Over the summer, academics take the opportunity to make progress on their research, sometimes in the company of their pets. @gillianmcfadyen.bsky.social reports that her cat Michael has been doing sterling work supporting her research into coloniality and the refugee regime. 😹 #CatsOfBluesky

Relevant for everyone, forever

Writing in The Conversation, Dr Gillian McFadyen explains that campaigners, academics and groups that support asylum seekers have long called for the UK to introduce “safe and legal routes”. More: tinyurl.com/5anb8hpb

Our @gillianmcfadyen.bsky.social had a new article in @uk.theconversation.com discussing Starmer's new 'one in one out policy' with France and what this means for safe and legal routes for refugees to the UK. #refugees #asylum #saferoutes

My new piece on safe and legal routes and the channel crossing #refugees #asylum #saferoutes #forcedmigration #smallboats

New piece in @theconversation.com discussing what Starmer's new pilot 'one in one out' means regarding the channel crossing and safe routes for #refugees #saferoutes #asylum theconversation.com/channel-cros...

Want to learn more about our department? Then come visit us on 5th July for our Open Day and learn more about our range of degrees, teaching style, modules, and what we can be offering you! For more details and registration, see here: www.aber.ac.uk/en/study-wit... #LoveAber #CaruAber

There’s a growing problem you’re not supposed to question: masked agents detaining migrants. Not in war zones...here...on U.S. soil. When power hides its face...it stops being accountable. When you can’t ID authority...you can’t challenge it. 1/5 🧵

"Stories don’t just inform people; they humanise them. And in a world where division can feel louder than unity, storytelling is one of the most powerful tools we have.” 🧡 Check out this beautiful storytelling project this #WorldRefugeeDay

The Welsh Pathway to Peace project, which uses digital storytelling to explore and share the lived experiences of forced migrants in Wales, has launched the first of its digital stories to mark #WorldRefugeeDay More: tinyl.co/3Q0t @welshrefcouncil.bsky.social @acehubwales.bsky.social

On World Refugee Day our project, Pathways to Peace asks, what does peace in Wales mean to you, and explores how we can be be building positive peace within our communities. #RefugeeWeek #CommunityAsASuperPower #NationofSanctuary #Cymru #Wales #Peace #PositivePeace

Great to share the first digital story of the @lswalescddcymru.bsky.social funded project A Welsh Pathway to Peace: Digital Storytelling & Forced Migration, exploring What does Peace in Wales look like? @welshrefcouncil.bsky.social @acehubwales.bsky.social #refugeeweek www.aber.ac.uk/en/news/arch...

Why, now more than ever, we need to be engaging with our communities in Wales, having deep and meaningful conversations about key issues such as migration, representation and ultimately understanding what peace means for them.

#OnThisDay 1943: David Low, in the Evening Standard, with one of the few cartoons directly addressing the Holocaust to appear in Britain during the Second World War

This #RefugeeWeek, #OurSuperpower is being a 10-million-strong global movement fighting to end human rights abuses, including those against refugees. We’re proud that this week, Amnesty UK activists have organised dozens of events around the country to support and stand in solidarity with refugees.

Refugee Week Ambassador Awssan says refugees should be integrated into the UK with dignity, equity and mutual respect to build communities.

The Moomins are the mascot of World Refugee Week! And we’re celebrating their 80th anniversary today on our website, discussing the cultural phenomenon #Moomins #refugee #kidlit worldkidlit.org/2025/06/16/w...

The Hostile Environment has so many sinister outcomes and does not consider the impact on wider society. Government policies like this make everyone less safe. The only people who benefit are those who are willing take advantage of vulnerable, isolated people. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

Great article and I appreciate that the author here is calling use of AI in academia cheating... for that is exactly what it is, and it's staggering how the students in this piece just aren't fazed. nymag.com/intelligence...

In 5 years there are going to be a rash of pieces about the weird superpower of young people who one way or another avoided AI slop during their school years and their unfair advantage over their peers.

Alison Holt, contemporary textile artist who creates machine and hand embroidered land and seascapes #WomensArt

Starting to think about what comes next after your degree? Then please join us on Wednesday 7th, 11-12:30 for the InterPol Aber Alumni Career Talks. Discuss employability and career trajectories after InterPol with guest Alumni Speakers, Harry Taylor and Lara Wade. Lunch provided.

