meet your hosts!
NICOLE HEMMER is an expert on the history of American politics and media. In addition to her weekly column on politics and history in U.S. News & World Report, Niki has written about political history for a number of national and international outlets, including the New York Times, Atlantic, New Republic, Los Angeles Times, and Sydney Morning Herald. She is currently a visiting research associate in Presidential Studies at the Miller Center of Public Affairs, as well as a research associate at the U.S. Studies Centre at the University of Sydney. Her book, Messengers of the Right, which charts the history of conservative media activism in the United States, will be published by Penn Press in August 2016. She received her Ph.D. in U.S. history from Columbia University, and previously taught at the University of Miami. Niki lives in Charlottesville, Virginia. She tweets @pastpunditry.
NATALIA MEHLMAN PETRZELA, an assistant professor of history at The New School, is author of Classroom Wars: Language, Sex, and the Making of Modern Political Culture (Oxford, 2015). Her latest research traces the rise of “wellness culture” since the 1950s, asking how and why Americans have increasingly linked food and fitness regimes to the pursuit of self-fulfillment. These scholarly pursuits are closely linked to her wellness activism as co-founder of HealthClass2.0, an experiential health education program that bridges a wellness gap in public school education and connects university mentors with K-12 students. Natalia writes a biweekly “fitness history” column for Well+Good. Her work has also appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Huffington Post, Brian Lehrer TV, History Channel, and the Atlantic. Natalia received a B.A. from Columbia College and an M.A. and Ph.D. from Stanford University, all in History. She lives and works in New York City. She tweets @nataliapetrzela.
NEIL YOUNG is a contributing columnist at The Week and an independent scholar of U.S. history, focusing on post-1945 religion, politics, and culture. His first book, We Gather Together: The Religious Right and the Problem of Interfaith Politics (Oxford, 2015), explores the rise of the Religious Right and the challenges of building religious and political alliances among conservative evangelicals, Catholics, and Mormons. He is currently working on a book about the history of gay Republicans. Neil holds an A.B. from Duke University and a Ph.D. in history from Columbia University. He previously taught at Princeton University. His writings have appeared in the Journal of Policy History, American Quarterly, and in Evangelicals and the 1960s. He frequently contributes historical analysis to publications including the Washington Post, Atlantic, Los Angeles Times, Vox, Politico, New York Times, Slate, and HuffPost. He tweets @NeilJYoung17.