Culture Study Podcast

What is Quince and why is it everywhere? Who is running Albion Fit? Who buys clothes at Altar’d State? Why is Madewell so sad? This is an explainer episode, but it’s also a brands-feelings processing episode, because any time millennials try and talk about how J.Crew or Madewell has changed, they’re also talking about how their own feelings about fashion have changed. And no one understands the rhythms of brands quite like Caroline Moss, the host and curator of the Gee Thanks Just Bought It extended universe. Listen as we attempt to answer all of your WTF-is-going-on-with-this-brand questions and hold space, as it were, for all of you big brand feelings… and tell us what brand still mystifies you!

• Again plugging Caroline’s Instagram (the primary way I access Gee Thanks content) and her eternally useful newsletter. And then there are the thousands who swear by the FB Group!

• The latest episode of the Gee Thanks podcast is an interview with the founder of Miry’s Place (which we’re raising money for over at the Culture Study newsletter!) about the dynamics of Giving Tuesday and weird discourses around charity/giving — it’s excellent

• The Instagram account that catalogs classic J.Crew catalogs

• As promised, the Carhartt overalls I’ve had forever (not pictured: the Carhartt pants I’ve had since I was 20)

• WTF is going on with kids toys right now (you can take this in any direction)

• The rise of therapy speak, how therapy manifests on social media, etc

• The future of (downhill) skiing and livability of ski towns just generally

• The new Gladiator + Paul Mescal JUST GENERALLY

• Anything you need advice or want musings on for the AAA segment

• You can submit them (and ideas for future eps) here (this is the subscriber-only form!)

• Join the ranks of paid subscribers and get bonus content, access to the discussion threads, ad-free episodes, and the knowledge that you're supporting an indie pod trying to make its way in the world.
• Got a question to submit, a prompt for Ask Anne Anything, or an idea for a future episode? Tell us here.
• Catch up on everything else happening in the Culture Study universe here.
• Transcripts will be available here within 24 hours of publishing.

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Sometimes I forget just how many classes I took on the history of cinema — or that I used to teach a class on it! — but then I have a conversation like the one you’re about to listen to and remember: oh right, I am a huge film history dork. This episode, featuring the brilliant Hannah McGregor, travels all over the past, present, and future of the blockbuster, from the theory of the “whammy,” to Hannah’s book on Jurassic Park, from Barbie to Twisters, from why we started going to the movies to why we’ve (largely) stopped. It’s a ROMP and incredibly listenable — perfect for wherever you’re driving or to have on in the background while you chop one million brussels sprouts.

• Read Hannah’s Jurassic Park book, Clever Girl!!!

• Follow Hannah on Instagram

• I appeared on Hannah’s podcast Material Girls to talk about ATHLEISURE, you can find it here

• Oh do you want a really nerdy book on the history of picture palaces? Here we go! And here’s another! Even more nerdy!!!

• We didn’t talk about this in the ep but here’s a great way to look up and see if there was a picture palace in your hometown

• An explanation on why these kinds of movies are called blockbusters

• A graph on the number of movie tickets sold over time:

• KIDS TOYS! This is an expansive one with a kids toy expert, so you can really take it wherever you want

• The rise of therapy speak

• The future of (downhill) skiing and livability of ski towns just generally

• Why does it feel like thrifting sucks now

• Anything you need advice or want musings on for the AAA segment

• You can submit them (and ideas for future eps) here (this is the subscriber-only form!)

• Join the ranks of paid subscribers and get bonus content, access to the discussion threads, ad-free episodes, and the knowledge that you're supporting an indie pod trying to make its way in the world.
• Got a question to submit, a prompt for Ask Anne Anything, or an idea for a future episode? Tell us here.
• Catch up on everything else happening in the Culture Study universe here.
• Transcripts will be available here within 24 hours of publishing.

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I could talk about Nicole Kidman for hours. Very few Hollywood actors have had careers this varied, this delightful, this weird — oh, and she’s also been married to Tom Cruise. She manages to be both chronically underestimated and overrated, and she’s recently found herself in a slew of roles where she embodies a slew of different rich white ladies, each miserable in their own specific ways. For this episode, I’m joined by the great Sam Sanders to talk about our own Kidman Syllabi and answer your questions about her most recent roles, (not) aging onscreen, and what makes her such an effective miserable rich person.

