Following the news of another political defection in Westminster, we're resharing our recent #HistParl article on the history of MPs 'crossing the floor' and changing their party affiliation, drawing heavily upon extracts from our #OralHistory archive. historyofparliament.com/2026/01/16/c...

Obituary: Gladys Mae West (1930-2026) mathematician who pioneered GPS technology go.nature.com/4jWMeM8

It's nice to have been invovled with a post that is so politically timely...

Residency for two emerging writers to explore the feminist archive at Nottingham Women's Library. Details in link. Please share :)

🚨Special announcement: our annual conference will be 3–4 Sept 2026 at LSE Library, in collaboration with @lselibrary.bsky.social, & Friends House, London. Theme: Celebrating the Centenary of the Women’s Library: One Hundred Years of Women’s History. Call for Papers coming mid-Jan! #WomensHistory

Bowie at V&A east storehouse. The exhibits are excellent, but it’s the archive side, complete with replica documents to leaf through, that really introduces people to the archive. People kept checking they were allowed to look at them but then sat fascinated for ages.

A few interesting things from #histday25. New home for the Music Hall Society in Lambeth Archives. NUWT archives @ucl.ac.uk. Port of London archive is open at Museum of Docklands. HIV Story Trust is preserving the story of HIV and AIDS. And it’s the best spot in London for postcards and bookmarks!

#OtD 1 Nov 1936 the Jarrow marchers arrived in London. They had marched all the way from Jarrow in North-East England to protest hunger and unemployment as a result of the closure of the town's shipyard, which was the main employer in the area stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/8136...

@nfsengland.bsky.social's released their first tranche of results at The Folklore Society HQ on Monday. Here are some of their findings about how people celebrate Halloween in England. Happy Halloween, however and wherever you're celebrating! 👻🎃🐈‍⬛ Image illustration: Jonny Ford

Long Row, Belper: housing built by William Strutt, 1794-1797 for the workers of his new cotton mill - one of the world's first factories and some of its earliest industrial housing.

I'm delighted to be doing this #free #online #event with @englishassociation.bsky.social on Tuesday 9 December. What can we do with a poem, and where can close reading take us? Please share! #poetry #teaching #English #closereading #unseenpoetry #poem #teachers www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/adventures...

I interrupt your doomscrolling for a heartwarming update: Notre Dame, which is generally unavailable for private events, is hosting a wedding...for one of the carpenters who helped rebuilt it after the fire. www.youtube.com/watch?v=FH7D...

How have people of African descent been represented in art, travel literature and visual culture? Join our 3-day course (25–27 Nov) on the Image of the Black archive, including a screening, exhibition tour and curator talk. 📍 Warburg Institute, London warburg.sas.ac.uk/news-events/...

Have you seen Black Atlas yet? Described as “powerful and thought-provoking,” this new exhibition by artist Edward George explores the Image of the Black archive — 30,000+ images documenting representations of people of African descent across history. warburg.sas.ac.uk/news-events/... #ArtHistory

Teaching the histories of slavery and keen to inform your students with insights from the most recent research? Just a month to go before @uclpress.bsky.social publishes this open access (free to download) expert volume. uclpress.co.uk/book/teachin...

You know those "mad", "woke" PhDs that the press go nuts over every so often? I think they sound great: www.thetimes.com/comment/colu...

We're also happy to announce the Research Seminars in Photographic Cultures and Heritage, which start on 30 October, 5.30 pm with none other than Martha Langford! The seminars are all free and online, and you can register here: photographichistory.wordpress.com/2025/10/05/r... #photohist

I’ve spent so much research time distracted by the ads in newspapers…now I’ve found an account that will serve it up to me, what can go wrong?

Just a quick reminder that I'm giving a FREE talk online for Warner Library, serving the town of Sleepy Hollow in the US, tomorrow night at 7pm EST / 11pm UK I'll be discussing Scooby-Doo and folklore with a particular slant on the gothic and folk horror Join me! warnerlibrary.org/2025/09/29/z...

Another excellent and evocative will of the month post from @emilymayvine.bsky.social - doubly unusual in that it is the nuncupative will (spoken) of a married woman. #EarlyModern 🗃️ 📜 @leverhulme.ac.uk @uoearchhist.bsky.social @uniofexeterhass.bsky.social

So good to see #LavLang32 being shared so widely! Join us for the annual Queer Linguistics conference, which in 2026 travels to Scotland for the first time thanks to @christianilbury.bsky.social and University of Edinburgh lavlang32.ppls.ed.ac.uk

A neat tool I just came across: Viabundus, a digital road map of northern Europe 1350-1650, that lets you calculate contemporary travel routes/times. In 1500, going Amiens → Köln by horse took almost 7 days and 13 toll payments. #medievalsky www.landesgeschichte.uni-goettingen.de/handelsstras...

📣 The WFA PhD Grant Scheme is currently open to applicants! We want to hear from anyone researching the First World War as part of their doctoral thesis, no matter what the topic! #fwwhist Full details and application form can be found below ⬇️ www.westernfrontassociation.com/latest-news/...

