If you write your book about explaining what the heck is going on with Utah culture, I will totally read it as an instruction manual because I am so confused. To this day I am so confused." 478 This research provides nuance to Amorette 478 Sarah, interview with the author June 22, 2017. 226 Hinderaker's claim that the LDS religion is totalistic to its members. 479 Despite its name, totalism is never one hundred percent totalizing. Erving Goffman, the sociologist who introduced the word to the academic lexicon, observed that even among inmate populations in psychiatric institutions and prisons, totalism is not complete. People find ways to resist a group's control over them. Sometimes that resistance is internal; they think differently than they are told to, which keeps their identities from being entirely overrun. Sometimes that resistance is rhetorical; they use language or other forms of symbolic communication to talk about themselves and others in ways that disrupt regimens and defy rules. At other times, the resistance is material; they move furniture, hang signs, sit when they are expected to stand. As one of the narrators in this study said, "I just don't like being told what to do. Usually, when someone gives me a rule, it makes me want to break that rule, even if before I had no desire to break the rule." 480 The women did not accept behaviors that seemed inconsistent with what they thought religious people should do, or "un-Christ-like," to use Mormon vernacular. Chapters 5 through 7 of this dissertation have described internal, rhetorical, and material ways that narrators resisted isolation, rules, and regimentation. This section describes patterns I observed when I considered all narrators' stories together, and both mission-field and homeland experiences were evaluated. Four behaviors seemed able to consistently disrupt totalism: vulnerability, parental support, focusing on "the one," and breaking the silence. Many narrators talked about how 479 Amorette Hinderaker, "Severing Primary Ties: Exit from Totalistic Organizations," Western Journal of Communication 79, no. 1 (January-February 2015): 92-115. 480 Brynhilda, interview with author, March 9, 2017. 227 whenever Mormons were willing to be vulnerable, Mormonism suddenly became about helping and supporting rather than protecting or restricting. When Mormons showed weakness and imperfection to each other, it was more difficult for individuality to be compromised and narrators felt more accepted. Narrators commented on the vulnerability they saw in mission-field congregations and said they longed for it in homelands. Emily, the woman from Snowflake, Arizona, says, I went to a fast and testimony meeting at the Manhattan branch once when I was in New York City. A lady got up and bore her testimony and said, "I have just been struggling to quit smoking." I was like, "That would never happen here! Someone here would never admit that they had a problem smoking." 481 Emily says that when people are unwilling to share their problems, "It feels like there's a lack of soul. Like [a lack of] realness to the community." In narrators' stories, when even one person said or did something to reveal his or her weaknesses, it seemed to increase the kindness of an entire group of Mormons, and that seemed true in both mission-field and homeland wards. Another disruptor I saw repeatedly was parental support. When parents were available and willing to serve as a sounding board and sanity check for what their daughters were experiencing, narrators were far more likely to conclude that isolation, rules, and regimentation were wrong. Parents whose views ran counter to the prevailing ideologies in Mormon homeland societies from 1975 through 2000 seemed especially helpful in disrupting totalism. For example, if a narrator's mother was a feminist, that narrator tended to resist when homeland societies tried to control her. When fathers supported narrators' goals, even if those goals were unusual for the context and the time Emily, interview with author, June 28, 2017. All contributions from Emily in this chapter come from this source. 481 228 period, young women seemed particularly empowered to resist homeland societies' encroachment on their identities. Parents who had lived outside of homelands reinforced their daughters' sometimes unarticulated opinions that Mormonism did not have to be like this, that something strange was going on in homeland societies, that one did not have to do everything one was told by homelanders in order to be righteous. Many narrators have tried be a disruptor of group overreach with their own children. Leah says, "I think the more a parent's involved in pointing out stupidity, that it's human stupidity, not Mormon stupidity, that your children will recognize that." 482 As I discussed in Chapter 5, some parents of narrators were complicit in totalism in their efforts to help their daughters be safe. But whenever a parent gave a daughter permission to buck the system, so to speak, that young woman seemed less willing to trade her identity for homeland membership. I think it would be productive to do future research with this oral history archive to explore the relationship between daughters and fathers. Narrators provided significant information about their fathers in our interviews. A third disruptor I observed was what several narrators called "a focus on the one." That is a popular Mormon phrase which seems to originate from two scripture parables that teach that Jesus Christ will expend effort to find and rescue a single lost soul. 483 Seeing a person as an individual independent of their membership in any group seemed to make it difficult to totalize that person. The opposite was also true. When Violet's peers only wanted to know if she was a Mormon and what ward she was in, they Leah, interview with author, June 8, 2017. All contributions from Leah in this chapter come from this source. 