Terryl Givens Explained

Terryl Lynn Givens is a senior research fellow at the Neal A. Maxwell Institute of Religious Scholarship at Brigham Young University (BYU).^[2] Until 2019, he was a professor of literature and religion at the University of Richmond, where he held the James A. Bostwick Chair in English.

Givens is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). As a young man, he served a mission in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and later graduated from BYU with a degree in comparative literature. He did graduate work in intellectual history at Cornell and earned a PhD in comparative literature from the University of North Carolina, working with Greek, German, Spanish, Portuguese and English languages and literature.^[3] A longtime collaborator with his wife, Fiona Givens, he is the co-author of The God Who Weeps: How Mormonism Makes Sense of Life and Crucible of Doubt: Reflections on the Quest for Faith.^[4]

The New York Times referred to his work as "polemical" and "provocative"^[5] while Harper's praised him for being "fair-minded and unbiased."^[6]

Personal life

Givens has served in the LDS Church as a bishop in a local congregation.^[7]

Publications

Books

• Dragon Scales and Willow Leaves. Putnam Juvenile, 1997.
• The Viper on the Hearth: Mormons, Myths, and the Construction of Heresy. Oxford University Press, 1997.
• By the Hand of Mormon: The American Scripture that Launched a New World Religion. Oxford University Press, 2002.
• The Latter-day Saint Experience in America. Greenwood Press, 2004.
• People of Paradox: A History of Mormon Culture. Oxford University Press, 2007.
• The Book of Mormon: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press, 2009.
• When Souls Had Wings: Pre-Mortal Existence in Western Thought. Oxford University Press, 2010.
• Parley P. Pratt: The Apostle Paul of Mormonism (with Matthew J. Grow). Oxford University Press, 2011.
• The God Who Weeps: How Mormonism Makes Sense of Life (with Fiona Givens). Ensign Peak, 2012.
• The Crucible of Doubt: Reflections On the Quest for Faith (with Fiona Givens). Deseret Book, 2014.
• Wrestling the Angel: The Foundations of Mormon Thought: Cosmos, God, Humanity. Oxford University Press, 2014.
• The Christ Who Heals: How God Restored the Truth that Saves Us (with Fiona Givens). Deseret Book, 2017.
• The Pearl of Greatest Price (with Brian M. Hauglid). Oxford University Press, 2019.
• All Things New: Rethinking Sin, Salvation, and Everything in Between (with Fiona Givens). Faith Matters Publishing, 2020.
• Mormonism: What Everyone Needs to Know®. Oxford University Press, 2020.

Edited volumes

• Joseph Smith, Jr.: Reappraisals After Two Centuries (with Reid L. Neilson) Oxford University Press, 2008.
• The Columbia Sourcebook of Mormons in the United States (with Reid L. Neilson) Columbia University Press, 2014.
• The Oxford Handbook of Mormonism (with Philip L. Barlow) Oxford University Press, 2015.

Articles and papers

• Mimesis and the Limits of Semblance. Ph.D. Diss. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1988
• "Blind Men and Hieroglyphs: The Collapse of Mimesis." European Romantic Review 2.1 (1991): 61–80.
• "Aristotle's Critique of Mimesis: The Romantic Prelude." Comparative Literature Studies 28.2 (1991): 121–136.
• "Romantic Agonies: Human Suffering and the Ethical Sublime." Romanticism Across the Disciplines (1998): 231–53.
• "'This Great Modern Abomination': Orthodoxy and Heresy in American Religion." Mormons and Mormonism: An Introduction to an American World Religion (2001).
• "Joseph Smith: Prophecy, Process, and Plenitude." in BYU Studies 44.4 (2005): 55–68.
• "'Lightning Out of Heaven': Joseph Smith and the Forging of Community." BYU Speeches 24 (2005).
• "New Religious Movements and the Orthodoxy: The Challenge to the Religious Mainstream." FARMS Review of Books 19.1 (2007): 201–221.
• "'There Is Room for Both': Mormon Cinema and the Paradoxes of Mormon Culture." BYU Studies 46.2 (2007): 188–208.
• "'Common Sense' Meets the Book of Mormon: Source, Substance and Prophetic Disruption." Revisiting Thomas F. O'Dea's The Mormons: Contemporary Perspectives (2008): 79–98.
• "Joseph Smith's American Bible: Radicalizing the Familiar." Journal of the Book of Mormon and Other Restoration Scripture 18.2 (2009): 4–17.
• "Paradox and Discipleship." Religious Educator 11.1 (2010): 142–155.
• "Fraud, Philandery, and Football: Negotiating the Mormon Image." International Journal of Mormon Studies 4 (2011): 1–13.
• "The Prophecy of Enoch as Restoration Blueprint" Leonard J. Arrington Mormon History Lecture Series, No. 18 : Utah State University Press, 2013.

External links

• Terryl Givens Official Website
• The Mormons PBS Frontline Documentary

Notes and References

1. Web site: Prominent Author Fiona Givens To Be Keynote Speaker At The Sunstone Education Foundation's Christ Conference December 29, 2012 . https://web.archive.org/web/20131012140152/http://www.prweb.com/releases/2012/12/prweb10276844.htm . dead . October 12, 2013 . Prweb.com . 2013-10-03.
2. Web site: Terryl Givens. Neal A. Maxwell Institute BYU. en-US. 2019-11-18.
3. Web site: 2019-07-31 . Scholars Terryl and Fiona Givens discuss life, love and their new book . https://web.archive.org/web/20121117235650/http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865566746/Scholars-Terryl-and-Fiona-Givens-discuss-life-love-and-their-new-book-The-God-Who-Weeps.html . dead . November 17, 2012 . Deseret News . Toone, Trent . 2012-11-15.
4. Web site: 2019-07-31 . Some Mormons Search the Web and Find Doubt. The New York Times . Goodstein, Laurie . 2013-07-20.
5. Bobrick, Benson: The Gospel According to Joseph Smith, page 2. The New York Times, August 18, 2002. https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9503E0D8163AF93BA2575BC0A9649C8B63
6. Davenport, Guy: By the Hand of Mormon: The American Scripture that Launched a New World Religion (Subject of Review). Harpers, July 2002. http://www.harpers.org/subjects/ByTheHandOfMormonTheAmericanScriptureThatLaunchedANewWorldReligionBook/SubjectOf/Review
7. News: Daniel Peterson: Terryl Givens making his mark in Mormon writing. https://web.archive.org/web/20110827023337/http://www.deseretnews.com/article/705385222/Daniel-Peterson-Terryl-Givens-making-his-mark-in-Mormon-writing.html. dead. August 27, 2011. Daniel Peterson. 2018-01-30. 22 July 2010. Deseret News.