Our Members
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Sydney E. Brammer, Assistant Professor
I am an Assistant Professor of Mass Communication at the University of North Florida. I specialize in research exploring digital and social media, gender, identity, and body image, and have a long-held interest in interpersonal communication and close relationships. This, of course, creates room for thinking about and interrogating purity culture. My instructional and investigative efforts meet at the intersection of (a) investment in emerging adults' holistic wellbeing and (b) a belief that they are living and learning in an unprecedented online media environment. My work in the classroom and in my research is anchored by a focus on equipping adolescents and young adults with media literacy tools to critically interpret and craft digital and social media. I am fascinated by the real-world impact of communication and media on our lives and passionate about providing practical and theoretical recommendations that improve the holistic lives of all people. In my free time, I enjoy going to the movies, reading, and volunteering with local nonprofits focused on fine arts (education).
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Victoria Houser, Assistant Teaching Professor
I live in sunny Southern California where I’m an Assistant Teaching Professor in the Writing Program at the University of California, Santa Barbara. My research interests center on cultural and feminist rhetorics with specific attention to gender, sexuality, reproductive justice, and religious trauma. I earned my PhD in the Rhetorics, Communication, and Information Design (RCID) program at Clemson University in 2021. My dissertation, Altared Bodies: Evangelical Purity Rhetorics in the Age of Sexual Politics, won the Victor J. Vitanza Outstanding RCID Dissertation award in April 2022 and was one of three finalists for the Religious Communication Association’s Top Dissertation award in 2022. I am currently working on a book project focusing on the rhetorics of Purity Culture. In addition to my monograph, I recently received a grant to conduct archival research that will support my on-going work on reproductive justice. My research and teaching continue to evolve from my investments in building just, equitable, and communal frameworks for embodied life.
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Kathryn House, Assistant Professor
I am Assistant Professor of Leadership Studies and Practical Theology and Chair of the Rev. Dr. Lee Barker Professorship of Leadership Studies at Meadville Lombard Theological School. My dissertation The Afterlife of White Evangelical Purity Culture engages the legacies of purity culture with preceding campaigns for sexual purity in mind and proposes Christian baptism as a practice of solidarity to counter purity culture's woudning legacies. In addition to purity culture, my research engages prophetic religious leadership, liberationist theological traditions, trauma-informed pastoral and spiritual care, theologies of vocation, and Baptist theologies and ecclesial communities. I am also a Baptist minister ordained in the American Baptist Churches (USA) and affiliated with the Alliance of Baptists.
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Ashley Hudson, Therapist
I am a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW) in Colorado, Texas, and North Carolina, dedicated to helping individuals embrace the sacred journey of becoming their best selves through education and psychotherapy. As the founder of Pearl in Process Counseling, I specialize in supporting the perinatal population through mood disorders, relational challenges, and the profound life transitions that come with this season of life.
With a deep understanding of faith and sexuality, I frequently work with individuals from diverse Christian backgrounds, providing a compassionate space to navigate the intersections of spirituality, mental health, and intimacy. Currently, I am pursuing a PhD in Clinical Sexology, with my research focusing on the impact of Purity Culture on the sexual satisfaction of postpartum women.
Through my work, I aim to empower individuals with the knowledge and tools to cultivate healthier relationships, deeper self-awareness, and a fulfilling sense of intimacy. Whether through therapy, education, or research, my mission is to help others reclaim their narratives and thrive in both their personal and relational lives.
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Kat Klement, Associate Professor
I am an associate professor of psychology at Bemidji State University in Bemidji, Minnesota, and the co-founder/co-director of the Northwoods Queer Outreach. As a sex educator and sex researcher, I focus on the ways that attitudes and perceptions of gender and sexuality influence behavior. I'm particularly interested in the ways that purity culture and rape culture feed each other reciprocally and how the messages we receive through religious and popular culture media reinforce harmful ideas about gender and sexuality.
