As a straight woman in her 40s I have been in my fair share of toxic relationships in my time, but none are as toxic as my relationship with academia. I should quit I should quit, but also think what it *could* be.

As yet another higher education institution rolls out a notice of job cuts, we surely have to ask the government when will they intervene? How decimated does this formerly world leading sector need to get before they say enough is enough?

"The neoliberalization and managerialization of UK universities, where we are expected to rubber stamp top-down initiatives, have led to our infantilisation...& the erosion of the universities’ academic community and intellectual life" @isrfoundation.bsky.social isrf.org/blog/dispatc...

The North has become 'one big border', a six county buffer zone between Britain and the EU. What is going on here in terms of racist policing and extraordinary levels of immigration and border enforcement is repression and state violence which is elevating violent loyalist neo-nazis.

I work really hard in my role because I believe in the importance of the work and yet time and time again senior management make ill-informed choices that make the work pointless. Life in British higher education is just one very long lesson in the futility of labour in late-stage capitalism.

Always fun to do something fancy, so was lovely to be invited to a civic dinner in the company of Hiroshi Suzuki, the Japanese Ambassador to the United Kingdom. Big thanks to @sainsbury-institute.org for the invite and all of their work in promoting Japanese culture regionally and beyond.

"The strong threat of compulsory redundancy and an invidious ‘consultation’ process created a hostile environment that felt designed to strong-arm as many of us out the door as possible while allowing the university to escape reputational damage.” www.timeshighereducation.com/depth/i-dont...

I honestly don’t even know how many times I’ve told students to “support clams” in my feedback.

Join us in building a Global Network of Girlhood Scholars! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/global-net...

Happy international women’s day! What a time to be a woman! On the brink of a fully realised fascist global regime! Resist! Take up space! Love your body! Be messy!

*Academics of Bluesky:* Do you know a great UG/PG student with excellent quants skills? @nspmartin.bsky.social and I are advertising a great fully-funded PhD on MRP and minority voting with our friends at Ipsos, so send them our way! ✌️ www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

Brewdog was never for punks.

One of the wickedest things Wes Streeting has ever done is push politically convenient falsehoods about suicide rates amongst young trans people. We have new data from the National Child Mortality Database that exposes the truth he tried to cover up.

Yesterday while I was teaching political ideologies and explaining the principles of neoliberalism and it’s faith in the market to solve social ills and deliver justice, one student literally said: “oh my god that’s so embarrassing” and I’m thinking maybe the kids are alright.

Just completed a wonderful guided Buddhist meditation on the changing nature of life and the inevitability of death and the whole time I had the Lolly version of ‘Hey Mickey’ running through my head 🧘🏼‍♀️🤷🏼‍♀️

Brilliant and affirming trip to The Feminist Library on Friday with my pal Ileana Jiménez. The volunteer staff there were amazing, I highly recommend a trip if you're in the area. Lost in zines///heaven. feministlibrary.co.uk

I encourage friends, colleagues and followers to support trans youth at a time when moments for connection and belonging are so cruelly being stripped away from them: www.change.org/p/allow-tran...

Heartbreaking news coming from #girlguiding today as they seek to employ an entirely unworkable definition of what constitutes a 'girl'. Ironic really that it is positioned as an 'equality and diversity' statement given that they are seeking to diminish both. www.girlguiding.org.uk/information-...

Went to the pub last night and *none* of my friends had heard of @halfmoonjoe.com so this is PSA that if you’re not watching him play video games then get on it he’s literally a dream and a gift.

Not the same Jimmy Carr that’s taking Saudi blood money?

Celebrity Traitors just out here showing us the extent of internalised racism.

The new Aussie critique of the Cass Review does not pull its punches about its failures, & makes the point that "gender-critical beliefs" should be declared. Since transphobes have made so much of having these protected by law, they should be required to declare them. archive.is/AqUGz#select...

Deeply ironic that Kimmel's newest book should be published by 'ethics' international press.

Happy Monday to UK academics politicalquarterly.org.uk/blog/where-n...

Today I changed my foundation year lesson plan on The Frankfurt School at the last minute to incorporate discussion about how we might use critical theory to understand Labubus and let me tell you, the future isn’t all broken, critical theory is still possible.

Come work at @dukegsfs.bsky.social: postdoc ad is live. academicjobsonline.org/ajo/jobs/30734

I love copyeditors because they make my work look nice but I also deeply resent their smug command of English grammar.

Let's be clear. The proposal to deport hundreds of thousands of people born in Britain to parents legally resident in Britain, just because they are black or brown, is not 'right populism'. It's the cornerstone policy of the 1970s National Front.

Not me thinking I could do anything other student oriented work in the first week of the semester.

All power to Melissa McCoul and colleagues.

My dear pal Jo Beckett-King has just published her first YA/children’s (8-12) novel called The House of Found Objects. It’s a mystery with two smart girls and has lots of puzzles - order in to your local libraries! (Jo is refreshingly offline and would loathe to blow her own trumpet so allow me!)

Here we go…

Birth rate is in decline and nationalism is on the rise - strap in ladies, we’re in for a rough ride.

Had a great time hearing students from Tohoku University present their learning of EDI and reflecting on how this applies to the Japanese context - all in the beautiful space offered by @sainsbury-institute.org

“Gender studies as a discipline…is defined by a set of debates and problematics.” In this 10-Minute Talk, Judith Butler FBA discusses gender as a field of study and its interdisciplinary contributions to research, social analysis and social movements. www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEvH...

As Maya Angelou reminds us: “when people show you who they are, believe them”

If an Israeli - or British or American etc - woman who was eight months pregnant was shot dead by any other military, the whole world would know her name. Her name was Sondos Jamal Muhammad Shalabi. She was 23.

We NEED professional creatives - from architects to animators; performers to publishers; game designers to gallerists, & everything in between, to mentor a bright, ambitious young person in 2026. Become an Arts Emergency mentor today 👉 www.arts-emergency.org/get-involved...

What really is there left to say?

Today is Samudaripen (Romani Holocaust) Remembrance Day. Today we remember and honour all the Roma and Sinti who perished targeted by the Nazis. Never forgotten.

UK university staff: keep signing!

If you do research in #girlhood studies then I have written an Oxford Bibliographies entry that will likely be of use! 93 entries sorted into 11 sub-fields, each subsection has its own overview of the field and each individual entry has an overview of the work's intervention doi.org/10.1093/obo/...

I’m reading Federici’s Caliban and the Witch and really feel our contemporary global situation is just another series of dominoes of those early mechanisms of capitalism, enclosure, and primitive accumulation. A nasty nasty chain reaction across history.

We're starting to release the video recordings of our keynote speakers from the FGEN Conference held at Bush House on the 21st June. The first of these is Jolyon Maugham - Director Good Law Project. Now available on our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/@feministgenderequalitynetwork

Since establishing the US/Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, not a day has passed that civilians were not murdered trying to get aid. www.theguardian.com/world/2025/j...

I can’t see how any #Wimbledon final this year will be able to compare with this semi-final between Anisimova and Sabalenka

Eating half a banana at my desk and putting the other half down as if I've just played two sets of tennis.