The Creation of American Democracy with Johann Neem

 What is the American experiment?  Johann Neem explores this question in books and essays, beginning with his Creating a Nation of Joiners:  Democracy and Civil Society in Early National Massachusetts, which showed how Americans created a civil society which fostered their independence.  He explored how newly-independent Americans created a system of public education to sustain the republic, in Democracy's Schools: The Rise of Public Education in America, and he continues to explore these questions of American identity and civic culture.  A Professor of History at Western Washington University, Neem has also written of the role of colleges today, and on the state of k-12 education in preparing citizens for the next 250 years. 

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 Hello, everyone,
 
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 and welcome to the Revolution Two Fifty
 
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 podcast.
 
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 I am Bob Allison,
 
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 co-chair of Rev Two Fifty.
 
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 We're a consortium with seventy five
 
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 organizations in Massachusetts which have
 
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 been planning commemorations of American
 
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 independence.
 
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 I also teach at Suffolk University.
 
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 And our guest today is Yohann Neame,
 
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 who is a professor of history at Western
 
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 Washington University,
 
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 former editor of the Journal of the Early
 
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 Republic and many other things which we
 
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 will be talking about.
 
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 Yohann, thank you so much for joining us.
 
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 Oh, it's a real pleasure to be here.
 
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 Thank you for inviting me.
 
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 And you have a lot of things we
 
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 can talk about.
 
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 Your first book,
 
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 Creating a Nation of Joiners,
 
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 is about democracy and civil society in
 
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 early national Massachusetts,
 
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 which really looks at kind of the life
 
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 of democracy at the founding.
 
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 So what taught you on to that particular
 
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 topic?
 
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 Yeah, that's a great question.
 
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 It was the nineteen nineties that got me
 
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 onto it.
 
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 I mean, one of the things, you know,
 
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 that those of us who lived through the
 
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 nineteen nineties remember is the end of
 
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 the Cold War, right?
 
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 The fall of the Berlin Wall,
 
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 the fall of the Soviet Union.
 
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 It was a moment where we really thought
 
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 that democracy was the future.
 
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 There were emerging democracies in Eastern
 
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 Europe and Central Asia.
 
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 And there was so much effort put into
 
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 developing civil societies in these new
 
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 places and cultivating citizenship and
 
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 legal regimes that are friendly to
 
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 non-governmental organizations.
 
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 And unlike today,
 
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 where democracy is globally struggling
 
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 against authoritarian forces,
 
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 this was a moment where we really felt
 
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 good about the future of democracy.
 
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 So I turned back to the United States
 
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 and I said, you know,
 
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 the United States was the world's first
 
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 emerging democracy.
 
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 Obviously,
 
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 that's anachronistic to frame it that way.
 
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 But how did Americans learn how to go
 
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 from being subjects to citizens?
 
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 How did they become active in their
 
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 political life?
 
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 How did they learn to organize?
 
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 How did they learn?
 
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 to work together to accomplish shared
 
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 purposes, because that's what, you know,
 
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 European and American foreign aid,
 
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 private philanthropy was trying to teach
 
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 people in these emerging democracies of
 
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 Europe and Central Asia to accomplish.
 
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 And so I wanted to know how it
 
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 happened here.
 
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 Wow.
 
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 And what did you find?
 
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 Well,
 
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 I found in a weird way that the
 
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 United States story echoed some of the
 
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 stories of what we were seeing in the
 
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 former Soviet republics in two ways.
 
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 First,
 
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 the leaders of these former Soviet
 
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 republics were saying,
 
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 this is not the time to allow the
 
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 proliferation of groups and NGOs.
 
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 We're unstable.
 
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 We're uncertain.
 
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 This is a time for unity.
 
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 We can't handle this kind of pluralism.
 
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 And so they wanted to clamp down on
 
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 them.
 
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 Well, in fact,
 
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 that's kind of what the federalist party
 
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 wanted as well.
 
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 Um,
 
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 and to try to maintain unity of a
 
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 fragile Republic, self-created societies,
 
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 self-created societies, right.
 
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 Where, I mean, not just partisan ones,
 
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 you know, religious ones,
 
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 even charitable associations, right.
 
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 Really limit legal access to the
 
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 privileges of forming a group.
 
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 The other thing was that it wasn't
 
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 natural.
 
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 Like the story at the time seemed to
 
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 be following Tocqueville.
 
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 that Americans somehow were natural
 
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 joiners.
 
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 It came in with the first boats in
 
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 the town meetings and the church
 
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 gatherings.
 
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 But it actually took a lot of learning
 
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 for people to learn how to apply what
 
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 they were doing in those contexts to
 
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 forming temperance societies or moral
 
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 societies or later anti-slavery societies.
 
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 And so the skills of being a citizen
 
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 that we take for granted now,
 
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 All of my students know if you go
 
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 to a club meeting,
 
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 someone's going to be elected treasurer,
 
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 someone's going to be elected secretary.
 
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 There's going to be some constitution.
 
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 There's some bylaws.
 
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 All of that had to be learned and
 
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 then popularized so that ordinary citizens
 
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 knew what to do with these skills.
 
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 I call it a new technology.
 
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 People really embraced it.
 
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 It became a mass technology by the
 
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 eighteen thirties,
 
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 forties when Tocqueville finally arrives
 
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 and comments on it.
 
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 But there's a back story of learning,
 
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 of civic learning.
 
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 And this sounds like the project you've
 
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 been pursuing in the book you're working
 
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 on now,
 
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 looking at this again on this ground
 
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 level, aside from the political world,
 
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 which we know a lot about,
 
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 looking at these groups forming and
 
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 citizens doing these mundane tasks.
 
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 Yeah, well, thank you for asking.
 
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 The book I'm working on now is called,
 
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 or at least tentatively called,
 
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 The Daily Life of Democracy.
 
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 And
 
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 what I'm looking at is how citizens engage
 
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 in mundane tasks that brought them
 
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 together and made them see themselves as
 
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 stakeholders in the larger enterprise of
 
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 civic life.
 
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 And in the early Republic,
 
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 there were three ways.
 
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 There was the sharing of the providing of
 
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 public services,
 
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 so people
 
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 Ordinary citizens had to be in the
 
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 militia, had to work the roads.
 
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 The only remnant we really have is jury
 
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 duty or volunteer fire companies.
 
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 It was commonplace and widespread then
 
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 that people had to participate.
 
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 The second way was volunteering.
 
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 And the third way, which is really lovely,
 
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 is that people really cared and took
 
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 seriously being good neighbors.
 
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 And what's been interesting about this was
 
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 I went in trying to learn about how
 
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 citizens thought about voting and how
 
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 citizens thought about politics formally
 
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 defined.
 
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 But in their diaries, in their memoirs,
 
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 in their farm books, in their letters,
 
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 they wrote about this other stuff way more
 
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 often.
 
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 And it took me a while to realize
 
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 that.
 
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 This is what cultivated a really vibrant
 
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 participatory civic culture and made
 
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 Americans feel like they were part of
 
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 something larger.
 
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 It was this daily giving to each other
 
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 at a local level.
 
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 That's interesting.
 
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 I'm just thinking about this, of course,
 
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 in the current context where much of the
 
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 focus is on things that are happening far
 
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 away but are very important politically,
 
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 whereas this is really the stuff of
 
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 democracy,
 
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 these communities that people were
 
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 building on the ground.
 
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 That's absolutely right.
 
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 I mean,
 
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 one of the things that I think will
 
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 make a big difference in helping us
 
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 through the democratic crisis we're facing
 
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 today is if more people met in person,
 
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 because I think, you know,
 
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 then the polls show this,
 
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 that the more time we spend
 
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 watching the media,
 
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 the more we think the people on the
 
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 other side are like the extreme version of
 
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 the people on the other side.
 
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 But when people meet in gatherings and
 
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 they actually meet a Republican or
 
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 Democrat, you know,
 
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 and they realize they're not that far
 
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 apart and they're actually good people and
 
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 they really have some shared concerns and
 
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 interests, people change their attitudes.
 
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 And so I think it's really important that
 
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 we find ways to bring people together face
 
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 to face again.
 
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 I think you're right.
 
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 We're talking with Yohann Neen,
 
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 professor of history at Western Washington
 
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 University.
 
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 And you also have written a good deal
 
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 about both the history of public education
 
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 as well as education generally.
 
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 In your book, Democracy Schools,
 
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 looks at the rise of public education in
 
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 America.
 
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 And tell something of a different story,
 
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 the story we have of the nineteenth
 
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 century,
 
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 this attempt to acculturate immigrants,
 
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 and you really show that this has much,
 
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 public education has much deeper roots.
 
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 No, that's right.
 
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 I think, you know,
 
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 when I started that book,
 
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 part of my impetus was
 
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 You know,
 
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 the nineteen sixties and seventies saw a
 
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 real revisionist bent associated with the
 
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 new left and also with the new right.
 
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 And if you followed the path down both
 
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 sides,
 
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 then both sides had legitimate criticisms,
 
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 which shaped my interpretation.
 
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 And I didn't discount, you know, either.
 
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 But what was lost in this kind of
 
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 bathwater was the baby.
 
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 What was public education for?
 
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 Where did it come from?
 
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 What are its purposes?
 
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 And at a time when Americans are a
 
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 little bit, you know,
 
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 uncertain about the future of public
 
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 schools,
 
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 I wanted to go back and remind people
 
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 why did people want them?
 
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 How did they emerge?
 
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 What made them work?
 
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 While taking seriously all the conflicts
 
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 around them and all their shortcomings as
 
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 well.
 
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 But I tried to argue that, you know,
 
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 that the public schools really were
 
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 developed locally,
 
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 not without state support,
 
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 but they were developed locally.
 
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 which helped create collective buy-in.
 
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 And the transition from thinking of
 
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 education as a private good to a public
 
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 good was a really difficult but important
 
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 transition in our nation's history.
 
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 And of course,
 
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 I took seriously this idea that public
 
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 schools were seen as common schools for a
 
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 reason,
 
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 that a diverse society really needs common
 
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 institutions where people come together
 
 00:08:51.659 --> 00:08:53.140
 and learn to be Americans together.
 
 00:08:53.181 --> 00:08:53.480
 And that
 
 00:08:54.335 --> 00:08:55.796
 That was important, you know,
 
 00:08:55.916 --> 00:08:57.317
 bringing rich and poor together,
 
 00:08:57.437 --> 00:08:58.998
 immigrants and native-born together.
 
 00:08:59.437 --> 00:09:02.039
 That integrative function was really an
 
 00:09:02.080 --> 00:09:03.760
 important function of public education,
 
 00:09:04.361 --> 00:09:05.422
 and I think remains so.
 
 00:09:07.663 --> 00:09:08.183
 I think you're right.
 
 00:09:08.203 --> 00:09:09.625
 So let's just talk a little.
 
 00:09:10.666 --> 00:09:12.267
 Many of our listeners don't know about the
 
 00:09:12.307 --> 00:09:13.967
 history of public education, then,
 
 00:09:14.008 --> 00:09:15.688
 which you trace in the book.
 
