Casual Friday

Call for applications for those of you research gender in the American West:

The Coalition for Western Women’s History announces the 15th Annual Irene Ledesma Prize, 2013 for Ph.D. graduate student research in western women’s history.

Deadline for submission: May 15, 2013.


The $1,000 prize supports travel to collections or other research expenses related to the histories of women and gender in the American West. Applicants must be enrolled in a Ph.D. program and be members of the Coalition of Western Women’s History (CWWH) at the time of application.  The prize honors the memory of Irene Ledesma, whose contributions to Chicana and working-class history were ended by her untimely death in 1997.

The CWWH will award the prize at the CWWH Breakfast during the 53rd Annual Western History Association conference at Tucson, Arizona,

October 9-12, 2013.

Proposals will be evaluated according to the following criteria:

 - How well the applicant stated her or his research question and the significance of the overall project.
- How well the applicant demonstrated her or his knowledge of the primary source materials related to the proposal.
- How well the applicant framed her or his project in terms of the broader theoretical and historiographic issues significant to the topic.
 - How well the proposal addressed issues of gender and/or women’s history in the U.S. West.
- How well the proposed budget dovetails with the applicant’s stated research agenda.


To apply, submit one copy of each of the following (as a PDF file) to committee chair Cynthia Prescott at <cynthia.culver@gmail.com>:

 - A CV
 - A brief description of the research project and an explanation of how the prize funds would support the research (not exceeding three pages, double spaced, addressing the criteria)
- A line-item budget
- A letter of support from the student's major advisor

Casual Friday

Attention, all graduate students! This looks like a great opportunity.

WESTERN HISTORY DISSERTATION WORKSHOP

The Center for the Southwest at the University of New Mexico, the Institute for the Study of the American West at the Autry National Center,the Huntington-USC Institute on California and the West, the Research Division of The Huntington Library, the Hemispheric Institute of the Americas at the University of California, Davis, the Howard R. Lamar Center for the Study of Frontiers and Borders at Yale University, the Bill Lane Center for the Study of the North American West at Stanford University, the Clements Center for Southwest Studies at Southern Methodist University, and the Center for the Study of the Pacific Northwest at the University of Washington invite applications for the eighth annual "Western History Dissertation Workshop,"which will be held on May 25, 2013 at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque.

We will pay travel expenses for up to five graduate students working on dissertations exploring the history and culture of the American West. Participants will have the opportunity to present a chapter at the workshop and to receive feedback from other participants and from scholars affiliated with the sponsoring institutions.


To apply, please send a cover letter and the abstract of the dissertation to Virginia Scharff atvscharff@unm.edu. Please also arrange for your dissertation adviser to send a letter of recommendation by email to the same address; that letter should describe how much of the thesis has been completed to date.  Applications are to be received by March 22nd; participants will be notified of their selection by April 15.

Casual Friday

“Religion in the Rocky Mountains and Great Plains” Conference

Call for Proposals

The Department of Religious Studies at the University of Denver cordially invites you to submit paper proposals for the one-day “Religion in the Rocky Mountains and Great Plains” conference, to be held Saturday, June 22 at the University of Denver with the support of an AAR Regional Development Grant.

This one-day conference is envisioned to bring together scholars at different career stages to examine religious identity and practice (including secular and spiritual identities and practices) around the region, past and present. It is intended to help highlight and bring greater interest to issues of religious identity and practice in the states of the Rocky Mountains and Great Plains, and to provide an opportunity for faculty, researchers, and graduate students to connect with and learn from colleagues. The conference is envisioned as a catalyst for more sustained efforts at regional community building, including future conferences and workshops.

Conference structure

The conference will consist of four panels of paper presentations, followed by a roundtable session in which panel chairs present the highlights of each panel, reflect on the day’s presentations, and offer suggestions for future research. The conference will conclude with a keynote speech by an eminent regional scholar.

Accepted papers will be organized into panels arranged either denominationally or thematically. Papers should reflect current research. Each panel will feature scholars from around the region and should include at least one graduate student, to support career stage diversity. Panels will take an interdisciplinary approach, with multiple disciplines represented, and will leave ample time for interactive discussions with
audience members.

