Imagine this—a cold beer, good conversation, dark wood paneled
walls, and one idea.
Ashley walked up to Jeremy that evening in 2015, interrupting
some nerdy conversation, and stated matter-of-factly, “We should
have a podcast.”
And that is how the idea for (w)Holy Media was born one warm,
sticky evening in June.
Jeremy and Ashley have long thought about the way news media
represents religion. They have also wondered how to make
coverage of religion more nuanced, more accessible, and more
interesting to a non-religion nerd population. (w)Holy Media is
their attempt to sate their curiosity.
It’s their hope that (w)Holy Media will illuminate the world of
religion in various media, from the daily news to Hollywood and
books to comics. Religion plays a role in society, even in ways we
cannot always recognize…like swear words!
So, join Ashley and Jeremy as they nerd out over the world of
religion and the various ways we depict different traditions.
It’s going to be a nerdy ride—so grab a beer, get comfy, and
prepare to become a #religionnerd like us!
What’s up with that name?
What’s In a Name
Yes, yes…we know that “wholly” has two ‘l’s.
The name of our podcast was a mild debate. Jeremy and Ashley
value spelling and grammar, so having a misspelled word in the
podcast title caused mild pain.
But the pun, and slight nod to academia, made them cave to the
typo.
On the one hand, the podcast discusses media—everything media!
It is wholly media.
On the other hand, the podcast focuses on a specific type of media.
It examines media about religion and religious media, or holy
media.
What do you get when you combine the two?
(w)Holy Media!
The nod to academia is a bit more subtle.
Parentheses are sometimes used to encompass prefixes in order to
give a word a more nuanced meaning.
For example…(re)enforce.
The addition of the () suggests that something is being initially
enforced and enforced again at the same time. Using parentheses
may also reference agency
For instance, the use of parentheses by Maria Amoamo and Anna
Thompson in “(re)Imagining Maori tourism: Representation and
cultural hybridity in postcolonial New Zealand” emphasizes the
active and reflexive nature of Pacific natives in conceptualizing
their culture anew, while also demonstrating that the tourist and
the Maori are not passive agents, even though the act of
(re)enforcing and (re)defining what it means to be Maori may
happen subconsciously.
Get it?
Nope?
That’s okay. The nod to the academy in our show title has
absolutely no reference to the contents of (w)Holy Media. In fact,
the way parentheses are used in the title does not reflect the
standard academic application.
Jeremy and Ashley are just super nerdy and goofy and they
wanted the show title to reflect that.
They hope you enjoy the show in spite of their occasional, nerdy ridiculousness.