“I needed to respond to the West Africa display as the story of the diaspora was missing”'. Looking forward to seeing Charmaine Watkiss's new works at the Royal Albert Memorial Museum soon. www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

For anyone interested in our 18-month post in British Studies please follow the link below. @ihr.bsky.social www.jobs.london.ac.uk/Job/JobDetai...

Please join us next Wed 11 Feb 2-3.30 in Oxford for ‘Imperial Circulations Climate Knowledge, Port Labor, and Material Worlds’

New blog post for the fab @bemccollective.bsky.social summarising my recent @rhi-ihr.bsky.social article on labour, global commodities, and material skill in the Port of London’s ivory warehouse sites.manchester.ac.uk/bodies-emoti...

Dummy board of a woman peeling apples, c. 1690, of English make (Victoria & Albert Museum) Dummy boards were life-size images placed in stairwells or in front of fireplaces in summer time. They were designed to amuse and also to startle visitors.

Looking to expand your historical knowledge in 2026? Why not see what @oxlifelonglearning.bsky.social has to offer. My disease in early modern England course is now full, but there are still a few spaces on my history of the Stuarts course. Details here: lifelong-learning.ox.ac.uk/tutors/13676

The story of this collection awaits its historian and fullest telling. It really is an amazing insight into multiple forms of historical erasure, neglect, and theft.

So awesome! Terrific and vocal support for the humanities. BUT this university is also near to slow-closing its languages programs and for real these schemes raise questions about economic feasibility arguments.

#CfP Call for Papers Organised by Global History and Culture Centre, University of Warwick: Between Thompson and the Global: Reflections on Labour History Today Workshop: 26-27 June 2026, University of Warwick Deadline for abstracts: 30 January 2026 Submit to [email protected]

How does a physical space become a site for global economic history? @alibennett.bsky.social unpacks the significance of African ivory in the Port of London 👇

Do you work at the intersection of universities, the arts 🎭 & culture? If so, we are very keen to hear from you! At @ncace.bsky.social we are organising our 2nd Festival of Cultural Exchange, taking place in April 2026. If you want to get involved apply by 8 Dec. files.ncace.ac.uk/NCACE%20Fest...

Medieval Visual Culture Seminar 'New directions in the study of ivories from the Islamic world: A talk and handling session' Mariam Rosser-Owen (V&A) & Ashley Coutu (Pitt Rivers) 5pm Nov 20 🗓️ Khalili Research Center 🏢 (Co-sponsored by the Khalili Research Center) www.hoa.ox.ac.uk/event/mediev...

A brilliant opportunity to work on a new exhibition on the Global Renaissance.

The first volume of the Special Issue on Global Economic History @rhi-ihr.bsky.social is now out! It features 4 new articles on 4 commodities in global economic history - salt, ivory, raw cotton, and finished cotton goods - all open access. It was a great experience editing this volume!

Very pleased to have published this new article entitled ‘Port labour, global commodities, and material skill development: A study of the ivory warehouse in the Port of London and its representation c. 1860-1968’ with @rhi-ihr.bsky.social. Huge thanks go to @alkaraman.bsky.social as special editor!

We are very pleased to be working with @ihr.bsky.social and @findmypast.bsky.social on this new Applied History Fellowship programme. The launch event on Weds 19 November bit.ly/49vcgCS provides further details of the scheme and how to apply #Skystorians

On flags and ‘patriotism’ in Kent right now 😩 www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/10...

Fascinating article by Nuala Zahedieh about the centrality of canoes in early colonial exploitation 🗃️https://academic.oup.com/past/advance-article/doi/10.1093/pastj/gtaf021/8231030

Over 90% of the world's museum collections are locked away in storage. Not anymore. UofG’s Museums in the Metaverse is bringing hidden treasures to life through 3D technology. Sign up to be first to hear about the beta launch www.gla.ac.uk/mim

After my annual summer break, I'm back with a new series on teaching East Africa in world history. This first post is free and introduces some resources and themes we can use when teaching East Africa. 🗺️🗃️ www.liberatingnarratives.com/a-mixed-popu...

Two years later, it still feels surreal that I had the (quite literally) once-in-a-lifetime honour of giving a keynote at the International Medieval Congress in Leeds. Turning that talk into an essay—whose proofs arrived today—is just the icing on the absurdity cake.

With it being #WorldElephantDay #ElephantDay we just had to post a photo of the Seal of the borough of Pwllheli featuring an elephant and castle, as it appears on the ceiling of the wonderful Shankland Reading Room here at Bangor University.

Today is #ElephantDay! Enjoy these illustrations of the largest living land animals from our collections. The first is from C. d’Orbigny's, 'Dictionnaire universel d’histoire naturelle', 1847, and the second from B. Hawkins's, 'A comparative view of the human and animal frame', 1860.

A bit of good news from the Yale University Art Gallery. www.nhregister.com/connecticut/...

Our latest @jich.bsky.social 'Current Debate' essay entitled 'Trump and the Commonwealth' is now #OpenAccess for a limited time. The journal's former editor Professor Philip Murphy offers some compelling commentary on the US president's ambition of joining the Commonwealth. doi.org/10.1080/0308...