483 Luke 15: 4-10, Holy Bible. 482 229 were seeing her as representative of a category rather than unique. 484 Violet was the woman who moved from England to Bountiful, Utah. Leah says, "Basically, it goes down to, what would Christ do? He's all about just loving the individual, quit worrying about the whole-or about what the whole community's doing. He's-it's a more individual thing." When Mormons did not try to classify a person as dangerous or not, righteous or not, properly Mormon or not, then they seemed much more willing to love and support that person. It seemed like when the encouragement to classify someone as in or out of the group was reduced, Mormons turned to the LDS theologies related to charity and unity to guide their behavior instead. A final pattern I observed was breaking the silence. By this, I mean not letting mistreatment of others or inconsistency between behavior and doctrine pass unremarked. Some young women who spoke up were ostracized. Remember Natalie and the charge of feminazi in Chapter 7. 485 However, even when those young women paid a personal price, it seemed their voices made a difference in disrupting totalism for themselves and others. Totalism, when made evident, is deplorable to most ordinary people. Many narrators used their interviews to speak up for the first time about the strangeness they experienced in homelands. Some have given themselves the job of breaking the silence in their Mormon congregations as adults. Leah says, "I think the Mormon culture is great and terrible, and I wish we'd talk about it more." She is the woman who wore prom dresses to high school in Orem, Utah, just to aggravate prim homelanders. Violet, interview with author, June 14, 2017. All contributions from Violet in this chapter come from this source. 485 Natalie, interview with author, August 11, 2017. All contributions from Natalie in this chapter come from this source. 484 230 Olivia says that a woman in one of the homeland wards she lived in as an adult told Olivia that she did not want to talk with her because afterward she felt "icky." 486 She says homeland women often believe they cannot show emotion, express a doubt ("Because, you know, that would be blasphemy"), or say anything that suggests life is not perfect. She says, "If you cried about the Lord and your testimony, you could cry. But don't cry because your brother died of a drug overdose, because that's icky. That makes them feel icky. Just don't talk about it." Olivia is the woman who no longer believes in Mormonism, but who is waiting to leave until her mother passes away and her stillbelieving son grows older. There is a limitation of this study related to voluntarism and adolescence. I made an assumption that Mormonism is voluntary, but I realize narrators did not always feel it to be so. I observed several mechanisms of voluntary totalism in narrators' stories, including the pattern of persuading individuals that totalism is in their best interests, which caused me to determine that my assumption was reasonable for this study. However, in future studies, I would like to probe more deeply into whether young women have enough control over their lives to voluntarily join, participate in, or withdraw from a religion endorsed by their parents. I believe I could examine this by studying what narrators have said about their parents' expectations for them. I also hope to interview young adult women (ages 18-25) and examine the voluntariness of their Mormonism. Olivia, interview with author, June 17, 2017. All contributions from Olivia in this chapter come from this source. 486 231 Mormonism Totalism provides a name for what many narrators described, but had not yet been able to label. Every narrator with whom I spoke observed that something was not quite right with Mormon culture in the religion's homelands, but most had difficulty articulating exactly what the something was. Leah says, "I've thought about this a lot, like, what is our weirdness, what are we doing? I don't know how to wrap words around it because it's a strange phenomenon, this thing that we think we need to do and be, and the reality of what we are." With totalism theory as a resource, I hope narrators and Mormons will be more successful at identifying imbalance between group and individual in their lives. Scholars have shown that totalism is often well-intentioned. It is sometimes believed necessary to protect individuals and is thought by many to be a reliable way to ensure people will work together when failure to do so might harm bodies or souls. This study demonstrates that totalism of adolescents and children can be rationalized as fulfilling normal responsibilities to protect. Understanding the three mechanisms by which narrators were controlled as young women may make it easier for Mormons to identify when individuality may be being suppressed in other contexts. I recommend Mormon leaders and members look for indicators of isolation, rules, and regimentation