"Restore Farms" Support Organization

[Bryce Haymond]

Those of you who support the original mission and vision of FARMS as a scholarly apologetic institution, and want to see it live on in some form, I've helped organize an organization for supporters to join. You can find out more about it at the links below:

RestoreFARMS.com

Facebook.com/RestoreFARMS

TempleStudy.com

Bryce

[Wiki Wonka]

Those of you who support the original mission and vision of FARMS as a scholarly apologetic institution, and want to see it live on in some form, I've helped organize an organization for supporters to join. You can find out more about it at the links below:

RestoreFARMS.com

Facebook.com/RestoreFARMS

TempleStudy.com

Bryce

FYI, you might want to correct a typo on the web page: "Their firing were handled extremely poorly."

WW

[Bryce Haymond]

FYI, you might want to correct a typo on the web page: "Their firing were handled extremely poorly."

WW

Yes, thank you. We've fixed it.

[Calm]

Five more typos, two "it’s restoration" and one "it's creation", one "it's content" and "it's former status" I think your automatic spellchecker went wild.

Will be very interested to see what happens.

Edited July 1, 2012 by calmoriah

[CV75]

Five more typos, two "it’s restoration" and one "it's creation", one "it's content" and "it's former status" I think your automatic spellchecker went wild.

Will be very interested to see what happens.

Maybe we need to restore the "Three Rs"!

[cursor]

The graph showing the history of publications is especially interesting.

[Bryce Haymond]

Thanks, fixed em. For the record, I didn't write the first draft.

[robuchan]

Question on this:

The chart shows decreasing trend since 2000. You say

I want to be very clear that this decline is not, at all, the fault of Daniel Peterson. He has wanted to publish more for many years (as has been the desire of many other scholars!), but was systematically stopped short at the behest of the administrator(s), who thought they knew better the direction to take the Institute.

And you reference Hamblin saying

Throughout the past two years Bradford has censored several articles that Dan planned to publish, thereby delaying publication of the Review.

That explains just the last two years. But even the last two years only partially. Several articles over a two year time period wouldn't come close to explaining the variance from the peak of 2000, which is a shortfall of over 150 per year.

Also, what are the "several articles". So far, I've only heard reference of the suppression of Shyver's analysis of the Book of Breathing scroll and the Dehlin piece. Both would be considered the non-academic/hobbyist style articles, right?

[Bryce Haymond]

I suspect the decrease since 2000 is a combination of administrative red tape that came from the merge with BYU, as well as the new "direction" that gradually took hold (censoring apologetics and apologetic scholars from publishing their work). These scholars left and found other publishers.

You'll have to ask Bill what the several articles are.

[robuchan]

I suspect the decrease since 2000 is a combination of administrative red tape that came from the merge with BYU, as well as the new "direction" that gradually took hold (censoring apologetics and apologetic scholars from publishing their work). These scholars left and found other publishers.

You'll have to ask Bill what the several articles are.

It would make your case stronger to flesh out some detail on this. The chart suggests Peterson might have been fired for lack of production.

[Bryce Haymond]

Any help fleshing it out would be appreciated. I'm short on details. I'll see what I can do.

[Bryce Haymond]

I've updated the paragraph on TempleStudy.com with a fuller perspective of my thoughts on Peterson's role in "The Decline":

I want to be very clear that this decline is

not

, even moderately, the fault of Daniel Peterson. He has wanted to

publish more

for many years (as has been the desire of

many other scholars!

), but was systematically stopped short at the behest of the Institute's administrator(s), who thought they knew better the direction to take it than its original creators, former contributors, and current editors. The decline was so gradual and subtle, over such an extended period of time, that many people probably didn't recognize it was even occurring, or only had a faint feeling that something was amiss. Hindsight is 20/20. After the firings, Dr. Peterson implied that

now

he recognizes that all of this was likely a work in progress for quite some time, a sloppy plan of sorts, the wool being pulled white-knuckled over his eyes the whole time. This was, perhaps, his only shortcoming in this whole ordeal, not seeing the freight train approaching from a distance, while looking through a glass, darkly (1 Cor. 13:12, which incidentally has apologetic

reference to the Urim & Thummim

, I come to now realize,

a sublime irony!

