A while ago I was chatting about the job market with a precariously employed academic and I asked them how many times a day/week they check jobs.ac.uk and they said "haha no, but sometimes friends send me a link from there if they think it's interesting" and I think about that a lot.

You can also join our Online Support Group to receive regular updates, join meetings and connect with fellow scholars at all career stages. We welcome everyone regardless of career stage, publication record or academic status forms.gle/hqiSNHBCAoCk...

Insomnia last night boded ill for this morning, but have blazed through my to-do list, with a job application out, material for my supervisor sent, a conference org. meeting and my "homework" for it done. Now a pre-writing break before the children come home from school. Startled by my own power.

New Snake Goddess just dropped: "La santa y la serpiente" by Nieves González. 🐍

Oxford’s most Oxford-y (free!) newsletter. In our midweek edition: 🏗 Botley Road bridge latest 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Flags go up… and down 🎼 Choral music bonanza 🍻 Oxford Pub of the Year 🐓 Save a hen! Plus politics, research news, trains and buses, and more. Read online or by email: oxfordclarion.uk/the-clarion-...

We are busy updating the new Tutankhamun Spatial Archive with material and we are happy to announce that all related maps, plans, sketches and drawings are now available online! You can browse them here: tutankhamun.griffith.ox.ac.uk/maps-plans-s... As always, we welcome any feedback!

Over 26,000 have emailed their local trust to keep Palantir out of the NHS. Will you join them? https://notopalantir.goodlawproject.org/email-to-target/stop-palantir-in-the-nhs/?utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=PalantirNHS&utm_medium=social_media

🚨WOW! The Petition calling for by-elections to be called automatically when MPs defect to another party now has almost 75,000 signatures! Let’s get it to the 100,000 needed! petition.parliament.uk/petitions/73...

My book is out and is open access! academic.oup.com/book/61892

I have an elderly parent who doom-scrolls, seeking out the grimmest news he can find globally. I can't stop him doing it, but I CAN pepper his intake with stories of positivity, like this unbelievable rebuilding of one of Ireland's derelict castles:

Science fiction (good and bad) plays a lot of roles in public culture: one of those roles is to provide a repository for guesses + prognostications on what the future might hold. Sometimes science fiction becomes self-fulfilling (see Zuckerberg's choice of the term 'metaverse')... 🧵

So great to see my new book How Plague Got Rats: Mastering a Zoonotic Pandemic, published OA @hopkinspress.bsky.social next May, has got a cover! www.press.jhu.edu/books/title/...

Starting the new year at the beautiful Gamelands stone circle: www.yorkshiredales.org.uk/gamelands-fi...

A beautiful sketch of a praying or weeping woman in The Palace of Minos by Sir Arthur Evans, depicted in a Minoan bronze figurine found at Troy in the 19th century, now at the Neues Museum in Berlin. The drawing might be by Emile Gillieron. id.smb.museum/object/69487...

Highlights of @tag2025york.bsky.social : 1. Giving my paper to such a lovely audience 2. Listening to so many great people 3. Dancing with them at the amazing party 4. The taxi driver who gave me a DETAILED account of his sister’s gangrene en route, prompting me to switch to the bus the next day

Help! Banbury Museum has been told that Cherwell District Council is cancelling ALL of its core funding. There is a very tight deadline - Friday 19th December - to tell the Council what you think. Please respond to the consultation and share this post www.banburymuseum.org/news/no-fund...

Ploughing thru' the 423 pg @tag2025york.bsky.social abstract book & trying to narrow down the speakers I'd love to hear - impossible task! It helps/does not help at all that every paper at @suegreaney.bsky.social 's Power & Politics panel looks so good - speaking (1st! 😨) but then enjoying the rest!

If you have any thoughts about the huge changes pending for the visa waiver scheme, it is NOT a given - there is a (buried) public consultation: www.federalregister.gov/documents/20...

The next meetings of the Script Keepers Network will be next Sunday, 14th December, all very welcome. Here are the zoom registration links: 09:00 ET (14.00 GMT) - us02web.zoom.us/meeting/regi... 16:00 ET (21.00 GMT) - us02web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

Just got the full programme for TAG in York week after next and it's INCREDIBLE - mostly though I am boundlessly impressed at the how much work has gone into pulling all this together. Gosh. @tag2025york.bsky.social Anyway - I can't WAIT.

We are hiring! We have an exciting opportunity for someone to facilitate research and engagement work in relation to a major exhibition at the Ashmolean Museum, around the theme of sensory experiences and exchanges across the early modern world. Apply now! www.history.ox.ac.uk/event/resear...

Trying to ignore my two flu-ridden teenagers, and back to marking some genuinely good essays, including a budding Linear B scholar who is going take all our jobs some day (if there are jobs to be taken, etc. etc.).

4. The Aegean Linear script Or Linear A and B if you prefer! Bronze Age syllabic systems with logograms (or whatever you want to call them) - which is the very subject of this recent presentation by me. youtu.be/oqwzTSLCeBE?... #adventcalendar

Switching from writing to marking for a few days and genuinely looking forward to reading what these students have to say about archaeology and material remains. Then next week, back to what *I* have to say about archaeology (and material forgeries…).