in their daily interactions by asking themselves questions such as the following. If many of these questions can be answered in the affirmative, paradigms and practices might bear further examination. To recognize oppressive levels of isolation, Mormons might ask: • Are there certain groups of Mormons we are particularly afraid for? Have we put proximity alarms in place to alert us if members of those groups come near people who are sinning? • Do we tell people they will inevitably sin if they are around sinners? Are we 232 relying on external controls to prevent misbehavior? Are we strengthening people's capacity to make good choices? • Are we kind to people when they make mistakes? Do we imply that mistakes are permanent? • Do we have lessons or manuals that foster a fear of "the world"? Do we have technology or policy in place to prevent socializing with non-Mormons? Do we label people who look different from us as bad examples? • Are we uncomfortable around people who look differently than we do? What do we say to those people? To recognize an overemphasis on rules, Mormons might ask: • Do we follow only rules that can be found in canonized sources? Could the rules we teach be followed by any Mormon living anywhere? Do we distinguish between rules and habits? Do we have a lot of rules or a few? • Can we explain the principles behind each of our rules? • Do we tell other people that they are not following the rules? • What do we do when people break rules? Do we feel that rule-breakers are a bad influence on others? When people break rules, is our first concern for the rule-breaker or for the others who might have seen the violation? • How do we measure spirituality? Do we assess a person's spirituality by her outward behaviors? If so, which ones? • Have we introduced ourselves to Mormons we have not yet met? Do we spend time with other Mormons outside of our families? Do we share good and bad news with people in our congregations? Do we ask other Mormons for help? • Do we believe people when they tell us about their level of spirituality? Do we require people to give us details about their behaviors before we will believe that they are righteous? • Do we believe that if we are righteous, God will bless us with money? • Do we think divorced people probably did something wrong? To recognize regimentation, Mormons might ask: • Is participation in church activities and programs mandatory? Do we tell people that participation will be good for them? Do we require everyone in a group to do the same activity at the same time? • What do we say to people who do not attend church meetings or activities? What do we say about them to others? • Do we tell people they will not be successful at meeting their goals unless 233 they participate in a particular church program or activity? • Do we use the word role when talking to other Mormons? Do we "pull rank" when trying to get others to do what we want? • Do we talk about marriage and family as a duty? • Do our lessons and materials teach that there is one right path through life? • Do we think single or divorced people would be married if they had different priorities? • Do we tell other people how and when to make major life decisions? • Do we tell other Mormons they are selfish when they have different priorities for their time than we do? Every group is totalizing to some degree, and every person is somewhat controlled by her group memberships. There is no precise formula for identifying when totalism has become extreme. Self-awareness is the best defense. Mormons are invited to peruse the oral history archive created for this project to read narrators' stories about Mormon homelands. Methodological Innovations Rhetorical oral history has been a remarkable way to conduct oral history research. It has allowed me to focus on adolescence, but also provided a means to understand that adolescence within the context of adulthood. It has enabled me to investigate narrators' lifetime intersections with Mormonism and empowered those narrators to interpret their Mormonism with me and for me. The parameters of the method encouraged relationship building, suited the collaborative style of many Mormon women, and were ideal for leveraging and reflecting on my insider standpoint. Studying the entire communicative process enabled me to recognize that my study population was seeking solidarity and that they had stories never before told. And it has allowed me to 234 create a permanent archive for those stories for the benefit of scholars, narrators, and church leaders and members. This research extended the practice of oral history interviewing in three distinct ways. First, it invited women to co-interpret their experiences with the researcher. This went beyond the practice of asking narrators to interpret their own descriptions. That practice is already recognized as valuable by oral historians and is considered a sharing of authority. My enhancement was to also invite narrators to evaluate and critique the researcher's conclusions and brainstorm with the researcher about meanings, themes, and patterns during the interview itself. This transformed the analysis stage of research from a solo activity to a social one, at least in part. In this project, co-interpretation helped me understand the complexity of women's experiences in homelands and recognize that control of those young women came from many individual actors. Second, it expanded the definition of