 00:09:15.749 --> 00:09:18.671
 So is it really a New England phenomenon,
 
 00:09:18.691 --> 00:09:20.692
 or do you find this in other places
 
 00:09:20.792 --> 00:09:22.052
 outside of Puritan New England?
 
 00:09:24.217 --> 00:09:25.599
 Well, I tell a national story.
 
 00:09:26.219 --> 00:09:28.799
 And, you know,
 
 00:09:29.080 --> 00:09:31.640
 one of the things I found was New
 
 00:09:31.721 --> 00:09:33.061
 England and the mid-Atlantic states,
 
 00:09:33.100 --> 00:09:34.922
 and then, of course, the old Northwest,
 
 00:09:35.001 --> 00:09:37.623
 Ohio, places like that,
 
 00:09:37.643 --> 00:09:38.682
 they're in the forefront of the
 
 00:09:38.722 --> 00:09:39.984
 development of public schools.
 
 00:09:40.823 --> 00:09:43.044
 But southern states are catching up by the
 
 00:09:43.085 --> 00:09:45.284
 time of the Civil War, you know,
 
 00:09:45.446 --> 00:09:46.046
 and for white,
 
 00:09:46.265 --> 00:09:48.907
 free white students in the South.
 
 00:09:49.187 --> 00:09:49.407
 And
 
 00:09:50.288 --> 00:09:51.708
 One of the reasons they start catching up
 
 00:09:51.769 --> 00:09:54.169
 is they discover what the North was doing.
 
 00:09:54.730 --> 00:09:56.571
 So Northern states really built schools
 
 00:09:56.630 --> 00:09:59.832
 locally and they really tapped into local
 
 00:09:59.873 --> 00:10:00.373
 citizens.
 
 00:10:00.413 --> 00:10:00.673
 You know,
 
 00:10:00.732 --> 00:10:02.833
 states would pass laws that said you have
 
 00:10:02.854 --> 00:10:04.794
 to form a district and in return for
 
 00:10:04.835 --> 00:10:05.534
 taxation,
 
 00:10:06.255 --> 00:10:08.136
 citizens have to come together and do
 
 00:10:08.177 --> 00:10:08.876
 these things.
 
 00:10:08.996 --> 00:10:10.677
 And then citizens would work locally to do
 
 00:10:10.697 --> 00:10:11.317
 these things,
 
 00:10:11.899 --> 00:10:13.359
 which also meant that you could build
 
 00:10:13.739 --> 00:10:14.840
 public institutions
 
 00:10:15.631 --> 00:10:17.153
 at a time when the state doesn't have
 
 00:10:17.192 --> 00:10:18.634
 the kind of bureaucracy where they would
 
 00:10:18.673 --> 00:10:19.855
 build it from the top down.
 
 00:10:20.294 --> 00:10:21.076
 Right.
 
 00:10:21.115 --> 00:10:22.475
 Southern states when, you know,
 
 00:10:22.515 --> 00:10:23.476
 not all Southern states,
 
 00:10:23.517 --> 00:10:25.018
 but Southern states that tried to follow
 
 00:10:25.057 --> 00:10:27.740
 in that path at first tried to build
 
 00:10:27.779 --> 00:10:29.380
 from the top down because they weren't,
 
 00:10:30.061 --> 00:10:31.682
 they had a different political structure,
 
 00:10:32.283 --> 00:10:33.844
 but then they shifted in places like North
 
 00:10:33.884 --> 00:10:35.745
 Carolina and Mississippi and Alabama.
 
 00:10:36.730 --> 00:10:38.192
 started to see in the eighteen forties and
 
 00:10:38.231 --> 00:10:40.053
 fifties real growth in the number and
 
 00:10:40.094 --> 00:10:41.716
 enrollment in public schools.
 
 00:10:41.755 --> 00:10:44.359
 And so they were catching up for white
 
 00:10:44.379 --> 00:10:45.220
 students in the south.
 
 00:10:45.240 --> 00:10:45.480
 Right.
 
 00:10:45.659 --> 00:10:48.163
 And so that surprised me, actually.
 
 00:10:48.222 --> 00:10:49.423
 But the trick was,
 
 00:10:49.884 --> 00:10:51.385
 how do you build a public system?
 
 00:10:51.447 --> 00:10:52.827
 And it's really tapping into the
 
 00:10:52.847 --> 00:10:55.230
 commitments of local citizens and having
 
 00:10:55.270 --> 00:10:57.432
 them do a lot of the work on
 
 00:10:57.472 --> 00:10:57.894
 the ground.
 
 00:10:59.522 --> 00:11:01.923
 So it really is essential for democracy
 
 00:11:01.943 --> 00:11:03.865
 and it is part of this democratization
 
 00:11:03.885 --> 00:11:05.606
 you've been talking about that is local
 
 00:11:05.647 --> 00:11:07.128
 communities or citizens and local
 
 00:11:07.148 --> 00:11:09.789
 communities building these institutions
 
 00:11:09.830 --> 00:11:13.033
 that are meant as a way of perpetuating
 
 00:11:13.092 --> 00:11:14.274
 this idea of citizenship.
 
 00:11:15.702 --> 00:11:17.182
 I think that's fundamental to what makes
 
 00:11:17.202 --> 00:11:18.144
 democracy work.
 
 00:11:18.264 --> 00:11:18.563
 You know,
 
 00:11:18.624 --> 00:11:22.465
 I think when we see ourselves as consumers
 
 00:11:22.504 --> 00:11:24.164
 of public goods rather than producers of
 
 00:11:24.184 --> 00:11:24.424
 them,
 
 00:11:25.524 --> 00:11:27.466
 our attitude towards the state changes and
 
 00:11:27.485 --> 00:11:28.745
 towards government changes.
 
 00:11:29.505 --> 00:11:30.625
 And it's much more likely we're going to
 
 00:11:30.645 --> 00:11:32.226
 be estranged from that state, right?
 
 00:11:32.246 --> 00:11:33.647
 It's much more likely we're going to see
 
 00:11:33.667 --> 00:11:35.528
 the state when it acts as something
 
 00:11:35.567 --> 00:11:36.347
 foreign to us.
 
 00:11:36.868 --> 00:11:38.587
 But when we're co-producers in it,
 
 00:11:38.827 --> 00:11:39.168
 you know,
 
 00:11:39.187 --> 00:11:40.729
 it doesn't mean we all have consensus.
 
 00:11:40.749 --> 00:11:41.688
 There's not arguments.
 
 00:11:42.115 --> 00:11:42.937
 School board meetings,
 
 00:11:43.018 --> 00:11:43.918
 even in the eighteen thirties,
 
 00:11:43.938 --> 00:11:44.921
 could be quite contentious.
 
 00:11:44.961 --> 00:11:45.261
 You know,
 
 00:11:46.003 --> 00:11:47.826
 it means that the people see a
 
 00:11:47.846 --> 00:11:51.030
 relationship between what they do and what
 
 00:11:51.072 --> 00:11:53.416
 their labor is and the goods being
 
 00:11:53.456 --> 00:11:53.916
 provided.
 
 00:11:55.774 --> 00:11:57.034
 I think that's really important that
 
 00:11:57.115 --> 00:11:59.638
 people feel they have a stake in the
 
 00:11:59.998 --> 00:12:02.301
 institutions that not only govern them,
 
 00:12:02.321 --> 00:12:04.062
 but shape their life, public and private.
 
 00:12:04.102 --> 00:12:05.644
 Right.
 
 00:12:05.924 --> 00:12:06.445
 It really is.
 
 00:12:07.265 --> 00:12:08.748
 And it really makes us think about the
 
 00:12:08.807 --> 00:12:10.448
 nature of the revolution,
 
 00:12:10.509 --> 00:12:13.211
 which puts this responsibility on citizens
 
 00:12:13.231 --> 00:12:13.812
 to do this.
 
 00:12:15.441 --> 00:12:15.902
 That's right.
 
 00:12:15.981 --> 00:12:16.221
 I mean,
 
 00:12:16.282 --> 00:12:18.203
 I think one of the things I find
 
 00:12:19.205 --> 00:12:22.168
 so fun to teach is I teach Tim
 
 00:12:22.207 --> 00:12:23.970
 Breen's book, American Insurgents,
 
 00:12:24.230 --> 00:12:26.592
 in my introductory survey course.
 
 00:12:27.514 --> 00:12:29.336
 And my students are blown away by the
 
 00:12:29.375 --> 00:12:32.438
 thought that our founders were responding
 
 00:12:32.479 --> 00:12:33.820
 to pressure from below.
 
 00:12:34.721 --> 00:12:37.183
 But they also quite quickly pick up that
 
 00:12:37.485 --> 00:12:38.547
 The centrality, you know,
 
 00:12:38.706 --> 00:12:42.307
 Breen's book argues that New Englanders,
 
 00:12:42.668 --> 00:12:45.009
 because they had a lot of sort of
 
 00:12:45.370 --> 00:12:46.671
 social capital, you know,
 
 00:12:46.691 --> 00:12:47.610
 they were in churches,
 
 00:12:47.650 --> 00:12:49.052
 they formed committees quickly,
 
 00:12:49.652 --> 00:12:51.232
 that they got out ahead of the members
 
 00:12:51.253 --> 00:12:54.195
 of Congress and actually pushed Congress
 
 00:12:54.514 --> 00:12:56.355
 to move towards independence faster than
 
 00:12:56.375 --> 00:12:56.836
 they might.
 
 00:12:57.576 --> 00:12:58.957
 And we miss that if we just look
 
 00:12:59.018 --> 00:13:00.739
 at the documents coming out of Congress.
 
 00:13:01.600 --> 00:13:03.581
 But they realize they don't have those
 
 00:13:03.621 --> 00:13:04.582
 same institutions.
 
 00:13:04.602 --> 00:13:06.043
 They're not members of the same kinds of
 
 00:13:06.083 --> 00:13:06.365
 groups.
 
 00:13:06.384 --> 00:13:08.506
 So they asked themselves if they were to
 
 00:13:08.527 --> 00:13:09.888
 face a similar threat today.
 
 00:13:10.833 --> 00:13:12.394
 Would they be in a situation where they
 
 00:13:12.434 --> 00:13:13.635
 knew how to mobilize,
 
 00:13:13.655 --> 00:13:14.937
 that they knew how to connect?
 
 00:13:16.999 --> 00:13:22.722
 And so they quickly see and are surprised
 
 00:13:22.763 --> 00:13:25.965
 by just how much citizens could do.
 
 00:13:27.245 --> 00:13:28.106
 And they're inspired by that,
 
 00:13:28.167 --> 00:13:28.687
 quite honestly.
 
 00:13:28.706 --> 00:13:30.249
 That's true.
 
