Percolating on my fall theory course & would love to hear: what single essay (or chapter of a book) makes theory (interpreted however you like) or intellectual / aesthetic infrastructures concrete in ways that have stuck with you & / or you really admire? Example: Barbara Johnson, “Muteness Envy.”

The book is dead! Long live the book! yalereview.org/article/shei...

Please encourage any early career & NTT scholars doing fantastic work on Victorian poetries to submit to @victorianpoetry.bsky.social ‘s 2026 Early Career Prize — more info in the thread (have not had enough coffee, text of the call is embedded in a reply to the post linked below)!

i’ve been thinking of what could even be said about such a tragedy. someone said it best that trans people are “born so late and die so young”. we uproot our lives and transition and live more life than anyone else ever does and society punishes us for it. we deserve better

Academic departments deserve to be saved, supported, resourced, allowed to grow even if they're not "best in the country," "first in the REF," "top-ranked," "at a Russell Group uni," or whatever other austerity-brained nonsense senior managers have been using to flimflam you out of solidarity

Is it New England Gothic Parks & Rec? The X-Files in the style of Veep? Rob Reiner's Halloween? I wrote about the temptation to think about TV like an AI prompt engineer, and I wrote about the best new show of the year — WIDOW'S BAY — which isn't like anything else. newrepublic.com/article/2100...

Resharing for the evening crowd: an article in which I investigate why so many were drawn to the (likely apocryphal) story about readers in rowboats clamoring for news of Little Nell—and what that anecdote has to do with white racial innocence, grievable lives, and Dickens' serial audience.

it is crucial that the MLA, the AHA, and the ACLS joined forces to fight the illegal theft of federal research and programming funds i donated to support these efforts, and if you can, in any amount, you should too

We did it! A FUNNY THING has officially flipped to open access at @universitypress.cambridge.org! enormous thanks to everyone who requested and purchased a copy!! www.cambridge.org/core/books/f...

Resharing for the evening crowd: an article in which I investigate why so many were drawn to the (likely apocryphal) story about readers in rowboats clamoring for news of Little Nell—and what that anecdote has to do with white racial innocence, grievable lives, and Dickens' serial audience.

Discovered belatedly that the article I wrote for Studies in the Literary Imagination is out! I'm grateful to Ellen Stockstill for organizing this issue's exploration of Victorian openings and for the chance to work through some thoughts on seriality, grief, and race. muse.jhu.edu/pub/212/arti...

Petition to save the Humanities at the University of Hertfordshire: c.org/9JLppW5tMS

Support @ucmerced.bsky.social faculty, staff and students. Demand an equitable instructional budget and an end to unnecessary layoffs! h/t @ucaft.bsky.social actionnetwork.org/petitions/eq...

Discovered belatedly that the article I wrote for Studies in the Literary Imagination is out! I'm grateful to Ellen Stockstill for organizing this issue's exploration of Victorian openings and for the chance to work through some thoughts on seriality, grief, and race. muse.jhu.edu/pub/212/arti...

It was an honor to appear on Dave Zirin's Edge of Sports podcast to talk about Living in a D.A.I.S.Y. Age. Had a lot of fun chatting about De La Soul, my experiences growing up listening to the group, and music history. The episode is out now!

Canvas undergoing “scheduled maintenance” during the last week of academic terms: I said, “oh I’m sure.”

Slightly diminish a book Tiny Dorrit

April (snow) showers

What better way to celebrate Earth Day than recognizing the honorees for the Vcologies Early Career Paper Prize for new work on culture and ecology? Please join me in congratulating @chandricab.bsky.social for winning the prize, and @meghnasapui.bsky.social for receiving honorable mention! #envhum

As you know, Hampshire College is closing, and hundreds of our wonderful staff & faculty colleagues are facing sudden job loss without severance. Hampshire staff & faculty have launched an Emergency Relief Fund—if you’re able, please donate or share! www.helphampshireworkers.com

My union @uam-umd.bsky.social did such a good job beating our bosses in the statehouse this year that we figured we'd go ahead and beat the White House too. With allies from across higher ed and the good people at @democracyforward.org we're suing to stop the latest illegal anti-DEI order.

'She also documented how few women were in federally sponsored clinical trials for AIDS drugs... That was significant, she told The San Francisco Chronicle, because “the clinical trials are the only way you can get treatment.”' Long helped save so many lives.

as me about the prestigious foundation who told me and my dean IN WRITING that "UIC does not meet our standards for an eligible faculty institution"

If you need me I’ll be gushing with gratitude while rereading this incredibly generous thread over and over (and half-wishing I was on a train somewhere sipping a beer and reading—you’ll see why if you read the thread! It’s 5 0’clock somewhere and all that 🍻)

And you need to read Lauren's whole essay (link in quoteskeet), but here's a little context on Rize.

