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Podcast: New Books in Women's History
Episode: Lauren D. Sawyer, "Growing Up Pure: White Girls, Queer Teens, and the Racial Foundations of Purity Culture" (NYU Press, 2025)
Description: Gaining mass popularity in the mid-1990s with the True Love Waits rally on the Washington Mall, purity culture began as an urge from evangelical conservatives for Christian adolescents to publicly commit to practicing abstinence until marriage. Throughout this decade and the next, millions of evangelical teenagers performed their commitment to sexual purity by signing pledges and wearing purity rings.
Growing Up Pure: White Girls, Queer Teens, and the Racial Foundations of Purity Culture (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Lauren D. Sawyer examines the shaping of purity culture in the United States, looking specifically at the experiences of whi...