Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Drawing upon social theory, this paper considers the functions that horses serve in conservative Old Order Mennonite communities. Three key functions are identified. Two of these functions are symbolic in character, while the third is identifiable as economic. The available evidence suggests that conservative Mennonite communities strive to channel the entrepreneurial behavior of their members into collective enterprises. The paper details the networks of transportation that bind the members of these communities together and guide their efforts to achieve collective entrepreneurship. The sample photographs appearing at the end of the paper illustrate key points about "horse-and-buggy" Mennonites.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: In 1970 African American and Latin@ Mennonites formed the Minority Ministries Council (MMC), lodged under the auspices of Mennonite Board of Missions, in order to present an organized movement for racial equality, leadership development, and new approaches to urban missions within ecclesiastical and institutional levels of the Mennonite church. This is a particularly important case as it represents an attempt at interethnic collaboration within a predominantly white and rural Mennonite church. Three ethno-racial groups made up the MMC: African Americans, Mexican Americans, and Puerto Ricans. From South Texas, to Puerto Rico, to New York, each group coalesced around similar, yet contested, notions of ethno-religious identity.
One main question undergirds this essay: what role did religion play in forging interracial alliances across place, space, and culture? Religion has historically played a prominent role in fomenting political dissent, especially during the struggles for civil rights across the South and Southwest. Both in shaping ideology and providing discursive space, the role of religion cannot be denied. But the centrality of religion does not deny that it operates within the social framework of race, power, resistance, gender, and class. In other words, religion works in concert with other social dynamics in shaping discourse and developing oppositional politics.
I argue that Mennonites of color rearticulated their racial status by affirming their collective identities. Important to this particular study is the role of the MMC as an autonomous organization. The MMC provided a space where Latin@ and African American Mennonites, from different communities, could come together and rearticulate an oppositional discourse that challenged the dominant Mennonite church culture. Moreover, the MMC also revealed critical fissures among and within the various groups involved. As these groups challenged white racism within the Mennonite church, they also contested each other over questions of identity, culture, and faith. Thus this essay helps provide insight into the complex interactions between Mennonites of color across discursive space, religious faith, oppositional politics, and identity.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: In the tradition of Goffman (1959) and other ethnographic researchers, interaction between people is often characterized as a drama. An alternative paradigm for social interaction is that of a game. Based upon field observations among Mennonites in southeastern Pennsylvania, I describe the “Mennonite game” as one that helps participants to define group boundaries and ethnic status in a modernized world where traditional dress and habit no longer provide the strong identity markers for insiders to identify themselves.
The Mennonite game is an informal interaction among Mennonites that has become ritualized through time. The interaction of the game is for strangers to attempt to identify common relatives, acquaintances, or networks that will situate each other in the broader society of Mennonites. In this paper, I describe the process of the Mennonite game, explore its implications for group boundaries and racial exclusion, and conclude with some self-reflective comments on my role as an ethnographer in the playing of the Mennonite game.