Irrational Forces and the Power of Ideology: Christopher Dawson on the Modern Age

Bradley J. Birzer holds the Russell Amos Kirk Chair in American Studies and is Professor of History at Hillsdale College in Michigan. In 2010, he co-founded The Imaginative Conservative (theimaginativeconservative.org). He also writes for Law and Liberty, Acton Institute, Ignatius Insight and Catholic World Report. He earned his B.A. from the University of Notre Dame and his Ph.D. from Indiana University. He had the great privilege of studying with such excellent scholars as R. David Edmund, Bernard Sheehan, Russ Hanson, Anne Butler, Walter Nugent, Greg Dowd and Marvin O’Connell. For the 2014-15 school year, Birzer had the honor of being the “Scholar in Residence” and “Visiting Scholar in Conservative Thought and Policy” at the University of Colorado – Boulder. He has authored biographies of J.R.R. Tolkien, Charles Carroll of Carrollton, Christopher Dawson, Andrew Jackson and Neil Peart. Currently, he is writing an intellectual biography of Robert Nisbet and a group biography of the Inklings. His latest book is Beyond Tenebrae: Christian Humanism in the Twilight of the West.