Proposal requirements

Each paper proposal should include the following:

*Paper title (working titles okay)
*Name and affiliation of the submitter
*Email address and phone number of the submitter
*Abstract of 250-350 words, laying out the subject of the paper, the
sources used, and the argument, as well as the methodological approach and
a sense of the subject’s broader significance to the scholar’s field
*A/V needs (Most DU classrooms have projectors, speakers, and dvd players)
*Interest in being hosted by University of Denver faculty and graduate
students, if needed

Submission Address and Deadline

Please submit your paper proposal to: andrea.stanton@du.eduandrea.stanton@du.edu

>.

Please submit your paper proposal by Friday, March 8. Acceptance notices
will be sent by Friday, April 5.

There is no cost to submit or present a paper, nor to attend the conference. Registration will be free and will open in late April.

Housing and Travel

The AAR Regional Development Grant will generously support lunch and coffee for conference presenters and attendees, but cannot provide travel support. The Department of Religious Studies will connect presenters in need of housing with faculty and graduate students who might host them; please indicate your interest in being hosted on your paper proposal.

Conference Website

For more information about the conference, please visit our website:
www.religionintherockiesconference.wordpress.com<http://www.religionintherockiesconference.wordpress.com> or email
andrea.stanton@du.eduandrea.stanton@du.edu

>.

Casual Friday

For those of you researching Hinduism in the American West, Mike Altman, a PhD candidate at Emory, is looking to propose a panel around this topic for the coming AAR. You may contact him at: mjaltma@emory.edu. 

Casual Friday: Redd Center Grants

For those of you doing field research or archival research on (American) Western topic that requires travel and find yourself in needs of some funds (which means all of us!), the Charles Redd Center for Western Studies, centered at Brigham Young University, offers a number of grants for students, faculty, and independent researchers. Here is a list of the awards they offer. Applications for awards will be available beginning Monday January 14. Here is the link: https://reddcenter.byu.edu/Pages/GrantsAwards.aspx

Casual Friday: Call for Papers

The Pacific Coast Branch of the American Historical Association has a call for papers for their August 8-10, 2013 conference in Denver. They are due January 15.

See this website for more information!

Casual Friday

So, in case you didn't notice, December 21, 2012--apparently the last day on one of the Mayan calendars--has come and gone with no apocalypse. At least, not one that I (or anyone I know of) noticed. The world, it seems, has not yet come to an end. But when it does, I know one place where the people will be well prepared.

I stumbled onto Rockland Ranch several years ago when I was driving around the dirt roads near Canyonlands National Park in southern Utah. The first time I saw it I just snapped a few pictures and wondered what it was all about. The second time, about a year later, I decided to stop. The man who began the project--which has now become a small community--was away at the time, visiting Salt Lake City, but I talked to one of the people who lived there. He described himself as an Independent Mormon Fundamentalist. He had recently left another community was living there with his family.

The community consists of several rooms blasted into the side of this massive sandstone formation. There is an orchard, water tanks, solar paneling, power generators and fuel reserves. Everything you'd need to carry on in the desert for a good long while after civilization collapses when it eventually does, on some future doomsday.

posted by Stan Thayne

Casual Friday

Call for Participants: Seminar on Religion and US Empire (2013-2015)

We invite applications to participate in a three-year series of research seminars on the history of religion and US empire from the formal inception of the US as a nation-state to the present.  The central aim of this project is to establish a major scholarly assessment of the linkage between religion and American empire.  We plan to address the relative inattention of scholars of religion to the powerful impact that the establishment of empire has made on religion in the US.  Conversely, we will emphasize the role of religion in shaping the history of the US as an imperial state, an area of inquiry that demands further attention.  This seminar series will also develop innovative theoretical approaches to interpreting the larger phenomenon of empire by considering the US state as a paradigm for modern empires.

To achieve this, we are organizing a series of meetings over a three-year period by an interdisciplinary team of twelve researchers to analyze historical data about religion and empire; exchange information, insights, and critiques; develop appropriate theoretical models; provide mutual feedback on resulting manuscripts; and contribute to a co-edited volume on religion and US empire.  We believe the seminar and its products will redirect several ongoing scholarly conversations, support teaching on the topic, and inspire further research on this pressing issue.

The first meeting will take place in fall 2013 (probably in October) at Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska, courtesy of a generous grant from Creighton's Kripke Center for the Study of Religion and Society.  We have also secured preliminary funding for the second meeting in fall 2014. We continue to seek funding for two additional meetings in 2015 to complete the series.