• Listen to Sam’s new podcast on KCRW, THE SAM SANDERS SHOW!

• Watch Sam and his splendid variety of shackets

• Follow Sam on IG

• My big feature on Nicole Kidman that came out during Big Little Lies: “How Many Times Does Nicole Kidman Have To Prove Herself?”

• I’m obviously obsessed with The Others

• It had been a hot minute since I watched To Die For but I’m just saying it’s in The Criterion Collection for a reason

• The cast of The Hours on Oprah in 2002

• Kristen Bell and Dax Sheppard do indeed sell diapers

• One of the questions cites Audrey Hepburn in her 60s

• Nicole Kidman wigs, ranked

• WTF is going on with kids toys right now (you can take this in any direction)

• The future of (downhill) skiing and livability of ski towns just generally

• The new Gladiator + Paul Mescal JUST GENERALLY

• Why does it feel like thrifting sucks now

• Anything you need advice or want musings on for the AAA segment

• You can submit them (and ideas for future eps) here (this is the subscriber-only form!)

• Join the ranks of paid subscribers and get bonus content, access to the discussion threads, ad-free episodes, and the knowledge that you're supporting an indie pod trying to make its way in the world.
• Got a question to submit, a prompt for Ask Anne Anything, or an idea for a future episode? Tell us here.
• Catch up on everything else happening in the Culture Study universe here.
• Transcripts will be available here within 24 hours of publishing.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Almost all of the public conversations about sex testing and sports — or, more to the point, who should be allowed to participate in women’s sports — are pretty bad. In many if not most cases, they’re outright transphobic; even in the “best” cases, they’re still pretty ham-fisted. But Rose Eveleth is having a very different sort of public conversation about sex testing in their new podcast, Tested — one that looks to the way these tests affect the athletes subject to them, and how the concept of fairness in women’s sports has become so fraught. For today’s episode, Rose answers your questions about the history of women’s sports gender panic, why men aren’t subject to the same sex testing, and how the Paralympics imagines “fairness” in profoundly different ways. I absolutely loved this conversation. I think you will too.

• Go listen to Rose’s podcast, Tested — it’s phenomenal

• The website for Tested has so much good stuff, including a glossary (and explanation) for all the terms used in the series and a bunch of the supplemental pieces Rose and I reference in our conversation, like this piece on the Paralympics

• Become part of FlashForward and directly support Rose’s ongoing work

• Rose strongly recommends Michael Waters’ The Other Olympians: Fascism, Queerness, and the Making of Modern Sports

• Christine Mboma, one of the featured athletes in Tested

• Rose also recommends: Katrina Karkazis’ Testosterone: An Unauthorized Biography

• WTF is going on with kids toys right now (you can take this in any direction)

• The future of (downhill) skiing and livability of ski towns just generally

• The new Gladiator + Paul Mescal JUST GENERALLY

• Why does it feel like thrifting sucks now

• Anything you need advice or want musings on for the AAA segment

• You can submit them (and ideas for future eps) here (this is the subscriber-only form!)

• Join the ranks of paid subscribers and get bonus content, access to the discussion threads, ad-free episodes, and the knowledge that you're supporting an indie pod trying to make its way in the world.
• Got a question to submit, a prompt for Ask Anne Anything, or an idea for a future episode? Tell us here.
• Catch up on everything else happening in the Culture Study universe here.
• Transcripts will be available here within 24 hours of publishing.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

“Most people who complain about BookTok have never seen a BookTok.” Alyssa Morris drops that insight about two-thirds of the way through the episode, and it’s such a good point that I almost want to make it the title of the episode. Most people have an idea of what BookTok is (people talking about books on TikTok) but no real understanding of the immensity of BookTok. It’s talking about what you’ve read, sure, but it’s also about recommendations, and performance, and the aesthetics of reading culture — and the criticisms of it have a lot more to do with weird ideas about what reading (or talking about reading!) “should” look like.

