Texas Takes Shape: Perceptions, Power and the Politics of Identity

What defines Texas — myth or memory, history or politics? In this sweeping conversation, historian Benjamin Heber Johnson, Texas: An American History, and scholar Jeff Roche, The Conservative Frontier, unpack the evolving identity of the Lone Star State and its outsized influence on national narratives. From frontier mythologies and cowboy conservatism to civil rights movements and cultural pluralism, these two authors explore how Texas has shaped and been shaped by shifting power structures, contested ideologies, and the stories we tell ourselves about what it means to be Texan and American.