American Campus Podcast
40 Episodes
The Hamilton School and conservative civics and leadership centers with Sam Goldman
Today at 12:00 PM
References and suggested readings:
Samuel Goldman, Right Minds: How a Revolt Against Academia Made American Conservatism (Basic Books, 2027)Karl Popper, The Open Society and Its Enemies (Routledge, 1945)Lauren Lassabe Shepherd, “Old Project, New Vehicle: Conservative Civics and Leadership Institutes in Historical Context,” Frontiers of American Illiberalism, May 7, 2025American Campus Podcast episode on Allan Bloom with Mark HlavacikAllan Bloom, The Closing of the American Mind: How Higher Education Has Failed Democracy and Impoverished the Souls of Today's StudentsSaul Bellow, RavelsteinAmerican Campus Podcast episode on Why white nationalists love Plato with Curtis DozierJames Loeffler, Exceptional Hatred: Antisemitism and the Fight over...The Postliberal University with Barrett Taylor
Last Sunday at 12:00 PM
References and suggested readings:
Barrett J. Taylor and Brendan Cantwell, The Postliberal University: Governance, Leadership, and Partisanship in Higher Education (Harvard Education Press, 2026)Burton R. Clark, The Higher Education System: Academic Organization in Cross-National Perspective (University of California Press, 1986)Gary Gerstle, The Rise and Fall of the Neoliberal Order: America and the World in the Free Market Era (Oxford University Press, 2023)Christopher Newfield, Unmaking the Public University: The Forty-Year Assault on the Middle Class (Harvard University Press, 2011)Elizabeth Popp Berman, Thinking Like an Economist: How Efficiency Replaced Equality in U.S. Public Policy (Princeton University Press, 2023)Elizabeth Popp...Campus ghosts, squirrels, and spooks with Chris Broadhurst and Gordon Maples
10/28/2026
References and suggested readings:
Christopher Broadhurst and Gordan W. Maples, Myths, Mysteries, and the Macabre on American Campuses (University of New Orleans Press, 2026)A Thread About Squirrels On College Campuses Totally Blew Up On Twitter, BuzzfeedThe Squirrel Club at the University of MichiganUniversity of South Carolina’s sewer man legendTiya Miles, Tales from the Haunted South: Dark Tourism and Memories of Slavery from the Civil War Era (University of North Carolina Press, 2017)David W. Anthony, The Horse, The Wheel, and Language: How Bronze-Age Riders from the Eurasian Steppes Shaped the Modern World (Princeton University Press, 2010)Patrik Svensson, The Bo...Mutiny: The Rise and Revolt of the College-Educated Working Class with Noam Scheiber
10/25/2026
WATCH this episode on Patreon!
References and suggested readings:
Noam Scheiber, Mutiny: The Rise and Revolt of the College-Educated Working Class (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2026)Dylan Gottlieb, Yuppies: The Bankers, Lawyers, Joggers, and Gourmands Who Conquered New York (Harvard University Press, 2026)Alex Press, “On the Origins of the Professional-Managerial Class: An Interview with Barbara Ehrenreich,” Dissent, October 22, 2019Karent Hao, Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman's OpenAI (Penguin, 2026)Tom Segev, One Palestine, Complete: Jews and Arabs Under the British Mandate (Picador, 2001)Rashid Khalidi, The Hundred Years' War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and...Who’s afraid of American studies? with Iván Chaar López and Erin McElroy
10/21/2026
References and suggested readings:
Iván Chaar López and Erin McElroy, “Who Benefits from Distorting American Studies?” Public Books, June 17, 2026Iván Chaar López, The Cybernetic Border: Drones, Technology, and Intrusion (Duke University Press, 2024)Erin McElroy, Silicon Valley Imperialism: Techno Fantasies and Frictions in Postsocialist Times (Duke University Press, 2024)Theodor Adorno, Authoritarian PersonalityJulian Posada, Platform Extractivism: Data Work and the People Powering Artificial Intelligence (University of California Press, 2026)Michel Serres, Conversations on Science, Culture, and Time: Michel Serres with Bruno Latour (University of Michigan Press, 1995)John Dewey, Democracy and Education OPEN ACCESS PDFMax Horkheimer and Theodor W Adorno...Student protests in France with Michael Stambolis-Ruhstorfer
10/18/2026
WATCH this episode on our Patreon (free)!