 00:13:30.548 --> 00:13:32.649
 We found that in Massachusetts,
 
 00:13:32.690 --> 00:13:34.451
 where you have in the end of seventeen
 
 00:13:34.491 --> 00:13:34.971
 seventy two,
 
 00:13:35.011 --> 00:13:37.274
 the Boston town meeting sends out this
 
 00:13:37.313 --> 00:13:39.375
 report to the towns and then the towns
 
 00:13:39.434 --> 00:13:40.155
 responds to it.
 
 00:13:40.652 --> 00:13:42.832
 And many of the town's responses go far
 
 00:13:42.873 --> 00:13:46.193
 beyond what this Boston group was saying.
 
 00:13:46.933 --> 00:13:50.274
 So this revolution really is happening all
 
 00:13:50.375 --> 00:13:50.554
 over,
 
 00:13:50.575 --> 00:13:52.535
 and they're not waiting for Samuel Adams
 
 00:13:52.556 --> 00:13:53.556
 to issue an edict.
 
 00:13:54.376 --> 00:13:54.817
 That's right.
 
 00:13:54.897 --> 00:13:55.736
 That's right.
 
 00:13:56.116 --> 00:13:58.798
 The people feel empowered to act and to
 
 00:13:58.817 --> 00:14:01.418
 put pressure on those who are above them,
 
 00:14:01.499 --> 00:14:01.719
 right?
 
 00:14:01.778 --> 00:14:03.659
 And I think that's amazing.
 
 00:14:04.292 --> 00:14:05.113
 It really is.
 
 00:14:05.133 --> 00:14:06.333
 We're talking with Johan Niem,
 
 00:14:06.374 --> 00:14:08.034
 who's a professor of history at Western
 
 00:14:08.075 --> 00:14:09.336
 Washington University.
 
 00:14:09.355 --> 00:14:11.577
 You know,
 
 00:14:11.597 --> 00:14:13.519
 you have been teaching at Western
 
 00:14:13.559 --> 00:14:14.801
 Washington for a long time,
 
 00:14:14.860 --> 00:14:16.501
 and many of us who are involved in
 
 00:14:16.722 --> 00:14:18.583
 teaching don't really think about the
 
 00:14:18.644 --> 00:14:19.945
 abstract nature of college.
 
 00:14:19.985 --> 00:14:21.005
 But you actually have.
 
 00:14:21.046 --> 00:14:23.008
 And you've written a number of books about
 
 00:14:23.048 --> 00:14:23.948
 college education,
 
 00:14:23.989 --> 00:14:25.649
 including something that seems
 
 00:14:26.490 --> 00:14:28.351
 it's been a timely question for the last
 
 00:14:28.392 --> 00:14:29.052
 thirty years at least.
 
 00:14:29.091 --> 00:14:30.273
 What's the point of college?
 
 00:14:30.312 --> 00:14:32.514
 Seeking purpose in an age of reform.
 
 00:14:33.153 --> 00:14:36.176
 And it's a fascinating topic about what is
 
 00:14:36.216 --> 00:14:37.056
 the purpose of college?
 
 00:14:37.076 --> 00:14:38.557
 We've seen it particularly since the
 
 00:14:38.596 --> 00:14:40.477
 financial meltdown in two thousand eight
 
 00:14:40.518 --> 00:14:42.198
 with why are we spending so much?
 
 00:14:42.219 --> 00:14:44.820
 So if you want to tell us what
 
 00:14:44.879 --> 00:14:45.980
 is the purpose of college?
 
 00:14:47.081 --> 00:14:47.662
 Read the book.
 
 00:14:49.123 --> 00:14:50.442
 Aside from employing you and me.
 
 00:14:50.462 --> 00:14:50.582
 Yeah.
 
 00:14:50.602 --> 00:14:52.924
 Yeah.
 
 00:14:52.945 --> 00:14:54.605
 The title of the book really depends on
 
 00:14:54.666 --> 00:14:55.186
 intonation.
 
 00:14:55.245 --> 00:14:55.525
 It could be
 
 00:14:56.052 --> 00:14:56.852
 what's the point of college?
 
 00:14:56.873 --> 00:14:57.253
 It can be like,
 
 00:14:57.312 --> 00:14:58.354
 what's the point of college?
 
 00:14:58.374 --> 00:14:58.653
 You know?
 
 00:14:58.714 --> 00:15:00.075
 So I think it's really important that you
 
 00:15:00.095 --> 00:15:00.936
 say it the right way.
 
 00:15:02.476 --> 00:15:03.197
 No, I mean, the book,
 
 00:15:03.658 --> 00:15:06.561
 the book emerged because I started like so
 
 00:15:06.600 --> 00:15:09.543
 many other professors in, you know,
 
 00:15:09.582 --> 00:15:10.504
 the early two thousands,
 
 00:15:10.543 --> 00:15:11.364
 two thousand tens,
 
 00:15:11.403 --> 00:15:12.826
 but particularly at the moment of the
 
 00:15:12.865 --> 00:15:14.407
 financial crisis, as you say,
 
 00:15:15.187 --> 00:15:15.768
 the rhetoric,
 
 00:15:16.279 --> 00:15:17.240
 around higher education,
 
 00:15:17.279 --> 00:15:18.941
 it becomes so narrow, you know,
 
 00:15:19.000 --> 00:15:20.880
 workforce development in a very narrow
 
 00:15:20.921 --> 00:15:22.181
 way, you know,
 
 00:15:22.240 --> 00:15:24.461
 in a way that meant specific degrees for
 
 00:15:24.501 --> 00:15:26.841
 specific jobs and,
 
 00:15:28.101 --> 00:15:31.182
 and lost in that was the richness of
 
 00:15:31.243 --> 00:15:34.124
 what a college education could provide
 
 00:15:34.604 --> 00:15:36.344
 that would pay off in a person's life.
 
 00:15:36.783 --> 00:15:37.724
 You know, personally,
 
 00:15:38.004 --> 00:15:39.445
 it would help our democracy and it would
 
 00:15:39.485 --> 00:15:41.465
 pay off evidence shows financially as
 
 00:15:41.504 --> 00:15:41.745
 well.
 
 00:15:42.225 --> 00:15:43.245
 It serves the economy.
 
 00:15:44.145 --> 00:15:44.686
 And so,
 
 00:15:45.918 --> 00:15:47.960
 I really wanted to recapture what that
 
 00:15:48.019 --> 00:15:48.740
 language was.
 
 00:15:49.081 --> 00:15:52.623
 And so one of the things I wanted
 
 00:15:52.643 --> 00:15:53.964
 to do in that book is try to
 
 00:15:54.004 --> 00:15:54.904
 tell people, look,
 
 00:15:56.044 --> 00:15:57.446
 professors sometimes say no,
 
 00:15:57.546 --> 00:15:58.966
 particularly professors in the traditional
 
 00:15:59.006 --> 00:15:59.427
 disciplines,
 
 00:15:59.467 --> 00:16:00.808
 the arts and sciences to a lot of
 
 00:16:00.849 --> 00:16:03.610
 reforms out there, online education,
 
 00:16:04.130 --> 00:16:04.390
 you know,
 
 00:16:04.471 --> 00:16:06.251
 all these ways to make degrees faster and
 
 00:16:06.312 --> 00:16:06.731
 easier.
 
 00:16:07.273 --> 00:16:08.072
 And people say, well,
 
 00:16:08.092 --> 00:16:09.354
 you just want to keep your job.
 
 00:16:10.053 --> 00:16:11.455
 And the truth is, of course,
 
 00:16:11.575 --> 00:16:12.697
 anybody wants to keep their job.
 
 00:16:12.736 --> 00:16:14.717
 We're not perfect human beings any more
 
 00:16:14.758 --> 00:16:18.020
 than any other group of people.
 
 00:16:18.601 --> 00:16:20.102
 But there was really something at stake
 
 00:16:20.123 --> 00:16:20.484
 for us,
 
 00:16:20.524 --> 00:16:25.288
 which was the capacity to bring people
 
 00:16:25.327 --> 00:16:27.029
 into a context called the campus.
 
 00:16:27.820 --> 00:16:28.799
 community of learning,
 
 00:16:29.539 --> 00:16:31.780
 where they could orient themselves over a
 
 00:16:31.841 --> 00:16:35.121
 series of years towards the arts and
 
 00:16:35.142 --> 00:16:35.621
 sciences,
 
 00:16:35.642 --> 00:16:37.542
 towards thinking about the world as
 
 00:16:37.601 --> 00:16:39.243
 something that they need to grapple with
 
 00:16:39.322 --> 00:16:41.763
 in new ways and developing their capacity
 
 00:16:41.783 --> 00:16:43.023
 to grapple with that world.
 
 00:16:43.683 --> 00:16:44.063
 And that,
 
 00:16:44.644 --> 00:16:46.724
 both that ability as well as that
 
 00:16:46.823 --> 00:16:48.445
 disposition to me is the purpose of
 
 00:16:48.465 --> 00:16:50.125
 college, developing those two things,
 
 00:16:50.745 --> 00:16:52.225
 that ability and disposition to grapple
 
 00:16:52.245 --> 00:16:53.946
 with the world in more complex ways.
 
 00:16:54.066 --> 00:16:54.166
 Yeah.
 
 00:16:54.778 --> 00:16:56.099
 and inspiring people to do so.
 
 00:16:56.119 --> 00:16:56.899
 And that takes time.
 
 00:16:56.918 --> 00:16:58.038
 It's like playing an instrument or
 
 00:16:58.099 --> 00:16:58.919
 anything else, right?
 
 00:17:00.360 --> 00:17:02.500
 It's not done fast, one done, right?
 
 00:17:02.520 --> 00:17:04.241
 It's not about gathering credits.
 
 00:17:04.281 --> 00:17:06.343
 It's about becoming a kind of person.
 
 00:17:06.702 --> 00:17:07.884
 And so I wanted to capture that in
 
 00:17:07.903 --> 00:17:08.223
 the book.
 
 00:17:09.084 --> 00:17:10.464
 And it really is something that gets to
 
 00:17:10.484 --> 00:17:11.525
 the whole point now of AI.
 
 00:17:11.744 --> 00:17:12.005
 I mean,
 
 00:17:12.025 --> 00:17:14.145
 the students easily can get the answers to
 
 00:17:14.165 --> 00:17:14.926
 these questions,
 
 00:17:14.967 --> 00:17:16.987
 but they're not necessarily developing
 
 00:17:17.147 --> 00:17:18.887
 these other skills that are really
 
 00:17:18.948 --> 00:17:20.368
 essential for them as citizens.
 
 00:17:21.795 --> 00:17:22.654
 I think that's absolutely right.
 
 00:17:22.694 --> 00:17:23.674
 Of course that's right.
 
 00:17:25.175 --> 00:17:26.395
 One of the things I talk about with
 
 00:17:26.435 --> 00:17:27.776
 my students is I ask them how many
 
 00:17:27.816 --> 00:17:28.996
 people play an instrument.
 
 00:17:29.635 --> 00:17:31.317
 And so many hands go up.
 
 00:17:32.257 --> 00:17:34.856
 But since really the beginning of recorded
 
 00:17:34.896 --> 00:17:35.356
 music,
 
 00:17:35.676 --> 00:17:37.518
 people have not had to play instruments to
 
 00:17:37.617 --> 00:17:38.877
 get access to music.
 