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Jenny McGrath, Licensed Mental Health Counselor
I am passionate about helping individuals find their way back to their bodies. I have been working with primariiy cis white women who grew up in purity culture for over a decade in my private practice. I believe that movement is the most innate thing about being alive, and I work to help individual and collective bodies find freer movements. I currently live in a van and am traveling around North America with my husband and Boxer dog. Some of my favorite things include rolling around on the ground, laughing with friends, and experiencing new places with my family. My research into purity culture focuses on its psycho-somatic impacts on young, white women and how those impacts convinced many of us becoming missionaries.
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Nicole Miller
Nicole Miller is a doctoral student in the Counseling Psychology Ph.D. program at Arizona State University, currently completing a practicum in Pediatric Neuropsychology at Phoenix Children’s Hospital. She earned her Master’s in Clinical Psychology from Washburn University, with an emphasis on psychological assessment of children, as well as a Master’s in Global Studies from Liberty University and a Bachelor of Science in Psychology from Morehead State University. Nicole’s research examines religious trauma, purity culture, and the impact of gender norms and roles on mental health and well-being, with a particular focus on LGBTQ+ populations. She integrates her clinical training and research to promote holistic, identity-affirming care.
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Allison Murray, Assistant Professor
I am Associate Professor of Feminist Theology and Gender Studies at the University of Oslo. Originally from Canada, I earned a PhD in Theological Studies from the University of Toronto in 2021. My research focuses on the history of gender in the Christian tradition, with specific expertise in anti-feminist theologies amongst American evangelicals in the 20th century.
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Tessi Muskrat, Researcher/Practitioner
I am passionate about supporting healing for people who have had harmful experiences with purity culture. A trained spiritual director and post-traumatic growth coach, I see clients locally as well as via telehealth. I have a MA in counseling psychology and am a doctoral student at the University of Missouri, where I study the various manifestations of adverse religious experiences and their healing. Co-founder of PCRC, my research centers the voices of those who have experienced sexual and gender-based trauma in religious contexts. Upcoming projects examine the impact of purity culture's gender binary on persons assigned male at birth, as well as on trans and nonbinary folks. I am especially interested in the ways that post-purity culture adults achieve empowerment through healing from oppressive systems in religious spaces. When I'm not working or researching, I enjoy snuggling my cats, watching trees dance in the wind, and playing complex tabletop board games with friends.
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Karly Poyner-Smith, Assistant Professor
I am an Assistant Professor of Communication Studies at Columbia College of Missouri. I teach courses relating to culture, identity, and politics within the Communication and Women's Studies disciplines such as Argumentation, Political Communication, Gender Communication, Health Communication, and Interpersonal Communication. I earned my Ph.D. in Communication from the University of Memphis and my M.A. in Communication Studies from Ball State University with an emphasis in Liberal Arts and Sciences Scholarship. My research focuses on using critical mixed methods to explore political, religious/spiritual, and health communication. Topics of interest include American evangelical politicism, purity discourse, and media and religion. Outside of my research and teaching, I am a fan of triathlons, trail running, and reality T.V.
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Lauren D. Sawyer, Ethicist and Educator
I am affiliate faculty at The Seattle School of Theology and Psychology where I teach graduate courses in theology and develop trauma-sensitive curricula for one of its non-degree programs. I earned my Ph.D. in Christian Social Ethics from Drew University, and as a doctoral student, I served as submissions editor for the Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion. My debut book, Growing Up Pure: White Girls, Queer Teens, and the Racial Foundations of Purity Culture, was published with New York University Press. Living in the North Beacon Hill neighborhood of Seattle, I enjoy a well-brewed cup of coffee and chilly swims in Puget Sound.
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Noelle Simpson, Researcher/Public Health Practictioner & Anthropologist
I am a public health professional with a focus in health promotion and global health. My expertise as a practictioner sits within public health interventions, project and program management, capacity building & training, monitoring and evaluation, and qualitative research and anthropology. I have over 10 years of experience managing programs within the social impact/charity sector and in low resource environments alongside and for marginalised populations such as: women and children (maternal newborn child health), rural healthcare workers, people with mobility disabilities in LREs, children with disabilities, immigrants and people living with chronic disease.
With a history working in mostly women’s health programs, I am now working on PhD in medical anthropology focusing on the health impacts on women related to the purity culture movement.