References and suggested readings:
Michael Stambolis-Ruhstorfer, By the Power Vested in Me: How Experts Shape Same-Sex Marriage Debates (Columbia University Press, 2025). “French student loses hand to grenade in unprecedented protests,” CNN, October 6, 2026Tom McCarthy, “Paris moves to sue Fox News for false reporting on Muslim 'no-go zones',” The Guardian, February 12, 2015“How racist police infiltration of high schools created the "Bismillah, it's darkness" meme,” LeHuffPost explainerMediapart, French online newspaperCole Stangler, US journalist in franceOctavia E. Butler, The Parables collectionMichael Michael Stambolis-Ruhstorfer’s website and BlueskyThe Secret Is OUTThe Secret Is...
Repressing Palestine on campus before October 7 with Omar Zahzah
10/14/2026
References and suggested readings:
Omar Zahzah, Terms of Servitude: Zionism, Silicon Valley, and Digital Settler Colonialism in the Palestinian Liberation Struggle (The Censored Press, 2025)Omar Zahzah, “A Question of Violence: Palestine in American Academia After October 7,” The Palestine Chronicle, April 3, 2026Eman Ghanayem and Theresa Rocha Beardall, “The University Is a Colony,” Diacritics 52, no. 1 (2024): 8-23Omar Zahzah, “Michigan 8 case is part of a broader pattern of repression,” The Electronic Intifada, August 49, 2026Omar Zahzah, “Two UCSD Professors Face Suspension in the War on Campus Protest,” Institute for Palestine Studies blog, September 3, 2026Purge palentir: Find Palentir near youMESA AFI report on attacks on acade...The university budget with Merle Eisenberg
10/11/2026
Apologies for the mic difficulties on Lauren's end!
References and suggested readings:
Merle Eisenberg’s faculty pageInfectious Historians podcastDean O. Smith, How University Budgets Work (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2019)Dean O. Smith, University Finances: Accounting and Budgeting Principles for Higher Education (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2019)Chris Newfield, The Great Mistake: How We Wrecked Public Universities and How We Can Fix Them (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2018)Office Hours with EABDavid Arnold, Pandemic India: From Cholera to Covid-19 (Oxford University Press, 2022)Michael G. Vann and Liz Clarke, The Great Hanoi Rat Hunt: Empire, Disease, and Modernity in French Co...Tuition discounting with Phillip Levine
10/07/2026
References and suggested readings:
Phillip B. Levine, Hidden Tuition: An Insider's Guide to College Pricing and Financial Aid (University of Chicago Press, 2026)ON COST DISEASE: Dennis M. Hogan, Artificial Negligence: Why are college administrators so eager to adopt AI? Hedgehog Review, Summer 2026Dean Spears and Michael Geruso, After the Spike: Population, Progress, and the Case for People (Simon & Schuster, 2025)Phillip Levine on LinkedIn, MyIntuition.org, Brookings InstitutionThe Secret Is OUTThe Secret Is Out tells the coming-out stories of LGBTQ people —...
Listen on: Apple Podcasts Spotify
Support the show
L...
What colleges (don’t) do about sexual assault with Nicole Bedera
10/03/2026
The Title IX process is working as intended.
References mentioned this episode:
Kendall Danielle Francis explains her assault and her Title IX experienceNicole Bedera, On the Wrong Side: How Universities Protect Perpetrators and Betray Survivors of Sexual Assault (University of California Press, 2024).Classroom resources to accompany On the Wrong SideNicole Bedera’s websiteThe Secret Is OUTThe Secret Is Out tells the coming-out stories of LGBTQ people —...
Listen on: Apple Podcasts Spotify
Support the show
Leave feedback or request an episode / browse the American Campus...
