This is thinking in public, a program dedicated to intelligent conversation about

front-line theological and cultural issues with the people who are shaping them.

I'm Albert Mowel, your host and president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville,

Kentucky.

Jonathan Zimmerman is professor of education and history and director of the History of Education

Program at New York University's

Steinhart School of Culture, Education, and Human Development.

He also holds an appointment in the Department of History of NYU's Graduate School

of Arts and Sciences.

He's a frequent op-ed contributor to the New York of NYU's Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.

He's a frequent op-ed contributor to the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the New

Republic, as well as other popular newspapers and magazines.

He is the author of several books including Small Wonder, The Little Red Schoolhouse in History

and Memory, Innocence Abroad, American Teachers in the American Century, whose America Culture Wars

in the Public Schools, and Distillingilling democracy alcohol education in America's

public schools 1880 to 1925. His most recent work is too hot to handle a global

history of sex education. Professor Jonathan Zimmerman, welcome to thinking in public.

Professor Zimmerman, you write about the intersection of the century of sex and the century of the school

and that led to your work on sex education.

How did that come about?

Well, in a way, my book is a story of something that didn't happen. Sex Ed in this country and around the world has been

remarkably brief and attenuated in schools. And that's ironic because I think the 20th century

...