American Experiment goes to college
Your humble, hometown think tank is now being studied at the university level. No, really.
As he documents on his PowerLine website, our president, John Hinderaker, received an email purportedly on behalf of something called the Center for Right-Wing Studies. (It exists; I totally want a t-shirt.)
The email does reveal that, apparently, the University of California’s Bancroft Library has a catalog entry reserved for American Experiment.
The occasion of the email was a request by a publishing company to digitize American Experiment’s work and sell it to others for commercial gain. Naturally, Hinderaker said “no.”
The email raised in John’s mind the question of the potential existence of a Center for Left-Wing Studies. Of course, no such entity exists, as it would be completely redundant with the remainder of the University of California, Berkeley, who hosts the right-wing center. The Center was founded in 2009.
As the flagship campus of the University of California system, Berkeley is considered by some to be the top-rated public university in America, along with its sister campus, UCLA. Berkeley’s Center for Right-Wing Studies is one of seven centers housed within the University’s Institute for the Study of Societal Issues (ISSI). Right-wingery is studied alongside other curiosities such as Asian Americans, Native Americans, and the Latinx.
The University claims that the center is funded entirely by private donations, all from anonymous donors. The Center lists some 86 individuals associated with its work.
They have a Twitter (X) page.
They have a Journal! There is a real-life academic publication called the Journal of Right-Wing Studies, founded in 2023, which recently published its third-ever issue. The latest issue covers the broad topics of “Gender, Sexuality, and Sociolinguistics of the Far Right.” It could do no other.
A typical article from the publication goes by the title:
“Hailing, Voicing, and Masturbation Abstention: NoFap’s Role in Socializing Young Men into the Right-Wing Politics of Ressentiment”
For those wondering, the title’s last word, in italics, is not a typo. The article was authored by three scholars, including one from Penn State.
We wish them all the best.