Edmund Burke, father of conservatism with Austin Clements
09/30/2026
References and suggested readings:
Austin J. Clements, ‘The Franco Way’: The American Right and the Spanish Civil War, 1936-9, Journal of Contemporary History 57(2), 341-364Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolutions in FranceCorey Robin, The Reactionary Mind: Conservatism from Edmund Burke to Donald Trump, 2nd edition (Oxford University Press, 2017)Katy Hull, The Machine Has a Soul: American Sympathy with Italian Fascism (Princeton University Press, 2025)John Patrick Diggins, Mussolini and Fascism: The View from America (Princeton University Press, 2015)Russell Kirk, The Conservative Mind: From Burke to EliotDavid Austin Walsh, Liberals Are to Blame for the Rise of J. D. Vance, Bost...Real estate, private equity, and Abundance with Billy Fleming
09/27/2026
References and suggested readings:
Billy Fleming, Building Postcarbon Futures: Land, Justice, and Energy Transitions (Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, 2026).Marshall Terrill, “ASU ranks No. 1 nationally, No. 2 globally for sustainability,” ASU News, September 8, 2026.Davarian L. Baldwin, In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower: How Universities Are Plundering Our Cities (Bold Type, 2021).Kevin Kovaleski, “ASU reaches milestone enrollment,” ASU News, August 10, 2026.Holly Jean Buck, Ending Fossil Fuels: Why Net Zero is Not Enough (Verso, 2021).Thea Riofrancos, Extraction: The Frontiers of Green Capitalism (W. W. Norton, 2025).Joshua Hong, “Universities are buying and selling property for data centers, prompting concerns about an AI brain d...Drugs: The Story of Pharmacology with Rod Flower
09/23/2026
References and suggested readings:
Rod Flower. 2026. Drugs: The Story of Pharmacology. Yale University Press.On the CIA and LSD: MKUltra wikiAldous Huxley. The Doors of Perception and Heaven and Hell.“Celebrities Who’ve Shared Their Ayahuasca Experiences: From Chelsea Handler to Aaron Rodgers.” US Magazine.Freud’s monograph on cocaine: Sigmund Freud. 1894. Über Coca.Rod Flower’s faculty pageThe Secret Is OUTThe Secret Is Out tells the coming-out stories of LGBTQ people —...
Listen on: Apple Podcasts Spotify
Support the show
Leave feedback or request an episode / browse the Ame...
The takeover of New College of Florida with Harry Hanbury and Gaby Batista
09/20/2026
References and suggested readings:
Film website: https://www.firsttheycameformycollege.com/ Rodrigo Diaz, “3 years later, the 'old' New College looks much better,” Sarasota Herald Tribune, January 20, 2026Joshua Janniere, “At the front line of the culture war,” American Reformer, May 1, 2023Adam R Nelson, Dartmouth College V. Woodward: Colleges, Corporations, and the Common Good (University Press of Kansas, 2025)Eli Saslow, Rising Out of Hatred: The Awakening of a Former White Nationalist (Vintage, 2019)R. Derek Black, The Klansman’s Son: My Journey from White Nationalism to Antiracism (Harry N. Abrams, 2024)Old School CatalystThe Secret Is OUTThe Secret Is Out tel...
Class, Race, and Place in Post-Industrial Britain with Amit Singh
09/16/2026
References and suggested readings:
Amit Singh. 2026. Cancelled Futures: Class, Race, and Place in Post-Industrial Britain. Princeton University Press. Paul Willis. Learning to Labor: How Working-Class Kids Get Working-Class Jobs.Arlie Russell Hochschild. 2018. Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right. New Press.Lauren A. Rivera. 2016. Pedigree: How Elite Students Get Elite Jobs. Princeton University Press.Sivamohan Valluvan and Amit Singh. 2026. Pubs for the People: The Fight for the Pint and the Nation. Manchester University Press.Loïc Wacquant. 2026. Rethinking the Penal State. Polity Press.Amit Singh’s faculty page and Bluesky and LinkedInThe Secret Is O...Lords of Serendipity, a campus novel with Randy Boyagoda
09/13/2026
References and suggested readings:
Randy Boyagoda. 2026. Lords of Serendipity. Mariner Books.George Elliot. 1871. Middlemarch.Ralph Ellison. 1952. Invisible Man.Kiran Desai. 2025. The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny. Hogarth.www.randyboyagoda.com Randy Boyagoda’s faculty pageThe Secret Is OUTThe Secret Is Out tells the coming-out stories of LGBTQ people —...
Listen on: Apple Podcasts Spotify
Support the show
Leave feedback or request an episode / browse the American Campus bookshelf
University in stone, silk, and blood with William Whyte
09/09/2026
On the material history of the university
References and suggested readings:
William Whyte. 2026. The University: A History in Stone, Silk, and Blood. Harvard University Press. William Whyte’s faculty page, Twitter, and LinkedInThe Secret Is OUTThe Secret Is Out tells the coming-out stories of LGBTQ people —...