primary source. In OH, the interview has long been considered the only source material. Each interaction that occurred before and after the interview is typically viewed by oral historians as necessary for logistical purposes rather than for research ones. A rhetorical approach recognizes that all communicative exchange is important because rhetoricians study how people make meaning. In this research, the women were delighted by the existence of each other, something that I would not have known had I not preserved their rhetoric when the call was posted. Until they saw the call, many narrators had thought they were alone in having a frustrating and confusing experience in Mormon homelands. The way potential applicants and future narrators engaged with each other helped me see that these women wanted to be considered as a group because they believed they would have a greater 235 impact on Mormonism together than individually. The email messages I received from women after their interviews reinforced my perceptions about this. Participatory critical rhetoric (PCR) claims to be ideal for observing an emerging public. The rhetoric created as groups form is a frequent object of study for PCR scholars. Because of the private nature of an oral history interview-discussed at length in Chapter 2-seeing a public emerge is not generally possible in OH research. However, by considering pre-interview rhetoric, this project was able to see the emergence of a public. One caution deserves mention. I have acted as if narrators and potential narrators are the same population group, which they are not. They share some characteristics, but also may not share others. There is no precedent for how a rhetorical oral historian should handle this problem. Participatory critical rhetoricians consider all rhetoric in a research engagement to be relevant, and oral historians do not consider any rhetoric outside of the interview to be relevant. Perhaps I should have analyzed pre-interview rhetoric only from women whom I eventually interviewed, and disregarded the rest, although that would have been difficult since I received and read pre-interview responses long before I determined whom to interview. I do not bring it up to suggest a course other than the one I took, but to indicate that this is an area that needs further consideration as rhetoric and oral history come together in future studies. My third extension of OH practice was to maintain a contemporary awareness not usually seen by OH narrators. Oral historians do not ignore the current realities of their narrators. However, they privilege the past. They allot more time to it, and they claim that it is the focus of the research. For a rhetorical oral historian, the focus of the research is perception and expression, not history. As such, the present time is equally important. For 236 this study, the present was not an afterthought to the past. Both were given significant attention in the interviews and the write-up. I encouraged women to talk about their contemporary experiences with Mormonism and draw connections between what happened to them as adolescents and what is happening to them, their daughters, and other young women in their current lives. This approach presented some challenges in this study. It was hard to write the narrative without burdening the reader with flashback scenes. It was time-consuming to analyze the interviews because they were unusually non-linear, even by oral history norms. In a few cases, the willingness to discuss past and present extended the length of the interview sessions beyond the scheduled time frame. PCR scholars have endorsed oral history and set a precedent for rhetoricians to conduct oral history interviews. However, few studies have been done that explicitly and critically merge PCR and OH practices, considering such areas of disparity as power distribution and advocacy. Perhaps this is because scholars who engage in PCR have not often been trained in historical epistemologies, and oral historians are generally unfamiliar with the discipline of rhetoric. I encourage PCR scholars to use oral history interviewing in their research. Future Directions I expect a future for this research both academically and within the LDS community. The archive created for this project provides a detailed record of young womanhood in North America and the Intermountain West region of the United States from 1975 through 2000. I hope historians will examine the stories to gain insight about culture and society in Utah and the United States in this period. Women's studies 237 scholars could use the archive to learn about young Mormon women's perspectives on and experiences with second-wave feminism. Specifically, Martha Sonntag Bradley's research about Mormonism and the Equal Rights Amendment could be extended to include the perspective of young women about these events. Researchers studying the LDS church in the latter twentieth century could find much information in the archive about policies, procedure, curricula, and other official communication to members, and about young women's participation in programs such as Personal Progress and girls' camp. Organizational communication scholars could use the archive to study identity, membership, and socialization with a religious community. I would like to see this archive used to further explore totalism in ordinary settings and in societies rather than institutions or organizations. I