137: The Value of Engagement Across Ideologies: Difference between revisions

  | tags = Cheryl Bruno, Newel K Whitney, Whitney Documents

  | categories = 132 Problems Episodes, Interview

  | transcript = [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hYs1WKtJoP4&t=00m00s 00:00] Michelle: Welcome to 132 Problems revisiting Mormon polygamy. I hope that everybody has already seen the announcement that I released on Friday morning. Cheryl Bruno and I are both so excited about this new adventure, the Academic Journal of Mormon Polygamy, which we are both working like crazy to launch, and which is going to be an incredible tool and vehicle to elevate. These conversations and keep this topic going and bring more and more attention to it. I, I hope that you are all anticipating that and as excited about it as we are. And in keeping with that, Cheryl and I, since we just spent the weekend together, um, at JWHA discussing the Whitney documents, the episodes that I have recently done. Episode, um, part one, I think, is episode 129. And then the last two weeks were parts 2 and part 3, and we had a lot of conversations, um, at JWHA with several other historians discussing the Whitney documents. So Cheryl agreed to come on and just kind of bat these ideas back and forth and share some preliminary ideas about them. Please don't look at this in any way as a debate or as trying to best one another. In fact, I really appreciate how. Support of Cheryl has been when she thinks I'm making good arguments. She also for sure lets me know when she thinks I'm not making good arguments, and I appreciate it so much. It's, it's sometimes tough, but this is exactly what we need to for all of us to get sharpened and to be able to do better and better as we, um, engage in the discourse on these topics. So a huge thank you to Cheryl for coming on and discussing the Whitney documents. Cheryl and I just barely recorded our announcement about the Journal of Mormon Polygamy. So please look for that announcement because we are terribly excited about it. And it's really going to be the cutting edge, the receptacle of the best, um, research and scholarship that is being done on polygamy at this time. So, so look out for that. But also, Cheryl and I have been having So many conversations. We're on the phone quite a bit. Um, sometimes intense conversations. I know that both of us can get triggered by, uh, things that the other one has said. But what I think is so valuable is that both Cheryl and I have stuck with it. We've stuck in there through the difficult conversations, through the difficult misunderstandings or differences in perspective. And as a result, we've really gained tremendous respect for one another. And I would say we've become really, really good friends. I, I genuinely love Cheryl. And so as I was doing, oh, thank you. As I was doing, I, but genuinely, she is, I just, I just adore Cheryl. I'm so glad that she is willing to engage in this way and that she's in my life. It's wonderful. And, um, as we have been doing this work, we thought it would be useful to kind of let you see some of our engagement. And so since I have recently done this work on the Whitney documents, Cheryl has been willing to engage with them, and she said, let's just come and talk about them. So did I introduce that all right,

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hYs1WKtJoP4&t=03m17s 03:17] Cheryl Bruno: Cheryl? Yes, absolutely. I am so excited about Michelle's last 3, Podcast where she has talked about or um given 12 and 3 of the Whitney, Whitney documents and I kinda wanna come on here and uh push back maybe a little bit and just um tell why I think this is such an important work. Um, I have said many times that as a historian it's hard for me to come on a podcast and just um Talk about a document without researching it for many, many weeks and making sure I know exactly what, you know, and I've done all my background research and I really admire Michelle for making us part of her investigations. She's willing to um put up her thoughts about each document, each thing as, as they come to her and let us kind of see the process which is really valuable. And so with the Whit Whitney documents I I think she's still kind of in the middle of her investigation, but still letting us be a part of how that is going and I love that it's been so much fun. It's very um difficult for me, but I'm, I'm enjoying our conversation, so hopefully we can uh provide you a little peek behind the scenes of the kinds of things that we do when we talk together on the phone. And I wanted to, OK,