 00:17:39.458 --> 00:17:41.018
 But people seem to know that there's both
 
 00:17:41.117 --> 00:17:44.019
 a joy as well as a distinction between
 
 00:17:44.298 --> 00:17:46.419
 live music and performing your own music
 
 00:17:47.098 --> 00:17:49.299
 and understanding it from the inside and
 
 00:17:49.339 --> 00:17:50.039
 listening to music.
 
 00:17:50.911 --> 00:17:53.012
 And so they get that.
 
 00:17:53.613 --> 00:17:53.752
 Well,
 
 00:17:53.772 --> 00:17:55.394
 the same is true of reading and writing.
 
 00:17:55.493 --> 00:17:57.015
 The same is true of learning history,
 
 00:17:57.134 --> 00:17:57.415
 right?
 
 00:17:58.096 --> 00:17:58.256
 You know,
 
 00:17:58.296 --> 00:18:00.196
 critical thinking means actually having
 
 00:18:00.238 --> 00:18:01.417
 some knowledge to think with.
 
 00:18:01.739 --> 00:18:03.940
 So no matter how much is out there,
 
 00:18:03.960 --> 00:18:04.681
 if it's not inside,
 
 00:18:04.721 --> 00:18:05.901
 you don't have something in your brain to
 
 00:18:05.961 --> 00:18:08.242
 work with, you're not able to make sense,
 
 00:18:08.442 --> 00:18:09.763
 right?
 
 00:18:09.824 --> 00:18:11.144
 And ultimately students know that,
 
 00:18:11.365 --> 00:18:11.605
 you know,
 
 00:18:11.664 --> 00:18:14.507
 I don't think students want to be cheated
 
 00:18:14.547 --> 00:18:15.428
 of an education.
 
 00:18:15.468 --> 00:18:16.608
 It's just, it's just,
 
 00:18:17.148 --> 00:18:19.451
 too easy sometimes when the pressure's on,
 
 00:18:19.471 --> 00:18:19.570
 right?
 
 00:18:19.931 --> 00:18:21.432
 Yeah, yeah.
 
 00:18:21.451 --> 00:18:22.992
 I'm really finding that this semester
 
 00:18:23.012 --> 00:18:24.594
 where I am assigning more reading that
 
 00:18:24.614 --> 00:18:26.154
 I've done and having students write things
 
 00:18:26.194 --> 00:18:26.694
 in class,
 
 00:18:26.734 --> 00:18:28.296
 they really are enjoying it because they
 
 00:18:28.316 --> 00:18:30.176
 do feel like they're actually learning
 
 00:18:30.277 --> 00:18:30.738
 something,
 
 00:18:30.778 --> 00:18:32.798
 which they haven't had an opportunity to
 
 00:18:32.818 --> 00:18:34.500
 do in a lot of cases before.
 
 00:18:35.401 --> 00:18:35.580
 Yeah,
 
 00:18:35.641 --> 00:18:36.800
 I just had a student come in and
 
 00:18:36.820 --> 00:18:38.402
 when I said there's no screens allowed,
 
 00:18:39.462 --> 00:18:40.022
 he said to me,
 
 00:18:40.083 --> 00:18:42.305
 when you first said that, I thought, wow,
 
 00:18:43.405 --> 00:18:44.066
 that's crazy.
 
 00:18:44.635 --> 00:18:45.656
 this professor is crazy,
 
 00:18:45.696 --> 00:18:46.497
 but he just came and he said,
 
 00:18:46.537 --> 00:18:47.597
 I'm really glad you did that.
 
 00:18:48.857 --> 00:18:50.659
 I think they themselves want that kind of
 
 00:18:50.699 --> 00:18:52.119
 space where they can be attentive to
 
 00:18:52.160 --> 00:18:54.421
 something and experience the joys of
 
 00:18:55.041 --> 00:18:55.922
 focused attention.
 
 00:18:55.942 --> 00:18:57.782
 Yeah.
 
 00:18:57.823 --> 00:18:58.584
 Last night in my class,
 
 00:18:58.604 --> 00:18:59.644
 we were talking about Franklin's
 
 00:18:59.723 --> 00:19:01.625
 autobiography and we're going through his
 
 00:19:01.944 --> 00:19:03.945
 Thirteen Virtues and we're talking about
 
 00:19:03.986 --> 00:19:04.247
 each one.
 
 00:19:04.287 --> 00:19:06.807
 So industry, you know, lose no time,
 
 00:19:06.827 --> 00:19:08.568
 be always employed in something useful,
 
 00:19:08.608 --> 00:19:10.170
 cut off all unnecessary actions.
 
 00:19:10.190 --> 00:19:10.950
 And the first student said,
 
 00:19:10.970 --> 00:19:12.931
 it sounds like he always wants you to
 
 00:19:12.951 --> 00:19:13.991
 be working and just
 
 00:19:14.352 --> 00:19:16.874
 no superfluous things and another speaks
 
 00:19:16.953 --> 00:19:18.976
 up and says well when i am painting
 
 00:19:19.497 --> 00:19:21.798
 i'm actually am using my mind in my
 
 00:19:21.858 --> 00:19:23.941
 hand so it was really a brilliant
 
 00:19:24.000 --> 00:19:27.163
 observation she's making about this what
 
 00:19:27.203 --> 00:19:29.306
 is an unnecessary action she said it's not
 
 00:19:29.346 --> 00:19:31.326
 like you know playing a computer game or
 
 00:19:31.867 --> 00:19:34.769
 uh or texting you're actually using all of
 
 00:19:34.790 --> 00:19:36.332
 these things i suppose someone could
 
 00:19:36.372 --> 00:19:38.153
 defend computer games and texting as
 
 00:19:38.653 --> 00:19:40.615
 useful actions but um
 
 00:19:41.115 --> 00:19:42.497
 a painting but neither of us are going
 
 00:19:42.517 --> 00:19:44.618
 to do it so no yeah it'll have
 
 00:19:44.638 --> 00:19:50.883
 to be someone else speaking of just
 
 00:19:50.942 --> 00:19:53.025
 generally um I was thinking as you were
 
 00:19:53.045 --> 00:19:55.987
 talking about jury duty at um Gordon Woods
 
 00:19:56.027 --> 00:19:57.288
 Memorial Service someone told this
 
 00:19:57.327 --> 00:19:59.788
 wonderful story about Gordon serving on a
 
 00:19:59.829 --> 00:20:02.230
 jury this is after his retirement and it
 
 00:20:02.250 --> 00:20:05.032
 was a contentious murder case and he was
 
 00:20:05.073 --> 00:20:07.095
 really impressed with how seriously the
 
 00:20:07.134 --> 00:20:08.615
 jurors took this and
 
 00:20:09.175 --> 00:20:10.696
 they came to the right decision and a
 
 00:20:10.737 --> 00:20:13.018
 few weeks after he was having lunch with
 
 00:20:13.038 --> 00:20:14.419
 the foreman of the jury and they were
 
 00:20:14.459 --> 00:20:15.980
 talking about this experience they had
 
 00:20:16.019 --> 00:20:17.941
 been through and how affirming it was for
 
 00:20:18.402 --> 00:20:20.762
 the nature of society the twelve strangers
 
 00:20:20.803 --> 00:20:22.923
 could come together and do this and the
 
 00:20:22.963 --> 00:20:24.846
 foreman said and what i found really most
 
 00:20:24.865 --> 00:20:26.926
 surprising was only one member of the jury
 
 00:20:26.946 --> 00:20:29.567
 had a college education and gordon said
 
 00:20:30.009 --> 00:20:31.549
 who do you think that was and the
 
 00:20:31.589 --> 00:20:33.009
 guy thought for me i think it had
 
 00:20:33.049 --> 00:20:33.911
 to be the minister
 
 00:20:34.983 --> 00:20:36.325
 Because they have to have a degree.
 
 00:20:36.365 --> 00:20:38.967
 He was delighted that no one knew he
 
 00:20:39.007 --> 00:20:41.327
 was the foremost historian of the American
 
 00:20:41.367 --> 00:20:42.008
 Revolution.
 
 00:20:43.028 --> 00:20:46.770
 And you write about anti-elitism in Wood's
 
 00:20:47.271 --> 00:20:47.672
 writings.
 
 00:20:47.692 --> 00:20:48.672
 I wonder if we could talk a little
 
 00:20:48.692 --> 00:20:51.453
 bit about our old friend Gordon Wood.
 
 00:20:52.275 --> 00:20:52.694
 Sure.
 
 00:20:53.555 --> 00:20:53.895
 Obviously,
 
 00:20:53.955 --> 00:20:55.817
 I'm so sorry about what happened to Gordon
 
 00:20:55.856 --> 00:20:56.116
 Wood.
 
 00:20:56.277 --> 00:20:57.698
 And, you know, he...
 
 00:20:59.010 --> 00:21:00.051
 He really inspired me.
 
 00:21:00.112 --> 00:21:02.373
 I was an undergraduate at Brown when he
 
 00:21:02.413 --> 00:21:05.554
 was there and I had been a history
 
 00:21:05.574 --> 00:21:08.096
 major and I was writing my thesis with
 
 00:21:08.135 --> 00:21:08.836
 Ted Sizer,
 
 00:21:08.875 --> 00:21:10.777
 who actually was in graduate school with
 
 00:21:10.797 --> 00:21:12.317
 Gordon Wood, another Balin student.
 
 00:21:12.958 --> 00:21:14.318
 But he was an education professor and I
 
 00:21:14.338 --> 00:21:17.299
 was writing about civic education and was
 
 00:21:17.359 --> 00:21:18.480
 really interested in the development of
 
 00:21:18.500 --> 00:21:19.060
 democracy.
 
 00:21:19.121 --> 00:21:20.342
 Again, it was the nineteen nineties.
 
 00:21:20.362 --> 00:21:21.201
 This was in the air.
 
 00:21:22.623 --> 00:21:24.284
 Putnam's article on Bowling Alone had just
 
 00:21:24.324 --> 00:21:24.703
 come out.
 
 00:21:24.784 --> 00:21:27.025
 So all this stuff was happening.
 
 00:21:27.951 --> 00:21:30.232
 And I took you know Gordon's early
 
 00:21:30.272 --> 00:21:33.034
 Republic course and I realized,
 
 00:21:33.054 --> 00:21:34.413
 like the only Republic if i'm interested
 
 00:21:34.453 --> 00:21:36.835
 in how and what a democracy is everyone
 
 00:21:36.875 --> 00:21:38.134
 in the early Republic from an enslaved
 
 00:21:38.154 --> 00:21:39.316
 person to Thomas Jefferson.
 
 00:21:39.776 --> 00:21:41.895
 is asking what does this revolution mean
 
 00:21:42.396 --> 00:21:44.297
 for me for us for the kind of
 
 00:21:44.457 --> 00:21:45.678
 social order we're going to create,
 
 00:21:46.417 --> 00:21:47.657
 and so it was on this is the
 
 00:21:47.718 --> 00:21:49.479
 time when that question was alive for
 
 00:21:49.598 --> 00:21:50.098
 everyone.
 
