Purdue Liberal Arts history professor and author recognized as a 2025 Andrew Carnegie Fellow

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — Kathryn Cramer Brownell, professor of history and director of the Center for American Political History and Technology within the College of Liberal Arts at Purdue University, has been selected for the distinguished 2025 Andrew Carnegie Fellows Program.

A panel of eminent jurors selected 26 exceptional scholars and writers from over 300 nominees for the honor on behalf of the Carnegie Corporation of New York. The fellowship supports research and scholarly outputs across the humanities and social sciences, focusing on originality, impact and the capacity of chosen fellows to communicate their findings broadly. A generous $200,000 stipend enables fellows to devote significant time to scholarship, research and writing.

A specialist in 20th century U.S. political history and the American presidency, Brownell was inspired to pursue her Carnegie fellowship application through conversations at a dinner hosted last fall for Purdue faculty who received university-level awards. Opportunities to strengthen Purdue’s research, teaching and engagement work have led her to craft new approaches to civic education with historically grounded research and engagement. Supported by the Purdue University Books Initiative, and with assistance from the Purdue Faculty Awards and Recognition Office, she chose to focus on the emergence of new businesses undergirding political polarization in the 1980s and 1990s.

“Overall, this research project will uncover the roots and mechanisms of the professional industries that fuel and capitalize on political polarization,” Brownell said. “The Carnegie fellowship will also generate opportunities to collaborate with colleagues at Purdue and across the country on developing innovative curriculum, information networks and digital navigation tools to help citizens engage more productively with a media and political landscape designed to divide and distract, both now and in the future.”

“Katie is an exceptionally dynamic scholar, and we couldn’t be prouder to help support the successes her efforts have reaped,” said Purdue Provost Patrick Wolfe. “As the liberal arts at Purdue continue to strengthen and to shine, I have no doubt we will continue to see yet more books that stand to change fields and even more scholars who receive outstanding national recognition for their work.”

Brownell plans to spend her fellowship working on her new book project, “The Enemy Makers: The Industries That Turned American Politics Into Open Warfare.” The project charts the historical development of a thriving world of consultants, partisan media and tabloid entertainment industries — “all of which,” Brownell noted, “eagerly exploited political divides to make immense profits by teaching Americans to see the political opposition as mortal enemies.”

This project expands on research from her most recent award-winning book, “24/7 Politics: Cable Television and the Fragmenting of America From Watergate to Fox News,” which uncovers how network broadcasters, cable operators and regulators created new possibilities for antiestablishment voices and opened pathways to political prominence for seemingly unlikely figures.

Brownell also plans to use her fellowship time to expand the scholarly efforts of Purdue’s Center for American Political History and Technology. Programming will start with a monthly seminar series that examines political polarization through an interdisciplinary historical lens in collaboration with communications scholars, political scientists, journalists and historians from across the country. This year of academic exchange and public engagement will culminate in a public summit in summer 2026, bringing scholars together with civic leaders, journalists and educators to develop an expansive information literacy program that teaches historical analysis and critical thinking around media consumption.

Read the full release from Carnegie Corporation of New York here.

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