Participants will receive food and lodging for three nights and two days and a travel subsidy of up to $400.  In return, each member of the team will agree to participate in all of the meetings, produce an essay for the edited volume, and develop related teaching materials (e.g., a syllabus and bibliography).  We are seeking an interdisciplinary team of participants representing diverse methodological, chronological, and geographical interests related to the problem of religion and empire.  We also hope to identify promising early career scholars as well as established academics.

To apply, please submit the following material in electronic form to Dr. Tracy Leavelle at tracy.leavelle@creighton.edu by 1 February 2013.

* 1-2 page cover letter explaining your interest in the seminar * 1-2 page description of the research and writing you propose to do as part of the seminar * Brief cv of no more than 5 pages * List of three references

We will notify applicants of their status in March 2013.

Casual Friday: New article by Quincy Newell!

Quincy Newell has published a new article in the most recent issue of the online journal Religion Compass, titled: "Religion and the American West." She identifies four areas of interest for scholars of the American West and the challenges that we face. This is an excellent overview of the field and provides a framework for future scholarship. For those of you preparing your PhD comps list, it should be at the top of your list.

On another note, we are sad to announce that Quincy has handed over her co-editor status of the blog. She worked hard throughout the year to bring new contributors on board, to increase our readership, and ensure that we continued to bring you interesting and relevant blog posts. We'll miss her and we wish her the best of luck for her future endeavors! (And hope that she'll continue to write blog posts once in a while!)

Call for Contributors: RAW enters a new phase

by the Editors

Five years ago the Religion in the American West Seminar at the American Academy of Religion was created. Since seminars at the AAR run as five-year non-renewable terms, the RAW Seminar at the AAR came to a close last week with its final meeting occurring at the AAR annual conference in Chicago (for a list of presenters see here). As we noted previously, we have proposed the creation of a Religion in the American West Group, which would allow us to continue meeting for the next five years with the option of renewing (for info on AAR program unit types, click here). We will keep you updated as that effort develops. In the meantime, the blog continues!

In the midst of these changes, the Religion in the American West blog enters a new phase. Thus, it seems appropriate to issue a call for new and continuing contributors. If you have contributed to the blog in the past, please continue to do so! If have not contributed in the past but you do research and writing on religion in the American West (or would like to), please contact us (relamwest@gmail.com)—we welcome your contributions! In particular, we would like to hear from you if you have presented in the past as part of the RAW Seminar at AAR, or if you would like to be a part of the RAW Group in the future. But we welcome anyone who would like to propose a topic and contribute a post. Are you writing on a topic relevant to the American West—thesis, dissertation, article, book project—and want to test out an idea, get some feedback? Try posting it to the blog! Did you come across an interesting primary document during your last trip to the archives and want to share it? Please do. Read a good book recently and want to write a review? The blog's a great place for reviews. Interesting field experiences? Please tell us about it. Saw something while travelling through Nevada, Utah, Idaho, Washington, British Columbia, Alaska, Hawaii, Mexico—even California!, etc.—and snapped a photo? Please send it in for our Casual Friday posts, where you don't have to have a fully developed idea or post to go along with it! We welcome your reflections on any aspect of religion in the American West(s)—and the study thereof!

Got something to contribute? Have a query? Suggestion? Comments? Send them to us at relamwest@gmail.com

or comment below!

We hope to hear from you soon!

Casual Friday

Graduate Student Fellowships at the
Western Historical Quarterly

Applications are now welcome for the
S. George Ellsworth Fellowship

For 2013-2014, a total stipend of $14,000, tuition awards, health insurance, and summer research funds will be awarded.
The Editorial Fellow must enroll in USU's master's program in history. Duties at the Western Historical Quarterly (WHQ) include 20 hours a week, beginning in August, helping to select, prepare, and copy read manuscripts. The fellowship may be retained for a second year, depending upon satisfactory progress toward the master's degree and acceptable completion of editorial assignments. During the summer of 2014, the editorial fellow will work 20 hours a week at the WHQ, with time off for research.
Applicants should send a letter of interest and a writing sample directly to the editor of the WHQ. The full application, including three letters of recommendation to the USU School of Graduate Studies, will suffice to complete the needed materials. All documents should be postmarked no later than 1 February 2013. Applicants will be notified in early April.
NOTE: The S. George Ellsworth Fellowship and the Robert M. Utley Fellowship are awarded in alternating years.
Funding for WHQ fellowships is provided by:

• Western Historical Quarterly
• USU School of Graduate Studies
• USU Department of History
• Robert M. Utley Endowment
• S. George Ellsworth Endowment

Please address correspondence to:
Editor
Western Historical Quarterly
0740 Old Main Hill
Utah State University
Logan, UT 84322-0740
or send email to: whq@usu.edu.
For more information on the WHQ and editorial fellowships please visit our website, http://www.usu.edu/whq/index.htm .