 00:21:50.830 --> 00:21:52.251
 know and it was answered in complicated
 
 00:21:52.292 --> 00:21:54.835
 ways and and not always the ways we
 
 00:21:54.875 --> 00:21:57.076
 would like but but the questions were
 
 00:21:57.116 --> 00:22:00.180
 alive and so i got inspired to go
 
 00:22:00.200 --> 00:22:03.163
 to graduate school in history by him um
 
 00:22:03.222 --> 00:22:04.824
 in that essay i write about gordon woods
 
 00:22:04.864 --> 00:22:07.186
 anti-elitism which came out in the yale
 
 00:22:07.227 --> 00:22:09.208
 journal of law of humanities and i was
 
 00:22:09.248 --> 00:22:10.690
 really happy that i had the chance to
 
 00:22:10.710 --> 00:22:11.671
 present it as a paper
 
 00:22:12.509 --> 00:22:15.531
 to him before he passed away.
 
 00:22:16.093 --> 00:22:17.294
 But it was also really scary as an
 
 00:22:17.334 --> 00:22:19.536
 undergraduate student of his to have him
 
 00:22:19.576 --> 00:22:20.576
 sitting right there and be like,
 
 00:22:20.596 --> 00:22:21.898
 here's my take on Gordon Wood.
 
 00:22:24.886 --> 00:22:26.227
 One of the things I argue is that
 
 00:22:26.307 --> 00:22:30.107
 Wood sees today's progressive historians
 
 00:22:30.768 --> 00:22:33.308
 the same way he sees the founders as
 
 00:22:33.328 --> 00:22:34.489
 elitists, right?
 
 00:22:34.828 --> 00:22:36.990
 And who tend to look down on the
 
 00:22:37.029 --> 00:22:40.650
 common aspirations of ordinary people or
 
 00:22:40.690 --> 00:22:42.191
 tend to see ordinary people as so
 
 00:22:42.250 --> 00:22:44.191
 narrow-minded and provincial.
 
 00:22:45.230 --> 00:22:48.092
 And what both Wood's own background
 
 00:22:48.132 --> 00:22:49.751
 growing up in a working class family,
 
 00:22:49.813 --> 00:22:51.992
 but also his disposition and his work,
 
 00:22:54.471 --> 00:22:55.934
 What resonated with me is that Wood
 
 00:22:55.974 --> 00:22:57.377
 refused to do that, right?
 
 00:22:57.397 --> 00:22:58.580
 That Wood said, look,
 
 00:22:59.262 --> 00:23:00.946
 democracy is about these common people.
 
 00:23:00.967 --> 00:23:01.788
 They're not perfect.
 
 00:23:01.828 --> 00:23:03.132
 You know, some of them are racist.
 
 00:23:03.292 --> 00:23:03.713
 They have
 
 00:23:04.144 --> 00:23:04.364
 You know,
 
 00:23:04.384 --> 00:23:06.445
 they didn't always want to read the best
 
 00:23:06.465 --> 00:23:08.307
 works of literature, you know, like that,
 
 00:23:09.709 --> 00:23:11.210
 that there was, you know, but,
 
 00:23:11.411 --> 00:23:14.753
 but to dignify what they aspired for in
 
 00:23:14.773 --> 00:23:17.896
 their daily lives was the really amazing
 
 00:23:18.396 --> 00:23:20.398
 outcome of the revolution.
 
 00:23:20.618 --> 00:23:23.280
 And I think he was deeply upset to
 
 00:23:23.362 --> 00:23:25.743
 see historians who call themselves
 
 00:23:25.763 --> 00:23:26.984
 progressives, you know,
 
 00:23:27.699 --> 00:23:29.859
 writing about the ways in which,
 
 00:23:30.559 --> 00:23:31.119
 on one hand,
 
 00:23:31.160 --> 00:23:32.340
 the founders were the elitists,
 
 00:23:32.361 --> 00:23:33.201
 but on the other hand,
 
 00:23:33.740 --> 00:23:35.162
 all these ordinary Americans with their
 
 00:23:35.201 --> 00:23:38.782
 ordinary desires become kind of unworthy,
 
 00:23:38.962 --> 00:23:39.282
 right?
 
 00:23:39.303 --> 00:23:41.023
 Yeah.
 
 00:23:42.651 --> 00:23:44.090
 And so that's what I tried to capture.
 
 00:23:44.151 --> 00:23:45.092
 It's like, you know,
 
 00:23:45.132 --> 00:23:46.711
 what Wood's critique is of the historians
 
 00:23:46.751 --> 00:23:47.971
 is not simply partisan.
 
 00:23:48.011 --> 00:23:51.553
 It's actually about a deeper sense of the
 
 00:23:51.633 --> 00:23:53.032
 dignity of ordinary people and their
 
 00:23:53.093 --> 00:23:53.894
 aspirations.
 
 00:23:54.594 --> 00:23:55.394
 I want to add one thing.
 
 00:23:55.453 --> 00:23:57.074
 One of the last things Wood wrote in
 
 00:23:57.094 --> 00:23:59.634
 the Wall Street Journal before he passed
 
 00:23:59.674 --> 00:24:03.056
 away was a defense of immigrants.
 
 00:24:03.455 --> 00:24:03.796
 Yeah.
 
 00:24:03.836 --> 00:24:04.115
 Right.
 
 00:24:04.236 --> 00:24:04.816
 And he said.
 
 00:24:05.950 --> 00:24:08.411
 the American dream remains alive for all
 
 00:24:08.471 --> 00:24:08.931
 people.
 
 00:24:09.330 --> 00:24:11.051
 And he was criticizing J.D.
 
 00:24:11.071 --> 00:24:13.413
 Vance and others who talked about heritage
 
 00:24:13.452 --> 00:24:14.794
 Americans and things like this.
 
 00:24:15.693 --> 00:24:17.394
 And he was a believer that the capacity
 
 00:24:17.414 --> 00:24:18.895
 of the United States to bring in and
 
 00:24:18.935 --> 00:24:22.076
 assimilate and inspire people here
 
 00:24:23.557 --> 00:24:26.419
 remained both true and available to all
 
 00:24:26.459 --> 00:24:27.219
 kinds of people.
 
 00:24:27.720 --> 00:24:28.859
 And he was adamant about that.
 
 00:24:28.880 --> 00:24:32.961
 Oh, yeah.
 
 00:24:32.981 --> 00:24:33.922
 And it is really central.
 
 00:24:34.001 --> 00:24:35.083
 And again, he was...
 
 00:24:36.499 --> 00:24:37.980
 certainly politically liberal,
 
 00:24:38.819 --> 00:24:42.122
 although one thing that really surprised
 
 00:24:42.182 --> 00:24:44.383
 me, people immediately after his death,
 
 00:24:44.403 --> 00:24:46.384
 people, historians posting and saying,
 
 00:24:46.943 --> 00:24:48.444
 I didn't agree with everything he said.
 
 00:24:49.664 --> 00:24:51.226
 Well, why is that necessary to say?
 
 00:24:51.246 --> 00:24:53.126
 You're talking about someone who really
 
 00:24:53.186 --> 00:24:55.528
 shaped the way we think or tried to
 
 00:24:55.567 --> 00:24:57.249
 shape the way we think about this and
 
 00:24:57.269 --> 00:24:59.130
 really understood this period better than
 
 00:24:59.190 --> 00:24:59.970
 anyone else.
 
 00:25:01.807 --> 00:25:03.067
 And he was always interested.
 
 00:25:03.367 --> 00:25:04.907
 I was just reminded when you said you
 
 00:25:04.928 --> 00:25:06.587
 were there presenting in front of him.
 
 00:25:06.848 --> 00:25:07.969
 The first time I met him,
 
 00:25:08.388 --> 00:25:10.650
 I was speaking at a teacher's workshop in
 
 00:25:10.690 --> 00:25:12.750
 the Adams homestead and didn't realize he
 
 00:25:12.769 --> 00:25:14.730
 was also on the program for the afternoon.
 
 00:25:14.790 --> 00:25:16.310
 I'm in the morning and I'm talking about
 
 00:25:16.330 --> 00:25:17.951
 the Massachusetts Constitution.
 
 00:25:18.432 --> 00:25:20.491
 And in comes Gordon Wood, as I'm speaking,
 
 00:25:20.532 --> 00:25:22.373
 and sits down in the back and just
 
 00:25:22.413 --> 00:25:24.634
 sat there with this really very serious
 
 00:25:24.673 --> 00:25:25.094
 look on.
 
 00:25:25.834 --> 00:25:26.914
 And I was petrified.
 
 00:25:27.875 --> 00:25:28.836
 And a week later,
 
 00:25:28.876 --> 00:25:30.397
 I got a note from him saying how
 
 00:25:30.438 --> 00:25:31.638
 much he enjoyed my talk.
 
 00:25:32.480 --> 00:25:33.861
 I can't remember even if I spoke to
 
 00:25:33.901 --> 00:25:34.261
 him after.
 
 00:25:34.281 --> 00:25:35.702
 I was so mortified at being in the
 
 00:25:35.722 --> 00:25:37.223
 same room with Gordon Wood talking about
 
 00:25:37.284 --> 00:25:38.786
 something he knew better than I did.
 
 00:25:39.967 --> 00:25:42.449
 But he was always very generous to other
 
 00:25:42.489 --> 00:25:44.510
 scholars and was genuinely interested in
 
 00:25:44.611 --> 00:25:46.752
 ideas, even with those he disagreed with.
 
 00:25:46.813 --> 00:25:48.693
 He wanted to know what they thought.
 
 00:25:48.713 --> 00:25:51.376
 And that was that curiosity that he had.
 
 00:25:52.896 --> 00:25:54.198
 We're talking with Yohannine,
 
 00:25:54.218 --> 00:25:55.738
 who's a professor of history at Western
 
 00:25:55.798 --> 00:25:57.137
 Washington University,
 
 00:25:57.259 --> 00:25:59.898
 as well as someone who has been plumbing
 
 00:25:59.979 --> 00:26:02.039
 the period of the early republic for
 
 00:26:03.099 --> 00:26:04.421
 thirty plus years,
 
 00:26:05.040 --> 00:26:06.701
 both in your book as well as your
 
 00:26:06.760 --> 00:26:07.181
 essays.
 
 00:26:07.601 --> 00:26:09.662
 It's been that long, huh?
 
 00:26:09.761 --> 00:26:09.882
 It has.
 
 00:26:09.942 --> 00:26:11.663
 It's amazing how quickly time goes.
 
 00:26:11.702 --> 00:26:13.843
 You know,
 
 00:26:13.863 --> 00:26:15.324
 we still think of ourselves as the young
 
 00:26:15.384 --> 00:26:16.023
 Turks, maybe.
 
