Susanna Morrill (left, Lewis & Clark College) presents MHA's 'Best Thesis Award' to Blair Hodges
The Maxwell Institute congratulates Blair Hodges for winning the Best Thesis Award at the 2014 conference of the Mormon History Association. His master's thesis (completed at Georgetown University in 2013) is entitled 'Intellectual Disability in Mormon Thought and History, 1830�1900.'
Hodges examined the shifting conceptions of intellectual disability from the LDS Church's founding in 1830 to the turn of the twentieth century by focusing on three questions: How has intellectual disability been constructed in Mormonism's public discourse? How were these representations informed by Mormonism's larger cultural context? What uniquely Mormon beliefs and ideas were brought to bear on the subject? Hodges plans to continue his research on the subject to cover the twentieth century up to the present.
The MHA conference took place earlier this summer in San Antonio, Texas. A full list of this year's award recipients is available here.