Pod Only Knows - #002 - Dr. Megan Goodwin on public scholarship in religious studies

#002 - Dr. Megan Goodwin on public scholarship in religious studies

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05/23/23 • 66 min

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Pod Only Knows

This week, Kelly and John talk to Dr. Megan Goodwin about the importance of getting religious studies out to the public and the challenges and tools for doing so.

Dr. Goodwin is the co-host of the podcast Keeping it 101: A Killjoy's Introduction to Religion. Her formal expertise is in issues of gender, sexuality, race, politics, and American religions. She is the author of the 2020 book Abusing Religion: Literary Persecution, Sex Scandals, and American Minority Religions as well as the forthcoming Cults, Inc.

Here she talks to your hosts about her journey into religious studies, why people should care about religion (even if they aren't religious), how her podcast works to demystify religion and make it more accessible, and why she calls Kelly "Kellsworth".

You can find out more about her here: https://www.megan-goodwin.com/

This week, Kelly and John talk to Dr. Megan Goodwin about the importance of getting religious studies out to the public and the challenges and tools for doing so.

You can find out more about her here: https://www.megan-goodwin.com/

Previous Episode

#001 - Mike Rothschild on his upcoming book "Jewish Space Lasers"

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Mike Rothschild, author of the acclaimed 2021 book The Storm Is Upon Us: How QAnon Became a Movement, Cult, and Conspiracy Theory of Everything, is set to publish his follow-up, Jewish Space Lasers: The Rothschilds and 200 Years of Conspiracy Theories, in September.

The book covers the history of the antisemitic conspiracy theories surrounding the Rothschild (to whom Mike is not related) family and how they set a new model for framing Jewish people as responsible for major world events.

Mike joined Kelly and John to discuss the book, its title (a joking reference to a conspiracy theory concerning wildfires and satellites once voiced by congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene), why someone with his last name would want to get into this ine of work, and why antisemitism often isn't really about religion at all.

You can preorder Jewish Space Lasers here: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/733925/jewish-space-lasers-by-mike-rothschild/

You can learn more about Mike and his work at his website: https://themikerothschild.com/

Mike is on Twitter @rothschildmd

Next Episode

Weekend Chit-Chat Episode #1 - The Middle Way

In the first weekend episode, John bring Kelly the topic of the Buddhist teaching of The Middle Way.

One of the first breakthroughs in Siddhartha's journey to become the Buddha, the Middle Way reminds us that in order to be successful in our quests, we must center ourselves in moderation. This means avoiding the pitfalls of thinking in terms of extremes - that the answer to our problems is probably not ever the opposite of whatever caused them.

As a society, and as a culture, we suck at this. And, worse, we tend to confuse the wisdom of this teaching with an endorsement of centrism, contrarianism, or moderation for moderation's sake.

And as two people who tend to take on more than they can handle and are very bad at considering their own mental well-being, your two hosts consider where they might learn from the Buddha's insights here as well!