By Danielle Stockton
About the author:
Danielle Stockton is a recent graduate of the Madeira School, where she was the co-editor-in-chief of both the school newspaper and the literary and arts magazine. She will be a freshman at Brigham Young University intending to double major in Political Science and English.
All too often, Mormon women are viewed as being housewives, their domain centered on raising children. Moreover, this perspective is reinforced by the fact that most Mormon men are strongly encouraged to go on missions to spread the Gospel, giving them a unique opportunity to both broaden their spiritual horizons and to discover a different part of the world. In actuality, with even a cursory glance at Mormon women’s lives, it is apparent that Mormon women are far from restricted in terms of their lifestyle. Reading about numerous Mormon women in Mormon Women: Portraits and Conversations and other separate publications emphasized my view that Mormon women are able to have a wide variety of different careers. Whether she is a poet, author, doctor, Utah Supreme Court chief justice, humanitarian, or historian, a Mormon woman can enjoy diverse professions in which she can spread Gospel principles in a wide variety of ways. However, these capable women do not neglect their familial responsibilities. Instead, they choose a healthy balance between their home and work obligations and use the Holy Ghost to guide them in the right direction. Although they have different interests, personalities, and nationalities, as Governor Olene Walker pointed out in Mormon Women: Portraits and Conversations, these women share “a common thread of service and faith” (xiii). More importantly, Mormon women use this faith as a foundation for their own lives and as a way to enrich the lives of their children as well as touch the lives of others.
To find out more about how Jim Kimball and Kent Miles capture some of the lives of Mormon women, please read their collection: Kimball, James N., and Kent Miles. Mormon Women: Portraits & Conversations. Salt Lake City: Handcart Books, 2009.
Also, please visit the following websites related to this book:
http://www.kentmiles.com
http://www.handcartbooks.com/
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=101103385311&ref=mf
http://twitter.com/MormonWomenBook
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Hi Danielle. I look forward to seeing more portraits of Mormon women, and will refer you to Mormonwoman.org, another site about the diversity and in-the-trenches' lives of great LDS women, contemporary and historic.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad that as Mormon women, some of whom of us are mothers, do not feel restricted but fulfilling the measure of our destiny, in being mothers and working to teach and nurture our children personally where possible, and when not, carefully and prayerfully working out the best situation for the growth of our children. In either case, it doesn't mean the forfeit of talents or continuing education, but the planning of ways and finding opportunities to utilize them in God-directed ways. That said, I'm one who is in the work force (if you can call it that--I love what I do in sharing accurate perceptions of who we are as members of the Church of Jesus Christ online), raising older teens, having been at home while my children were younger. While I have pursued advanced degrees, and am involved politically and ecclesiastically in serving the community, I realize that any work I do outside my home, however valuable, will never be a substitute for what I do within its walls. I look forward to more of your posts and to knowing you!