plan to continue exploring the archive myself. There are two topics I would like to study: 1) affluence, and 2) interactions between young women and Mormon men and young men. I considered affluence and the way it was thought to be a reward for righteousness briefly in Chapter 6 when I discussed rules in homeland societies. However, I want to explore possible connections between affluence, geography, and Mormon homeland identity because narrators' remarks to me suggested that there may be some tie. I would also like to examine narrators' interactions with Mormon males, both youth and adult. I believe this analysis would provide information about gender dynamics from 1975 through 2000 that would prove useful to historians, feminists, and religious scholars. I also wish to add interviews to the archive. Drawing on the applicant pool for this study, I intend to interview women who moved into homelands as young adults rather 238 than during secondary school years. I want to consider the nature of voluntariness in totalistic societies, and I think speaking to women who are demographically similar to current narrators but slightly older will allow for comparison. It may also allow me to consider Mormon totalism in the official, institutional environment of Brigham Young University rather than in the organically assembled societies featured in this study. Future interviewing could include non-Mormons who lived in Mormon homelands, men, young men, and young women who are native to homelands rather than newcomers. This would add richness to the archive for studies of this region and era. In addition, I would like to rhetorically examine the YW curricula used by young women in this period and speeches and other discourse directed to young women from general church leaders. It would be interesting to use distance reading and other computer-assisted methods to look for the themes and patterns brought up in narrators' interviews. Before undertaking this research, I speculated that Mormon theology's dual emphasis on agency and community would make Mormonism a rich setting for exploring how people deal with the sometimes onerous demands of group membership. I am now convinced that hunch was well-founded. The difficulty of staying connected to other Mormons without being unacceptably constrained by those Mormons was discussed by every narrator. Mormons form close-knit communities. Church members were in each other's business constantly, presumably because Mormonism seeks to improve a person socially, emotionally, financially, spiritually, physically, and professionally. This research has examined whether an organization or society can influence a woman's complete identity in the way Mormonism seeks to, but do so in the capacity of guide 239 rather than dictator. This is a question in which Mormons are deeply invested. Many narrators chose to participate in this project because they hoped my research would improve the social aspects of Mormonism for themselves and others. Narrators were especially concerned that contemporary young women-daughters, friends, fellow congregants-be empowered rather than stifled by whatever groups they choose to join, including Mormonism. The hope was that Mormons would be kinder and more accepting of individual differences if many stories about Mormon homelands became publicly available. This was said by narrators who are devout Mormons, and it was said by those who have left the religion or who doubt its value to them as adults. This desire to help others provides one explanation for why so many women applied to do a two-hour interview with a stranger immediately upon hearing about the project. It may also explain why some narrators are traveling to a conference to co-present the research with me. Narrators also seemed to be seeking validation that the control they experienced in Mormon homelands was real, that they had not imagined the ways they were mistreated or remembered their troubles as more impactful than they actually were. Having their lives be the subject of doctoral level research seemed to offer this validation, and hearing that so many other women participated seemed to further legitimize their experiences. I have several projects in mind that would address narrators' desires. I expect to make the audio exhibit that I am pilot testing at the June 2018 Mormon History Association meeting into a performance that is offered to the various venues in Mormon homelands and elsewhere that regularly feature public history projects. I expect narrators will continue to join me in presenting their stories, and I may at some point create a 240 nonprofit organization to oversee the public history components of this study. I also hope to publish my findings in two books, one geared for an academic audience summarizing my findings about totalism, organizational communication, and women; and the other geared to a Mormon audience and containing detailed recommendations for how Mormons can address isolation, insularity, and collectivism in Mormon congregations. I may also create a password-protected online community where all narrators who choose to can access and comment on each other's stories and meet each other. It would be the virtual equivalent of the "potluck" that was suggested by one of the narrators. This study is part of a larger research trajectory that examines the communication strategies used when personal identity conflicts with social expectations in membership groups such as congregations, work teams, and classrooms. People in contemporary society seem to be abandoning familiar organizational frameworks, perhaps due to an unwillingness to accept the static definitions of self that group membership often requires. The fastest growing religious category in America is unaffiliated. 