manicule! (not to be confused with an index or printer's fist)

Online Lecture Fri. Oct. 17, 12:00pm EDT @sims-mss.bsky.social J. D. Sargan on Trans Studies as Book Historical Method @jdsargan.bsky.social

I’m sure this is just me, but cat trees look like printing presses?

We've extended the deadline for submissions to our special issue, "Adaptations," to January 15th, 2026. Attaching the cfp here: please submit!

Academics who record audiobooks of their monograph…Thank you!!

anyway, apropos of nothing, if anyone needs provide editing, proofreading, or archival/special collections/bibliographical research services, I have those skills that can be used on a freelance basis and otherwise

In SPINE, I want players to play with the ttrpg's rulebook in innovative ways. I wrote this essay to think through the design. It describes the various ways we play with books in ttrpgs, with examples of how we use books as props, as anchors for fictions, and how we recreate them as art.

I see no lies here

Even Walt is anti-AI.

Want to learn more about what a bibliographical approach might be for working with hand-press books? Come think with me about how to notice, ask questions, and maybe even discover new things about the material features of old books! 📜📚 #BookHistory

Made With Human Intelligence (and all 19th century type) 7x5” prints now available. #letterpress www.starshaped.com/small-prints...

🚨 Funding Alert! 🚨 Are you passionate about book history, bibliography, or book arts? Check out this funding opportunity to support events in your community! 📖✨ 📅 Deadline: 3 November – Don’t miss your chance to apply! Learn more & apply today 👉 bibsocamer.org/events/funding-opportunities

🚨 Job alert! UPenn Libraries, on behalf of @digitalscriptorium.bsky.social, seeks to appoint an early career library professional or postdoctoral researcher with a background in premodern manuscript studies for an NEH-funded, 22-month Manuscript Data Curation Fellowship 📜

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use your Cat paws! 🐾 hear the creaky wheeze of the machine! 🔩 feel alive again! ✨ remember what it is to touch things and be one with them! 😻 smash your screen! 💥 scoop the Goose and get down with the Printing Bug -- it's catching!! 🪿🪿🪿🪿🪿

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Working in an #earlymodern print shop? Have a large boulder the size of a small boulder ready to press the paper into its form, and also have a washing line handy to dry the printed sheets. #bookhistory

Wake up babe new 40-minute meta analysis of trans literature just dropped. Also I find this question funny because when I was doing initial research for TFR, it took me a shitton of work to sift through long co-ed lists to figure out who the transfemme authors were.

I’m serious about bagels. 3 baker’s dozen heading back to Urbana. sorry not sorry to everyone on my flight about the smell of yeast and everything wafting through cabin.

It has been brought to my attention that not everyone knows about Ben Franklin's virtue-tracking app

Same! Still can’t believe I’m going to be a paid full-time printer starting in January. And it won’t involve printing wedding invitations.

Opening at Penn for a Special Collections Accessions Librarian, responsible for acquiring and accessioning all special collections materials for the Kislak Center. The salary range for this position is $66,000 - $89,039. Come work with meeeee! wd1.myworkdaysite.com/recruiting/u...

After a decade of work, here is the unboxing of Frances Ellen Watkins Harper’s Civil War and Reconstruction! Cloth ISBN 9780197804490. Use discount code AUFLY30 to get 30% off at global.oup.com/academic/pro...

Some good news during these trying times: I'll be heading to Lexington in Dec to start a tenure track library faculty position at the University of Kentucky as their new (and first full-time) Head of King Library Press, one of the oldest bibliographic teaching presses at a US college or uni. 1/2

There’s still time to submit your #bookhistory #bookstudies proposals!

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Okay I need some internet magic. JAPANESE TRANSLATORS: I am hunting for a lost translation of Oshaberi kaidan (1998) by Chiya Fujino. The 2007 translation was done by Chikako Kobayashi, and was titled Chatty. It was published on the J-Lit Center's defunct website. I would *really* like a copy.

Illinois Governor JB Pritzker has signed an executive order which permits pharmacists and other medical personnel to administer vaccines recommended by state officials, no prior prescription needed. The order also requires insurance companies to cover the vaccines.

Possible grant op for #DHmakes folks! www.centerforcraft.org/grants-and-f...

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The @bibsocamer.bsky.social [Bibliographical Society of America] is hiring our next executive director! Is it you? The ED coordinates & manages the varied activities of this active scholarly society that focuses on the study of books & other textual artifacts. Please circulate widely! Due: 10/10/25.

The time has come once again for a long overdue update to our New and Upcoming page! I know I'm missing a LOT of books right now - I'll be filling it in from my own personal notes too, but if theres any missing book released after 7/1/25 by a transfeminine author, please share them here!

Not to constantly refer to one of my own translations, but Saitō's use of André Gorz's distinction between open and locking technologies is very pertinent here -- generative AI is locking tech masquerading as open tech

When people ask, "Right before the Republic crumbled, who was doing the best 19th century literary pun stencils?" remember my name.

#c19 question: this daguerreotype pops up in a few places on social media, and now wikipedia, identified as Harriet E. Wilson. But is there any scholarly provenance documenting that it is / probably is her?

DEADLINE EXTENDED! The 2026 New Scholars application will remain open for submissions through Friday 12 September! Please share with your bookish networks. BSA membership is not required for New Scholars Program applicants. Link in bio to learn more. 🔗https://bit.ly/bsa-new-scholars

History of text friends - what's the author holding in this c. 1290s illustration? Thank you! (@sonjadrimmer.bsky.social?)

nerds of Bluesky: do you have a favorite historical woodcut depicting a book? @skeuomorphpress.org will be doing a live print as part of Banned Books Week programming here at UIUC & I’d love to include a historical woodcut in our print Reminder about woodcuts good for letterpress—pure B&W, line art

Pritzker is giving real "lawn chair in a parking spot on a snow day in Chicago" energy.

Moby-Dick / Moby-Dick without all the horny.

Me and my dissertation

They seem very concerned with making things easy to read, but then it’s still 6pt type with 6pt leading. Anyway I love stuff like this wnanews.com/2025/08/30/w...

Making a zine about/of clipart and am interested in talking to any Clipart Experts (broadly construed) that you can think of who, for ex. - have written about clip art - make art with it - collect it - did pre-digital paste-up layout - created 80s MacPaint era clipart - just have thoughts about it

This morning’s long weekend leisure reading. Would love to know about more trans authors who are self publishing printed zines/chapbooks. Drop your recommendations here. (I stay up on digital self publishing. I’m wanting more material objects.)

Even tho Carrie Bradshaw never once did any labor in her life, we are celebrating Labor Day Weekend by offering 10% off in the Girl Dad Press shop! Use the code STEVE to get 10% off your Sex Change and the City Presale, or a copy of 2 Trans 2 Furious, or both! shop: girldadpress.bigcartel.com :)

"Ignorance is the parent of fear..." —Moby-Dick

My job now is to go school to school, university to university trying to help them sort through the challenge of teaching in a world with AI and the first thing I recommend to improve the teaching of writing is cut the number of students per instructor in half. No one is going to do that, though.

Getting in some more relaxing on day two of my 6 day weekend before I get back to writing the dissertation. Finished McKinney’s book on Pee Wee Herman and started Raving by McKenzie Wark last night. I’m in my minigraph era of pleasure reading.