NEWS & EVENTS

Press 

• Amazon ranks Dark Persuasion #1 New Release in Popular Psychology History (8.6.2021)
• Dark Persuasion was shortlisted for the American Psychological Association's 2022 William James Award
• ​​Dark Persuasion - The History of Brainwashing from Pavlov to Social Media (UCTV, 10.30.2021) has received over 885,000 views

• Episode 23: Brainwashing & Master Persuasion (Mind Dive Podcast, The Menninger Clinic, 1.23.2023)
• Sleight of Mind (Carleton College Voice, Summer 2022)   
• Extracting Information with Drugs (The Psychologist, 6.9.2022)
• Brainwashing: From the Korean War to cults to today (Colin McEnroe Show, Connecticut Public Radio, 4.20.2022)
• The Many Faces of Brainwashing—From Heaven’s Gate to QAnon (The Daily Beast, 2.7.2022)
• The PsychopharmaStahlogy Show: The Power of Dark Persuasion (NEI Podcast, 1.10.2022)
• Attenzione ai social, il cervello ci lavano (La Repubblica, 12.10.2021)
• Brainwashing has a grim history that we shouldn’t dismiss​ (Psyche, 11.24.2021)
• ​The Science of Mind Control (Think, KERA Radio, 9.15.2021)
• Dr. Joel Dimsdale: Brainwashing in History (and Today) (College Commons Podcast, 9.13.2021)
• ​​Brainwashing—A Bubbe-meise? (Yale University Press Blog, 8.24.2021)
• ​Can Stimulating Brains Lead to Controlling Them? (Wall Street Journal, 8.7.2021)

Speaking Engagements

Please contact me ​for information on speaking engagements. Some of my previous engagements include:  

​Civic Groups and Miscellaneous  Consecratio Medici, San Diego  |  Emeriti Association, UCSD  |  Geisel Library, UCSD  |  International Spy Museum, Washington  |  Osler Lifelong Learning Institute, La Jolla  |  San Diego Independent Scholars  |  Vi at La Jolla Village  |  1230 Club, La Jolla  Colleges and Universities  Carleton College​  |  Columbia University  |  Harbor-UCLA Medical Center  |  Laureate Institute for Brain Research, Tulsa  |  Massachusetts General Hospital  |  Mayo Clinic  |  Pomona College  |  Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior  |  Seoul National University, Korea  |  University of California, San Diego  |  UCSD Psychiatry  |  UCSD Emeriti Association  Jewish Organizations  Congregation Beth El, La Jolla  |  Congregation Beth Israel, San Diego  |  Detroit Jewish Book Fair  |  Houston Holocaust Museum  |  Jewish Book Fair, New York  |  Jewish Public Library, Montreal  |  Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust  |  Merage JCC of Orange County  |  Sherwin Miller Museum of Jewish Art, Tulsa  |  Temple Concord, Syracuse  |  WIZO San Diego  |  92Y, New York  Scientific Meetings  Academy of Behavioral Research, Whistler  |  American Psychiatric Association, Atlanta  |  American Psychosomatic Society, Seville  |  California Psychiatric Association, Palm Springs  |  European Association of Psychosomatic Medicine  |  Mexican Psychiatric Association, Mexico City

Featured Events 

• May 21, 2022 - Brainwashing: A Haunting Past and Troubling Future for Psychiatry and Society, American Psychiatric Association Annual Meeting, New Orleans
• March 16, 2022 - Sleep Deprivation Examined: Insights from a Century Ago as Well as Contemporary Studies, World Sleep Congress, Rome
• March 24, 2022 - Discussion about Dark Persuasion, American Psychosomatic Society, Long Beach, CA
• January 15, 2022, 1:30-2:30pm - Spoke at San Diego Independent Scholars on “The evolution of brainwashing in the 20th century”
• November 10, 2021, 3:45-5pm - Spoke at UCSD Emeriti Association
• November 9, 2021, 7pm - Spoke at World Affairs Council, Houston
• October 29, 2021, 5:30-6:30pm - “Dark Persuasion,” Annual Lecture, Center for Communication, Health, & the Public Good, San Diego State University
• October 21, 2021, 1-3pm - “LSD and the War on Memory,” Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, UCSD
• October 20, 2021, 5:30-6:30pm - Book signing, UCSD Geisel Library
• October 19, 2021, 10am-Noon - “Pavlov and the Birth of Brainwashing," Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, UCSD

Video Lectures 

• Doctors’ Checkered Careers in Public Health Communication ​(delivered at UCSD Osher Institute, March 7, 2023)
• The Stockholm Syndrome and its Variants (delivered at Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, UC San Diego, October 2022)
• The Evolution of Brainwashing in the Twentieth Century (presented at San Diego Independent Scholars, January 2022)
• ​​Reflections on History, Brainwashing, and Psychosomatic Medicine (presented at Academy of Consultation Liaison Psychiatry, November 2021)
• Dialogue Between Spy Museum Historian and Curator Andrew Hammond and Joel Dimsdale on History of Brainwashing (Curator's Corner, 12.9.2021)
• ​Dark Persuasion - The History of Brainwashing from Pavlov to Social Media (UCTV, 10.30.2021).
• LSD and the War on Memory (Video & Podcast; Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, UCSD, 10.21.2021)
• ​Pavlov and the Soviets: the Origins of Scientific Brainwashing (Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, UCSD, 10.19.2021)
• Early Cold War Prelude to Brainwashing (Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, UCSD, 5.4.2021)
• The Korean War and the Art of Brainwashing  (Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, UCSD, 5.5.2021)
• A Twentieth Century History of the History of Coercive Persuasion: Drugs of Interrogation (Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, UCSD, 4.29.2020)
• ​​The Patricia Hearst Trial: Brainwashing? (Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, UCSD, 4.16.2020)