In 1926, an NYU professor took to the high seas with 500 undergraduates on a worldwide learning voyage. The experimental "Floating University" docked for excursions at nearly 50 ports, where students were introduced to world leaders Mussolini, Gandhi, and others. Tamson Pietsch recounts the endeavor, unpacking the larger story of US intellectual imperialism in the 1920s.

• Tamson Pietsch. 2023. The Floating University: Experience, Empire, and the Politics of Knowledge. University of Chicago Press. 
• Ross L. Jones, James Waghorne, and Marcia Langton, eds. 2024. Dhoombak Goobgoowana: A History of Indigenous Australia and the University of Melbourne. Melbourne University Press.

Text the show here!

Support the show

Browse the American Campus bookshelf

Get in touch! Email Lauren at [email protected]. You can also anonymously request an episode or give feedback on the show.