). I suspect a large part of the decrease in publications since 2000 is a combination of administrative red tape that came from the merge with BYU, as well as this new "direction" that's gradually taken hold over so many years, which censored apologetic works written by a number of scholars. These scholars consequently picked up their bags and left to find other publishing houses with vacancy signs that were fully lit (e.g.

Kofford Books

,

Salt Press

,

Oxford University Press

). Some might point fingers and say that they were improving the

quality

, at the expense of

quantity

. But I think most scholars would agree that the FARMS scholarship before the union with BYU, and shortly thereafter, was in many cases better than in recent times. (

"Well, yea, that's because of Nibley!"

Ok, then, where are the Nibleys of today? Again, I note, you could count the Nibley articles, chapters, updates, etc. included in my graphic representation on one hand). FARMS scholars had more freedom at that early time, to do the passionate work that they wanted to do without bureaucracy standing solidly in front of the printing press.

Thank you Dan

, for your years of selfless service and resolute testimony in the face of untold harassment from the Church's detractors. I have personally learned abundantly from your hand, and have been able to share that with many others. You've been a tremendous influence for good, and we mourn what this has done.

[robuchan]

I suspect a large part of the decrease in publications since 2000 is a combination of administrative red tape that came from the merge with BYU, as well as this new "direction" that's gradually taken hold over so many years, which censored apologetic works written by a number of scholars.

I'm satisfied with your explanation, but I'm going to give you my best FARMS-style response, just to keep you on your toes, complete with an appropriately masculine tone.

Do you have any actual evidence to support such wild accusations? Or is this a product of an active imagination?

[Bryce Haymond]

Thus my prefix of "I suspect." I'm not certain. I've read a lot of what's happened, and could do my own investigative research and put together some evidence. But this is my perspective as of present. Maybe a FARMS article on the subject is in order.

[ringringring]

FYI, you might want to correct a typo on the web page: "Their firing were handled extremely poorly."

WW

Dr. Peterson resigned, but I was unaware that others had resigned or had been fired. You may want to verify this fact before you state it openly on a public facebook group.

[Calm]

A New Beginning for the Mormon Studies Review

The Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship is continually striving to align its work with the academy's highest objectives and standards, as befits an organized research unit at Brigham Young University. Our areas of endeavor include the study of LDS scripture and other religious texts and related fields of religious scholarship, including the burgeoning field of Mormon studies.

To better serve these goals, last year we renamed our venerable FARMS Review to Mormon Studies Review. For many years the FARMS Review has filled an important niche in the intellectual life of its many readers under the vigorous editorship of Professor Daniel C. Peterson and his associates, Louis C. Midgley, George L. Mitton, and, more recently, Gregory L. Smith and Robert White. We thank these colleagues and the many contributing writers to the Review for their industry and scholarship over the past twenty-three years.

We are proud of the accomplishments of the FARMS Review. But to better position the new Mormon Studies Review within its academic discipline, we are now assembling a board of scholars in this field to advise us and will appoint a new editorial team. We regret that we must suspend publication during this period of reorganization and reorientation, but we are certain that our current—and many new—readers will find the new Mormon Studies Review a valuable scholarly resource for the discipline.

We will be in contact with our subscribers shortly with information about a subscription refund. We have not yet set a launch date for the new Review, but we will post further developments on our website as they occur.

http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/news/index.php?id=150&type=news

[Bryce Haymond]

Dr. Peterson resigned, but I was unaware that others had resigned or had been fired. You may want to verify this fact before you state it openly on a public facebook group.

See calmoriah 1:1, or otherwise see here.

[Wiki Wonka]

Dr. Peterson resigned, but I was unaware that others had resigned or had been fired. You may want to verify this fact before you state it openly on a public facebook group.

More precisely:

1) Dr. Peterson was fired as the editor of the Mormon Studies Review (ref. Bradford email).

2) Dr. Peterson subsequently resigned as the Director of Outreach for the Maxwell Institute (ref. Peterson email response to Bradford). Dr. Peterson retains his position with METI, which is also part of the Maxwell Institute.

3) The Maxwell Institute subsequently fired all of Dr. Peterson's associate editors by posting a notice on the Maxwell Institute website, without contacting them directly.

WW

Edited July 2, 2012 by Wiki Wonka