Zachary Jonathan Jacobson is the author of On Nixon’s Madness: An Emotional History (2023). He received his Ph.D. from Northwestern University in U.S. History with a focus on the Cold War. He teaches at Merrimack College and is a Community Scholar with the Society of U.S. Intellectual History and the American Institute of Thought at Indiana University—Purdue University Indianapolis. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, USA Today and the Chronicle of Higher Education as well as journals including the Presidential Studies Quarterly and Cold War History. He is currently writing The Saints and the Navigators: A Storied History of the Early Cold War.
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Education
Ph.D., Northwestern University, Department of History (2015)
Dissertation: “American Studies, the Soviet Union: A Cultural History of US-Soviet Encounters through the Cold War”
Committee: Michael Sherry (chair), John Bushnell, Sarah Maza
M.A., Northwestern University, Department of History (2007)
Master’s Thesis: “The Children of Lenin: A Cultural History of the Narrative that Drove Perestroika”
B.A. with distinction, Yale University, Department of English (2002)
Jonathan Edwards Arts Award for Performing Arts
Books
On Nixon’s Madness: An Emotional History (Johns Hopkins University Press, Spring 2023,)
The Saints and the Navigators: A Storied History of the Early Cold War (In Progress)
Fellowships/Grants (selected)
Community Scholar, Society for United States Intellectual History and the Institute for American Thought at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (2023-2025)
Presidential Fellowship, Nomination by History Department, Northwestern University (2012)
Language Travel Grant for three-month study in St. Petersburg, Russia, US State Department (Summer 2008)
Teaching/Graduate Assistantship, Department of History, Northwestern University (2007-2013)
Hearst Fellowship, Department of History, Northwestern University (2006-2007)
Academic Publications
“Zelensky Wags the Dog, But Softly,” Passport: The Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR) Review, (Sep 2022).
“Putin’s War Spawns a New Generation of Kremlinologists,” H-Diplo (Apr 20, 2022).
“The Nixon Act,” Presidential Studies Quarterly (Dec 2020)
“Trump Is the New ___,” Chronicle of Higher Education (Oct 24, 2017)
“A Russian Journal: John Steinbeck’s Quixotic Quest to the Soviet Union,” Steinbeck Review 13, No. 1 (2016)
“On the ‘Arcane Modern Science of Kremlinology’ or The Case of the Vanishing Birthdays,” Cold War History 16, issue 2 (Feb 2016)
“Parable on Ice: Hockey, Capitalism and American Decadence at the Lake Placid Olympics,” UCLA Historical Journal (Jun 2013)
Mainstream Publications (selected)
“The Lesson of Richard Nixon for Interpreting Putin’s Saber-Rattling,” Washington Post, Mar 2023
“The Madman Theory Was Quintessential Nixon,” History News Network, Mar 26, 2023
“Trump’s Big Lie Was plucked from Countless Smaller Ones,” New York Daily News, Jul 26, 2022.
“The Silly Hunt for an Impeachment Smoking Gun,” New York Daily News, Dec 18, 2019
“The Deep State Did Not Begin with Trump,” New York Daily News, Dec 5, 2019
“Why Julian Assange Is Unlikely to Find a Refuge in the Supreme Court,” Washington Post, Jul 7, 2019
“How Paranoia about the ‘Deep State’ Brought down a President,” Washington Post, Apr 8, 2019
“The Irrational Rationality of Conservative Conspiracism,” Washington Post, Sep 27, 2018
“Republicans Want Voters to Ignore Trump’s Words. Here’s Why They’re Wrong,” Washington Post, Aug 31, 2018
“The Putin paradox: he’s brutally repressive — and incredibly popular,” Vox, Jul 16, 2018
“The Case for Trump’s Nobel,” Washington Post, Jun 12, 2018
“Many are worried about the return of the ‘Big Lie.’ They’re worried about the wrong thing,” Washington Post, May 21, 2018
“The March for Our Lives will last a few hours. Its impact will last a generation,” Washington Post, Mar 23, 2018
“The Search for Donald Trump’s Own Watergate,” New Republic, May 16, 2017
“Trump and Foreign Policy Entanglements: The Cautionary Tale of US Involvement in Guatemala,” New York Daily News, Feb 7, 2017
“Fascism in the USA, A Rebuttal,” The Hill, Jan 1, 2017
“What Millennials Don’t Get about Bernie,” USA Today, May 10, 2016