New Journal Announcement: American Political Thought (APT)

[FYI: This has made the H-Net rounds, but I think it needs an underscore for readers of this site. It is clearly a publication meant to be friendly to USIH practitioners. Bolds, hyperlinks, and italics are mine- TL]
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New Journal from the University of Chicago Press: American Political Thought: A Journal of Ideas, Institutions, and Culture

The University of Chicago Press, the University of Notre Dame's Program in Constitutional Studies, and the Jack Miller Center are pleased to announce the launch of the only peer-reviewed academic journal exclusively devoted to the study of American political thought.

American Political Thought: A Journal of Ideas, Institutions, and Culture is now accepting submissions and will publish its inaugural issue in spring 2012. For subscription information and complete submission guidelines, go the journal's homepage.

The new journal will feature research by political scientists, historians, literary scholars, economists, and philosophers who study the texts, authors, and ideas at the foundation of the American political tradition. Research will explore key political concepts such as democracy, constitutionalism, equality, liberty, citizenship, political identity, and the role of the state.

Professor Michael Zuckert, director of Notre Dame's Program in Constitutional Studies, will serve as the journal's first editor.

"Our goal is to create the essential and defining journal for the field," Dr. Zuckert said. "It will be a forum for analysis as well as critique of American political thinking from multiple disciplines and perspectives."

"The new journal will be a natural complement to the new related group within the American Political Science Association dedicated to American political thought," said Dr. Rafael Major, director of faculty development at the Jack Miller Center, a national nonprofit, nonpartisan education foundation. "Both new endeavors have already generated a strong response from both junior and senior scholars seeking an outlet for their research."

"We're very pleased to add American Political Thought to our roster," said Everett Conner, manager of the University of Chicago Press Journals Division. "It will not only be a fine complement to our history and law titles, but also open new ground for the Press in serving scholars of American politics."

APT will publish twice a year in print and online, and will include book reviews along with major articles accepted through a double blind peer-review process.

The journal is now accepting submissions on all areas of relevance including:

*Description, justification, and criticism of the institutions of constitutional democracy in the United States.
*The plurality of first principles called upon to ground these institutions and to orient political action.
*The mentality of the American people, either taken as a whole or as members of various subcultures within the polity.
*Political literature, which has sought to bring political principles to full, imaginative life.
*The ideas around which have been built the platforms of the various political parties in American political history and around which coalesce partisan coalitions today.
*The character of the United States as it presents itself on the world stage and thus in the eyes of those who live abroad.

To submit a manuscript for consideration, please send an electronic file (formatted in Microsoft Word) via the American Political Thought online submission system here. For more information on the submission process, please visit here.

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And here's the editorial staff---notice the names who are both known among USIH folks and are friendly to related topics:

EDITORIAL BOARD

Editor: Michael Zuckert
Managing Editor: S. Adam Seagrave
Editorial Board

W.B. Allen, Michigan State University
Joyce Appleby, University of California, Los Angeles
Benjamin Barber, Rutgers University
Mark Bauerlein, Emory University
Paul Cantor, University of Virginia
James Ceaser, University of Virginia
Jonathan Clark, University of Kansas
Patrick Deneen, Georgetown University
Max Edling, Uppsala Universitet
Jean Elshtain, University of Chicago
Robert Ferguson, Columbia University
Robert P. George, Princeton University
Daniel Howe, University of California, Los Angeles
Harvey Klehr, Emory University
Robert Koons, University of Texas
Harvey Mansfield, Harvard University
Wilfred McClay, University of Tennessee, Chattanooga
Walter McDougall, University of Pennsylvania
Pauline Maier, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Lucas Morel, Washington and Lee University
Peter Onuf, University of Virginia
Karen Orren, University of California, Los Angeles
Rogers Smith, University of Pennsylvania
Steven Smith, Notre Dame University
Eric Sundquist, University of California, Los Angeles
Keith Whittington, Princeton University
Gordon Wood, Brown University
David Wootton, University of York
Jean Yarbrough, Bowdoin College
Donald Yerxa, Eastern Nazarene College

Do You Still Read Hofstadter?