Casual Friday: Left Behind

Spotted outside Green River, Wyoming, in August 2012:

Photo by Quincy D. Newell.  Click image to enlarge.  It's worth it.

One has to wonder: who's paying the billboard company for this? Has anyone else seen these signs since May of last year?

Casual Friday: Our Lady of the Rockies and the Shape of Montana Christian Ecuminism

Earlier this summer, during a cross country road trip we pulled into Butte, Montana. I noticed right away (how could I miss it) a giant statue of what I took to be Jesus, with outstretched arms, overlooking the valley, positioned on the top of a mountain ridge in the eastern side of the valley. It made me think of the Cristo Redentor statue overlooking Rio de Janeiro, though on a slightly smaller scale. A brochure in the hotel lobby, however, explained that the sculpture is not Jesus but is the Virgin Mary, dubbed Our Lady of the Rockies.

I took it to be a sign of the prevalence of Catholicism in Montana, but the pamphlet from our hotel lobby described it as a nondenominational expression of Christian faith. Still, it seems like a rather Catholic expression of nondenominational Christian faith. Anyone more familiar with the religious landscape of Montana who can speak to this?

Casual Friday: Built Miracles

The Loretto Chapel in Santa Fe, New Mexico, is known for its spiral staircase.

Photo by Quincy D. Newell

Specifically, this is a spiral staircase built, apparently, in answer to a prayer by nuns. Built by a mysterious stranger who rode into town, built the staircase, and disappeared. Built in such a way that it still stands, even though the laws of engineering seem to indicate that it should have collapsed long ago.

In the West, it seems the focus is often on the natural landscape and the ways people find the divine in it. But people also see the divine in the built environment (as attested by the number of tourists who visit Loretto Chapel every day)!

Casual Friday: Social Media

We're happy to announce a new Twitter page! You can find us at RelWest. We'll tweet new blog posts when they are posted on Fridays and Mondays.

If Facebook is more your speed, we've been there for a year. You can find us under "Religion in the American West." The Facebook page has been on hiatus, but you will start seeing notifications for new posts there as well.

Update:

The Twitter account has not gone live yet--stayed tuned for further updates!

Casual Friday: Chican@ history

This is exciting news!

The Department of Archives and Special Collections, William H. Hannon Library, Loyola Marymount University, has opened to researchers an extensive collection documenting Mexican immigrant and Mexican-American history in Los Angeles. This is the Venegas Family Papers, which consist of correspondence, photographs, immigration records, Roman Catholic realia and devotional literature, and business records, principally related to Miguel (1897-1994) and Dolores (1900-1991) Venegas. The collection guide is on-line at the Online Archive of California.

Themselves Cristeros, the Venegases came to Los Angeles from the Mexican state of Jalisco in 1927 as refugees from the troubles of the Cristero Rebellion (1926-1929). A remarkable run of correspondence from Miguel and Dolores Venegas to relatives in Jalisco from the first five years of their life in Los Angeles (1927-1932) extensively details the challenges and opportunities of their lives as immigrants. The letters offer valuable insights into their work and economic opportunities, family life, recreation, religious practices, diet, health, continued ties with Mexico, and education. Examples of the kind of detail found in the letters include the effects of the Great Depression on the Mexican-American community in Los Angeles and the United States immigration law of 1929.

A letter from Miguel Venegas to his brother, containing (on p. 2) one of the earliest known uses of the word "chicano." From the William H. Hannon Library tumblr.

Almost all the correspondence is in Spanish, often colloquial, with irregular orthography, which in itself is evidence for Spanish linguistics and levels of literacy in Mexico and Los Angeles in Spanish. Striking in the correspondence is the uses of the word "chicano" by Miguel Venegas to describe his United States-born children (the couple had ten). His uses of the word here may constitute some of the earlier written instances of the word.