If you’re interested in reading culture, you’ll be interested in this episode — full stop. Let it surprise you! And make sure to check out Alyssa’s BookTok newsletter, which has quickly become one of my favorite reads of the week.

• Check out more of Alyssa Morris’s work here — and subscribe to Romancing the Phone!!!

• Alyssa breaks down a bunch of the different “genres” of Booktok here — it’s so good

• One of my favorite Alyssa pieces on the appeal of the hockey romance

• The Hinge “No Ordinary Love” Collection featuring Roxane Gay

• The Atlantic piece I reference re: “college kids can’t read books”

• The Rachel Cusk reading order Tok

• The VERY FALL Laurie Gilmore books

• The special edition Bridgerton hardbacks

• Yes / No / Maybe

• Underhyped / Appropriately Hyped / Overhyped

• How Much I Read This Week (With a Full Time Job)

• Glen Powell in a White T-Shirt Recs

• SOME OF THE DAHLIA THINGS I MENTION: Kristine Albrecht’s Dahlias: From Seed to Bloom, Swan Island Dahlias, The Saran Wrap Method, The Dahlia Growers FB Group (which is absolutely full of gall pictures right now). And if you want to read the other things I’ve written about dahlias

• THE STATE OF KIDS TOYS — what’s weird? What’s interesting? What doesn’t make sense?

• Why does it feel like thrifting sucks now

• The new Gladiator + Paul Mescal JUST GENERALLY

• Anything you need advice or want musings on for the AAA segment

• You can submit them (and ideas for future eps) here (this is the subscriber-only form!)

• Join the ranks of paid subscribers and get bonus content, access to the discussion threads, ad-free episodes, and the knowledge that you're supporting an indie pod trying to make its way in the world.
• Got a question to submit, a prompt for Ask Anne Anything, or an idea for a future episode? Tell us here.
• Catch up on everything else happening in the Culture Study universe here.
• Transcripts will be available here within 24 hours of publishing.

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A podcast episode on the state of podcasting? Classic Culture Study Pod. At this point in my career, I’ve been interviewed on hundreds of podcasts, been adjacent to the production of dozens, been the host of three pods, and even watched a fourth pod go through two years of production only to get axed. The podcasting world is so dynamic, so weird, and so complicated… and industry analyst and critic Nicholas Quah is the best person to talk about its shifts, its future, and the best stuff coming out RIGHT NOW.

You asked so many good questions (about ads, about funding structures, about editing) that Nick and I did our best to answer — but I also can’t wait to hear your follow-ups, because this world is ever-changing.

• Find all of Nick’s writing (on podcasts and non-podcasts) over at Vulture; I especially liked this recent piece on the devaluation of the “good interview”

• Nick’s piece on the Best New Podcasts of 2024 (thus far)

• Nick’s podcast recs:

  • Hysterical, about a mysterious illness spreading among a group of high school girls in upstate New York

  • The Town with Matthew Belloni, about the business of Hollywood

  • Nymphet Alumni, about fashion and cultural trends

• WTF is going on with kids toys right now (you can take this in any direction)

• The future of (downhill) skiing and livability of ski towns just generally

• The Present and Past of NICOLE KIDMAN (with Sam Sanders!)

• The new Gladiator + Paul Mescal JUST GENERALLY

• Why does it feel like thrifting sucks now

• Anything you need advice or want musings on for the AAA segment

• You can submit them (and ideas for future eps) here (this is the subscriber-only form!)

• Join the ranks of paid subscribers and get bonus content, access to the discussion threads, ad-free episodes, and the knowledge that you're supporting an indie pod trying to make its way in the world.
• Got a question to submit, a prompt for Ask Anne Anything, or an idea for a future episode? Tell us here.
• Catch up on everything else happening in the Culture Study universe here.
• Transcripts will be available here within 24 hours of publishing.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You might look at the question in the title of this episode and think: duh, it’s because we’re weird about death. But cancer is so common, with so many different variations, with so many ways it can touch your life, in ways immediate and lasting… that of course we’ve figured out ways to be weird about it. Of course there are bizarre metaphors, of course we don’t have space for the messy, extended work of recovery; of course there are bizarre tropes and plot lines intended to make cancer more understandable which just make so many people feel like they’re “failing” at cancer when their own experiences don’t fit the popular narrative trajectory.