487 Workers change companies every five years. 488 Half of college students drop out. 489 My research considers the role discourse plays in a world that values relationships but increasingly rejects formal organizational membership as a necessary condition of those relationships. This research does not offer certainties. Even though I followed a coherent "America's Changing Religious Landscape," Pew Research Center. Anya Kamanetz, "The Four-Year Career," Fast Company, January 12, 2012, https://www.fastcompany.com/1802731/four-year-career. 489 "Table 326.10: Digest of Education Statistics," National Center for Education Statistics, accessed October 21, 2016, http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d13/tables/dt13_326.10.asp; Doug Shapiro, Afet Dundar, Phoebe Khasiala Wakhungu, Xin Yuan, and Autumn T. Harrell, Completing College: A State-Level View of Student Attainment Rates Signature Report No. 8a (Herndon, VA: National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, February 2015). 487 488 241 research design and reflexive practices, there will always be another person to interview, another story to threaten whatever understanding I thought I had. My hope, however, is that the knowledge this study presents will be the "dangerous" kind, frightening and exciting because it insists we "reassess [our] outlook, character, or assumptions about life in order to . . . possess it." 490 Bernard Harrison claims we can only perceive the limits of our own vision when we are courageous enough to cross those limits, and I suggest it is the stories of others that bump us up against those boundaries. If I have collected life experiences of Mormon women in a trustworthy way, perhaps narrators, readers, and myself as researcher will be able to reorder our views in order to accommodate that new information. Instead of using knowledge to master our current worlds, we will use knowledge to transcend them. 490 Bernard Harrison, Inconvenient Fictions: Literature and the Limits of Theory (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1991), 3. APPENDIX A LIST OF NARRATORS 243 Interview Date 6/30/2017 7/3/2014 7/8/2014 8/8/2017 6/6/2017 3/9/2017 6/8/2017 6/22/2017 8/22/2017 7/10/2014 8/25/2017 6/17/2017 6/28/2017 9/1/2017 6/15/2017 6/20/2017 7/3/2017 7/2/2014 LDS Now? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes Move FROM State Washington Maryland Utah Pirkanmaa Missouri South Dakota Oklahoma Washington Virginia Idaho Japan North Carolina California Alberta Washington Louisiana Utah Colorado 8/4/2017 Jeanine Massachusetts Stockton California 17 1977 Yes 7/3/2014 Jennifer California Provo Utah 16 1980s Yes Texas Orem Utah 16 1996 No Jordyn Alaska Boise Idaho 17 1995 Yes 8/1/2017 Julia Louisiana Laie Hawaii 15 1989 Yes 7/3/2014 Karen Idaho Provo Utah 18 1984 Yes 6/26/2017 Kendra California Provo Utah 17 1993 No 6/24/2017 Kimberly Montana Rexburg Idaho 13 1980 Yes 6/21/2017 Joanna 6/7/2017 Move TO City Tooele Provo Salt Lake City Fair Oaks Las Vegas Rexburg Orem Orem Lethbridge Springville Orem Grantsville Snowflake Orem Bountiful Nampa Provo Provo Move TO Age at Year of Move Move State Utah 13 1998 Utah 18 1986 Utah N/A 1980s California 16 1994 Nevada 15 1975 Idaho 18 1998 Utah 16 1991 Utah 15 1982 Canada 14 1994 Utah 13 1985 Utah 15 1992 Utah 13 1995 Arizona 15 1991 Utah 15 2000 Utah 16 1993 Idaho 13 2000 Utah 13 1981 Utah 15 1983 Pseudonym Abigail Angela Anne Aurora Beth Brynhilda Camryn Cara Catherine Charlotte Claudia Elizabeth Emily Emma Gwen Hannah Janae Jean 8/1/2017 Korin Ohio Nyssa Oregon 15 1984 Yes 7/7/2014 Kristen Pennslyvania Provo Utah 18 1987 Yes 6/8/2017 Leah Taiwan Salt Lake City Utah 16 1982 Yes 6/23/2017 Lena Virginia Layton Utah 17 1992 Somewhere in between 7/9/2014 Lynne 6/30/2017 Maggie Arizona California Spanish Fork Utah Orem Utah 16 12 1980s 1996 Yes Yes 8/26/2017 8/1/2017 8/17/2017 6/21/2017 7/31/2017 8/10/2017 8/11/2017 Marie Mary Mary Ann Megan Melissa Mira Natalie Taiwan South Dakota California Florida New Mexico West Germany Nicaragua Orem Various Salt Lake City St George Ammon Elko Fairfax Utah Idaho Utah Utah Idaho Nevada Virginia 13 12 12 15 13 12 12 1999 1975 1986 1996 1998 1985 1993 6/17/2017 5/31/2017 6/12/2017 6/14/2017 8/24/2017 Olivia Paula Rita Roselyn Rosemary Washington Virginia Illinois Virginia Illinois Rexburg Orem Cedar City Layton Mesa Idaho Utah Utah Utah Arizona 18 16 17 16 14 1976 1992 1990 1979 1997 8/3/2017 6/22/2017 8/4/2017 8/12/2017 7/8/2014 6/22/2017 8/8/2017 6/7/2017 6/13/2017 7/31/2017 6/14/2017 Ruth Sarah Sophia Stacey Stella Tamara Teresa Tori Ursula Veronica Violet New York Maryland Washington Oregon California Massachusetts Texas Colorado Texas California England Orem Orem Sunset Bountiful Bountiful Kearns Orem Clearfield Provo Orem Bountiful Utah Utah Utah Utah Utah Utah Utah Utah Utah Utah Utah 15 15 13 12 13 16 14 13 16 15 13 1990 1996 1996 1995 1981 1994 1998 1993 1999 1992 1988 Somewhere in between Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes Somewhere in between Yes Yes Yes Yes Somewhere in between No Yes Yes No Yes Yes No No Yes Yes APPENDIX B SUPPORTING DOCUMENTS FOR