A peculiar people
Subtitle: anti-Mormonism and the making of religion in nineteenth-century America
By: J. Spencer Fluhman
Publisher: University of North Carolina Press
Published: 2012
Place of publication: Chapel Hill
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 229
ISBN-13: 9780807835715
Subjects: Controversial literature; Mormon Church; Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints; Church history; Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints; History
Description: Though the U.S. Constitution guarantees the free exercise of religion, it does not specify what counts as a religion. From its founding in the 1830s, Mormonism, a homegrown American faith, drew thousands of converts but far more critics. In A Peculiar People, J. Spencer Fluhman offers a comprehensive history of anti-Mormon thought and the associated passionate debates about religious authenticity in nineteenth-century America. He argues that understanding anti-Mormonism provides critical insight into the American psyche because Mormonism became a potent symbol around which ideas about religion and the state took shape. - Jacket flap.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p.         ) and index.
Table of contents: title: Prologue : On familiarity and contempt; title: Introduction : Religious liberty as an American problem; title: "Imposter" : the Mormon prophet; title: "Delusion" : early Mormon religiosity; title: "Fanaticism" : the church as (un)holy city; title: "Barbarism" : rhetorics of alienation; title: "Heresy" : Americanizing the American religion