On Wednesday October 25th at 7PM ET, BigTentUSA is thrilled to host historian and popular Substack author Heather Cox Richardson in conversation with award-winning journalist Katie Couric. They will discuss Richardson’s new book Democracy Awakening: The State of America; how we got to this perilous point, what our history really tells us about ourselves, and what the future of democracy can be.
Many books tell us what has happened over the last five years. Democracy Awakening explains how we got to this perilous point, what our history really tells us about ourselves, and what the future of democracy can be.
In the midst of the impeachment crisis of 2019, Heather Cox Richardson launched a daily Facebook essay providing the historical background of the daily torrent of news. It soon turned into a newsletter and its readership ballooned to more than 2 million dedicated readers who rely on her plainspoken and informed take on the present and past in America.
In Democracy Awakening, Richardson crafts a compelling and original narrative, explaining how, over the decades, a small group of wealthy people have made war on American ideals. By weaponizing language and promoting false history they have led us into authoritarianism — creating a disaffected population and then promising to recreate an imagined past where those people could feel important again. She argues that taking our country back starts by remembering the elements of the nation’s true history that marginalized Americans have always upheld. Their dedication to the principles on which this nation was founded has enabled us to renew and expand our commitment to democracy in the past. Richardson sees this history as a roadmap for the nation’s future.
ABOUT OUR SPEAKERS
Katie Couric (@katiecouric) is an award-winning journalist and #1 New York Times best-selling author of her memoir, Going There, which was published in October 2021. She is also a co-founder of Stand Up To Cancer (SU2C) which has raised more than $700 million for cancer research. Couric was the first woman to solo anchor a network evening newscast, serving as anchor and managing editor of the CBS Evening News from 2006 to 2011 following 15-years as co-anchor of NBC’s Today show.
In 2017, she founded Katie Couric Media (KCM), which has developed a number of media projects, including a daily newsletter, “Wake-Up Call”, a podcast, “Next Question”, digital video series and several documentaries. You can find it all at katiecouric.com.
Heather Cox Richardson is Professor of History at Boston College. She writes widely about Reconstruction, the Civil War, and the history of the Republican Party. She is the author of seven books including, most recently, Democracy Awakening, as well as the award-winning How the South Won the Civil War: Oligarchy, Democracy, and The Continuing Fight for the Soul of America. She writes the popular newsletter, Letters from an American, a daily chronicle of the history behind American politics.
