Historian and broadcaster Professor Adam Smith explores the America of today through the lens of the past. Is America - as Abraham Lincoln once claimed - the last best hope of Earth?
Produced by Oxford University’s world-leading Rothermere American Institute, each story-filled episode looks at the US from the outside in – delving into the political events, conflicts, speeches and songs that have shaped and embodied the soul of a nation.
From the bloody battlefields of Gettysburg to fake news and gun control, Professor Smith takes you back in time (and sometimes on location) to uncover fresh insights and commentary from award-winning academics and prominent public figures.
Join us as we ask: what does the US stand for – and what does this mean for us all?
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Historian and broadcaster Professor Adam Smith explores the America of today through the lens of the past. Is America - as Abraham Lincoln once claimed - the last best hope of Earth?
Produced by Oxford University’s world-leading Rothermere American Institute, each story-filled episode looks at the US from the outside in – delving into the political events, conflicts, speeches and songs that have shaped and embodied the soul of a nation.
From the bloody battlefields of Gettysburg to fake news and gun control, Professor Smith takes you back in time (and sometimes on location) to uncover fresh insights and commentary from award-winning academics and prominent public figures.
Join us as we ask: what does the US stand for – and what does this mean for us all?
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
It is one of the most famous speeches in the English language and one of the most consequential. In this special two-part documentary, we explore Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address – why he gave it, what it meant, and its impact at the time and ever since. From the rolling fields of Pennsylvania to Parliament Square in London and the dust of Havana, Cuba, Adam Smith follows the path of the Gettysburg Address and asks why it is has mattered.
Contributors: Steve Scafidi, a poet and the author of To the Bramble and the Briar (University of Arkansas Press, 2014); Richard Carwardine, Rhodes Professor Emeritus at the University of Oxford and author of Righteous Strife: How Warring Religious Nationalists Forged Lincoln’s Union (Knopf, 2024); Elizabeth Varon, Langbourne M. Williams Professor of American History at the University of Virginia and author of Armies of Deliverance: A New History of the Civil War (Oxford University Press, 2019); Martin P. Johnson, Associate Professor of History at Miami University in Ohio and author of Writing the Gettysburg Address (University Press of Kansas, 2013); and Dr Jared Peatman, George Washington University, and author of The Long Shadow of Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address (Illinois University Press, 2013).
Adam's latest book is Gettysburg (Oxford University Press, 2025)
The Last Best Hope? is a podcast of the Rothermere American Institute at the University of Oxford. For details of our programming go to rai.ox.ac.uk
Producer: Emily Williams. Presenter: Adam Smith
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.