IT WAS A JOKE MAJOR AMONG UNDERGRADS WHEN I WAS IN LAW SCHOOL AT YALE, AND THAT WAS DECADES AGO. IT HASN’T IMPROVED. American Studies Can’t Stand Its Subject: Eighty percent of articles in the field’s leading journal were negative, while not one was positive.

Imagine if, say, African-American studies approached its subject matter the same way.

American Quarterly is only one journal, but what’s found in its pages captures a much larger problem in education, particularly at the collegiate level. During our research, we contacted University of Texas at Austin historian Steven Mintz, who has analyzed the field of American studies. He told us: “A field that once asked, ‘What is America?’—exploring its myths, music, monuments, and contradictions—now too often narrows its focus to a different question: ‘Whom has America silenced, failed, or harmed?’”

This deeply pessimistic view of the U.S. has taken hold of many young people.

That is entirely by design.