PODCASTS ARE A GREAT WAY TO EXPERIENCE ADST’S ORAL HISTORY COLLECTION

In our Modern American Diplomacy podcast, we interview American diplomats, capturing the sacrifice, leadership, humor, heroism, wisdom, and lessons of modern American diplomacy. Through historical reflections and personal anecdotes, guests explain foreign policy and tradecraft, or what they were trying to accomplish and how. Episodes include conversations with America’s diplomatic legends — including Thomas Pickering, John Negroponte, Bill Burns, Maura Harty, Beth Jones and Kristie Kenney — as well as rising leaders and foreign policy experts from diverse backgrounds. **Some interviews will be cited in the forthcoming book Modern American Diplomacy: A Field Guide to Success in The Foreign Service. And some episodes, as marked, were brought to you as part of an Una Chapman Cox Foundation project on American Diplomacy and the Foreign Service. The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training (ADST) manages the podcast, which was begun by career FSO Jeremy Beer.

Check out this week’s FEATURED EPISODE (or listen below): Leola Calzolai-Stewart, Rachell Shapiro, Kiley Kraskouskas talk about the careers of three outstanding African-American diplomats – ambassadors Edward Dudley, Terence Todman, and Carl Rowan – as well all that was involved in bringing the story of these pioneers to life in “The American Diplomat” on PBS. The discussion covers the history of African-Americans in the Foreign Service from Reconstruction to the modern day, as well as the barriers they faced in a State Department that initially confined them to just a few posts in predominantly black countries, maintaining racial inequality from office culture to the lunchroom. Listen and hear about how America’s inequality affected Cold War rhetoric, the efforts of these trailblazing diplomats to create opportunity at home and abroad, the progress that has been made, and the work still to be done, as well as insights on resilience and breaking barriers in the present day.

You can find Modern American Diplomacy on several platforms including Google, iTunes, and Spotify!

You can also listen to our most recent podcasts without leaving our site.  Scroll through the list below.  Happy listening!

For more podcasts, check out our Anchor page.