Listen on: Apple Podcasts Spotify
Support the show
Leave feedback or request an episode / browse the American Campus bookshelf
Tuition, Gaza encampments, and tenure with Marshall Steinbaum and David Austin Walsh
09/06/2026
References and suggested readings:
Marshall Steinbaum and David Austin Walsh. 2026. How America’s Public Universities Stopped Being Public. Hedgehog Review.Robert A. Nesbit. 1996. The Degradation of the Academic Dogma. Routledge.Zachary Bleemer and Aashish Mehta. December 2024. College Major Restrictions and Student Stratification. National Bureau of Economic Research.Maya Rosen. October 11, 2026. Degrees of Separation. Jewish Currents. Anna Perez. 2023. Understanding Zionism: History and Perspectives. Fortress Press.F. Scott Fitzgerald. Tender is the Night.Theodore Dreiser. Jennie Gerhardt.Molly Crabapple. 2026. Here Where We Live Is Our Country: The Story of the Jewish Bund. One World.Mark Weitzman, Robert J Williams, James Wal...Big budgets behind big college sports with Karen Weaver
09/02/2026
References and suggested readings:
Karen Weaver. 2026. Understanding College Athletics: What Campus Leaders Need to Know About College Sports. Johns Hopkins University Press. Karen Weaver. 2025. Sport Finance: Where the Money Comes From and Where the Money Goes, 2nd ed. Kendall Hunt.W Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne. 2026. The Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make the Competition Irrelevant. Harvard Business Review Press.Trustees and Presidents Managing Intercollegiate Athletics podcast on YouTubeKaren Weaver’s website, Instagram, Bluesky, LinkedInSupport the show
Leave feedback or request an episode / browse the American Campu...
The Frenchmen with Emily Eakin
08/30/2026
A deep-dive into the personal lives of the famed 20th century French theorists (all men) with their newest biographer.
References and suggested readings:
Emily Eakin. 2026. The Frenchmen: Or, My Life in Theory. Penguin Press.Sarah Bakewell booksRoss Douthat. November 2, 2022. How the Right Became the Left and the Left Became the Right. New York Times.James Miller. 2010. The Passion of Michel Foucault. Harvard University Press.John Guillory and Merve Emre. 2023. Cultural Capital: The Problem of Literary Canon Formation. University of Chicago Press.Meghan O’Gieblyn. 2026. Will and Attention: A Memoir. Doubleday.Emily Eakin’s website, essa...A short history of the connoisseur with Peter Burke
08/26/2026
References and suggested readings:
Peter Burke. 2026. The Connoisseur: A Cultural History. Reaktion Books. Gore Vidal. 2000. Burr: A Novel. Vintage Books.Peter Burke’s websiteSupport the show
Leave feedback or request an episode / browse the American Campus bookshelf
How a media panic led to the modern research university with Chad Wellmon
08/23/2026
On the origins of the German research university and what universities should be today.
References and suggested readings:
Chad Wellmon. 2016. Organizing Enlightenment: Information Overload and the Invention of the Modern Research University. Johns Hopkins University Press.Chad Wellmon. 2026. After the University: Higher Education and the Future of Intellectual Work. Johns Hopkins University Press. Paul Reitter and Chad Wellmon. 2023. Permanent Crisis: The Humanities in a Disenchanted Age. University of Chicago Press.The Other University episode with Chad Wellmon.Ann M. Blair. 2011. Too Much to Know: Managing Scholarly Information Before the Modern Age. Yale University Press.Frank Landymore. F...Classical liberals and Know-Nothings on higher learning with James Chandler
08/19/2026
References and suggested readings:
James Chandler. 2026. The Know-Nothing Campaign Against Higher Learning. Prickly Paradigm Press. Robert Mackey. April 18, 2026. Trump’s antipathy for Pope may have roots in childhood Protestant church. The Guardian.Alexis de Tocqueville. Democracy in America.Wendy Brown. 2017. Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism's Stealth Revolution. Zone Books.Sam Moyn 2024. Liberalism Against Itself: Cold War Intellectuals and the Making of Our Times. Yale University Press.Adam Smith. The Wealth of Nations.Tyler G. Anbinder. 1994. Nativism and Slavery: The Northern Know Nothings and the Politics of the 1850s. Oxford University PressLaura K. Field. 2025. Furious Minds: The Making of the MAG...The KKK comes to UCLA with Trevor Griffey
08/12/2026
References and suggested readings:
Trevor Griffey. 2007. “The Strongest Chapter in WA: Bellingham's KKK.” The Seattle Civil Rights and Labor History Project.Allan J. Lichtman. 2008. White Protestant Nation: The Rise of the American Conservative Movement. Grove Press.Pierce v. Society of Sisters (1925)Lothrop Stoddard WikiPerlstein’s mea culpa: Rick Perlstein. April 11, 2017. I Thought I Understood the American Right. Trump Proved Me Wrong. New York Times Magazine.On MAGA small business owners and car dealers: Alexander Sammon. May 30, 2023. Want to Stare Into the Republican Soul in 2023? Slate. Higher Ed Labor (in California and Beyond) SubstackFollow Trevor on Twitter, BlueSkyhttps://x.com/tre...Country of Lords with Kim Phillips-Fein
08/09/2026
An intellectual history of inequality in the US.
