Leonard Steinhorn Professor Public Communication
- Additional Positions at AU
- Affiliate Professor of History
- Degrees
- BA History, Vassar College; MA History, Johns Hopkins University
- Bio
- Leonard Steinhorn is a professor of Communication and an affiliate professor of History. His expertise includes American politics, culture and media; the presidency and presidential elections; political strategy and communication; recent American history; the 1960s; race relations in America. He is author of The Greater Generation: In Defense of the Baby Boom Legacy, co-author of By the Color of Our Skin: The Illusion of Integration and the Reality of Race, and is currently writing a book on America in the 1960s. He has published in books, journals, the Washington Post, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Politico, The Hill, Political Wire, International Herald Tribune, Chicago Sun Times, Baltimore Sun, Huffington Post, Salon, History News Network, BillMoyers.com, World Financial Review, among others, and he was the founding editor of PunditWire, a site where political speechwriters commented on the news. For more than a decade he served as the political analyst for CBS News Radio, and before that he served ten years as the political analyst for FOX-5 News in Washington, DC. Steinhorn has appeared as an on-air expert in a number of documentaries, including CNN's The Sixties and 1968: The Year That Changed America, Superheroes Decoded on the History Channel, and The Kennedy Files on REELZ, and he also appeared in a DVD special feature on the baby boom generation for the final season of AMC's Mad Men. He has given hundreds of talks at home and abroad, and has lectured on politics and history for One Day University and the Smithsonian. Steinhorn was twice named AU Faculty Member of the Year, and he also was named Honors Professor of the Year in 2010. Before joining the AU faculty, he spent 15 years as a political consultant and speechwriter.
- See Also
- Why race has bedeviled Republicans for more than half a century
- 50 Years Ago Congress Gave the President a Blank Check for War
- The Real Forgotten Americans
- Donald Trump's Populism Decoded: How a Billionaire Became the Voice of the "Little People"
- The forgotten riot that explains Trump’s appeal to the white working class
- For the Media
- To request an interview for a news story, call AU Communications at 202-885-5950 or submit a request.
Teaching
Fall 2024
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COMM-301 Public Relations
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COMM-640 Principles of Strategic Comm
Spring 2025
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COMM-420 Topics in Mass Media: The Sixties in America
AU Experts
Area of Expertise
Politics, presidency, campaigns, American culture, 1960s, baby boom generation, race relations, social movements, civil rights, public relations, political communication, media, journalism.
Additional Information
Leonard Steinhorn teaches political communication, public relations, media studies, and courses on American culture, presidential elections, the modern presidency, and the 1960s. He is author of the much discussed book The Greater Generation: In Defense of the Baby Boom Legacy (St. Martin's Press, 2006), and he is coauthor of the critically acclaimed By the Color of Our Skin: The Illusion of Integration and the Reality of Race (1999). Since 2012 Steinhorn has served as the CBS Radio News political analyst, and before that he spent ten years as the political analyst for FOX-5 News in Washington, DC. Steinhorn writes and lectures frequently about politics, presidential campaigns, the 1960s, race relations, social movements, American history, youth issues, generations, mass media, and trends in American culture. His work has appeared in books and scholarly publications as well as in magazines and newspapers including the Washington Post, New York Times, Politico, Political Wire, The Hill, Chicago Sun Times, International Herald Tribune, Baltimore Sun, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, World Financial Review, History News Network, Salon, Huffington Post, BillMoyers.com, among others. Steinhorn's approach to teaching became internationally visible when CNN came weekly to cover his real-time course on the 2000 election; his courses on subsequent presidential elections have been covered by NBC, FOX, and CBS affiliates. Steinhorn has appeared as an on-air expert in a number of documentaries, including The Sixties and 1968: The Year That Changed America on CNN, Superheroes Decoded on the History Channel, and The Kennedy Files on REELZ, and he also appeared in a DVD special feature on the baby boom generation for the final season of AMC's Mad Men. He has appeared a number of times on C-SPAN and many other outlets discussing politics and race relations, he has given hundreds of talks at home and abroad, and he currently lectures nationwide on politics and history for One Day University. Twice he was named American University's Faculty Member of the Year; he also has been named AU's Honors Professor of the Year; and from 2002 to 2004 he served as president of AU's Phi Beta Kappa chapter.
For the Media
To request an interview for a news story, call AU Communications at 202-885-5950 or submit a request.