 00:26:18.324 --> 00:26:19.805
 Not going to do that anymore after that
 
 00:26:19.825 --> 00:26:20.184
 statement.
 
 00:26:21.056 --> 00:26:22.557
 No, no, no.
 
 00:26:23.576 --> 00:26:25.396
 So are you optimistic about the future?
 
 00:26:25.636 --> 00:26:27.137
 You're writing about these things,
 
 00:26:27.157 --> 00:26:29.618
 and within your mind, a democracy crisis,
 
 00:26:29.679 --> 00:26:31.558
 the public education in crisis.
 
 00:26:32.559 --> 00:26:35.200
 What keeps you hopeful?
 
 00:26:35.220 --> 00:26:36.240
 That's a great question.
 
 00:26:37.181 --> 00:26:38.300
 And I like the way you phrased it,
 
 00:26:38.320 --> 00:26:40.521
 because you prevented me from going
 
 00:26:40.541 --> 00:26:41.862
 through the litany of things that are
 
 00:26:42.782 --> 00:26:43.482
 going wrong.
 
 00:26:45.123 --> 00:26:46.044
 You know what keeps me hopeful?
 
 00:26:46.104 --> 00:26:46.784
 And this, again,
 
 00:26:47.503 --> 00:26:49.484
 builds off of our discussion of Gordon
 
 00:26:49.505 --> 00:26:50.005
 Wood's work.
 
 00:26:51.377 --> 00:26:52.078
 Gordon Wood,
 
 00:26:52.979 --> 00:26:54.240
 one of the things I learned from his
 
 00:26:54.339 --> 00:26:55.721
 democracy is a way of life.
 
 00:26:56.000 --> 00:26:57.182
 It's not just a set of formal
 
 00:26:57.221 --> 00:26:58.801
 institutions.
 
 00:26:58.883 --> 00:27:00.703
 Our formal institutions are in crisis,
 
 00:27:00.884 --> 00:27:02.565
 right?
 
 00:27:02.825 --> 00:27:04.205
 And there's a long story about how that
 
 00:27:04.226 --> 00:27:04.546
 happened.
 
 00:27:04.586 --> 00:27:04.786
 I mean,
 
 00:27:05.548 --> 00:27:08.231
 It's a decades and decades story, right?
 
 00:27:08.412 --> 00:27:09.854
 Like that led to this moment.
 
 00:27:10.094 --> 00:27:10.875
 It's not sudden.
 
 00:27:11.756 --> 00:27:15.920
 But if you go to towns and communities,
 
 00:27:16.621 --> 00:27:18.462
 you find that people are still living
 
 00:27:18.502 --> 00:27:19.384
 democratically.
 
 00:27:19.644 --> 00:27:20.704
 And I mean that in kind of Wood's
 
 00:27:20.744 --> 00:27:20.904
 way.
 
 00:27:20.924 --> 00:27:22.406
 They still, for the most part,
 
 00:27:23.248 --> 00:27:24.628
 treat each other on the street with
 
 00:27:24.689 --> 00:27:25.210
 dignity and
 
 00:27:25.798 --> 00:27:27.339
 consider each other to be equals.
 
 00:27:28.000 --> 00:27:31.183
 They still get together in PTAs or to
 
 00:27:31.223 --> 00:27:33.346
 make sure that snacks are provided at the
 
 00:27:33.405 --> 00:27:35.207
 soccer games for their kids,
 
 00:27:35.327 --> 00:27:37.549
 or they're still going to church.
 
 00:27:37.569 --> 00:27:39.111
 There's all kinds of ways in which,
 
 00:27:39.671 --> 00:27:40.632
 in a daily way,
 
 00:27:40.992 --> 00:27:42.854
 people are living democratic lives.
 
 00:27:43.214 --> 00:27:44.796
 And I think what gives me hope is
 
 00:27:44.836 --> 00:27:46.377
 that'll be our source for renewal.
 
 00:27:47.137 --> 00:27:51.301
 But I also think that vitality at the
 
 00:27:51.342 --> 00:27:51.962
 local level
 
 00:27:53.040 --> 00:27:55.363
 will make it harder for any person who
 
 00:27:55.403 --> 00:27:56.865
 wants to turn this country into an
 
 00:27:56.904 --> 00:27:59.488
 authoritarian country to do so because our
 
 00:27:59.528 --> 00:28:00.308
 practices,
 
 00:28:00.669 --> 00:28:03.171
 our social practices are democratic and
 
 00:28:03.211 --> 00:28:04.752
 therefore our ways of thinking about our
 
 00:28:04.792 --> 00:28:06.174
 interactions are democratic.
 
 00:28:06.835 --> 00:28:09.657
 And so even as we're deeply divided and
 
 00:28:10.038 --> 00:28:12.540
 we're angry at each other and our formal
 
 00:28:12.560 --> 00:28:14.963
 institutions are struggling to say the
 
 00:28:15.003 --> 00:28:16.265
 least, that's a mild way of putting it,
 
 00:28:17.656 --> 00:28:20.798
 Our lives remain culturally, socially,
 
 00:28:21.098 --> 00:28:22.940
 in our practices, and democratic.
 
 00:28:22.961 --> 00:28:25.561
 And that, to me, gives me hope.
 
 00:28:25.602 --> 00:28:26.163
 That's good.
 
 00:28:27.624 --> 00:28:29.184
 Very good.
 
 00:28:29.204 --> 00:28:33.106
 Do you think that de Tocqueville was right
 
 00:28:33.146 --> 00:28:35.509
 about his analysis of American society?
 
 00:28:36.869 --> 00:28:38.009
 Tocqueville was right about everything.
 
 00:28:38.049 --> 00:28:38.790
 What are you talking about?
 
 00:28:40.192 --> 00:28:44.134
 I just wanted the affirmation.
 
 00:28:44.214 --> 00:28:46.316
 I think Tocqueville is...
 
 00:28:48.249 --> 00:28:50.330
 one of the things Tocqueville asks in
 
 00:28:50.371 --> 00:28:51.411
 Democracy in America,
 
 00:28:51.451 --> 00:28:53.093
 the big question he asks is,
 
 00:28:54.032 --> 00:28:56.474
 why does American democracy work when the
 
 00:28:56.515 --> 00:28:58.236
 French Revolution failed, right?
 
 00:28:58.896 --> 00:29:01.178
 Why does American democracy sustain itself
 
 00:29:01.759 --> 00:29:05.840
 when the French Revolution led to so much
 
 00:29:05.901 --> 00:29:08.083
 violence, right?
 
 00:29:09.104 --> 00:29:11.885
 And I think what Tocqueville reminds us is
 
 00:29:11.945 --> 00:29:12.246
 that
 
 00:29:13.984 --> 00:29:15.585
 institutions and the practices they
 
 00:29:15.625 --> 00:29:17.385
 encourage particularly the participatory
 
 00:29:17.405 --> 00:29:20.566
 institutions were essential for that to
 
 00:29:20.586 --> 00:29:23.247
 happen for democracy to sustain itself he
 
 00:29:23.307 --> 00:29:24.906
 also looks at other kind of checks right
 
 00:29:24.926 --> 00:29:26.708
 he looks at the role of judges and
 
 00:29:26.748 --> 00:29:29.928
 juries and and lawyers and other kinds of
 
 00:29:30.327 --> 00:29:33.249
 forms that sort of mediate democracy but
 
 00:29:33.269 --> 00:29:34.769
 he's very committed to the fact that
 
 00:29:35.608 --> 00:29:38.130
 because the people have various ways of
 
 00:29:38.150 --> 00:29:38.890
 getting involved
 
 00:29:40.079 --> 00:29:41.221
 They feel a stake in it.
 
 00:29:41.281 --> 00:29:42.943
 And because his big concern is social
 
 00:29:43.023 --> 00:29:43.605
 isolation.
 
 00:29:44.767 --> 00:29:46.009
 And what's interesting is I taught a
 
 00:29:46.048 --> 00:29:48.231
 section where he in Democracy in America
 
 00:29:48.992 --> 00:29:50.556
 to my early Republic course,
 
 00:29:50.736 --> 00:29:52.258
 where he talks about the tendency of
 
 00:29:52.278 --> 00:29:53.480
 democracy to isolate people.
 
 00:29:54.525 --> 00:29:55.945
 And my students really ran with that
 
 00:29:55.986 --> 00:29:57.645
 because we're going through an epidemic of
 
 00:29:57.685 --> 00:29:58.526
 loneliness, right?
 
 00:29:58.566 --> 00:30:00.207
 And our students are aware they're lonely.
 
 00:30:00.507 --> 00:30:01.728
 They struggle to make friends.
 
 00:30:01.748 --> 00:30:02.948
 They're not happy about this,
 
 00:30:03.288 --> 00:30:04.248
 but they are aware of it.
 
 00:30:05.249 --> 00:30:05.868
 And they said,
 
 00:30:05.909 --> 00:30:07.609
 this is really true about our culture.
 
 00:30:08.190 --> 00:30:09.710
 And Tocqueville looks at the ways in which
 
 00:30:09.769 --> 00:30:12.651
 the people rebuild bonds in a society that
 
 00:30:12.691 --> 00:30:15.571
 tends to push them to be fragmented,
 
 00:30:15.692 --> 00:30:15.972
 right?
 
 00:30:16.653 --> 00:30:18.272
 And I think that's what we can still
 
 00:30:18.553 --> 00:30:19.473
 learn from Tocqueville.
 
 00:30:20.314 --> 00:30:21.974
 he did in the later parts of his
 
 00:30:22.015 --> 00:30:23.875
 life he died right before the civil war
 
 00:30:23.935 --> 00:30:26.377
 but in his later letters he started to
 
 00:30:26.397 --> 00:30:28.398
 get worried as he saw violence breaking
 
 00:30:28.519 --> 00:30:31.641
 out in the united states and sectional
 
 00:30:31.701 --> 00:30:35.442
 conflict emerging um he started to worry
 
 00:30:35.462 --> 00:30:37.324
 that the things he saw that made democracy
 
 00:30:37.364 --> 00:30:39.884
 work were no longer holding that democracy
 
 00:30:39.944 --> 00:30:42.186
 together you know but in democracy in
 
 00:30:42.207 --> 00:30:42.606
 america
 
 00:30:44.337 --> 00:30:45.798
 He really looked for the ways of what
 
 00:30:45.838 --> 00:30:49.680
 makes democracy work and not fall apart,
 
 00:30:49.880 --> 00:30:50.160
 right?
 
 00:30:50.720 --> 00:30:50.980
 Yes.
 
 00:30:51.300 --> 00:30:52.740
 And he wasn't simply looking at the
 
 00:30:52.800 --> 00:30:54.662
 political leaders of the day.
 
 00:30:54.721 --> 00:30:57.083
 He is really looking at this organic
 
 00:30:57.702 --> 00:30:59.763
 entity that you've been really looking at,
 
 00:30:59.884 --> 00:31:01.023
 these communities now,
 
 00:31:01.483 --> 00:31:03.384
 the diaries of individuals talking about
 
 00:31:03.424 --> 00:31:04.925
 their relations with neighbors.
 
