More News and Analysis from Nationhood Lab

Most Americans say they support the liberal democratic values at the core of the American Experiment, but would they actually do so in practice when doing so might not help their “side” obtain or sustain power? The answer, according to our latest surveys, is “yes,” for most Americans, but not necessarily on the American right.
This summer Nationhood Lab has been focused on regional health disparities and earlier this month the project published a large data journalism package showing wide gaps in life expectancy between U.S. regions. On Sept. 1, Politico published a magazine length story on the findings by project director Colin Woodard, which became the most read story on the site the following afternoon.
In Smithsonian Magazine, Nationhood Lab Director Colin Woodard shares the backstory of one of the United States's misguided national origin stories. Frederick Jackson Turner's massively influential and deeply flawed Frontier Thesis, which dominated the teaching and public understanding of American history for half a century after it was first presented at the Chicago World's Fair in 1893, was a cul-de-sac of nationhood building
In the Boston Globe, Pell Center senior fellow Colin Woodard argues a breakup of the United States would be a disaster to be avoided at all costs. But if it happened, history suggests an independent New England might well emerge.