New dissertation treats Book of Mormon as "oral performance"

[_Maksutov]

An interesting perspective.

https://www.academia.edu/37886712/Perfo ... qJOz-El840

Excerpt:

The factors surrounding Smith’s performance of the work are further accentuated when the text “appears to be a carefully crafted, integrated work, with multiple narrative levels, an intricate organization, and extensive intratextual phrasal allusions and borrowings.”21

Thus, comprehending Smith’s production of the text requires an analysis of performance that reaches beyond the artificial boundaries of “performance as product,” an arbitrary confinement to dictation sessions, to include the framework of “performance as sequence.” This focus, in turn, opens the analysis to the preparatory elements leading up to the dictation.

Once the performance analysis widens to include the cultural context, relevant questions then naturally arise: can the experiences of a man who grew to adulthood in poverty in rural New England and rural New York in the early nineteenth century account for the creation of such a work? If so, what are the specific factors in Smith’s life and cultural context that would have contributed to the process of creating such a complex and extended oral composition? These questions are essentially dramaturgical in nature.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Can someone translate that into regular English?

- Doc

[_Maksutov]

Can someone translate that into regular English?

- Doc

The author is approaching the Book of Mormon as a work of oral performance and draws parallels to other examples in American history that are comparable. Once again we see that a naturalistic explanation is possible.

[_Symmachus]

Thanks for finding this, Mak. I have been hinting for a few years now at the oral mode underlying the Book of Mormon and planned to write something up at some point. So many of the stylistic features of the Book of Mormon jump out anyone who has spent a lot of time with Homer or other kinds of oral poetry (for example, the chiasmus that apologists love so much: it's not that it's a feature of ancient literature but a feature of oral literature—it's basically a mnemonic device to help an oral performer keep track of their own narrative structure). I am glad to see I'm not alone in seeing that this idea can generate some fruitful possibilities, so I will give this a good read when I have the time.

[_Maksutov]

Thanks for finding this, Mak. I have been hinting for a few years now at the oral mode underlying the Book of Mormon and planned to write something up at some point. So many of the stylistic features of the Book of Mormon jump out anyone who has spent a lot of time with Homer or other kinds of oral poetry (for example, the chiasmus that apologists love so much: it's not that it's a feature of ancient literature but a feature of oral literature—it's basically a mnemonic device to help an oral performer keep track of their own narrative structure). I am glad to see I'm not alone in seeing that this idea can generate some fruitful possibilities, so I will give this a good read when I have the time.

Recently I've been studying the history of American revivalism and its context for the Mormon example. From the Cane Ridge revival onwards there were phenomena that would be familiar to early Mormons.

[_Kishkumen]

This is both welcome and long overdue. I recall discussing this idea at length with Don Bradley years ago, but I never had time to develop any serious work on it. I see Symmachus, too, had intended to write something on the topic. Classicists readily see the possibility. I look forward to reading this.

[_Kishkumen]

Looks like John Hamer talked about this some years ago too:

http://www.mormondiscussions.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?p=657756#p657756

[_Kishkumen]

Some guy with the moniker “Trevor” mentioned oral composition of the Book of Mormon in 2008.

http://www.mormondiscussions.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?p=138807#p138807

[_consiglieri]

There are several places in the Book of Mormon where it appears the author is orally correcting something he just misspoke.

One example among many:

1 Nephi 19:7 For the things which some men esteem to be of great worth, both to the body and soul, others set at naught and trample under their feet. Yea, even the very God of Israel do men trample under their feet; I say, trample under their feet but I would speak in other words—they set him at naught, and hearken not to the voice of his counsels.

I have to admit, though, that if the Book of Mormon was dictated in its entirety, even leaving out the obvious "borrowings," or what is now being referred to among LDS scholars as "intertextuality," it nevertheless manages to do a pretty streamlined job of it without too many missteps.

[_Simon Southerton]

An interesting perspective.

https://www.academia.edu/37886712/Perfo ... qJOz-El840

Excerpt:

The factors surrounding Smith’s performance of the work are further accentuated when the text “appears to be a carefully crafted, integrated work, with multiple narrative levels, an intricate organization, and extensive intratextual phrasal allusions and borrowings.”21

What a fascinating find Maksutov. I took the trouble of looking at the CV of William Davis, the author of the thesis, and discovered another gem. Back in 2012 Davis wrote a short but fascinating essay entitled "Hiding in Plain Sight: The Origins of the Book of Mormon". Here's a link to the essay.

https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/hid ... f-mormon/#!

Davis is extremely familiar with John Bunyan's work and he is completely convinced Joseph Smith borrowed very heavily from his work. I have never heard of this before. I feel like I have been hiding under a rock.