Maxwell Institute Announces NEW Mormon Studies Review

This morning, I blogged about hiring of Blair Hodges as the new public communications specialist at the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship.

Today, the Maxwell Institute announced the new Mormon Studies Review:

The Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship at Brigham Young University is pleased to announce the inauguration of a new annual periodical that will address the needs of a growing community of scholars who contribute to the interdisciplinary field of Mormon studies. The Mormon Studies Review will publish reviews of important books and other publications relevant to the academic study of Mormonism, along with review essays that will chronicle the field and assess its development.

M. Gerald Bradford, executive director of the Maxwell Institute, has appointed J. Spencer Fluhman, Assistant Professor of History at Brigham Young University, as the first editor of the new Review.

“I appreciate very much Professor Fluhman’s willingness to serve as editor of the Review,” Bradford said. “Under Spencer’s capable leadership, and with the help of those individuals who have agreed to serve on the editorial advisory board, its prospects are bright indeed. I expect it will soon become a major voice in tracking and commenting on developments in the growing area of Mormon studies.”

Professor Fluhman … holds a PhD in history from the University of Wisconsin—Madison and is the author of “A Peculiar People”: Anti-Mormonism and the Making of Religion in Nineteenth-Century America (University of North Carolina Press, 2012).

“I’m excited by Gerald Bradford’s bold vision for the Review and thrilled to be a part of it,” Fluhman said. “It will become an engaging, one-stop shop where scholars and non-specialists alike can keep up with the vibrant, growing academic field of Mormon studies.”

Many snarky voices have been critical of the productivity at the Maxwell Institute in recent months. Turns out, they have been laying the ground work for a range of new ventures.

Not only does the Review have a new editor, it has an amazing editorial advisory board made up of Philip L. Barlow (Utah State University), Richard L. Bushman (Columbia University), Douglas J. Davies (Durham University), Eric A. Eliason (Brigham Young University), James E. Faulconer (Brigham Young University), Kathleen Flake (Vanderbilt University), Terryl L. Givens (University of Richmond), Sarah Barringer Gordon (University of Pennsylvania), Matthew J. Grow (Church History Department, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints), Grant Hardy (University of North Carolina—Asheville), David F. Holland (University of Nevada, Las Vegas), Laurie F. Maffly-Kipp (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill), Patrick Q. Mason (Claremont Graduate University), Quincy D. Newell (University of Wyoming), and Grant Underwood (Brigham Young University).

Wow.