References and suggested readings:
Kim Phillips-Fein. 2026. Country of Lords: Neo-Aristocrats, Social Darwinists, Tech Utopians, and the Long Fight Against Equality in America. W. W. Norton.Kim Phillips-Fein. 2018. Fear City: New York's Fiscal Crisis and the Rise of Austerity Politics. Picador.Kim Phillips-Fein. 2010. Invisible Hands: The Businessmen's Crusade Against the New Deal. W. W. Norton.Corey Robin. 2018. The Reactionary Mind: Conservatism from Endmund Burke to Donald Trump, 2nd ed. Oxford University Press. Open access PDF. Richard Herrnstein. 1971. “i.q.” The Atlantic.Pioneer Fund, the dark money trust that won't let ra...Napoleon’s scientific military school on the US western border with Sveinn M. Jóhannesson
08/05/2026
How Napoleon's École polytechnique inspired A&M universities on the Western US border (ft. some of our favorite topics: American imperialism, science, and social hierarchy)
References and suggested readings:
Sveinn M. Jóhannesson. 2026. The Scientific-Military State: How Enlightened Engineers Reinvented Early American Government. University of Chicago Press. James McNeill Whistler. 1879. Arrangement in Grey and Black No. 1 (known as Portrait of the Artist’s Mother) painting.Livy’s History of RomeTacitus The Annals of Imperial RomeSveinn M. Jóhannesson’s websiteSupport the show
Leave feedback or request an episode / browse the American Ca...
Thorstein Veblen’s The Higher Learning in America with Christian Churchill and Gerald Levy
08/02/2026
A century later, what did Veblen get right?
References and suggested readings:
Christian J. Churchill and Gerald Levy. 2011. The Enigmatic Academy: Class, Bureaucracy, and Religion in American Education. Temple University Press. Thorstein Veblen. 1918. The Higher Learning in America: A Memorandum on the Conduct of Universities by Business Men. PDF.Thorstein Veblen. 1899. The Theory of the Leisure Class. PDF.On Google’s former motto, “Don’t be evil.”Know Your Meme: “Wait. Is this f****** play about us?”Arthur J Vidich and Joseph Bensman. 2000. Small Town in Mass Society: Class, Power, and Religion in a Rural Community. University of...History of college grading with Joshua R. Eyler
07/29/2026
On class rank, Latin honors, the 4.0 grading scale, and other old traditions
References and suggested readings:
Joshua R. Eyler. 2024. Failing Our Future: How Grades Harm Students, and What We Can Do About It. Johns Hopkins University Press. Josh Eyler. February 26, 2024. The Origin of Grades in American Schools. Saturday Evening Post.Adam Laats. 2024. Mr. Lancaster’s System: The Failed Reform That Created America's Public Schools. Johns Hopkins University Press.Victor Hugo. Les Miserables.Follow Josh on LinkedIn and BlueskyJosh Eyler’s faculty page, email Josh at [email protected] The Secret Is OUTThe Secret...