Morning spot for some admin and #AcWri ☕️🥐

Two years of conflict in Sudan, marked by continued attacks on civilians and aid workers #Refugees

Devastating that this is viewed as a potential solution.

'Bluebells', machine embroidered artwork by Alison Holt, UK textile artist #womensart

Exceptional reporting by Today in Focus podcast @theguardian.com on the creation and dismantling of IDF narratives around massacre of humanitarians on 23rd March in Gaza. www.theguardian.com/world/audio/...

You know why European countries are so quiet about the El Salvador situation? Because they started the normalisation of extraterritorial detention of migrants and asylum seekers, often without any due process. The UK’s Rwanda plan. Italy’s attempted plan with Albania. And some still want to do it.

DOJ insists it can’t be expected to comply with Fed Dist Judge Paula Xinis’s order that it tell her, as directed by S.Ct.’s 9-0 ruling last night (4/10), how it plans to “facilitate” kidnapped Maryland resident Garcia’s return from El Salvador to the U.S.! storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Morming spot for writing ☕️ 🥐 #acrwri #academia #SUAW #research

Excellent episode on Trump's disappearances, undermining of refugee law and lack of Democratic accountability. www.globalplayer.com/podcasts/epi...

I wrote about this a bit in my last book but it really shakes me that a defining feature of this catastrophic era is that we just keep going to work. We work through pandemics, we work through natural disasters, we work through economic calamity, we work through coups, we work, we work, we work.

Yesterday, Joseph Thurgate with questioning from Prof Rachel Rosen of UCL and our own @catrineds.bsky.social successfully defending his thesis: ‘An investigation into the politics and problems of disputing and attributing ages to young people seeking asylum in the UK’. Congratulations Dr Thurgate!

And here is Dr Thurgate with his two proud as punch supervisors, Dr Lucy Taylor and Dr @gillianmcfadyen.bsky.social 🥂🍾

It's Shut Up and Write Time again with @hannahhughes.bsky.social! ☕️👩🏻‍💻📚🖊 #acrwri #academia #SUAW #pomodoros #writing

Someone explain to me why it's illegal to give an old lady a bottle of water as she's waiting on line for hours in the sun to vote, but it's totally cool for an ultra-billionaire to bribe voters with million dollar checks in Wisconsin.

Tea and books 2' by Leah Gardner, contemporary Chicago-based oil painter #WomensArt

Properly-paid three-year postdoc at University College Dublin: Vietnamese boatpeople in the South China Sea in the 1970s and 1980s €45–58k/year, full time, working on Irial Glynn's ERC project on the global history of boat refugees Deadline soon – Tue, 1 April www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DMG724/p...

Non academic output to share but equally exciting! The Q(g)uilt is featured at the Quilter, the magazine of the UK Quilters' Guild. All made possible after an #AHRC funded engagement activity at @emfcamp.bsky.social last summer! @tripsandflips.bsky.social @gillianmcfadyen.bsky.social #academicsky

Great to have our Mum Quilt Project featured in the Quilter spring edition 🙌🏼🧵🪡

Spring on campus 🌞🏵️💛#LoveAber

Truer words were never spoken.

Other work by the Ladybird artists. ‘March’ (Shell Guide, 1957) Artist: SR Badmin

"Nothing prepared me for the reality of mothering without the extended family to help take care of you, and the nonchalance with which the western world treats mothers." www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

You might remember the Daily Mail sting where recordings were made of immigration solicitors allegedly encouraging false asylum claims. One of the solicitors was Rashid Khan of Rashid& Rashid sols whose pracising certificate was suspended. He has been cleared by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal.

there were an average of 10,495 decisions a month between October and December last year. Up from 3,060 in June. There were a record number of asylum applications in 2024 - more than 108,000 people.

According to the Times, the Gov will amend the Border Security bill to introduce a 24 week limit on the processing of asylum appeals. Given the backlog has grown 500% in the last two years, the shortage of legal reps and many other things, that seems challenging. www.thetimes.com/article/4d49...