Dr. Stacy Wentworth is an oncologist, the author of the newsletter Cancer Culture, and the host of Less Radical, a new podcast about the surgeon who revolutionized breast cancer treatment — and changed the way we understand cancer today. And I knew she’d be the perfect person to talk about the way we talk about cancer, all the weirdness that can accompany it, and how that discourse has changed over time.

• Subscribe to Stacy’s newsletter, Cancer Culture

• And listen to Less Radical wherever you get your podcasts by clicking this magic button

• Find all of Kate Bowler’s work (which Stacy mentions) here

• A good interview re: pinkwashing with the author of Pink Ribbon Blues

• Stacy also mentions a guest post in her newsletter by Judy Pearson, the biographer of the New York socialite who was instrumental to passing the bill that would grant significant government funding to cancer research — it’s fascinating

• The trailer for LOVE STORY!!!!! I’M NOT CRYING YOU’RE CRYING!

• My Life now I’m really crying

• Brian’s Song

• The Present and Past of NICOLE KIDMAN (with Sam Sanders!)

• Midwest [Dad] Masculinity / Tim Walz Memedom

• The new Gladiator + Paul Mescal JUST GENERALLY

• Explaining trends on BookTok

• Why does it feel like thrifting sucks now

• Anything you need advice or want musings on for the AAA segment

• You can submit them (and ideas for future eps) here (this is the subscriber-only form!)

• Join the ranks of paid subscribers and get bonus content, access to the discussion threads, ad-free episodes, and the knowledge that you're supporting an indie pod trying to make its way in the world.
• Got a question to submit, a prompt for Ask Anne Anything, or an idea for a future episode? Tell us here.
• Catch up on everything else happening in the Culture Study universe here.
• Transcripts will be available here within 24 hours of publishing.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You know that feeling when you and a friend get weird and detailed and hilarious about something you deeply (and maybe irrationally) hate, or find ridiculous, or can’t stomach in your vicinity? It’s one of my favorite versions of friendship intimacy — talking shit about something you shouldn’t dislike nearly as much as you do, because that thing is relatively trivial, but that doesn’t mean that the thing itself doesn’t make you want to bang your head against the wall.

And that’s what this week’s episode is: talking about all of your strong opinions about trivial shit. Our co-host, Krista Burton, came up with the idea — because it’s a regular feature of her excellent and always entertaining newsletter (O Caftan My Caftan!). So join us as we talk about your strong opinions about gnomes, “journey” and “season,” boarding planes, late-in-life-lesbian-Tok, calling your romantic person “partner,” mullets, and a very juicy/useful AAA section about almond boomers. I can’t wait to talk even MORE about all of your strong opinions about trivial shit in the comments.

• Subscribe to O Caftan My Caftan!!!!!

• My interview with Krista about her AMAZING book Moby Dyke: An Obsessive Quest to Track Down the Last Remaining Lesbian Bars in America

• BUY MOBY DYKE !!!

• The thread where Melody said she wasn’t going to buy the porch geese costumes

• If you didn’t get the gnome situation like me here’s what we’re talking about

• The British GQ article I reference re: the feelings about the mullet

• How the “green bubble” for Android users has been part of the case against Apple re: “anti-competitive behavior”

• One of those infinitely annoying articles about how there are better ways to board a plane

• Just a hot lesbian chopping wood on Tiktok

• From the AAA: one of my favorite Virginia Sole-Smith pieces about “the grandparents are not okay” re: boomers and diet culture

• The Present and Past of NICOLE KIDMAN (with Sam Sanders!)

• Midwest [Dad] Masculinity / Tim Walz Memedom

• What Happened to the Summer Blockbuster?

• The new Gladiator + Paul Mescal JUST GENERALLY

• Explaining trends on BookTok

• Why does it feel like thrifting sucks now

• Anything you need advice or want musings on for the AAA segment

• You can submit them (and ideas for future eps) here (this is the subscriber-only form!)

