Divine Rite of Kings: Land, Race, Same Sex, and Empire in Mormonism and the Esoteric Tradition

Clyde R. Forsberg Jr. is a Professor in the Department of Western Languages and Literatures at Karabuk University, Turkey. He is also a Civic Education Project and Open Society Institute Fellow with a personal and professional interest in higher education reforms in emerging democracies in the former Soviet Union and parts of the Middle East. His academic training is highly interdisciplinary, with a PhD in American Social and Cultural History under Klaus J. Hansen at Queen’s University, Canada, an MA in the Philosophy of Religion under the devout Roman Catholic and Bernard Lonergan scholar Hugo A. Meynell, and a BA (magna cum laude) in Religious Studies with a twin concentration in Biblical Studies under Peter C. Craigie and Medieval Islamic Civilization under Andrew Rippin. Forsberg is also a Canadian playwright and jazz musician of note, conflating the fine arts and liberal arts in an attempt to “get the message out.” Born in the United States (Logan, Utah), raised and educated in Canada’s capital (Ottawa), before going on to live and teach abroad in Kyrgyzstan, Taiwan, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey, he is that brand of international American Studies scholar who feels most at home when far, far from it. The scion of pioneer Utah Mormons, he is a devout Unitarian. His wife, Cholpon Alieva, is a Central Asian Muslim. They have two children, Acacia and Attila.