The Evangelical Tradwife

Abstract

This article analyzes the Instagram account of the Christian (evangelical) influencer @realbrittanydawn, focusing on how she uses the aesthetics of the tradwife phenomenon and those of religious influencers, drawing parallels with “Cowboy Christianity,” to position her account at the intersection of gender, nationalism, and religion. It outlines the tradwife figure and discusses the role of Cowboy Christianity and the Christian cowboy ideal as specific expressions of conservative evangelicalism. Using a combination of Bildcluster Analyse (image cluster analysis) and Text- und thematische Feldanalyse (text and thematic field analysis), the Instagram account of @realbrittanydawn will be analyzed. The article situates the analyzed representations within the framework of the hegemonic gender order and interprets them as expressions of contemporary female subjectivation on social media merging claims of tradition and modernity. Our analysis shows that @realbrittanydawn incorporates conservative evangelicalism as part of Cowboy Christianity, cowboy culture, and elements of the tradwife phenomenon into her Instagram account. Therefore, she can be classified as a subtype of both the tradwife phenomenon and evangelical conservative influencers. Her political positioning as part of the Make America Great Again movement is evident in the underlying structure of her content. She uses social media aesthetics and her portrayal as a homemaker and housewife, in line with the notion of biblical womanhood, to present and promote her political messages in an appealing way to her followers and a broader audience.