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PODCAST

American Hysteria

chelsey weber-smith

American Hysteria explores how fantastical thinking has shaped our culture – moral panics, urban legends, hoaxes, crazes, fringe beliefs, and national misunderstandings. Poet-turned-podcaster Chelsey Weber-Smith tells the strangest stories from American history and examines the forces that create the reality we share, and sometimes, the reality we don"t.

society & culture

All Episodes

69:14

SATANIC PANIC EMERGENCY RE-RELEASE

American Hysteria ·

2021/03/30

Lil Nas X and the sexy-ass Satanic imagery featured in Call Me By Your Name has sparked a mini Satanic panic, especially after his Satan Shoes went viral, the ones that contain a drop of human blood. This two-part re-release of our Satanic Panic episodes dives deep into evil cartoons, toys, and games, heavy metal's backward messages, the suspicion of hypnotized teenaged devil worshippers, fake memoirs by alleged members of Satanic cults, and the unfortunate union between feminist and fundamentalist

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52:48

Horror Movies, pt. 1

American Hysteria ·

2021/03/29

Horror movies, consistently written-off by critics, exist unbound from mainstream respectability and because of this, they can often tell us the brutal truth. For this two-part series, we will be investigating what horror movies, their plots, their victims, and their villains reflect back to us about the dominant repressed fears of each generation. From the Big Bug movies of the atomic era, the earliest monster movies of post-WWI eugenics, the psychotherapy gender-panic of Psycho inspiration Ed

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17:08

Rewind: Believing in the Blair Witch

American Hysteria ·

2021/03/22

Leading up to our two-part Horror Movies series, we wanted to return to this little prequel focused on one of my most favorite horror movies ever and the wild story behind one of the most successful horror hoaxes of all time. So listen for the first time or rewind this old Blockbuster VHS and listen again. For more on horror movies and their link to culture, check out our other episodes on Monsters, Rednecks, the Satanic Panic, Phantom Clowns, and Talking to the Dead. There is always more content

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46:46

Unmasking Matilda with Mara Wilson

American Hysteria ·

2021/03/15

Mara Wilson is a writer, actor, and the former star of the 1996 classic movie Matilda as well as the author of the memoir 'Where Am I Now? True Stories of Girlhood and Accidental Fame'. In this episode, Mara shares her relationship to the character that many in the public still see her as 25 years later, and we talk about the dramaturgy of living, our on-stage and off-stage personas, and for Mara, the pressure that comes from yet another mask. We’ll also talk about mental health, queerness, drag and

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54:36

Influencers

American Hysteria ·

2021/03/08

The new American archetype known as the “Influencer” has existed in various forms long before the advent of social media, and long before Kendall Jenner and the offensive brand activism of a now infamous Pepsi commercial. For this episode, we will trace the history of how corporate brands have used the idea of personal “authenticity” to sell us shit we don’t need since the mid 1800s: we’ll hear about the early form of visual social media that swept America in the 1860s, the story of the first living

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41:25

Gen Z and the Millennial with Gael from Teenager Therapy

American Hysteria ·

2021/03/01

Gael Aitor is a senior in high school and the host of the podcast Teenager Therapy, a show where he and four other teenagers talk about mental health and the experiences they share with a rare and empathetic nuance. Today Gael and I will explore the differences and similarities between Gen Z and Millennials and the importance of moving through our egos and being vulnerable. Today, I’ll check in with the kids to find out if they are, in fact, alright. Next week: Influencers Make sure you subscribe

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2:38

American Hysteria: LIVE VARIETY HOUR (Watch the full...

American Hysteria ·

2021/02/22

Our Live Variety Hour is not your run-of-the-mill podcast live show, but an actual two-hour theatrical production performed in 2019. For the first time ever, you can get access to the full video on Patreon (pay what you can)! Using my background as a drag and performance art producer, a handful of my brilliant creative partners and I created a vaudevillian bananas bonanza with skits, drag, dance, stand-up comedy, and videos from clips you'll remember from season one. Expect a lot of weird surprises

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54:50

Children's Programming

American Hysteria ·

2021/02/15

As the nation grapples with a volatile culture war over just what version of American history our children will grow up learning, in this episode we will see that the Public School has always been a complicated, explosive, sometimes bizarre socio-political battleground. We’ll look at the messy transformations of children’s curricula through the conservative and progressive clashes over the bible, evolution, Black anti-literacy laws, Indian boarding schools, anti-commie-patriotism, good suburban

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48:42

We Were Teenage Conspiracy Theorists

American Hysteria ·

2021/02/08

Ellen Cushing's recent piece in The Atlantic called “I was a teenage conspiracy theorist” tells her story as a young Illuminati-truther during the post-9/11 years. Her history with conspiracy theories isn't all that different from my own, so I asked Ellen to join me to talk about our experiences to try to explain what these stories were like back in the 2000s, and how they intersect with the stories we hear now. We’ll also ask the biggest question of all, how do we combat this alternate reality? As

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47:42

Animatronic America with Sarah Marshall of 'You’re...