We are excited to be hiring for a Community and Advocacy Manager! The role, based in the Digital Humanities Research Hub at the School of Advanced Study, will lead on developing and delivering a programme of community engagement and advocacy for the Association. www.jobs.london.ac.uk/Job/JobDetai...

Happy to make it to Grayson Perry at the Wallace Collection just before it finished. Good to see this fresh response to such a classic collection - and Newham artist Madge Gill featured too!

What can you expect to find at #HistDay25 our celebration of history collections with @senatehouselib.bsky.social? Come along and find out on 4 Nov. Book your free space here www.sas.ac.uk/news-events/...

Are you coming along to #HistDay25 on Tuesday 4 November 2025? Why not stay at Senate House for my #lecture in the evening, on 'Can popular #history be radical? Historical research and writing for the public'. Book your free place: www.history.ac.uk/news-events/...

The Bibliography of British and Irish History (BBIH) has recently been updated with 5000+ new references. Discover further details about this update in this On History blog blog.history.ac.uk/2025/10/bibl... @brepols.net

On a university nostalgia weekend in Bristol and whilst wandering around Clifton spotted a couple of plaques commemorating suffragettes Annie Kenney and Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence. The visit also gave me a good reason to read this great book on Bristol women by @janeduffus.bsky.social

#OtD 13 Oct 1970 famous Black activist Angela Davis was arrested by the FBI in NYC. She had fled California after a warrant for her arrest was issued in connection with an attempted jailbreak. Davis was later acquitted. Learn more in this book: shop.workingclasshistory.com/collections/...

BRAID Responsible AI and Cultural Heritage Forum (hybrid), 6 November www.sas.ac.uk/digital-huma...

Free workshop (two afternoons) on ‘Getting started with open LLMs for humanities research’, 6-7 November www.sas.ac.uk/digital-huma...

This blog from @lrylandepton.bsky.social draws together the participatory elements in @vch-home.bsky.social's work. Producing high-quality, primary-sourced, peer-reviewed texts which speak to, and drawn on, the communities they describe is no mean feat!

I will be running an intro session on using open source census data at Senate House on 23rd October…sign up at the link below. It’s in person so limited spaces available www.sas.ac.uk/digital-huma...

#Free Talk next Saturday 11 October. Find out more about the life of author and photographer James Arthur Brimble with Gary Stone 📍The View, Ranger’s Rd #Chingford 🗓️ Saturday 11th October 🕰️ 12-1 🎟️ www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-life-a...

When people comment 'woke, over-representative' on #AThousandBlows vids etc and I tell them about the dozen (known!) Black boxers just in the 1880s, just in London, incl. two women, their response is to not reply, or to simply repeat themselves. Anyway 🥊❤️ >> www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...

It's #DigitalFriday ! This is my routine appeal to #skystorians & all academics prepping for teaching to share any software, hardware, online resources (primary, secondary, teaching tools, blogs), tips and tricks that they've found useful this week! #AcademicSky

New blog article: @skelding.bsky.social tells the story of Forest Gate's Nora and Charles Busby and their trials and tribulations as missionaries in China between the 1920s and 1950s, incl a period as Japanese internees during WW2. Charles' brother Walter awarded MC in WW1. www.E7-NowandThen.org

The full IHR #London #SummerSchool 2025 programme is now live! Join us in July 2025 as we explore London’s history through its #REBELS. 10% discount still available until 13/12/24! https://buff.ly/4fUSvVX

📢 Please do join us on Zooniverse, and spread the word! 📢 ⌛️Check as as many lines of text as you like in your own time ✍️Learn & practice palaeography with our Field Guide Read a range of Tudor, Stuart, and Georgian wills 📜, and discover a range of interesting bequests, from caps to cows... 🧢🐄

Celebrated historian and broadcaster David Olusoga will deliver the inaugural National Humanities Lecture! The first of its kind, the lecture will make the case for the humanities and explore how new ideas are emerging. Find out more and book: www.sas.ac.uk/news-events/...

The Humours and Narratives of Elections in the Eighteenth Century Written by Dr Kendra Packham | 08 Oct 2024 ies.sas.ac.uk/blog/humours... #skystorians #c18th 🗃️

We offer dissertation bursaries of up to £500 for students on taught Masters programmes or in the final year of a first degree. Please spread the word. sslh.org.uk/bursaries-gr...

Before we start adding to the tsunami of starter packs, all our lovely new followers might want to explore our collection pages, where you can get an overview of the geographic and chronological spread of what can be found in the library www.history.ac.uk/library-digi...

Starter pack for Queer & Trans History (modern & contemporary)! This is a very incomplete work in progress - suggested additions welcome :) go.bsky.app/DF3FYCh

New open-access journal launched: Public Humanities. www.cambridge.org/core/journal... #Highered

This reminds me - there are some great resources for researchers in smaller archives like Redbridge Heritage and Archives centre (not on Bluesky yet) including the Greenham Common song book and stories of a local woman on hunger strike in the cause.

#FridayRoundUp @thegenealogist.bsky.social have a new release of Military Records Find out more 👉https://www.thegenealogist.co.uk/news/

I've seen a few people still searching, so here's the Directory 🤩