American Campus Podcast

a social and political history of higher education

American Campus Podcast is a history podcast hosted by Lauren Lassabe Shepherd, with 153 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Lauren Lassabe Shepherd hosts American Campus Podcast, a history show with 153 episodes published.

Our AI reads these to draft pitches. Use them as grounding for a pitch that cites a real guest and a specific topic.

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  American Campus Podcast

  Classical liberals and Know-Nothings on higher learning with James Chandler

  Aug 19, 202625 min

  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 Press Laura K. Field. 2025. Furious Minds: The Making of the MAGA New Right . Princeton University Press. Jennifer Pitts. Kayfabe, Trolling, Satire, and Cynicism . Prickly Paradigm Press blog. Richard Hofstadter. 1966. Anti-Intellectualism in American Life . Vintage. Thorstein Veblen. 1918. The Higher Learning in America: A Memorandum on the Conduct of Universities by Business Men . Open Access PDF. American Campus episodes on Thorstein Veblen and with Laura Field on Furious Minds . Text the show here! Support the show Browse the American Campus bookshelf

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  American Campus Podcast

  The KKK comes to campus in the 1930s with Trevor Griffey

  Aug 12, 202637 min

  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 Wiki Perlstein’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) Substack Follow Trevor on Twitter , BlueSky https://x.com/trevorgriffey/status/2080041013507510403?s=46 Text the show here! Support the show Browse the American Campus bookshelf

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  American Campus Podcast

  Neo-Aristocrats, Social Darwinists, Tech Utopians, and the Long Fight Against Equality with Kim Phillips-Fein

  Aug 9, 202640 min

  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 race science die American Campus episode with John P. Jackson Jr. Victor S. Navasky. 2003. Naming Names . Hill and Wang. Thomas Mann. 1996. Magic Mountain . Vintage. Anna Veltfort. 2019. Goodbye, My Havanna: The Life and Times of a Gringa in Revolutionary Cuba . Redwood Press. Kim Phillips-Fein’s faculty page kimphillipsfein.com Text the show here! Support the show Browse the American Campus bookshelf

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  American Campus Podcast

  The Scientific-Military State comes to the US with Sveinn M. Jóhannesson

  Aug 5, 202620 min

  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 Rome Tacitus The Annals of Imperial Rome Sveinn M. Jóhannesson’s website Text the show here! Support the show Browse the American Campus bookshelf

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  American Campus Podcast

  Thorstein Veblen’s The Higher Learning in America with Christian Churchill and Gerald Levy

  Aug 2, 202648 min

  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 Illinois Press. Hannah Arendt. The Origins of Totalitarianism . Tragedy of the education commons episode with Guy Standing Herbert Blumer. 1986. Symbolic Interactionism: Perspective and Method . University of California Press. Peter Gould. 2026. Part for the Whole . Whetstone Publishing. John Williams. Stoner . Elizabeth Cotton. 2025. Ubertherapy: The New Business of Mental Health . Bristol University Press. christianjchurchill.com Jerry Levy’s faculty page Text the show here! Support the show Browse the American Campus bookshelf

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