The collection also treats the history of Mexico. The Venegases' correspondence with relatives in Jalisco contains extensive information on commerce, agriculture, health and medicine, family life, and religious practices from the 1920s through the 1940s in Jalisco. Comments by relatives in Guadalajara on the political situation in Jalisco, both before and after the Cristero Rebellion, are especially valuable for understanding the course of the Cristero Rebellion and its aftermath. Cristero "corridos" (ballads) provide a valuable source for understanding the culture of the Cristero movement.

Photographs in the collection record the social activities and work of this LA family. Noteworthy are those of Venegas family outings to Lincoln Park and the beach in the late 1920s, which provide photographic documentation of the social life of Mexican immigrants in Los Angeles at that time. In addition, there is a strong run of photographs of Guadalajara and Zapotlanejo, in Jalisco, which document work, family life and religious culture, e.g. vacations, masses, and work on a hacienda.

Casual Friday - Online Resource

Jared Farmer, author of On Zion's Mount: Mormons, Indians,and the American Landscape (Harvard, 2008) has published a free e-book titled Mormons in the Media, 1830-2012. It looks like a great resource for teaching and for research, described as "a free educational e-book archive of nearly 500 images about Mormons and Mormonism in U.S. politics and the public sphere, from Joseph Smith to Mitt Romney."

Mormons in the Media, the e-book's website explains, "considers both outside views of Mormons—including historic anti-Mormon propaganda—and media images promulgated by Latter-day Saints themselves. This topical reference work also features a preface, a fact sheet, a list of suggested readings, and bibliographic citations." The collection comprises a vast range of visual media. 

Here's a link: www.stonybrook.edu/mormons-media

Check it out!

Casual Friday

REMINDER: WHA Proposals Due Tomorrow!

Hi everyone -- your friendly blog editors here, reminding you that proposals for the 2013 Western History Association meeting are due tomorrow.  To see the call and get more details, go to our blog post here, or head over to the WHA website.  Happy Friday!

Casual Friday

This announcement came across our desk recently. You might be interested, or know someone who is.

2013 Webb-Smith Essay Competition

$1000 for the best research essay on: "Contested Empire: Rethinking the Texas Revolution"

The Department of History at the University of Texas at Arlington in collaboration with the Center for Greater Southwestern Studies at the University of Texas at Arlington announces the 2013 Webb-Smith Essay Competition as part of the Walter Prescott Webb Memorial Lectures on March 7, 2013. The topic is “Contested Empire: Rethinking the Texas Revolution.” We are looking for students and scholars to submit original, unpublished article-length essays (maximum 10,000 words plus endnotes) that explore Texas during the Mexican period, and which examine the origins and long term ramifications of the events that gave birth to the Texas Republic and its subsequent incorporation by the United States. Preference will be given to papers that attempt to integrate the early nineteenth century Texas borderlands into a broad, geopolitical or multicultural interpretive framework, or which seek in other ways to connect the region and its peoples to a wider world.

The winning essay will be published in a forthcoming volume of the Walter Prescott Webb Memorial Lecture Series, published by Texas A&M Press, along with essays by the lecturers, Amy S. Greenberg, Will Fowler, Eric Schlereth, Miguel Enrique Soto Estrada, and Sam W. Haynes.

Deadline for submissions: January 28, 2013

Send submissions either electronically or by mail to:

Jennifer Lawrence
Chair, Webb Lectures Committee
Department of History
UT Arlington, Box 19529
Arlington, TX 76019-0529

For more information about previously published volumes or the upcoming lectures, please write to Walter Prescott Webb Memorial Lectures Committee (see mailing address above) or by email.

Got a photo, link, or other item that you think would be great for Casual Friday? Send it to us!

Casual Friday

We thought this potential session looked pretty interesting when it came across our desk. Remember the deadline for proposals to the WHA is coming soon!

Hunter Hampton, a Ph.D. student at the University of Missouri, writes: I am interested in forming a panel on religion and the West for the 2013 WHA conference. The paper I would present examines the relationship between Protestant clergy and baseball in western towns. It focuses on ministers and missionaries employment of baseball and muscular Christianity to interact with the lower rungs of western society. Please contact me if you are interested. Submissions are due to the WHA by 1 September.

Got a photo, link, or other item that you think would be great for Casual Friday? Send it to us!