 00:31:05.586 --> 00:31:08.507
 And he talks about seeing a need and
 
 00:31:08.527 --> 00:31:10.067
 then setting out to fill it or solving
 
 00:31:10.087 --> 00:31:11.768
 a problem,
 
 00:31:12.208 --> 00:31:13.308
 which is what we still can do.
 
 00:31:15.202 --> 00:31:16.344
 Yeah.
 
 00:31:16.364 --> 00:31:17.625
 We're talking with Johan Niem,
 
 00:31:17.704 --> 00:31:20.207
 professor of history at Western Washington
 
 00:31:20.346 --> 00:31:21.027
 University.
 
 00:31:21.047 --> 00:31:22.367
 Now,
 
 00:31:22.428 --> 00:31:24.308
 you wrote a really interesting essay
 
 00:31:24.349 --> 00:31:27.050
 called Unbecoming American about half a
 
 00:31:27.090 --> 00:31:27.991
 decade ago,
 
 00:31:28.011 --> 00:31:30.634
 which is really about your experiences as
 
 00:31:30.653 --> 00:31:33.395
 you're immersed in this period and then
 
 00:31:33.955 --> 00:31:37.898
 the various ways that society at different
 
 00:31:37.919 --> 00:31:39.579
 times has been trying to break people
 
 00:31:39.619 --> 00:31:42.721
 apart based on ethnicity or identities of
 
 00:31:42.801 --> 00:31:43.363
 other kinds.
 
 00:31:43.762 --> 00:31:45.644
 Can we talk a little bit about that
 
 00:31:45.683 --> 00:31:46.084
 phenomenon?
 
 00:31:46.104 --> 00:31:47.923
 I don't know if it's something you wanted
 
 00:31:47.963 --> 00:31:49.724
 to discuss further.
 
 00:31:50.345 --> 00:31:51.625
 I think you say so much in your
 
 00:31:51.704 --> 00:31:52.086
 essays,
 
 00:31:52.306 --> 00:31:53.786
 there's really no need to go on and
 
 00:31:53.846 --> 00:31:54.286
 explain.
 
 00:31:55.185 --> 00:31:55.386
 Well,
 
 00:31:55.426 --> 00:31:56.987
 if only everyone in the world had read
 
 00:31:57.007 --> 00:31:57.487
 them, right?
 
 00:31:58.487 --> 00:32:02.249
 That's my thoughts exactly.
 
 00:32:02.328 --> 00:32:04.189
 No, that was a very personal piece.
 
 00:32:04.269 --> 00:32:05.630
 It came out in the Hedgehog Review.
 
 00:32:06.109 --> 00:32:07.509
 It's called Unbecoming American.
 
 00:32:07.569 --> 00:32:09.730
 And I meant unbecoming in two ways.
 
 00:32:09.790 --> 00:32:10.050
 And then
 
 00:32:11.045 --> 00:32:12.967
 And unbecoming in the sense that I feel
 
 00:32:12.987 --> 00:32:14.749
 like I'm being pushed out of being
 
 00:32:14.788 --> 00:32:17.152
 American by both forces of, you know,
 
 00:32:17.211 --> 00:32:18.492
 ideas on the left and the right.
 
 00:32:19.054 --> 00:32:20.496
 But also unbecoming because then when I
 
 00:32:20.576 --> 00:32:22.637
 say that, people find me unbecoming.
 
 00:32:25.181 --> 00:32:26.402
 But what I wrote in that piece is,
 
 00:32:26.422 --> 00:32:27.262
 you know, I'm an immigrant.
 
 00:32:27.303 --> 00:32:28.243
 I was born in India.
 
 00:32:28.724 --> 00:32:29.945
 I came here as a young child.
 
 00:32:30.874 --> 00:32:32.756
 and grew up in the seventies and eighties
 
 00:32:32.836 --> 00:32:34.856
 in, in the suburbs of San Francisco.
 
 00:32:35.778 --> 00:32:36.798
 And, you know,
 
 00:32:36.919 --> 00:32:39.160
 of course there was racism and things at
 
 00:32:39.180 --> 00:32:39.540
 the time,
 
 00:32:39.580 --> 00:32:42.262
 but the dominant experience was welcoming,
 
 00:32:42.303 --> 00:32:44.364
 you know, how do we welcome you?
 
 00:32:44.544 --> 00:32:46.226
 And the experience I had with things like
 
 00:32:46.266 --> 00:32:47.507
 history or holidays,
 
 00:32:47.527 --> 00:32:48.787
 like Thanksgiving and Christmas,
 
 00:32:49.567 --> 00:32:51.449
 wasn't these belong to some people.
 
 00:32:51.630 --> 00:32:52.069
 It was
 
 00:32:52.813 --> 00:32:54.294
 These belong to all of us.
 
 00:32:54.334 --> 00:32:55.414
 And as an American now,
 
 00:32:55.515 --> 00:32:57.455
 you are part of that, right?
 
 00:32:57.497 --> 00:32:58.537
 And so you should be,
 
 00:32:59.198 --> 00:33:00.638
 you should see yourself in the sixteen
 
 00:33:00.679 --> 00:33:01.579
 hundreds in America.
 
 00:33:01.599 --> 00:33:02.839
 You should see yourself in the seventeen
 
 00:33:02.861 --> 00:33:03.161
 hundreds.
 
 00:33:03.221 --> 00:33:05.041
 You should, you have the, you know,
 
 00:33:05.122 --> 00:33:06.482
 you can be an American.
 
 00:33:06.603 --> 00:33:06.983
 And of course,
 
 00:33:07.023 --> 00:33:08.305
 what an American is always has been
 
 00:33:08.345 --> 00:33:08.805
 evolving.
 
 00:33:09.305 --> 00:33:11.166
 Our traditions have always been shaped by
 
 00:33:11.267 --> 00:33:12.928
 immigrants adding new things to it.
 
 00:33:13.528 --> 00:33:14.648
 But there was a concept,
 
 00:33:14.808 --> 00:33:16.570
 this shared idea of being American that
 
 00:33:16.590 --> 00:33:19.032
 was cultural and social as well as
 
 00:33:19.093 --> 00:33:19.512
 political.
 
 00:33:21.146 --> 00:33:22.567
 And what I was experiencing was
 
 00:33:22.607 --> 00:33:24.788
 increasingly, you know, the left,
 
 00:33:25.188 --> 00:33:26.769
 the progressive left tended to want to
 
 00:33:26.808 --> 00:33:27.669
 racialize things.
 
 00:33:27.689 --> 00:33:28.849
 So they were turning a lot of these
 
 00:33:28.869 --> 00:33:31.029
 things that were held in common into
 
 00:33:31.089 --> 00:33:32.270
 belonging to white people.
 
 00:33:32.931 --> 00:33:34.351
 And there was paradoxical, right?
 
 00:33:34.391 --> 00:33:34.490
 Like,
 
 00:33:34.530 --> 00:33:36.872
 of course their intentions were good.
 
 00:33:37.813 --> 00:33:39.192
 And, but they were saying, look,
 
 00:33:39.212 --> 00:33:41.034
 a multicultural nation can't have this
 
 00:33:41.054 --> 00:33:42.253
 shared idea of American.
 
 00:33:43.574 --> 00:33:45.494
 And I was worried that if we don't,
 
 00:33:45.934 --> 00:33:47.076
 we won't have a shared sense of who
 
 00:33:47.096 --> 00:33:47.895
 we are as a people.
 
 00:33:48.856 --> 00:33:49.537
 But also,
 
 00:33:49.958 --> 00:33:52.058
 my own experience suggests that this is
 
 00:33:52.078 --> 00:33:53.179
 the magic of America,
 
 00:33:53.298 --> 00:33:56.240
 is that people are not bound by their
 
 00:33:56.300 --> 00:33:57.240
 race or ethnicity.
 
 00:33:57.882 --> 00:33:59.142
 They're not prevented from becoming
 
 00:33:59.162 --> 00:33:59.682
 American.
 
 00:34:00.762 --> 00:34:01.462
 But at the same time,
 
 00:34:01.502 --> 00:34:02.784
 you were seeing on the right the sort
 
 00:34:02.804 --> 00:34:05.865
 of reemergence of white nationalism.
 
 00:34:07.246 --> 00:34:08.947
 The heritage American thing had not quite
 
 00:34:09.467 --> 00:34:10.728
 been said out loud.
 
 00:34:11.215 --> 00:34:12.635
 But you were seeing other ways in which
 
 00:34:13.157 --> 00:34:15.338
 there was this defense of of a kind
 
 00:34:15.358 --> 00:34:17.961
 of traditional Americanism and a fear of
 
 00:34:18.021 --> 00:34:18.442
 immigrants.
 
 00:34:18.601 --> 00:34:18.862
 Right.
 
 00:34:19.682 --> 00:34:21.764
 And so I was feeling increasingly like
 
 00:34:21.804 --> 00:34:23.847
 this idea that we are a common people
 
 00:34:24.447 --> 00:34:26.550
 and that American culture is open enough
 
 00:34:26.570 --> 00:34:28.452
 to assimilate new people and that people
 
 00:34:28.512 --> 00:34:30.353
 actually appreciate that.
 
 00:34:30.454 --> 00:34:31.594
 You know, I think as an immigrant,
 
 00:34:31.614 --> 00:34:33.717
 you appreciate the fact that unlike in
 
 00:34:33.737 --> 00:34:34.617
 many other countries,
 
 00:34:35.217 --> 00:34:36.318
 I can become American.
 
 00:34:38.059 --> 00:34:40.079
 And so I was looking at what was
 
 00:34:40.159 --> 00:34:42.001
 lost when we no longer believe that.
 
 00:34:42.702 --> 00:34:44.682
 And so part of the story was how
 
 00:34:44.824 --> 00:34:47.244
 I felt as increasingly I felt like, oh,
 
 00:34:47.525 --> 00:34:49.347
 you know, for different reasons,
 
 00:34:49.726 --> 00:34:50.967
 ideas on the left and the right and
 
 00:34:51.007 --> 00:34:52.929
 people on the left and right don't want
 
 00:34:52.969 --> 00:34:54.849
 that shared common project anymore.
 
 00:34:55.510 --> 00:34:57.211
 And that pushes people like me out.
 
 00:34:57.452 --> 00:34:58.793
 But I still believe in it.
 
 00:34:59.440 --> 00:34:59.599
 Yeah.
 
 00:35:00.019 --> 00:35:00.460
 Yeah.
 
 00:35:00.480 --> 00:35:01.460
 I think it pushes a lot of us.
 
 00:35:01.480 --> 00:35:04.260
 And, you know, I think over time,
 
 00:35:04.840 --> 00:35:05.960
 guys like us who are in the middle
 
 00:35:06.001 --> 00:35:07.780
 get clobbered by both sides.
 
 00:35:07.902 --> 00:35:09.422
 But I think there's something essential
 
 00:35:09.461 --> 00:35:11.121
 that we need to hold on to as
 
 00:35:11.242 --> 00:35:12.141
 a nation.
 
