Joseph D. Staubhaar

JOSEPH D. STRAUBHAAR is the Arnon G. Carter Centennial Professor of Communication at the University of Texas at Austin. His primary research interests are in international communication and cultural theory, and comparative analysis of new technologies. He has published several books, including Media Now: Communication Media in the Information Age, as well as numerous scholarly articles and essays on the topic.

Through a Glass Darkly: Mormons as Perceived by Critics’ Reviews of Tony Kushner’s Angels in America

Articles/Essays – Volume 32, No. 2

Membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is expanding rapidly. As the church passes the ten-million member milestone, social science researchers have raised a number of important questions about the rapid growth of Mormonism. Issues include changing Mormon demographics, cultural tensions of church globalization, and the evolution of Mormon identity and assimilation. Another topic of research focuses on mass media use and the role it plays in the ways Mormons accommodate the larger society. What has not been examined, however, are the ways mass media, such as movies, television, newspapers, etc., tend to describe Mormons.