Welcome to the RAI

The Rothermere American Institute is the University of Oxford’s centre for the study of the United States and its place in the world. Our mission is to support world-leading scholarship and to promote the public understanding of America.

Discover our research

The RAI seeks to provide a supportive and stimulating research environment so that our researchers at all levels across our three key subjects – History, Literature and Politics – can conduct the highest quality of research under our roof.

Attend our events

Every year, the RAI hosts more than one hundred seminars, workshops, conferences and lectures. These attract leading scholars, students, policy-makers and public figures from across the world to debate and study the United States.

Meet our team

The RAI community is made up of a diverse range of Americanists at all career stages. FInd out more about the people who form our community.

Give to the RAI

Our work in promoting the public and scholarly understanding of America and its place in the world is dependent on the generosity of donors. Find out more about the opportunities to give to the RAI.

Our podcast

The Last Best Hope?

Understanding America from the Outside In

On our podcast, our Director Professor Adam Smith talks to guests doing world-leading research that sheds light on the United States from the outside in. We ask what forces have shaped the culture and politics of the US, how its role in the world has changed and what it might be in the future. Is America now, or has it ever been, the "last best hope of earth"? Probably not, but plenty of people have thought so. We try to understand why.

Latest episode