From the Archives: Episode 10 The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives Season 1 (9/23/2024)

It is the end of the semester and we here at Cult Favorite are ready for a long winters nap. So, we have a special episode from deep in the Cult Favorite archives that you may not have heard yet. This week we are replaying our episode about Season One of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives from 9/23/2024. And we have a lot more episodes in our back catalog for your long holiday drives and airport layovers. Grab some peppermint cocoa, curl up close to the fire, and give it a listen.

This week, Mike convinced Merinda to watch Secret Lives of Mormon Wives! Luckily, docusoaps offer a neato middle ground between documentaries and reality tv. We talk genre, gender, sexuality, power, audiences, tradwives, the capital of “cute,” and Mormon media. Merinda quotes people she admires. She also describes her Very Strong Feelings about the tendency to reduce/oversimplify complex worlds inhabited by women creating media content. Inasmuch as we should #believewomen, we should also pay serious attention to pop culture by and about women, even (especially?) when it cuts against our comfort zones. We should also, it turns out, make sure to label moving boxes with some degree of nuance. Come hang and follow/subscribe wherever you listen to things. Meanwhile, know this: if you invite us to an important life event, we promise to show up for you. We will also totally tell you if we ever see toilet paper stuck to your shoe. #thatswhatfriendsarefor #cultfavorite #studyreligion

Links:

Sadaf Ahsan’s essay, “Inside the Real Housewives’ Feminism”: https://this.org/2021/11/02/inside-the-real-housewives-feminism/

The LDS Church’s low-key rebuke of the show: https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/commentary-when-entertainment-media-distorts-faith

You’re Wrong About episode “The Tradwife Rises”: https://podcasts.apple.com/si/podcast/the-tradwife-rises-with-sarah-archer/id1380008439?i=1000657221736

How are these shows produced?: https://www.realityblurred.com/realitytv/2021/05/real-housewives-produced-excerpt-from-housewives-brian-moylan/

Real Housewives https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2023/10/real-housewives-bravo-reckoning

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Special thanks to the REL Digital Lab in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Alabama for production assistance.

The views expressed in this episode are our own as experts and researchers in religious studies and do not represent the University of Alabama.

Theme music produced with Udio.