If you find yourself in the Margate area, do check out the Powell-Cotton Museum’s redisplay of some of its East African Collections. Especially useful for those interested in missionary collecting but also a new focus on Ugandan figures- not just the solitary British missionary ‘expert’ or explorer

How might ships change the way we understand migration policy in postwar Britain and its empire? My new article in @jbritishstudies.bsky.social offers an answer to that question. Here's a thread to hopefully pique your interest and maybe get you to read it 🧵🚢 www.cambridge.org/core/service...

So excited to see ‘Faith in the Town’ (co-authored my me, @kategibson Jeremy Gregory and Carys Brown & published in Open Access form (free to read) today by @oxfordunipress.bsky.social. Want to know how religious faith was woven through urban life in northern English towns 1740-1830? Then read on …

Manchester have posted 14 more postdoc positions in 'SHAPE' disciplines - 4x simon fellowships and 10(!) hallsworth fellowships. Simon eligibility is 'within 4 years of PhD award', except career breaks www.humanities.manchester.ac.uk/research/fun... Happy to discuss these via email

Such excellent and important work, @zoecormack.bsky.social and team!

A piece of Ethiopia's Maqdala plunder comes under the spotlight A diptych linking Dürer and Christian Ethiopia likely taken from Portugal to Ethiopia by Jesuit missionaries. Quotes @zoecormack.bsky.social @alulapankhurst.bsky.social @krebsverena.bsky.social www.theartnewspaper.com/2025/01/21/i...

Are you a postdoctoral (or equivalent) researcher in the UK within c. 10 years of your PhD? If so, the @britishacademy.bsky.social 's Early Career Research Network (ECRN) is designed & funded for you. North West & North Wales cluster is now live. 1/2 www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/news/early-c...

Call for papers for Port Cities and Maritime Cultures International Conference @portsmouthuni, 10-11 June 2025. Submit your 300-word abstract by 19 January 2025 to [email protected] for @UoP_Maritime's inaugural conference www.port.ac.uk/news-events-...

The German Maritime Museum invites applications for 3-9 month-long fellowships to work on interdisciplinary object-based research focussing on the cultural & political significance of the relationship between humans and the sea. Deadline 31 January 2025. More info: www.museumsbund.de/stellenangeb...

Ruling the World argued that governance of the British Empire should be examined everywhere & all at once. For example, the decision to make the East India Company sovereign and the Act Abolishing slavery in the Caribbean are usually examined in isolation, but they were directly connected:

Very pleased to share that my first article is now online www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Interested in the histories of material culture, museums, and/or East Africa? Our recent conference supported by @britishacademy.bsky.social & @paulmelloncentr.bsky.social is now available to view: www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8Zz... [youtube.com] www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMVf... [youtube.com]

carpet appreciation post

Funded PhD in photographic history: please share widely! With The Story, Durham and @durhamhistory.bsky.social, 'Images and Empire in British Military Collections' will examine the photo archive of the Durham Light Infantry regiment over its 90-year history. Apply by January 31st! 🗃️📜📷📸

This just out: Antoinette Burton in conversarion about Gender History: A Very Short Introduction #skystorians open.spotify.com/episode/53Nz...

Still perplexed by a letter I once found in which H.M. Stanley's agent writes to John Ruskin for a letter of support to Br customs to help him import Ruskin's 20 vols from New York & take them to Zanzibar. Ruskin refuses. Any thoughts Bluesky friends? Why would S want them? & why would R refuse?

It’s that special time of year where I tell you about 19th century Christmas cards being so batshit weird! Here’s a podcast I did with Dr Ferren Gipson - expect clowns assaulting cops, polar bears savaging men, giant wasps attacking kids, and more weird animal fun! artuk.org/discover/sto...

This one from last week looks at the first incident of an American slave ship entering a British port after 1834, with new archival work, addressing the "benign slavery" myth, and centering the freedom choice in Bermuda of 72 of 76 enslaved people on the Enterprise. #EarlyModern #SlaveryArchive

Very pleased to have been part of this roundtable on Catherine Hall’s Lucky Valley: Edward Long and the History of Racial Capitalism (CUP, 2024) With Herman L. Bennett, Kennetta Hammond Perry, Bill Schwarz and Catherine Hall herself www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

We've written a Researcher's Guide to Bluesky! It's a bit like all those other useful guides to Bluesky, but with several useful insights from University of York academics about using the platform, and we'd love it if it was reposted far and wide... >> blogs.york.ac.uk/library/2024... 🧵 below

JOB KLAXON: We are hiring a Lecturer in History of Medicine and/or Health (FT & permanent); we're encouraging applications from colleagues with expertise in history of mental health & mental illness. Please share and repost. www.jobs.manchester.ac.uk/Job/JobDetai... #HistMed #HistSTM #HistPsych

A quick peek at behind the scenes dress storage at Manchester Art Gallery’s costume collection in Platt Hall, Manchester

Just doubling up on this notice. I'd have to say that "adding" East Africa to our definitions of the #GlobalMiddleAges has been one of the biggest transformations in medieval studies of the past decade. Obviously, it was always there. But the work surveyed here shows how much we've been missing!

Really amazing account both of the 18th C Black scholar Francis Williams, and of Dr. Dabhoiwala’s sleuthing that led to a re-appraisal of the meaning of this portrait. (Significant page number of a book shown in the art! Dates of books shown on bookcase!) 🧪🔭 www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...