Co-Executive Editor, Public Seminar and Professor of History, The New School for Social Research

From the Editors

#BlackLivesMatter

Like Killer Mike, we don’t want to be here — but we are. And we embrace it.

June 4, 2020 • by Claire Potter

Instead, we are shocked by how quickly the protest networks that have mobilized in response to George Floyd’s murder have won our hearts, and how completely they have compelled us to act. It caused us to pull together a second special issue in a row quickly. We begin with an address by ...

Activism

Wired Politics

Social media is crucial to organizing modern protests: It is also a vulnerability

June 4, 2020 • by Claire Potter

Nowadays, I try not to watch the cable news shows. There are other ways to get information about the demonstrations engulfing the United States, and my neighborhood in Manhattan, following the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25, 2020. I text friends in the community for updates ...

From the Editors

Can We Get Back to Politics, Please?

Covid-19 is an ongoing tragedy–and it’s time to get back to the business of taking our country back

May 29, 2020 • by Claire Potter

We at Public Seminar are picking ourselves up off the floor after the closure of our university and 100,000 deaths from Covid-19. It’s time to return to the political crisis that the virus interrupted. The Democratic administration we hope for in November will have to address the wreck that the Trump ...

From the Editors

The Last Monday in May

There are no parades, no baseball games, no parties, and we stay home all the time anyway: why should we care that it is Memorial Day?

May 22, 2020 • by Claire Potter

As Joan Rivers would say, “Oh, grow up!” First of all, let’s be clear: Memorial Day is not about you. It’s about honoring the dead, which would make you think it would be a more sober holiday than it usually is nowadays. And initially, it was. Memorial Day sprang from the practice ...

Sex & Gender

Believe Me: A Public Seminar Book Talk

Jaclyn Friedman, Samantha Irby, Tatiana Maslany, and Sabrina Hersi Issa talk feminism with co-executiv editor Claire Potter

May 18, 2020 • by Claire Potter

Almost 150 viewers joined us for an hour of conversation and readings from a new collection of feminist essays that have never been more relevant. Believe Me asks us to imagine a world in which we not only believe women, but act as though the things they report – harassment, sexual assault, ...

From the Editors

Begin Again

Good luck to all our brave, strong graduates from Public Seminar

May 15, 2020 • by Claire Potter

As The New School’s brand-new president, Dwight A. McBride, writes to lead off our issue: “I love commencement.” It is, as he puts it, “a sacred and ecstatic ritual.” We agree. One of the few graduations I have missed in my years as a college professor was in June 2008. ...

Exiles on 12th Street

Nevertheless, She Persisted

Exiles on 12th Street, Episode Eight

May 10, 2020 • by Claire Potter

This is the eighth episode of Public Seminar’s podcast, Exiles on 12th Street. If you like it, go to iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts and subscribe. Thanks to the bravery of several generations of activist women, the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified on August 18, 1920, finally granting women in the ...

From the Editors

Running in Place

We are all living in Corona Time, where history seems to have stopped

May 8, 2020 • by Claire Potter

But now, since we all live in Corona Time, I think they might have done precisely that, at least at the beginning. I believe this because every day, for every person, is now shaped by Covid-19. The days are—sometimes pleasantly, sometimes numbingly—similar. We work. We eat. We read. We exercise. ...

Event

Believe Me: How Trusting Women Can Change the World

A Book Talk with Jaclyn Friedman, Samantha Irby, Tatiana Maslany, and Sabrina Hersi Issa, May 4, 2020, 7:00-8:00 pm EDT

April 29, 2020 • by Claire Potter

Moderator, Claire Potter, co-Executive Editor, Public Seminar Jaclyn Friedman, author, activist, and editor of Believe Me Samantha Irby, New York Times best-selling author Tatiana Maslany, Emmy-winning actor Sabrina Hersi Issa, CEO of Be Bold Media, and founder of Survivor Fund This webinar is sponsored by Public Seminar, a journal of politics and culture based at The ...

Believe Me: How Trusting Women Can Change the World

From the Editors

The Most Beautiful Economy in the World

We saw it coming, but the collapse was swifter and more brutal than we ever imagined

April 28, 2020 • by Claire Potter

“It was a terrible relationship,” a pal of mine commented after a couple we knew suddenly announced that they were divorcing; “but I thought they would be together forever.” We feel that way about the whole house of cards that is the American economy. What has happened to our world three ...

From the Editors

What We Are Capable Of

As the pandemic reshapes our lives, we read, bake, sew and hope

April 22, 2020 • by Claire Potter

We have become resilient. We know that we can continue to produce Public Seminar from our homes; and that we can teach our students on Zoom, organized as if they were contestants on the classic television game show, Hollywood Squares. We are accustomed to new forms of uncertainty: for example, ...

Democracy

Donald Trump Has Been in Politics for Decades

As a new book by Andrea Bernstein details, creating a 20th-century real estate empire demanded it

April 19, 2020 • by Claire Potter

As early as 1987, rumor had it that Donald Trump was considering a presidential bid. In October 1987, as both parties began to assemble the 1988 field, Trump took a trip to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, where a crowd bearing “Trump for President” signs greeted him. He decided not to run ...

Claire Potter

#BlackLivesMatter

Like Killer Mike, we don’t want to be here — but we are. And we embrace it.

Wired Politics

Social media is crucial to organizing modern protests: It is also a vulnerability

Can We Get Back to Politics, Please?

Covid-19 is an ongoing tragedy–and it’s time to get back to the business of taking our country back

The Last Monday in May

There are no parades, no baseball games, no parties, and we stay home all the time anyway: why should we care that it is Memorial Day?

Believe Me: A Public Seminar Book Talk

Jaclyn Friedman, Samantha Irby, Tatiana Maslany, and Sabrina Hersi Issa talk feminism with co-executiv editor Claire Potter

Begin Again

Good luck to all our brave, strong graduates from Public Seminar

Nevertheless, She Persisted

Exiles on 12th Street, Episode Eight

Running in Place

We are all living in Corona Time, where history seems to have stopped

Believe Me: How Trusting Women Can Change the World

A Book Talk with Jaclyn Friedman, Samantha Irby, Tatiana Maslany, and Sabrina Hersi Issa, May 4, 2020, 7:00-8:00 pm EDT

The Most Beautiful Economy in the World

We saw it coming, but the collapse was swifter and more brutal than we ever imagined

What We Are Capable Of

As the pandemic reshapes our lives, we read, bake, sew and hope

Donald Trump Has Been in Politics for Decades

As a new book by Andrea Bernstein details, creating a 20th-century real estate empire demanded it

Newsletter

Connect With Us