• Join the ranks of paid subscribers and get bonus content, access to the discussion threads, ad-free episodes, and the knowledge that you're supporting an indie pod trying to make its way in the world.
• Got a question to submit, a prompt for Ask Anne Anything, or an idea for a future episode? Tell us here.
• Catch up on everything else happening in the Culture Study universe here.
• Transcripts will be available here within 24 hours of publishing.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

What’s the difference between a conspiracy theory and gossip? When does joking around about Kate Middleton’s abduction turn into something much darker? Are women actually more susceptible to contemporary conspiracy theories — or are we just finally paying attention to it? Cristen Conger, host of the new podcast Conspiracy, She Wrote joins me to talk about Taylor Swift’s evil twin, Beyoncé’s illuminati connections, Katie Holmes getting impregnated by Scientology aliens, sex trafficking panics, and how to talk to someone when they start directing a conspiracy theory your way. We go deep down the wormhole in this one, friends, but I think you’re gonna love it.

• Go listen to Conspiracy, She Wrote!

• Follow Cristen’s other (very popular!) podcast Unladylike on Instagram

• My piece from earlier this year re: the information vacuum around Kate Middleton’s disappearance from public view

• Annie Kelly is one of the leading researchers on QAnon (and women’s involvement in particular). Read her excellent op-ed in the Times and listen to her episode of QAnon Anonymous on Mothers for QAnon

• I briefly mention a book about the history of C-sections — it’s called Invisible Labor, and here’s an interview with author Rachel Somerstein

• Cristen talks about The Awful Disclosures of Maria Monk — here’s a fascinating deep dive

• CORRECTION: An earlier version of the podcast referenced Naomi Klein, when we meant Naomi Wolf. The episode has been corrected and re-uploaded. Thank you to Marissa for pointing it out in the comments!

• The Present and Past of NICOLE KIDMAN (with Sam Sanders!)

• Midwest [Dad] Masculinity / Tim Walz Memedom

• What Happened to the Summer Blockbuster?

• The new Gladiator + Paul Mescal JUST GENERALLY

• Explaining trends on BookTok

• Why does it feel like thrifting sucks now

• Anything you need advice or want musings on for the AAA segment

• You can submit them (and ideas for future eps) here (this is the subscriber-only form!)

• Join the ranks of paid subscribers and get bonus content, access to the discussion threads, ad-free episodes, and the knowledge that you're supporting an indie pod trying to make its way in the world.
• Got a question to submit, a prompt for Ask Anne Anything, or an idea for a future episode? Tell us here.
• Catch up on everything else happening in the Culture Study universe here.
• Transcripts will be available here within 24 hours of publishing.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You can almost hear the producers trying to sell this show to Hulu: It’s hot Mormon moms… who are also swingers. Turns out only one of them was “swinging,” and the swinging was (in her words) “soft.” But it was enough to get Hulu — and now, millions of other viewers — on board with Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, which tracks the interlocking stories of eight Mormon influencers in Utah.

Like so much of contemporary reality television, this show is glossy, melodramatic, unhinged, and addictive. It’s entertainment, sure, but it’s also a way for us to think through some of our own understandings of marriage, sex, friendship, religion, and feminism — which is exactly what Sara Petersen and I try to work through in this episode. That, and whether Dakota is a paid actor.

• Subscribe to Sara’s newsletter

• And read her latest piece on Secret Lives of Mormon Wives

• The Us Weekly aggregation of “where the women stand with the church”

• The breakdown of Demi’s relationship with Bret

• The best thing I’ve read from the Mormon feminist perspective re: Secret Lives and the church’s reaction to it

• A big feature I wrote for BuzzFeed about the women who’d left the FLDS and were trying to remake their lives

• My interview with Meg Conley re: what got left out of LuLaRich and the role of MLMs in Mormon culture

• Sara’s excellent reflection on the Times Ballerina Farm profile (and Hannah Neeleman’s reaction)

• Join the ranks of paid subscribers and get bonus content, access to the discussion threads, ad-free episodes, and the knowledge that you're supporting an indie pod trying to make its way in the world.
• Got a question to submit, a prompt for Ask Anne Anything, or an idea for a future episode? Tell us here.
• Catch up on everything else happening in the Culture Study universe here.
• Transcripts will be available here within 24 hours of publishing.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.