The American Vandal

Matt Seybold

marktwain@theamericanvandal.com

For verified host and producer emails, sign up to view.

Booking Overview

An academic panel and symposium-conversation podcast focused on literature, history, higher education, media, technology, and political economy, typically featuring university scholars and specialized researchers rather than commercial executives or celebrities. Credible pitches include professors, literary critics, historians, media and technology scholars, higher-education researchers, and political economists with substantial research or publishing credentials; booking difficulty is medium because the show serves a specialized academic audience and favors subject-matter expertise.

Metrics

Episodes: 117

Frequency: Irregular

Rating: 4.7/5.0

Estimated listeners: 1k-10k

Gender skew: Unknown

Location: USA

Contact Information

marktwain@theamericanvandal.com

For verified host and producer emails, sign up to view.

Host

Matt Seybold - Scholar of Mark Twain and American literature associated with the Center for Mark Twain Studies.

Booking Intelligence

Booking Requirements

medium
Typical Credentials:  
University professors, literary critics, historians, and researchers specializing in literature, higher education, media, technology, or political economy.
Required Achievements:  
Published scholarly research, Academic conference presentations, Books or articles in relevant fields

Recent Guest Discussions

Mattin Biglari - The Historical Production Of Oil And Knowledge In Iran And The Political Context Surrounding The Strait Of Hormuz.

Katayoun Shafiee - The Historical Production Of Oil And Knowledge In Iran, Iranian Oil, And The Political Context Surrounding The Strait Of Hormuz.

Recent Topics

Literature, Mark Twain, Higher Education, History

Episodes

Here's the recent few episodes on
The American Vandal
:

Reading Machines (Vandal Live at Berkeley)

July 15, 2026

The final episode recorded at the ⁠Modes of Reading Today Symposium⁠, hosted by the ⁠Townsend Center For The Humanities⁠ focuses on media, mediation, and machine-generated texts. It opens with Nicholas Baer and Pardis Debashi's "Unattainable Texts," followed by David Bates's "Reading and Writing" [20:00], Nina Beguš's "Novel Audiences in 'Finnegan's Wake'" [37:30], Hannes Bajohr's "Surface Reading LLMs" [57:00], Matt Seybold&...

Close Reading Is Having A Moment (Vandal Live at UC-Berkeley)

July 07, 2026

The second episode derived from the ⁠Modes of Reading Today Symposium⁠, hosted by the ⁠Townsend Center For The Humanities⁠ assesses what it means that "close reading is having a moment" through papers titled "What is Close Reading?" [8:00], "Finding The Right Place For Close Reading" [30:00], "The Affected Fallacy" [56:00], "On Generalizing" [77:30], and "Close Reading as Field-Making" [100:00]Cast (in order of appearance): Yael Segalovitz, Matt Seybold, Jonathan Kramnick, Toril Moi, Joshua G...

Reading, Sleep, Attention, Grief (Vandal Live at UC-Berkeley)

June 18, 2026

An episode recorded as part of the Modes of Reading Today Symposium, hosted by the Townsend Center For The Humanities begins with a discussion of John Donne's insomnia and Wilfred Bion's undigested nightmares, followed by a vigorous discussion of attention, sleep, and immersion as they relate to literature and criticism [39:00], after which the symposium's organizer (and host of the Psychoanaliterature podcast) flips the studio for some analysis of The American Vandal's creato...

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