100 years after Tutankhamun’s mummified body was unwrapped, we are retelling this story through the Tutankhamun Spatial Archive, a new searchable database of every archaeological record from the tomb’s excavation. Explore the Beta release on the 1925 unwrapping: tutankhamun.griffith.ox.ac.uk

Hi all, A modest proposal on the contours and future of Decolonial Archaeology (open access). Grateful to all who inspired the ideas! I would welcome all feedback and critique. A decolonial archaeology of refusal, care and repair | Antiquity | Cambridge Core - www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

If you’re in Oxford TODAY, it will be lovely to see you @blackwelloxford.bsky.social at 5.30pm 📗 #Economica #womenwealthpower

Had the pleasure of using the new Tutankhamun Spatial Archive in my teaching today! tutankhamun.griffith.ox.ac.uk @griffithinstitute.bsky.social

📢 Vacancy on the Crete Subcommittee Applications are invited from those interested in becoming a member of the Crete Subcommittee to serve for four years from 1 April 2026. Check out our website to find out more! www.bsa.ac.uk/2025/11/07/v... Deadline: Friday 19 December

Interested in getting some hands on experience with our collections? We're looking for volunteers to help catalogue and research our collection of 17th-century tokens. Volunteering will usually take place on a Thursday, 2 hours per week. Email [email protected] for the full role description.

I'm a fan of volunteering as a way to gain valuable cv-friendly experience, which can be tricky, but I don't think volunteers should be load-bearing in any way like project manager, compared to "helps at coin-handling sessions 2 Saturdays a month" or data entry. But I just saw a volunteering opp 1/3

Join us on the 27th of November for the 7th LBA/EIA Aegean ECR group online conference, happening from 2-6pm (UK time)! We have some fantastic speakers joining us this year (see the poster below), and we look forward to welcoming you - register here: forms.cloud.microsoft/e/BTwUa6HmBB

We're kinda new to #HillfortsWednesday. Are we doing it right? www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scot...

Preparations continue for the MultakaOxford 'With These Hands: Crafting a Shared Humanity' gallery trail, being launched at this Friday's Late Night event. Here we see details of beautiful embroidery on a Ukranian vyshyvanka which we are excited to welcome into the collection and to share with you!

What is there to look forward to on these miserable grey Autumn days? Why not join Manchester Ancient Egypt Society's online study day exploring the landscape of ancient Egypt and the effects of geology and climate change on society, economics, politics and wildlife.

If you or anyone you know is a PGR or ECR working on the Aeagan LBA/EIA, come to this online conference, chaired by Dr Yannis Galanakis (Cambridge) on the 27th of Nov. Proposals on any topic within the remit of the group are v welcome - forms.gle/PJN5cw4HbkiC... Please share widely!

Suddenly, when I have to leave the library to go to a seminar (which will be fun! and have fizz, for some reason too!) I am filled with The Spirit of Productiveness. Great. Thanks.

I wonder what the Mantel effect has been on A-level answers about the Tudors, compared to 20 years ago? My 16 year old is encountering Cromwell for the first time, and we're watching Wolf Hall together, so naturally she adores him. When she reads the book her conversion will be complete.

🏺🗃️ 🤗 very excited to be at the @socstudyofthepast.bsky.social conference this week to talk abou the #HistoriansOfArchaeology online support group You can sign up to join our meetings, co-working sessions, reading group and #Discord server anytime via this link: forms.gle/KptYbPZ641Z8...

We're hiring! 🔬 The BSA is currently seeking a Fitch Laboratory Scientific Research Officer, full-time, fixed-term appointment (5 years). Check out the full job advert on our website for further information and the application form: www.bsa.ac.uk/2025/09/04/f...

My fab art history seminar group spent today's session designing and pitching an exhibition on iconoclasm for an imaginary job interview to be a gallery curator. I love that one group selected this sculpture by Esther Strauß to be their exhibition's finale:

It's not often I succumb to Kickstarter, but this was irresistible: www.kickstarter.com/projects/dux...

Gave a paper at the Bristol Classics Seminar yesterday on Arthur Evans & skulls. Great fun to share the Dark Truths (TM) with a brand new audience. Got to stop miming Charles Hawes being lowered down into a TOWER OF SKULLS to see how many he can grab like a claw machine (it was 26 - he was pleased).

We've launched a podcast: #AwayWithThePharaohs! Listen now for an introduction to @theees.bsky.social and the #podcast itself. Make sure you follow to never miss our monthly episodes (starting tomorrow), bringing Egypt to life in ways you’ve never heard before! #InternationalPodcastDay

Here is the direct zoom registration link: cam-ac-uk.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

CPF: the 7th LBA/EIA Aegean ECR Group online conference, chaired by Dr Yannis Galanakis (Cambridge) is on the 27th of Nov. We welcome proposals on any topic within the remit of the group - an ideal place to test out a chapter, article idea or presentation. forms.gle/PJN5cw4HbkiC... Please share!

The stunning Georgian interior of St Deiniol’s, Worthenbury has a complete set of original 18th-century box pews, an elegant triple-decker pulpit, and a grand west gallery. 1/7

Late night library find: a pamphlet written by the archaeologist John Evans with a note on the front cover that appears to be in his hand, dedicating it to his son, Arthur Evans (of Knossos fame). Any experts on Evan's handwriting out there?

the 16th colloquium on Mycenaean studies (basically Aegean scripts) begins in two days in Madrid: www.uned.es/universidad/...

Did Marco Polo’s dad abscond with an ancient Chinese tomb statue? Lead isotope analysis suggests that might be how the Lion of Venice got to Italy in the 13th century. 🏺🧪 (Study published today in @antiquity.ac.uk.)