See You at the Pole, the Columbine massacre, and Christianity on campus with Amy Laura Hall
07/26/2026
Muscular Christianity and its various forms on the campus
References and suggested readings:
Amy Laura Hall. 2026. Erecting the Pulpit: Muscular Christianity from Teddy Roosevelt to Donald Trump. Bloomsbury.Theodore Roosevelt. 1899. The Strenuous Life speech.From the vault: [Lawrence] Wright talks to Alec Baldwin about Scientology and Tom Cruise. October 10, 2022.Darren Dochuk. 2019. Anointed with Oil: How Christianity and Crude Made Modern America. Basic Books.Bethany Moreton. 2010. To Serve God and Wal-Mart: The Making of Christian Free Enterprise. Harvard University Press.Daneil Silliman. 2021. An Evangelical Is Anyone Who Likes Billy Graham: Defining Evangelicalism with Carl Henry and Networks o...The Flexner Report and contemporary critiques of medical professionalization with Ira Halpern
07/22/2026
References and suggested readings:
Ira Halpern. 2026. Imagining Health: Medicine, Social Protest, and Modern American Literature. University of Massachusetts Press.Abraham Flexner. 1910. Medical Education in the United States and Canada: A Report to the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.Regina Kunzel. 2024. In the Shadow of Diagnosis: Psychiatric Power and Queer Life. University of Chicago Press.Ivan Illich. 2000. Limits to Medicine: Medical Nemesis - The Expropriation of Health. Marion Boyars Publishers.Ira Halpern’s faculty pageThe Secret Is Out tells the coming-out stories of LGBTQ people —...
How LLMs could have been developed differently with Xiaochang Li
07/19/2026
On the origins of natural language processing and how corporations like IBM leaned into predictive algorithms.
References and suggested readings:
Xiaochang Li. 2026. Divination Engines: Natural Language Processing, Artificial Intelligence, and the Making of Algorithmic Culture. University of Chicago Press.Anil Seth. July 15, 2026. “Once again we are told AI may be conscious – I study consciousness, and I have my doubts.” The Guardian.Paul Kockelman. 2024. Last Words: Large Language Model and the AI Apocalypse. Prickly Paradigm Press.Lief Weatherby. 2025. Language Machines: Cultural AI and the End of Remainder Humanism. University of Minnesota Press.Carlo Ginzburg. 2026. The Cheese and the Wo...Tragedy of the education commons with Guy Standing
07/15/2026
References and suggested readings:
Guy Standing. 2026. Human Capital: The Tragedy of the Education Commons. Penguin Press. “Linda McMahon slaps her daughter Stephanie McMahon-Helmsley: RAW IS WAR, Apr. 17, 2000”Nafeez Ahmed, Peter Jukes, and Hardeep Matharu. July 9, 2026. Palantir Co-Founder Peter Thiel and Reform UK’s Cambridge University Recruitment Pipeline Project Revealed. Byline Times.Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway. 2011. Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Climate Change. Bloomsbury.Ralph Wilson and Isaac Kamola. 2021. Free Speech and Koch Money: Manufacturing a Campus Culture War. Pluto Press.Quinn Slobodian and Ben Tarnoff...Revilo Oliver and the academic freedom of white supremacists with Matthew C. Ehrlich
07/10/2026
References and suggested readings:
Matthew C. Ehrlich. 2021. Dangerous Ideas on Campus: Sex, Conspiracy, and Academic Freedom in the Age of JFK. University of Illinois Press.Matthew C. Ehrlich. 2024. The Krebiozen Hoax: How a Mysterious Cancer Drug Shook Organized Medicine. University of Illinois Press.Pseudoscience and the ethics of academic medicine episode with Matthew C. EhrlichMichael Bérubé and Jennifer Ruth. 2022. It’s Not Free Speech: Race, Democracy, and the Future of Academic Freedom. Johns Hopkins University Press.Mary Anne Franks. 2024. Fearless Speech: Breaking Free from the First Amendment. Bold Type Books.Beware of FIRE (and institutional neutrality) episode with...Disrupting White Noise: Challenging Beliefs about Race on Campus with Zak Foste and Lauren N. Irwin
07/05/2026
References and suggested readings:
Zak Foste and Lauren N. Irwin. 2026. Disrupting White Noise: Challenging Beliefs about Race on Campus. Harvard Education Press. CODE FOR 20% OFF: HCPR26 Elijah Anderson. 2023. Black in White Space: The Enduring Impact of Color in Everyday Life. University of Chicago Press.Beverly Daniel Tatum. 2025. Peril and Promise: College Leadership in Turbulent Times. Basic Books.Sarah J. Mass. 2023. Throne of Glass. Bloomsbury.Colin Diver. 2022. Breaking Ranks: How the Rankings Industry Rules Higher Education and What to Do about It. Johns Hopkins University Press.Follow Lauren N. Irwin and Zak Foste on LinkedInThe Secret Is O...Creating the Black high school with Alexander D. Hyres
07/01/2026
References and suggested readings:
Alexander D. Hyres. 2026. Protest and Pedagogy: Charlottesville’s Black Freedom Struggle and the Making of the American High School. University of Georgia Press. Alex Hyres’s faculty pageHeather Andrea Williams. 2007. Self-Taught: African American Education in Slavery and Freedom. University of North Carolina Press.James D. Anderson. 1988. Education of Blacks in the South, 1860-1935. University of North Carolina Press. Jarvis R. Givens. 2023. Fugitive Pedagogy: Carter G. Woodson and the Art of Black Teaching. Harvard University Press.Vanessa Siddle Walker. 1996. Their Highest Potential: An African American School Community in the Segregated South. University of North Carolina Press...The Other University with Chad Wellmon
06/28/2026
On the student life apparatus.
