Mormon Social Science Association

Armand Mauss, a long time MSSA member, is in the news again as a recent article of his is provoking discussion about the future of Mormonism in Europe.  Another long time member of the MSSA, Grant Underwood, is also mentioned in the story.

Armand Mauss is featured in an LATimes article on Mormons and Muslims.

After a lengthy and thorough search, Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, has a new editor.  Peggy Fletcher Stack has a good write up about it here.  You can also see the announcement on Dialogue’s website.

Marcus Martins, a member of the MSSA, recently delivered a retrospective speech looking at how the 1978 Revelation on the Priesthood brought changes in Mormonism. The speech is available on Dr. Martins’s website here.

Richard Bushman, a friend of the MSSA, recently participated in a lengthy panel discussion on Mormonism and politics. The transcript of the session is well worth the read and is available free of charge here.

MSSA member Henri Gooren, who will soon be joining the faculty at Oakland University, recently addressed faculty and students in the Clark Building on the campus of BYU. Professor Gooren spoke at length about Mormons and Mormonism in Nicaragua, where he has done extensive fieldwork. You can read BYU NewsNet’s coverage of the talk here.

Scholars interested in the social science of Mormonism would do well to begin their research on the topic by reading the following books:

• Altman, Irwin and Joseph Ginat. 1996. Polygamous Families in Contemporary Society. Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press.
• Cornwall, Marie, Tim B. Heaton, and Lawrence A. Young, Editors. 2001. Contemporary Mormonism: Social Science Perspectives. 2nd ed. Illinois: University of Illinois Press.
• Duke, J.T. 1998. Latter-Day Saint Social Life: Social Research on the LDS Church and Its Members. Bookcraft Pubs.
• Heaton, Tim B., Stephen J. Bahr, and Cardell K. Jacobson. 2005. A Statistical Profile of Mormons: Health, Wealth, and Social Life. New York: Edwin Mellen Press.
• Jacobson, Cardell K., Editor. 2004. All God’s Children: Racial and Ethnic Voices in the LDS Church. Springville, UT: Bonneville Books.
• Mauss, Armand. 2003. All Abraham’s Children: Changing Mormon Conceptions of Race and Lineage. Illinois: University of Illinois Press.
• Mauss, Armand L. 1994. The Angel and the Beehive: The Mormon Struggle With Assimilation. Illinois: University of Illinois Press.
• O’Dea, Thomas F. 1957. The Mormons. University of Chicago Press.
• Phillips, Rick. 2004. Conservative Christian Identity and Same-Sex Orientation: The Case of Gay Mormons. New York: Peter Lang Publishing.
• Shepherd, Gary and Gordon Shepherd. 1984. A Kingdom Transformed. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press.
• Shepherd, Gary and Gordon Shepherd. 1998. Mormon Passage. Illinois: University of Illinois Press.
• Stark, R., & Neilson, R.L. 2005. The Rise of Mormonism. Columbia University Press.