Richard P. Horwitz
Professor of American Studies

Professional Bio and Vita
 

This site began in the 1990s as "American Studies Recommendations." It featured free, on-line, multidisciplinary and multimedia collections of reliable information about the US. It was mainly designed to help teachers and students find such sources where and when they were hard to get. Fortunately, they are now much more accessible just about everywhere; so, this site is limited to recommended samples of my own work, linked below. The vita has a more complete list, including links to more recent, applied-research reports and plans for US agriculture, the environment, and emergency management.

On key concepts and methods in American Studies:

• Roots of American Studies for The American Studies Anthology (2001)
• America Studies: Approaches and Concepts for Encyclopedia of American Studies (2001)
• To Kvetch and Define a Field for American Studies (1997)
• The J-Factor in American Studies for MAASA Conference (2010) 

On international American Studies:

• The Politics of International American Studies for Exporting America and American Studies International (1993)
• Coming to Terms With International American Studies for The Fulbright Difference, 1948-1992 (1993)
• 'Foreign' Expertise: American Studies in Taiwan for American Studies International (1989)
• Principles in Assessing Academic Exchange for Fulbright-hosted conference in Vienna (2010)

On writing and teaching American Studies:

• On Writing American Studies for Encyclopedia of American Studies (2014)
• Just Stories of Ethnographic Authority for When They Read What We Write (1993)
• Shit Happens: An American Studies Engagement for American Studies (1993)
• Teaching About Method for American Studies (1990)
• Multiculturalism and University Lore for Multiculturalism and the Canon of American Culture (1993)
• American Studies as a Way of Life with Al Stone for American Studies (2002)

On American cultures off-campus:

• Americans' Problem with Global Warming for American Studies (2004)
• Hog Wars and Pig Ties for Fear Itself (1999)
• Hogs and the Meaning of Life in Iowa for the Smithsonian Institution's 1996 Festival of American Folklife, Iowa's Festival of Iowa Folklife (1996), and PBS Online's Mississippi: River of Song Project (1998)
• An Artist Makes History for North Dakota Quarterly (1987)
• Architecture and Culture: The Meaning of the Lowell Boarding House for American Quarterly (1973)
• The Small Miracles of Everyday Life for Surpassing Expectations (1999) 

Books:

• Hog Ties: What Pigs Tell Us About America (2002)
• The American Studies Anthology (2001)
• Hog Ties: Pigs Manure and Mortality in American Culture (1998)
• Exporting America: Essays on American Studies Abroad (1993)
• The Strip: An American Place (1985)
• Anthropology Toward History (1978) 

Updated April 2026
E-mail: Richard-Horwitz@uiowa.edu