References and suggested readings:
Chad Wellmon. 2026. After the University: Higher Education and the Future of Intellectual Work. Johns Hopkins University Press. Paul Reitter and Chad Wellmon. 2023. Permanent Crisis: The Humanities in a Disenchanted Age. University of Chicago Press.Chad Wellmon. 2016. Organizing Enlightenment: Information Overload and the Invention of the Modern Research University. Johns Hopkins University Press.Bavarian L. Baldwin. 2021. In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower: How Universities Are Plundering Our Cities. Bold Type Books.David S. Busch. 2025. Disciplining Democracy: How the Modern American University Transformed Student Activism. Cornell University Press.M...Academic gerontocracy with Samuel Moyn
06/24/2026
On age, class, and jobs.
References and suggested readings:
Samuel Moyn. 2026. Gerontocracy in America: How the Old Are Hoarding Power and Wealth—and What to Do About It. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.Samuel Moyn. April 23, 2026. Professors Are Too Old: The Academy’s Gerontocracy Problem is Worse than Anyone Admits. The Chronicle of Higher Education.Dino Buzzati, translated by Lawrence Venuti. 2023. The Stronghold. NYRB Classics.Nazmul Sultan. 2024. Waiting for the People: The Idea of Democracy in Indian Anticolonial Thought. Harvard University Press.Samuel Moyn’s faculty pageFollow Sam on X, The Everything App, @samuelmoynThe Secret Is OUT...
Spirits, specters, and parapsychology professors with Jesse Bering
06/21/2026
Speaking to the dead, academically.
References and suggested readings:
Jesse Bering. 2026. The Incredible Afterlives of Dr. Stevenson: One Scientist's Epic Quest for Evidence of Reincarnation, Apparitions, Poltergeists, and Other Matters of the Soul. University of Chicago Press.Jesse Bering’s websiteBering in Mind SubstackThe Secret Is OUTThe Secret Is Out tells the coming-out stories of LGBTQ people —...
Listen on: Apple Podcasts Spotify
Support the show
Leave feedback or request an episode / browse the American Campus bookshelf
The right’s attempt to capture Western Civ and Jewish Studies with Emmaia Gelman
06/17/2026
A nice companion episode to last week's on The West with Curtis Dozier.
References and suggested readings:
Emmaia Gelman. 2026. The Anti-Defamation League and the Racial State. University of California Press. Alice Speri. April 24, 2026. US universities are seeing an influx of ‘antisemitism centers’. Some Jewish scholars are worried. The Guardian.Lauren Lassabe Shepherd. May 7, 2025. Old Project, New Vehicle: Conservative Civics and Leadership Institutes in Historical Context. Frontiers of American Reaction.Sabri Jiryis. 2025. Foundations of Zionism, translated by Fida Jiryis. Ebb Books.Rana Barakat. 2026. Ongoing Return: Mapping Memory and Storytelling in Palestine. University of North Carolina Press.Emmaia Gelma...The West with Curtis Dozier
06/14/2026
Athens, Jerusalem, and sometimes Rome.
References and suggested readings:
Curtis Dozier. 2026. The White Pedestal: How White Nationalists Use Ancient Greece and Rome to Justify Hate. Yale University Press. Why white nationalists love Plato with Curtis DozierAnders Stephanson. 2025. American Imperatives: The Cold War and Other Measures. Verso.Naoíse Mac Sweeney. 2023. The West: A New History in Fourteen Lives. Dutton.Stephen Graham Jones. 2021. The Only Good Indians. S&S/Saga Press.Dozier’s website, Pharos: Doing Justice to the Classics, Pharos on FacebookCurtis Dozier on BlueSkyThe Secret Is OUTThe Secret Is Out tell...