 00:35:12.181 --> 00:35:16.023
 Some and holidays are really one way of
 
 00:35:16.063 --> 00:35:19.344
 doing this, as well as, you know,
 
 00:35:19.364 --> 00:35:20.724
 baseball practice for our kids,
 
 00:35:20.764 --> 00:35:21.664
 other things, churches,
 
 00:35:21.704 --> 00:35:23.483
 the other kinds of places where we come
 
 00:35:23.523 --> 00:35:27.505
 together aside from any other identity.
 
 00:35:27.914 --> 00:35:28.976
 This is fascinating.
 
 00:35:29.056 --> 00:35:30.297
 And you also did an essay called
 
 00:35:30.376 --> 00:35:31.898
 Re-enchanting American History,
 
 00:35:31.938 --> 00:35:33.400
 following on the theme of the magic of
 
 00:35:33.440 --> 00:35:34.000
 America.
 
 00:35:34.561 --> 00:35:36.342
 And again,
 
 00:35:36.402 --> 00:35:38.123
 having been taught this for a long time,
 
 00:35:38.184 --> 00:35:41.166
 how do we go about re-enchanting it or
 
 00:35:41.206 --> 00:35:42.887
 getting people excited about the teaching
 
 00:35:42.989 --> 00:35:44.570
 of history or the study of history?
 
 00:35:45.000 --> 00:35:46.340
 Yeah, it's not going to be easy.
 
 00:35:48.081 --> 00:35:51.364
 Yeah, that essay is really about,
 
 00:35:52.503 --> 00:35:52.744
 you know,
 
 00:35:52.784 --> 00:35:56.726
 at this moment when we see globalization
 
 00:35:56.766 --> 00:35:59.208
 being challenged by nationalism globally,
 
 00:35:59.248 --> 00:36:00.168
 right, around the world,
 
 00:36:00.188 --> 00:36:01.429
 but certainly at home as well.
 
 00:36:03.150 --> 00:36:04.990
 I think we need to take seriously why
 
 00:36:05.070 --> 00:36:05.891
 nations matter.
 
 00:36:06.693 --> 00:36:08.556
 And nations matter and national identity
 
 00:36:08.597 --> 00:36:11.181
 matters because in a large democracy like
 
 00:36:11.320 --> 00:36:11.561
 ours,
 
 00:36:11.621 --> 00:36:13.204
 if we don't see ourselves as common
 
 00:36:13.244 --> 00:36:14.967
 citizens, we'll see each other as enemies,
 
 00:36:15.047 --> 00:36:15.688
 right?
 
 00:36:15.847 --> 00:36:17.250
 And that makes violence more likely.
 
 00:36:17.309 --> 00:36:18.853
 It makes it less likely that we'll accept
 
 00:36:18.913 --> 00:36:20.375
 outcomes of elections we don't like.
 
 00:36:20.989 --> 00:36:22.190
 it makes it less likely that we'll be
 
 00:36:22.231 --> 00:36:24.672
 willing to play by the rules.
 
 00:36:24.972 --> 00:36:26.614
 And it makes it less likely that when
 
 00:36:26.655 --> 00:36:27.615
 we elect people,
 
 00:36:27.635 --> 00:36:28.876
 they'll govern in the interest of all
 
 00:36:28.896 --> 00:36:29.817
 Americans, right?
 
 00:36:30.257 --> 00:36:31.539
 If we are us versus them,
 
 00:36:31.659 --> 00:36:35.782
 rather than playing the same game,
 
 00:36:35.822 --> 00:36:38.764
 just being opponents in a similar game and
 
 00:36:38.784 --> 00:36:41.646
 we see ourselves as rivals rather than
 
 00:36:41.706 --> 00:36:43.469
 enemies, that's a different story.
 
 00:36:43.509 --> 00:36:45.269
 And so national identity helps hold us
 
 00:36:45.309 --> 00:36:45.731
 together.
 
 00:36:46.800 --> 00:36:49.862
 I felt in a lot of ways that
 
 00:36:49.902 --> 00:36:53.244
 historians had kind of abandoned that
 
 00:36:53.304 --> 00:36:54.865
 national project, right?
 
 00:36:55.885 --> 00:36:57.246
 One set of historians embraced
 
 00:36:57.266 --> 00:36:59.367
 globalization and said the nation's a
 
 00:36:59.407 --> 00:36:59.849
 nativism.
 
 00:36:59.889 --> 00:37:01.809
 It's something we need to get beyond.
 
 00:37:02.429 --> 00:37:05.592
 Another set of historians were saying the
 
 00:37:05.632 --> 00:37:07.293
 true story of America is all the things
 
 00:37:07.313 --> 00:37:09.253
 that are wrong with America, right?
 
 00:37:09.273 --> 00:37:10.514
 And just the darkest story.
 
 00:37:10.574 --> 00:37:13.115
 And so America is truly fundamentally a
 
 00:37:13.175 --> 00:37:14.697
 racist settler colonial project.
 
 00:37:14.817 --> 00:37:15.458
 And there's nothing...
 
 00:37:16.197 --> 00:37:18.119
 There's nothing redeeming in that American
 
 00:37:18.179 --> 00:37:18.418
 story.
 
 00:37:18.478 --> 00:37:20.219
 Not that those things are not true or
 
 00:37:20.239 --> 00:37:20.940
 the facts are wrong,
 
 00:37:20.960 --> 00:37:22.420
 but is that the American story?
 
 00:37:22.440 --> 00:37:23.460
 Yeah.
 
 00:37:23.541 --> 00:37:24.601
 And you were seeing on the right,
 
 00:37:24.621 --> 00:37:25.902
 and you see this clearly in the Trump
 
 00:37:25.942 --> 00:37:26.442
 White House,
 
 00:37:26.481 --> 00:37:29.023
 this effort to like re-enchant with the
 
 00:37:29.103 --> 00:37:30.844
 most aggressive,
 
 00:37:31.184 --> 00:37:33.085
 limited understanding of American history,
 
 00:37:33.184 --> 00:37:34.945
 one that denies a lot of our past,
 
 00:37:35.045 --> 00:37:35.346
 right?
 
 00:37:36.106 --> 00:37:38.126
 And uses force to kind of achieve it,
 
 00:37:38.266 --> 00:37:38.427
 right?
 
 00:37:38.467 --> 00:37:40.827
 A kind of cultural counter-reformation.
 
 00:37:43.768 --> 00:37:45.269
 And I was sort of saying, okay, look,
 
 00:37:45.764 --> 00:37:49.028
 We need to find a way after decades
 
 00:37:49.048 --> 00:37:49.809
 of culture wars,
 
 00:37:49.849 --> 00:37:51.331
 after decades of globalization,
 
 00:37:52.472 --> 00:37:54.233
 to tell an American story that is honest,
 
 00:37:55.014 --> 00:37:56.416
 that isn't hiding the facts,
 
 00:37:56.976 --> 00:37:59.280
 but is also capable of providing us with,
 
 00:37:59.599 --> 00:38:00.201
 as a people,
 
 00:38:02.000 --> 00:38:04.202
 a common ground to imagine a shared future
 
 00:38:04.242 --> 00:38:06.625
 again and to me that's the re-enchantment
 
 00:38:06.664 --> 00:38:08.007
 project but i think it's going to be
 
 00:38:08.067 --> 00:38:11.110
 no easier than reshoring manufacturing you
 
 00:38:11.130 --> 00:38:13.632
 know yeah because because we're not in a
 
 00:38:13.672 --> 00:38:15.173
 good place to do that but i think
 
 00:38:15.193 --> 00:38:16.815
 that is the work we need to do
 
 00:38:16.876 --> 00:38:20.860
 well well thank you we've uh we've been
 
 00:38:20.880 --> 00:38:22.762
 talking with johannim i know we could go
 
 00:38:22.922 --> 00:38:24.184
 on but i know you have
 
 00:38:25.320 --> 00:38:26.561
 Now we all have to get at that
 
 00:38:26.601 --> 00:38:26.902
 work.
 
 00:38:27.181 --> 00:38:30.224
 Let's get to the work, yeah.
 
 00:38:30.264 --> 00:38:31.746
 Thank you so much for joining us, Johan.
 
 00:38:31.766 --> 00:38:32.445
 It's been great talking to you.
 
 00:38:32.465 --> 00:38:33.547
 Thank you so much.
 
 00:38:33.567 --> 00:38:34.648
 Thank you so much for having me.
 
 00:38:34.668 --> 00:38:37.451
 And I want to thank Jonathan Lane,
 
 00:38:37.471 --> 00:38:38.592
 our man behind the curtain,
 
 00:38:38.632 --> 00:38:39.572
 and Jack Caddy.
 
 00:38:39.612 --> 00:38:41.594
 And if you have a question or want
 
 00:38:41.634 --> 00:38:43.476
 to get some Revolution Two-Fifty swag,
 
 00:38:43.496 --> 00:38:44.697
 send Jonathan an email.
 
 00:38:44.717 --> 00:38:45.918
 His email is jlane at
 
 00:38:45.958 --> 00:38:47.659
 revolutiontwofifty.org.
 
 00:38:48.519 --> 00:38:50.501
 And every week we do thank folks who
 
 00:38:50.521 --> 00:38:52.023
 are regularly tuning in.
 
 00:38:52.083 --> 00:38:53.945
 And if you're in one of these places
 
 00:38:53.985 --> 00:38:55.967
 and want some Revolution two fifty stuff,
 
 00:38:56.407 --> 00:38:58.409
 Jay Lane at Revolution two five oh dot
 
 00:38:58.469 --> 00:39:00.331
 org is the person to ask.
 
 00:39:00.391 --> 00:39:02.492
 And this week I'll thank our listeners in
 
 00:39:02.813 --> 00:39:05.155
 Stratton, Nebraska, and Redondo Beach,
 
 00:39:05.195 --> 00:39:07.217
 California, Crestwell, Oregon,
 
 00:39:07.637 --> 00:39:09.820
 and Seattle and Auburn in the great state
 
 00:39:09.860 --> 00:39:10.621
 of Washington,
 
 00:39:10.721 --> 00:39:10.960
 where
 
 00:39:11.380 --> 00:39:12.322
 Professor Neem,
 
 00:39:12.402 --> 00:39:14.425
 you can also find Professor Neem here in
 
 00:39:14.445 --> 00:39:16.668
 Massachusetts, Waltham, Woburn, Lowell,
 
 00:39:16.688 --> 00:39:19.190
 and Lemonster, Endicott, New York, Edmond,
 
 00:39:19.251 --> 00:39:20.952
 Oklahoma, Garching, Bavaria,
 
 00:39:20.972 --> 00:39:22.514
 and all places between and beyond.
 
 00:39:22.574 --> 00:39:23.456
 Thanks for joining us.
 
 00:39:23.577 --> 00:39:25.539
 Now we will be piped out on the
 
 00:39:25.559 --> 00:39:26.280
 road to Boston.