[1991 Mormon Historical Association Winner for Best Article]
Moses Rischin had no idea of the difficulties he would cause historians focusing on the development of the Latter Day Saints when he coined the term "New Mormon History" in 1969. It has come to mean any number of things to any number of observers. Some have used it to question writers' motivations; others to question credentials, beliefs, or objectives. It has served as a descriptive label to lump together diverse scholars with diverse interests and approaches, unified only by the fact that they are interested in Mormon history, broadly interpreted, and are writing during the latter half of the twentieth century. In some unfortunate circumstances such widely separate historians in terms of goals and priorities as Jerald Tanner and Richard L. Anderson are linked together as "new Mormon historians," even though it could legitimately be argued that they are not truly a part of this trend in historical inquiry. Even those firmly in the tradition are often quite different, but all are painted with the same historiographical brush as new Mormon historians, and the distinctions between them, some of which are fundamental, are blurred. [From the text]