In continuation of what appears to be a series, I'd like to talk about Richard Hofstadter. Hofstadter, of course, was the American political historian who taught at Columbia with other academic luminaries such as Lionel Trilling and Jacques Barzun. Though an immaculate stylist and one of the most influential historians of his generation, Hofstadter's star faded upon his (premature) death, before experiencing a slight revival with the publication of of David S. Brown's Richard Hofstadter: An Intellectual Biography. Today his reputation is unclear to me, and I can't quite figure out the status of his work, even when it overlaps with my own field.

Hofstadter introduced several hugely influential terms into historical analysis and public debate, many of which you still hear: "status anxiety," "anti-intellectualism in American life," and "the paranoid style of American politics." And his books continue to be known, though many of them have various problems. I still run across references to his first book, Social Darwinism in American Thought, though I've never had the occasion to read it. His second book, The American Political Tradition, would prove the most lasting, but after Rogers Smith's work positing multiple traditions in American political life, I'm not sure that Hofstadter's book can hold up. The Development of Academic Freedom in the United States, as Brian Ingrassia has pointed out in a recent comment, remains the fullest statement of academic freedom (at least as far as I know), even though it is so old. I've heard numerous people call Anti-Intellectualism in American Life a "brilliant but flawed book," but whenever I press them on the flaws, they are never quite forthcoming. The Paranoid Style in American Politics, and Other Essays continues to be known mainly for the titular essay. And, finally, there is The Age of Reform, a book that is still widely read but, many people assure me, the most problematic of the lot. In short, many of his books are still in some kind of circulation, some more than fifty years after he wrote them, but they are all of uncertain reliability.

So how are we to regard Richard Hofstadter? I think I'm not alone when I say that I have long had an intellectual crush on him. And I suspect that one of the reasons that his work is still read is that, even if you think that he is historiographically dated, he is just so fun to read. But what is the academic status of his individual works and of his oeuvre as a whole?

Do You Still Read Hofstadter?

In continuation of what appears to be a series, I'd like to talk about Richard Hofstadter. Hofstadter, of course, was the American political historian who taught at Columbia with other academic luminaries such as Lionel Trilling and Jacques Barzun. Though an immaculate stylist and one of the most influential historians of his generation, Hofstadter's star faded upon his (premature) death, before experiencing a slight revival with the publication of of David S. Brown's Richard Hofstadter: An Intellectual Biography. Today his reputation is unclear to me, and I can't quite figure out the status of his work, even when it overlaps with my own field.

Hofstadter introduced several hugely influential terms into historical analysis and public debate, many of which you still hear: "status anxiety," "anti-intellectualism in American life," and "the paranoid style of American politics." And his books continue to be known, though many of them have various problems. I still run across references to his first book, Social Darwinism in American Thought, though I've never had the occasion to read it. His second book, The American Political Tradition, would prove the most lasting, but after Rogers Smith's work positing multiple traditions in American political life, I'm not sure that Hofstadter's book can hold up. The Development of Academic Freedom in the United States, as Brian Ingrassia has pointed out in a recent comment, remains the fullest statement of academic freedom (at least as far as I know), even though it is so old. I've heard numerous people call Anti-Intellectualism in American Life a "brilliant but flawed book," but whenever I press them on the flaws, they are never quite forthcoming. The Paranoid Style in American Politics, and Other Essays continues to be known mainly for the titular essay. And, finally, there is The Age of Reform, a book that is still widely read but, many people assure me, the most problematic of the lot. In short, many of his books are still in some kind of circulation, some more than fifty years after he wrote them, but they are all of uncertain reliability.

So how are we to regard Richard Hofstadter? I think I'm not alone when I say that I have long had an intellectual crush on him. And I suspect that one of the reasons that his work is still read is that, even if you think that he is historiographically dated, he is just so fun to read. But what is the academic status of his individual works and of his oeuvre as a whole?