“AI products are best understood not as technologies of information […] but of labor management and the accelerated concentration of wealth.” My mantra and yours for the long fight ahead

Also file this under I am so done with AI 🤖

Soooo... I'm looking up books on a certain topic and found one that looks to me like it might be an AI pub. Cover doesn't make sense, no hits on the author, "independently published", author has another book out on a wildly diff topic. Any other red flags I should look out for in the future?

Just saw a vacancy with the job title education producer (onderwijsproducent) and if that's not a sign of the times 🙃

Not only is this devestating for the academics, it makes the UK look petty and pathetic. What kind of a country thinks it's being diminished by being attractive to intellects from abroad? www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...

We're hiring! 🌿 The Greenhouse Center for Environmental Humanities at the University of Stavanger invites applications for a 3-year postdoc in Environmental History. See thread for more details. #envhist #envhum

Book announcement!! 🎉 CREATURES OF STORY AND SONG looks through Britain’s stories and poems to rediscover our lost species. It’s time to remember what people thought about wolves, lynxes, great whales, great auks, sturgeon & more when they were all still here! 🐺🦫🐳💚 @reaktionbooks.bsky.social

A workshop on uncharismatic species in Augsburg - surely I know people who want to present at this 🕷️🦐🪱* *not sure if these are uncharismatic but they're definitely a little weird

Big news: issue 3.1 marks John C. Ryan’s last as editor for Plant Perspectives. Thank you to John for all your work establishing PP and a very warm welcome to Joela Jacobs (@joelalala.bsky.social) who takes over as editor 🌱 More in the blog: whitehorsepress.blog/2026/03/17/p...

Funded PhD opportunity working with my ex-supervisor Staffan at Cambridge; a good fit for historians of insect-human relations, natural history collections and history of science. Information session online 24 March 11:00–12:00 pm BST www.ccc.cam.ac.uk/initiatives/...

Pleased to be quoted here. This is the first request for a conversation I've accepted from a journalist who emailed me abt AI bc the journalist, Kathryn Palmer, didn't approach me as a stenographer for industry but instead to provide visibility for a movement.We had a great substantive conversation

Make your Monday morning better. Lovely writing about the GOAT

(I’ve been put on an AI hater mod list and honestly? Yeah. Yes, I am a hater and I am poorly disposed for productive conversation about AI.)

Issue 3.1 of ‘Plant Perspectives’ is now live online. This journal is #openaccess again in 2026 through #subscribetoopen – with warm thanks to all of our subscriber-supporters! Read it here: www.whp-journals.co.uk/PP/index #plantstudies #envhum @plantperspectives.bsky.social

Min och Maarits bok Havet och Tove har kommit ut och vi har fått våra författarexemplar! #tovejansson #environmentalbiography

📷 Looking for photo essays in the humanities Before I scour every journal archive ever - would people be willing to share/name any photo essays published in academic journals they had published or really like? I'd like to have a look at some examples :)

Dear everyone, As per the post from the Bodleian librarian below, AI bots and scrapers are putting just about every website under great pressure, British History Online included. A lot of excellent tech staff are working hard to keep everything working, but outages and siruptions are inevitable.

Admin complicity has been kind of heartbreaking > Many universities’ administrations are embracing AI for instruction, research, and evaluation. In some cases, AI has guided decisions about which programs to cut at times of austerity in the education sector. www.theguardian.com/technology/n...

With only five months left of my postdoc I’ve been applying for jobs and can I just say that appl portals that require you to submit your work history line by line in addition to your CV come straight from The Bad Place? As if these times aren’t trying enough.

I dropped out of high school, gained a huge amount of often difficult life experience, then went to community college, and now I'm a professor in a prestigious university. There HAS TO BE A PLACE for non-traditional students. www.theguardian.com/education/20...

They killed 180 children and their teachers in a double-tap strike on a school. The girls were 7 to 12 years old.

Does full-on excited jig. Great PhD opportunity here with @drhick.bsky.social.

Super excited to announce our big annual conference! 🥳 "Caring for Non-Humans: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Care among Animals, the Environment, and AI" 📍Prague, October 12-14 Organized by @johndorsch.bsky.social & yours truly 😇 Please share widely! 🙏 cetep.eu/news/cfa-car...

We're delighted to announce publication of 'Grasping Soil: A Syllabus and Essays for The Environmental Humanities' (E. Brownell, ed.) – exploring #soil as a vessel of human #history and point of view for inquiry. Available print or #openaccess here: www.whpress.co.uk/publications... #envhum #envhist

Two great looking PhD positions with @clia.bsky.social

Well, yes, trans people are getting drugs; yes, from entirely unregulated sources; yes, without counselling; yes, without blood tests; yes, they are self-administering; yes, without clinical oversight; yes, risking long term harm; yes, it is highly suboptimal. What did you think would happen?

Israeli-US strike on girls’ elementary school in Minab killed 165 people and injured 96 others Kids. www.theguardian.com/world/2026/m...

