Review
Title: Illicit Monogamy: Inside a Fundamentalist Mormon Community
Author: William R. Jankowiak
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Genre: Non Fiction
Year Published: 2023
Number of Pages: 320
Format: Hardback & Paperback
ISBN: 978-0231150217
Price: Hardback (75.00); Paperback (30.00)
Reviewed by Amanda Ray for the Association of Mormon Letters
I come from a long line of Latter-day Saints (“both sides go back to Nauvoo,” as I say), and because of that lineage, my family definitely has some polygamists in it from the old days of the early church to more modern connections. As far as I’m aware, my distant relatives are not members of the Angel Park community studied for this book. However, I have read my fair share of “escape memoirs” of women who were raised in fundamentalist Mormon communities (most being FLDS, but not all), so I’m somewhat familiar with the landscape of life in a polygamist community. And I was excited to read this book, by William R. Jankowiak, Illicit Monogamy: Inside a Fundamentalist Mormon Community, which was a few steps back from the usual highly emotional and personal connection to polygamy.
Jankowiak approaches his topic like any scientist – with as open of a mind as he’s able. He reports on the behaviors and attitudes, and social practices of this particular polygamist community as the outsider he is, assuming the reader has little to no context for their behaviors. As someone who does have more context of polygamy, and this religious strain of it, breaking down the behaviors and actions to a more simplified approach is helpful to also see how connected our communities are and even trace how some behaviors develop. Not only did I recognize some familiar patterns, I also appreciated that Jankowiak developed connections with the Angel Park community over many years, further giving him a good foundation to be able to make these observations.
Having done my fair share of reading on the FLDS community and in particular the Jeffs family within it, it was a little refreshing to read about a community practicing polygamy that wasn’t as controlling or horrible-sounding to an outsider. I still can’t say I approve of a polygamist lifestyle generally, but I didn’t come away from the book feeling like the women of this community can’t get out if they desire to. The author developed what appears to be a good working relationship with the Angel Park community and got a wide range of responses and feelings for his queries into their beliefs, some that seemed fairly personal and honest. He conversed with people who had been in the community for generations, as well as those who had left and those still in who seemed at times ambivalent about the practice of polygamy and the traditions of the community. It led to some surprising passages to read.
The reader gets a more sympathetic approach and outlook to this polygamist community, how they try to achieve this ideal family life and relationships they’ve been taught since birth to want and emulate, and how reality and various life circumstances alter their perceptions. The author even gets into seemingly minute details of practices like how naming children can be used as a power move and what trends within the community have been noticed. Personally, I found the chapter on the “pecking order” of wives in a polygamist marriage and how they adapt and navigate each other and their husband of particular interest.
Ultimately, to me, it seems that very few families can make polygamy work in a way that seems successful – the financial burdens contribute a great deal, but the emotional toll of a wife sharing her husband’s love and attention with other women and their children, and the men needing to find ways to love and support their multiple wives is a difficult road. Even those of us in monogamous relationships struggle with these related issues, and we aren’t living a so-called alternative lifestyle. I appreciated reading Illicit Monogamy to gain a little more understanding of how these religious and family dynamics play out in the community a little more removed from mine, and how respectfully the author treated his subjects.