METHODOLOGY 245 Call for Research Participants Women Needed to Tell Their Stories of Being an LDS Teenager For my dissertation, I am looking for women who were LDS teenagers from 1975-2000 and who would be willing to share their remembrances. I want to talk to women who relocated as teenagers from a place where there were few Mormons to a place where Mormons were a majority, perhaps with their families or to attend college at Ricks or BYU. You don't need to be associated with the LDS Church as an adult in order to participate. Interviews can be scheduled by phone or in person at your convenience, and you get a transcript and recording for your personal history. If interested in participating, please fill out this quick survey: <link to Google doc application>. Feel free to share this link with anyone who might be interested. If questions, please email me at <researcher email> or message me. I look forward to talking with you! Heather Stone Department of Communication University of Utah <researcher phone> <researcher email> 246 Application for Participation This thirteen-question survey was created in Google Forms and distributed via a shareable link. Responses were automatically delivered in a Google Sheets spreadsheet, which I then converted to MS Excel for analysis. Share Your Stories about Moving to a Mormon Community as a Young Woman LDS Young Women Oral History Project Thanks for your interest. For my dissertation, I am interviewing women who were LDS (Mormon) teenagers from 1975-2000, and who moved from Mormon-minority to Mormon-majority communities when they were 12-19 years old. Please answer these few questions to see if your experiences match the parameters for this phase of research. Feel free to pass this survey link or my contact information to anyone else who might be interested. I look forward to hearing about your experiences. Please call, text, or email if you have any questions. Heather Stone Department of Communication Department of Writing/Rhetoric University of Utah <researcher phone> <researcher email> *=Required First & Last Name* Email* Phone number City, state, and country where you live now.* NOTE: If your country is not divided into states, please provide whatever regional unit you use. Did you move from a Mormon-minority community to a Mormon-majority community while you were a teenager (ages 12-19)?* (Yes/No) 247 Where did you move FROM? (city, state, country or regional equivalent)* Where did you move TO? (city, state, country)* How old were you when you moved?* Approximately what year did you move?* Are you LDS now? Note: You do not need to be LDS or active in the LDS Church as an adult in order to participate.* (Yes/No/Somewhere in between) Why did you move?* (Parents or family moved and brought me along/I came to attend college or university/Other) How did you hear about this study?* (Facebook post/LinkedIn post/Other Internet Post (not Facebook or LinkedIn)/From Heather Stone/From a friend or family member/Other) Anything else you would like to say? 248 Interview Data Sheet 249 Oral History Consent Form 250 08-25-17 Field Note [00:00:02] Field notes for today 8/25/2017. I just finished interviewing <name redacted>, my second to last interview so far in the project. [00:00:17] A couple of thoughts continuing on some themes. Something that kind of emerged here is the idea that that the generation I'm talking to as kids, they were protected by isolation and shelter. So their parents in many cases were trying to protect them by sheltering them, isolating them, dividing them from the world, separating them from the world. [00:00:45] And that permeated Utah culture as a "Utah separated from the world is a safe haven" kind of mindset. But many of the women I've talked to now protect their children by embedding them in the world, by connecting them to the world. [00:01:00] It's almost like the immunology theory of the practice of exposing your immune system to a lot of things so that when the real serious disease hits the immune system is well developed. A lot of people are taking that approach with their children. They're not . . . as one woman just said she's not handing her children marijuana but she is exposing them to a lot of ideas and having a lot of conversation with them about philosophy and practice and church history and policies and doctrine and kind of not trying to shelter her children from the diversity of the world. But rather help her children be in the diversity of the world and maybe be more connected to it as-she didn't use the word inoculation-but as a, as a way to protect them when they're out on their own. [00:01:52] So that feels like an interesting shift from that era to this one. And I wonder if that's one of the things that could emerge from this project is the fear-based isolationist mentality so common in that era versus the BE IN THE WORLD mindset that I'm seeing from my participants. I don't think I can say that I'm seeing it church-wide or that there's any kind of global trend. But that many of the women who experienced shelter by isolation found that actually to be judgmental, found it to be not Christ-like, found it to be not helpful in testimony development. And they are with their own children taking an approach that is different where they are embedding them in the world versus isolating them from the world. [00:02:53] Anyway, not exactly sure where I'm going with that. 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