Childcare is chaotic this week so I'll be skipping my usual blog rhythm. Instead, ICYMI late on Friday I shared this post on gratitude, gifts, and finding purpose in your writing.

My latest is a love letter to Chicago. "I see you stumbling through the stubborn, awkward rhythm of showing up, again and again. I see you fighting alongside people who sometimes frustrate and confuse you, and defending neighbors you may have never met, because you know they’re all your people."

I love this series. Check it out if work on digital pedagogy, music, sound studies

Tryig to give everyone their flowers now, while they can appreciate them 🌻

THIS PART — which I was just texting to a friend:

Keep making and sharing things. It matters. #DHmakes

I was just telling a friend I have been deeply touched by friend-colleagues from my “home” fields recently sharing ways in which they respect/look to my work & the way I move in the world. As someone who too-often thinks about what I have failed to do or be, this has meant a great deal.

On the gifts we give to others, writing against despair, and gratitude for others - "The Gift We Give." walshbr.com/blog/the-gif...

It’s a thing, y’all. Printed it out for my final proofing read front to back. Working title right now is “Embedded Pedagogies: Digital Humanities Teaching and the Infrastructure of Change.”

The Mamdani speech last night was so good. Clear example of a gifted speaker and charismatic personality meeting a speechwriter who knows how to absolutely cook for their person.

a lot of people are quoting this and saying things like “standing up for trans rights is a winning political strategy” and while I agree with this, win or lose standing up for trans rights is important - no, vital - because it’s the right thing to do.

We do not leave anyone behind, & certainly not those of us most under attack. We do not get where we want to go by letting anyone drown, not for a moment. You do not offer up targeted groups for "rights but later" unless you think they are not The People.

You African Studies majors out there: you too can become mayor of New York City!!!

I for one am shocked that debating an AI construct was not a successful political strategy.

So happy for Zy and for our community! Great job with your campaign—your voice and energy will be a welcome addition to the School Board

As someone who grew up in VA this is making my eyes pop out of my skull

WINSOME LOSESOME

begging with my entire heart for election results across the map which force the Dems to finally begin internalizing the lesson that throwing trans people under the bus is going to fuck them repeatedly

Unplugged today and took toddler to DIY swim lessons. Had him saying “good job buddy” to every lane swimmer that passed. Was a good holiday.

Sometimes parenting is hard and sometimes parenting is introducing your wife and toddler to the “I drink your milkshake” scene and then chasing said toddler around threatening to drink up his belly button.

We’ve been given the all clear for those following along from a distance. No evidence of a threat and investigating a false report.

Absolutely devastating news. @teenvogue.com has produced some of the most thoughtful, well-written political reporting over the past decade. I hope that these talented staffers find a way to regroup and continue bringing the world knowledge.

Always get irrationally angry that "Run-Hide-Fight" is the best safety advice we can muster in an emergency and at the dizzying media ecosystem that can't get accurate information out to those who need it.

Stay away from Central Grounds and especially Shannon Library, apparently there is an active attacker with a gun tooling around.

Few things better than bundling up for an annual gig that was achingly cold a couple years back only to find the weather turned out really lovely. Great morning playing tunes with @zorakc2c.bsky.social and friends on the mountain.

Yesterday @rondagrizzle.bsky.social & I drafted a minizine on *why* to write collaborative project/working team charters 📚We're going to do a companion full-length zine on *how* to run/do the conversation & cowriting that produces the kinds of charters @scholarslab.bsky.social makes, eg:

Just passed an open door in the library where a coworker beckoned me into a dark hallway with the smell of popcorn and it that wasn’t the most effective haunted house I have ever experienced

ICYI more writing this week on process -

As DH grows, it’s increasingly important to publish conference papers, but there hasn’t been a clear venue for that. So I’m thrilled to share this new home for DH proceedings, which will include CHR papers & more. Thanks to @taylor-arnold.bsky.social for leading this effort! bit.ly/ach-anthology

Finalized developmental editing on the book project today. Big milestone and the end feels like it’s in sight. 58,000 words at present. Started working through some style guide stuff - different kind of labor but a welcome change.

hi all, the awaited day has come: I'm looking for freelance writers to pitch Inverse Gaming for end-of-year coverage! namely, I'm looking for someone to contribute our best of RPGs this year list ($350), and pitch us on some year-end lookback essays ($500+). please pitch me: [email protected]

Wrote this week about how I try to differentiate the different phases of the writing process and end each session with what I need for the next one. "Filling the Cup of Each Writing Phase" - walshbr.com/blog/filling...

Deceased

"I DON'T NEED YOU TO FUCKING REWRITE WHAT I'VE JUST WRITTEN!"

My wife is reluctant to get rid of things so like any totally relaxed digital humanist I made a categorized and color coded gallery of our blankets to help us decide what to donate as we make room for a second child.

Python was awarded a funding grant, funding grant asked Python foundation to remove all diversity and inclusion initiatives they have. Python foundation said no and rejected the grant. If you use Python, send a few dollars to the charity to keep it going. I’m pushing a dono on behalf of ScamGuard.

Office for the night

if anything this undersells how much meddling the university has invited. every hire, every admissions decision, every talk & lecture, even every bathroom trip thanks to these people’s absurd fixation on others’ genitals—all of these are now subject to snitch “whistleblowers” looking for a DoJ case

This week I started working again on my new #DHMakes piece! Since several people asked how I scale the design onto the wood, here’s a look at my setup — laptop and projector on one side of the room, the wood panel on the other, all ready to begin!

Long day of parenting but then before bed the kid yelled TRY while reading hungry caterpillar and proceeded to lick every picture of food there was.

Finished Silksong while the baby naps and life is too short for me to go for more than one ending. Very fun game though.

Huge thanks to @walshbr.bsky.social + entire @scholarslab.bsky.social team for organizing this series. These sessions are such a breath of fresh air & so thought-provoking! Today we're hearing about ways to help students build data literacy about their own data + a Twine digital history assignment

Still time to join this hangout that starts in ~10 minutes to get a daily helping of digital pedagogy. Zoom registration link below.

“The widespread use of these tools, in both school and work, feels like it's driven by a self-fulfilling prophecy: the promise of an employment landscape only AI itself can imagine.”

I keep having to show people this is actually real because trying to describe it makes me sound like I am out of my mind.

Love this! Would work, I think, across humanities and not limited to the digital.

ICYMI I shared a project scoping exercise that I ran with our Praxis students. Take a neutral topic, develop a project idea on it, and then push/pull that thing in all sorts of directions to see the different shapes that come out.

Every institution of higher education right now.

Digital history folks, I'll be sharing an assignment that worked v well for my grad students to demonstrate the idea of historical contingency, introducing the narrative tool Twine, & exploring the affective power of pedagogical games. I hope you'll join us this afternoon if that sounds interesting!