All Writings and Appearances

The Golden Thread (Substack), April 10, 2026 In the numerous interviews and podcasts I’ve done about The Golden Thread since the publication of vol. 1 last August, I’ve often been asked to explain how and why Christianity spread in the ancient world. I’m not sure why this subject comes up so often, unless my interviewers are trying to gauge just how Christian I am. I suspect some of them want to know whether I’m capable of a giving a secular, causal account in terms of socio

unSILOed Podcast with Greg LaBlanc, April 1, 2026 It’s one of the oldest debates in political philosophy: Do good laws make good men, or do good men make good laws? Minds have been wrestling with this question since the days of Petrarch and Machiavelli, but both sides may have insights that can inform modern political philosophy. James Hankins and Greg LaBlanc discuss Renaissance humanism, sparked by Petrarch’s response to 14th‑century crises, and explore humanist education f

The Golden Thread (Substack), March, 25, 2026 By kind permission of Matthew Schmitz and Compact , the online magazine, we are able to offer our subscribers access to the full text of my article published on December 29, 2025, under the title “ Why I’m Leaving Harvard .” It was published hard on the heels of a viral article in the same outlet by Jacob Savage which had raised the issue of widespread institutional discrimination against white males, citing credible facts and fig

The Golden Thread (Substack), March 13, 2026 You don’t have to go very far into the extensive literature devoted to the “defense of the humanities” before you find the proud claim that the humanities teach “critical thinking.” What this ordinarily means, when it comes to reading books, is that students are taught a discipline of taking a text apart and seeing how it ticks, as though it were a machine. In more benign examples of criticism this might amount to rhetorical analys

Conversations with Coleman, March 10, 2026 In this conversation with Coleman Hughes, James Hankins discusses the controversy surrounding the Western canon, and how professors should respond when students without Western backgrounds feel excluded from courses centered on the Judeo-Christian tradition. Ultimately, Hankins argues that curricula should prioritize teaching the Great Books because of their intellectual importance, even if that means the authors studied don’t have d

In conversation with Kathleen O'Toole on the Hillsdale College K-12 Classical Education Podcast (February 16, 2026) In this conversation with Kathleen O’Toole, associate vice-president for K-12 Education at Hillsdale College, James Hankins discusses the first volume of The Golden Thread  and the importance of classical education. They explore the nature of the Western tradition, the tension between civilization and barbarism, the importance of historical knowledge, and the f

Compact, December 29, 2025 Two weeks ago I gave my last lecture at Harvard, where I have been a history professor for forty years. My four decades of experience at one of the world’s leading universities have given me a unique vantage point to trace the replacement of Western history by global history. This change is part of the reason why the younger generation finds itself in a state of moral and intellectual disorientation. My decision to retire was not a sudden one. I am

Unherd, December 26, 2025 Prof. Hankins speaks with Freddie Sayers of Unherd about the precarious state of the Western tradition and the burgeoning resistance movement in classical education. Moving through a 2,500-year narrative arc from the ancient Greek invention of reason to the modern-day “cult of innovation,” he warns that elite institutions are suffering from a dangerous cultural amnesia. But, despite the degradation of the canon, he offers a defiant hope rooted in his

Conversation with Michael Fontaine of Cornell University, Classical Wisdom, December 4, 2025 Have We Broken the Golden Thread? Why the West's Future Depends on Remembering Its Past The West’s greatest peril is forgetfulness, its loss of cultural memory. Without knowing where we came from, how can we know what to defend, or even what to value?   In an age when history itself is contested ... when the past is either dismissed or distorted ... The Golden Thread reminds us why th

The Saad Truth, Oct. 20, 2025 On this episode of The Saad Truth with Gad Saad, Prof. Hankins discusses The Golden Thread , the deeper meaning of civilization and the West, the potential for cultural renewal, and his lifelong friendship with his coauthor Allen Guelzo. Prof. Guelzo continued the conversation with Gad Saad about The Golden Thread on December 2. The Saad Truth, Dec. 2, 2025

The American Mind , August 15, 2025   Andrew Beck argues that America needs to revive the ideal of assimilation if our country is to...

Law and Liberty , August 11, 2025   The ongoing clash of the titans, President Trump and Elon Musk, is bringing into high relief the...

The Southeastern Consortium of Classical Educators, Thales College, August 2, 2025 In his plenary lecture at the Southeastern Consortium...

First Things , June 23, 2025 The research pursued these days in university humanities departments does not, as a rule, enjoy high esteem...

Law and Liberty , May 15, 2025 The first hundred days of the second Trump presidency have brought unprecedented challenges to the...

New Humanists, ep. 87 (May 1, 2025) In this podcast interview, Prof. Hankins joins Ryan Hammill and Jonathan Roberts of the Ancient Language Institute to discuss his book Political Meritocracy in Renaissance Italy , which focuses on the life and thought of Francesco Patrizi of Siena (1413–1494). Although Niccolò Machiavelli is often held up as the paradigmatic political philosopher, Hankins argues that he is in fact an outlier. Instead, it is Patrizi and his focus on virtue t

The American Mind , May 1, 2025   It’s not often that an opinion writer has the good fortune to elicit serious commentary from...

The Wall Street Journal , April 24, 2025 In recent reports about the Trump administration’s assault on Harvard, the statistic is often...

Compact , April 15, 2025 The Trump administration has been conducting a shock-and-awe campaign on official Washington that has astonished...

The American Mind , April 1, 2025   In his address to Congress this month, President Trump boasted—and justly so—of his administration’s...