DiaBLOGue

The Postum Table

March 14, 2018

The family had been in the dream house about three months. It was October, and they were gathered for Family Night. A box of See’s chocolates, wrapped in glossy white paper, sat like the fruit…

A company man on his day off

March 14, 2018

thinks of:

blue sky
not the oppressive space of huge warehouses
chopped by endless categories of air

Archaic Pronouns and Verbs in the Book of Mormon: What Inconsistent Usage Tells Us about Translation Theories

March 14, 2018

Dialogue 44.3 (Fall 2014):53–101
Initially, I intended only one article on the usage of archaic pronouns
and the implications of certain irregularities. But as I delved deeper
into the implications, particularly what the erratic usage suggests
about the translation of the Book of Mormon, it became obvious
that this particular detour needed to stand alone as a companion
piece to the main article

Crossing the Planes: Gathering, Grafting, and Second Sight in the Hong Kong China International District

March 14, 2018

Hong Kong, Dan Rather declared as he began his television coverage of the 1997 “handover” from British to Chinese sovereignty, “is Asia for beginners.” That is what it was for me, although it has been my home now for more than twenty years. In all of that time and in all of my work on American culture in transnational contexts, considering how people are changed by their cross-cultural encounters, I have never written about Mormonism and its various crossings in Asia. Although I have no doubt that my beliefs infuse my professional work, as I thought about Asia in my Mormonism, trying to parse influences and see where the academic training and the Mormon upbringing inform one another became impossible.

Charity on the Rocks

March 14, 2018

My husband grew up backpacking, and it was one of the conditions of our marriage that I would learn to backpack too. I do it now, and occasionally even enjoy it, but it’s definitely a stretch to say that I’m good at it or love it as wholeheartedly as Mike does; backpacking is perpetually a challenge for me, and my favorite part is the end of the day when I collapse in our tent with my Kindle. I say this by way of prefacing a personal story so that you understand the context as I start telling you about a time when nature nearly got the best of me. 

Negotiating the Paradoxes: Neylan McBaine’s Women at Church | Neylan McBaine, Women at Church: Magnifying LDS Women’s Local Impact

March 14, 2018

Neylan McBaine’s book Women at Church includes the following interview excerpt: 

On one Sunday in my ward, the final assigned speaker was a woman. She seemed flustered to be in the last slot, was apologetic to the audience and lamented that we weren’t going to get the final word in the meeting from a priesthood holder. And then she gave her talk.

The stake president happened to be visiting, and after she finished he stood to make a few comments. He thanked her for the talk, and acknowledged she was just being self-deprecating. But he said it was his responsibility as presiding officer in the stake to correct misinformation. He then affirmed that there is nothing wrong with scheduling a sister to speak in the last slot in sacrament meeting, that that is perfectly appropriate. When we don’t do that, it is just a tradition.