Julia Carroll

Julia Carroll is a PhD candidate in Boston University’s American & New England Studies Program. She studies histories of the Atlantic world, specifically intersections of religion and race. Her dissertation, “The Protestant Sanctioning of Race-Based Slavery in Language & Landscape in the Anglo-American South, 1739-1791,” explores how eighteenth-century proslavery Protestant itinerants influenced public policy in the American Lowcountries of Georgia and South Carolina, and considers how these legacies continue to manifest in the public realm, in landscapes both rhetorical and physical. When she is not working on her dissertation she is tucked away in the hills of Western Massachusetts, working alongside her partner to renovate their nineteenth-century home. Connect with Julia on Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.

Religious Disaffiliation: Can you ever really leave a religion?

Run time:  40:35

This audio article is the first of the “Religious Historian” podcast series and was recorded in fall 2018. The subject of this episode is religion through the lens of personal experience, specifically the experience of leaving it. The two interviewees, bandmates Wayne Fishell and Keith Miller (aka recording artist big.peaches), were both raised in the Christian tradition – Catholicism and Protestantism, respectively – and hail from the so-called “Bible Belt” of the American South. Questions that arise here include the motivations for pulling away from one’s family tradition, the fallouts and/or benefits associated with doing so, and the long-term effects of separating oneself from the formal, ritualized components of organized religion. 

One zillion thanks to my sweet friends, Wayne and Keith, for spending nearly two hours on a recorded call with me; you boys are the best. Special thanks to Steve Prothero, whose course assignment prompted this podcast and whose approaches to scholarship continue to inspire me to think outside the box. All audio clips used in this episode courtesy of Wayne Fishell.