American Hysteria ·

2021/02/01

Join me and our Disney darling of the day, podcaster Sarah Marshall of ‘You’re Wrong About’ and ‘Why Are Dads?’ as we discuss our love for Disney parks, the weird history of animatronics, and Disneyland’s hilarious, disastrous opening day. So grab a Dole Whip, sit back and enjoy the tour through this gleefully haunted mansion of America. Listen to You’re Wrong About Listen to Why Are Dads? Subscribe to the One Strange Thing podcast today! Thanks to our sponsor Skillshare, get your free trial of

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56:43

Disneyfication

American Hysteria ·

2021/01/25

Disney has been presenting a fairytale reality within a reality since the 1920s, a far cuter reality that mimics our reality until reality is no longer reality at all. Make sense? For this episode, we will look at the possible underlying biological reasons for the success of the Disney corporation and the history of this ever-softening societal construction we call childhood. We’ll explore both the finished and unrealized projects of the company, and how they have long presented us with a much

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40:30

The Theater of Trash with Alissa Bennett

American Hysteria ·

2021/01/18

Alissa Bennett is co-host of The C-Word podcast on Luminary as well as a decorated historian of bad behavior. “By sifting through the cultural trash heap of history,” her podcast dives deep into the lives of famous women who have been called "Crazy" throughout history, the stories that we’re told about them through the tabloid press, and the real life that was happening behind the scenes. Alissa is also the author of four zines; collections of essays reflecting on dozens of fascinating characters in

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57:31

Trash Talk Shows

American Hysteria ·

2021/01/11

There are few pieces of popular culture as problematic as the trash talk shows of the 1980s and 90s. Many of us remember Jerry Springer, Geraldo, Jenny Jones, and so many others trying to outdo each other in a parade of sensationalized deviance. The more outrageous, the better, but some of what was considered outrageous then is different than it is today. These programs certainly reinforced stereotypes and exploited their guests for profit, but like the Freak Shows of the past, they also offered

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35:28

'Falling for Fascism' Emergency Re-Release

American Hysteria ·

2021/01/06

Due to the what appears to be an attempted coup happening right now at the Capitol, I wanted to re-release this vital interview immediately. Please listen and share if you can. This is the colossal power of conspiracy theories. Today we are talking to Jason Stanley, Jewish-American professor of philosophy at Yale University and author of the New York Times bestselling book 'How Fascism Works'. He'll help us understand more about the relationship between conspiracy theories, moral panics, and the

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25:42

Seekers and Swindlers with Glynn Washington

American Hysteria ·

2020/12/14

Podcaster and storyteller Glynn Washington grew up in an extremist religious sect called the Worldwide Church of God and also hosted the Heaven’s Gate podcast about the UFO cult that famously committed a mass suicide in 1997. He’ll tell us all about this experience and how it shaped him, and together we will talk about how cults draw well-meaning people in, and what it means to be a seeker. For more monthly content become a Patron and get access to our new exclusive podcast called Walk with

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63:04

Charismatic Leaders

American Hysteria ·

2020/12/07

The charismatic leaders we are talking about today offer utopia and doomsday, salvation and absolute truth, perfection of the self and of the world at large, as long you dedicate yourself completely to the reality of these embodied Gods. Their radical alternate realities can draw in hundreds, thousands, even millions, as they preach spiritual wholeness and heaven, equality and communalism, or apocalyptic visions of a degrading nation, promising they alone can make it great again. For this episode,

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40:07

Walk with Me

American Hysteria ·

2020/11/30

“I would like to step out of my heart/and go walking beneath the enormous sky”, poet Rainer Maria Rilke wrote in 1918, probably consumed with a similar human anxiety to the one we each bear every weirdass day of our lives. This is the first episode of our new biweekly Patron’s-only podcast where you’ll come on a walk with me, either literally or figuratively, from wherever you happen to be. Walks facilitate, by nature of our very biology, more creative ways of thinking about the world; they are a

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56:02

Black Evangelicalism and the Christian Right with...

American Hysteria ·

2020/11/23

Today we are talking to two scholars of religion, Professor Lerone A. Martin of Washington University in St. Louis and Professor Anthea Butler of the University of Pennsylvania about the relationship between white and black evangelicalism and televangelism in the 20th century through the present day. Lerone is also the author of Preaching on Wax: The Phonograph and the Making of Modern African American Religion and Anthea is the author of Women in the Church of God in Christ: Making a Sanctified

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53:49

Televangelists

American Hysteria ·

2020/11/16

At this point in American culture, televangelists are often seen as overblown parodies, with their pleas for private jets, their fiery sermons, their many scandalous falls from grace. However, millions of people believe in the messages of these celebrity Christians who preach the Prosperity Gospel, that money donated to their megachurches will return to the donor in fantastical ways. Since the 1950s, conservative political preaching has slowly weaved into the gospels of prominent televangelists who

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35:29

Falling for Fascism with Jason Stanley

American Hysteria ·

2020/11/09

Today we are talking to Jason Stanley, Jewish-American professor of philosophy at Yale University and author of the New York Times bestselling book 'How Fascism Works'. He'll help us understand more about the relationship between conspiracy theories, moral panics, and the tactics of fascist movements. Make sure you check out Jason's book 'How Fascism Works', it's vital! Next time on the show: Televangelists Hosted by Chelsey Weber-Smith Produced by Miranda Zickler Sound by Clear Commo

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