9,600 redundancies at research intensive unis in 2 yrs. 9,400 staff paid £100,000+ a yr at Russell Group institutions. 'Uni of Nottingham, which recorded a loss of over £85 million, increased its number of top earners significantly from 207 to 294.' www.timeshighereducation.com/news/top-ear...

PhD students, check out this International Doctoral Workshop in Cologne, Germany, in November. Deadline: 30 April. #envhist #envhum

In Episode 3 of 'Edges of Extinction', Andrea Boom, @sicilyfiennes.bsky.social & @jdroberts.bsky.social talk to Seb Stroud about the looming extinction of botanical knowledge and the importance of plants extinctionstudiesleeds.podbean.com/e/edges-of-e... #botany #education #extinction

The number of academics working in UK institutions has fallen for the first time on record, new figures reveal. Patrick Jack reports #EduSky #AcademicSky https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/number-academics-working-uk-falls-first-time

Are you doing #interdisciplinary, #participatory or #policy engaged research on #environment #biodiversity #sustainability? How about learning from past experience rather than starting from scratch! Stoked to see this on our @renewbiodiversity.bsky.social research with @britishlibrary.bsky.social

Fascinating thread 🧵

If you are a fan of graphic narrative of any type, but nonfiction/memoir/journalism in particular - or if you’re a visual thinker and want some inspiration for using that to write/speak/create in any way - I can’t recommend this book highly enough! store.abramsbooks.com/products/mak...

Books, bitches!

3 weeks to decide, 9 months salary to choose to leave - almost certainly forever - the industry you've dedicated most of your adult life to.

Juurikaan sen parempaa motivaattoria ei voi luonnontilaisten metsien kartoittajalle olla, kuin tieto siitä, miten upeita ja monimuotoisia alueita voimme vielä säästää. Annetaan seuraavallekin sukupolvelle mahdollisuus istua lammen rannalla katsellen usvaan katoavaa ikimetsää.

There are currently 8(!) PhDs on art & environmental justice at different unis in the Netherlands. Fascinating projects on environmental themes including soil, ceramics, & wetlands justart.info/phd/ Deadlines all mid-March. I'm not associated but happy to talk about my favourite cities in NL ;)

De schande van Nederland. "... zo’n 445.000 mensen door ziekte of handicap niet kunnen werken, maar geen recht hebben op een passende arbeidsongeschiktheidsuitkering. Van hen ontvangen 245.000 mensen geen enkele financiële ondersteuning; nog eens 200.000 zijn aangewezen op de bijstand."

Today is the launch of the travelling exhibition, Picturing Scholasticide @unileiden.bsky.social. It raises awareness of Israel's destruction of Palestinian academic & intellectual life, & what can be done to support Palestinian scholars & institutions. www.universiteitleiden.nl/en/events/20...

Some colleagues in my old department in Trondheim are recruiting a PhD candidate in Gender Studies and/or STS on the "Imagining Positive Energy Futures" project. 3 years, fully funded. Norway's a good place to do a PhD and Trondheim's a nice place to live!

CALL FOR PAPERS - Modern British History and the 'Environmental Turn'. A two-day workshop organised by @maxlong.bsky.social and myself at Lincoln College, Oxford, 16-17 September. Deadline for abstracts is 15 May. Details in poster below, please share.

A new issue of Plant Perspectives will be out next month - right on time for spring 🌸

Hoeveel gif zit er in uw stoelgang? Onderzoeksjournalist Dirk de Bekker (34) schrok zich alvast een hoedje: ondanks zijn biologische dieet bleek zijn staal vol pesticiden te zitten. In zijn boek Het pesticidenparadijs legt De Bekker bloot dat er niet meer aan bestrijdingsmiddelen en pfas te ...

The CFP deadline for our upcoming workshop on 'unwanted non-human life', broadly conceived, here at York has been extended a couple of weeks. Do send in an application if it appeals to you, we've already got a great pair of keynotes lined up!

“Having the university here was a big part of the city’s feeling of youthfulness, and the idea that you can be here and learn and grow.” What happens when a city loses its university? (A question that will soon be answered in several other places across the UK, sadly…)

MA Food Studies opportunity - 5 scholarships 2026/27: @crpr-exeter.bsky.social & @exeter.ac.uk are offering a fee reduction of £5000 to 5 full time students. Programme led by @crpr-exeter.bsky.social Co-Director and @exeterfood.bsky.social lead Prof. Harry West www.exeter.ac.uk/study/fundin...

I hate to tap the sign but again: this is all made to make in-person education and access to knowledge transfer a preserve of the elite. Human education for the few, bots for the many.

Immune dysfunction from repeated COVID infections is not helping

It's Burns Night, a good reason to quickly read through my poetry handout for my ecocriticism seminar Last year I decided Fatimah Ashgar's poem 'I don't know what will kill us first' should be on it. It's a poem about hope with a brutal title & I love the quick ref to Prince, especially now