Just read @lerikscline.bsky.social on Rize Education and FUCK THEM and FUCK THIS 👇 UNBUNDLING BULLSHIT SO VERY MUCH. www.higheredjobs.com/search/detai...

In honor of Michigan clinching the NCAA here's my multi year goal to capture the full milky way arch over a body of water, taken last July over Lake Superior from a state park in Michigan. 🗺️

Great publicity for The Michigan Daily

honestly the best thing I’ve ever written, make me a KA Applegate Professor of Transgender Literature

Thanks for the photo @saaupdates.bsky.social ! Btw, you can preorder the Canonical Misogyny paperback for 30% off with code PAPER30 😉

So so good from cass

If you're at #shax2026 and you would like to write a performance review for @shaxbull.bsky.social, or you'd just like to find out more about it, then please come and say hello to me! I look like my profile picture (minus Paul Revere pointing at me) and I'd love to talk to you 🙂

Fantastic job by @devingarofalo.bsky.social and the authors in this issue. Already scheming about how to make space for this on my undergrad intro to literary studies syllabus (required course for majors). These kinds of issues need to be center stage in our classrooms.

What an inspiring read from @lerikscline.bsky.social: "So quit the AI pilot, quit the busywork created by the next administrative crisis, quit your job if that pushes the work forward, but don’t quit fighting. The #humanities we need is still ahead of us."

Resharing, for the Friday crowd, the news of this crucial special issue, in which I'm honored to appear alongside scholars and humans I deeply admire and to share the article I wrote when I thought it might be my last. Solidarity with all who have wondered the same. muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/articl...

Resharing, for the Friday crowd, the news of this crucial special issue, in which I'm honored to appear alongside scholars and humans I deeply admire and to share the article I wrote when I thought it might be my last. Solidarity with all who have wondered the same. muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/articl...

looking like my time in academia finally coming to an end, with no job lined up beyond May. If you're interested in my early attempt to think through a new project on energy, riots, and masses, check out new issue of @victorianreview.bsky.social. muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/articl...

LYRIC LOGIC is out in the world now!

Appropriate reading for Good Friday: the story of a crucified college. But like Holy Week, crucifixion is not the whole story (read to the end for @lerikscline.bsky.social's good word about why the work still matters)

ICYMI yesterday afternoon, a new, currently ~open access issue of Victorian Poetry—abt VP & so much more—dropped ft a stellar intro by @devingarofalo.bsky.social, essays by @carolinelevine.bsky.social, @lerikscline.bsky.social, Ruth McAdams, & me, and a keywords essay by @ryancarroll.bsky.social.

I'm so grateful to @devingarofalo.bsky.social for organizing this special issue and for offering me the opportunity to contextualize the events at St. Norbert College within a broader range of attacks on higher education. The thinking that went into writing this has been vital to me, in all senses.

It's true though. How many new genres have you found yourself writing in out of necessity in recent years? These, too, are the public humanities, if not the sanitized, institution-friendly version.

I'm so grateful to @devingarofalo.bsky.social for organizing this special issue and for offering me the opportunity to contextualize the events at St. Norbert College within a broader range of attacks on higher education. The thinking that went into writing this has been vital to me, in all senses.

Hey remember when I told you guys I wrote my 1st peer-reviewed essay in 4ever during the most challenging yr of my life? It's out! In Victorian Poetry! And it's OA! I critique the persistence of inside/outside metaphors & concepts to understand the production and consumption of scholarly work. 1/?

This issue of VP is incredible — it was important to me to make space in the pages of VP for a timely convo abt the forces surrounding its simultaneous editor & press transitions. First time I’ve said anything in print as ed for reasons that become clear in intro. More importantly, the essays are 🔥.

"criticizing AI use in journalism or other creative industries is classist" NO IT IS NOT there is a class that benefits enormously from cognitive surrender, epistemic warfare, and the enclosure of all hitherto produced culture and it is NOT THE WORKING CLASS

"This dynamic, relational, context-aware work is the essence of teaching. Artificial intelligence, although it can mimic the surface of that interaction, cannot participate in it as an accountable, reflective human being. Moreover, faculty are not just information delivery devices."

To my surprise I got invited to be on a panel here called "The Problem of AI" and took the opportunity to try to shift the discussion from boosterism & normalization, however "thoughtful and deliberative," & toward the political economy of higher education nathankhensley.net/uncategorize...

always read tricia matthew