Before essay mills were banned in 2022, advertising for essay mills were all like ‘students, get help with your ideas’ and *everyone* knew it was bullshit. EVERYONE! And now universities themselves are encouraging students to ‘get help with their ideas’ from ChatGPT - and it’s STILL bullshit!

There never used to be this many "deadline extension" announcements, did there? Feels like this might be another symptom of everything falling apart.

I'd love to see actual journalism on students' experience at university, but a piece based entirely on the PR work of a for-profit student accommodation provider ain't it. www.theguardian.com/education/20...

The defining thing about nationalism and racism is that they offer you a cross-class subjectivity! That's what whiteness and Britishness are for!

Our version of “does it spark joy” should be “does it support our core functions”??

But how do we know it would work?

"This is just what the world sounds like now. This is how everything has chosen to speak... We are unearthing the echo of loneliness. We are unfolding the brushstrokes of regret." www.nytimes.com/2025/12/03/m...

I got tired of studies saying historians were one of the top professions that could be replaced by AI. It just didn't sound right to me. Librarians, curators, and teachers all score as much less "replaceable", and lawyers score much, much lower still. And I think I figured out why. /1

This is a helpful push towards what should guide university governance in UKHE. Particularly helpful to see mention of the need to value critical challenge, using internal staff expertise, diversity of membership (not just finance!), election of governors and accountability to staff/students.

Graduate of the American Studies programme that the University of Nottingham wishes to close wins 2025 Wolfson History Prize for Survivors: The Lost Stories of the Last Captives of the Atlantic Slave Trade. History, it's a long game. Divest in haste, repent for the longue durée.

Edinburgh Uni has paid ££££s to Nous Group to restructure their staff and curriculum. I suspect far more unis have been paying millions to Nous Group, for longer than we realise. A complete undermining of university governance & academic expertise & autonomy. www.theferret.scot/consultancy-...

There's a million things I haven't done, but writing another blog post is no longer one of them.

My book CONTROL SCIENCE is out in May-- a four-century history of labor control & economic thought, from Caribbean plantations to Zambian mines to Amazon warehouses, it explains how cynicism became economic common sense. It's also a call to do better today www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/804714...

The @royalhistsoc.org is running a charitable donation campaign to fund the research of historians who lack support. The number of applications we're seeing is way up. I've been very lucky to have a career as a historian, I've donated, and I think this Christmas you should too. Pay it forward.

Maybe it's just that time in the teaching term, but I'm really feeling all of this (from Steven Mintz's very prolific substack). substack.com/home/post/p-...

Almost as if managers are too removed from students to actually understand what they need/want? Almost as if managers relying solely on consultants and not staff is creating a top layer of the university devoid of any input by reality?

For #SHEAR #SHEAR2026, seeking panelists for session on economic issues circa 1780s-1790s. My paper: examining MA debates over property requirements etc. in the proposed 1778/1780 constitutions. Proposals due Dec 1st, please contact me [email protected] if interested.

Corporate profit margins have increased by 30% since the pandemic. Electricity companies have trebled their margins. The 4 big banks made £45bn in 2022 (up by 75%). But instead of talking about corporate profiteering our gov talks about taking jewellery and “identifiable assets” from migrants.

I'm an American Studies grad from Nottingham, and the beneficiary of an AmStuds/History fellowship that launched me into grad school in the U.S. I literally wouldn't have the career I have without it.

American and Canadian Studies at Notts have been so important for so long. Our colleagues there have a plan to save jobs and teaching provision and management are not considering it. Please sign and share.

Managers cite concern for students in everything they do, but never actually prioritise student opinion or voices in any of their decision making. They do irreparable harm to student courses and turn around to staff and ask: ‘right: how can we improve student satisfaction and recruitment?’

Centre-left politicians worried about anti-car policies polling badly in the short term need to remember: every measure that pushes people to cycle or use public transport ultimately creates more centre-left voters; every measure that leads to more people driving creates more right-wing voters

Compulsory team teaching on every module is perhaps the biggest ever threat to the quality of teaching in UK universities. It causes chaos on the ground for timetabling, ruins course coherence and turns lecturers into permanent supply teachers. It is pedagogically incoherent… 1/

CFP for Slavery North conference on "Rebellion, Resistance, and Refuge: Slavery and Border-Crossing during the American Revolution" @umassamherst.bsky.social 7/9-7/12/2026, abstracts due 12/19/2025 #vastearlyamerica slaverynorth.com/event/call-f... 🗃️

Ok, I finally got around to writing something for the new blog. It's about what else I've been doing with my time lately! buttondown.com/cutterham/ar...

Friends, I could not be more excited to let you know that my book, The American Revolution and the Fate of the World, is out today from Penguin. I’m super proud of it and super grateful to all the scholars whose work informs it. I hope you’ll take a peek and spread the word! amzn.to/4nHkziG

Not my place, not my period, but I'm looking forward to some "intimate history" in the present tense, in my colleague @tricksterprince.bsky.social's new book.

📣 Calling all PGR students, ECRs, & heritage employees: two weeks left to submit your abstract! With a program of keynote speakers, paper presentations, & 10-minute ‘lightning talks’ to unpack works in progress, we welcome submissions from a range of research interests & disciplinary perspectives.

What it feels like to work in "one of an elite group of School's" these days... 😑

After submitting a FOIA request UKRI, I obtained success rates by three grant call scheme and I can only say that I am disheartened by the results: - AHRC Responsive Mode 2025: 2% - ESRC New Investigator Grant 2025: 1% - ESRC Research Grant Round 2025: 1%

An unrivaled opportunity to study in the ‘show me’ state: Thanks to the generosity of the Kinder Institute at the University of Missouri, BrANCH is once again pleased to offer a fully-funded place on their MA program in Atlantic History and Politics for 2026-27! www.branch.org.uk/kinderbranch...

Interesting report which resonates with things my students told me when I worked at Birmingham. Proper student journalism is important for holding institutions to account and needs supporting!

Maybe British universities should be treated like failing rail franchises, getting gradually nationalised as they go bust one by one, then run cooperatively, democratically, comprehensively, strategically and collectively for the public good.

Can student journalism survive and thrive? Tanshpreet Kaur and I spent part of the summer talking to student journalists and other interested parties. Our report focuses on Redbrick, the flagship paper here at Birmingham. You can read it here: drive.google.com/file/d/1QiJG...

My interim editorship is over at the end of the academic year and we are hiring a permanent editor of the WMQ! Please share widely!

If you claim “rights” as a citizen that other citizens can’t claim, or rights as a person that other people don’t have, you don’t have rights, you just have privileges

This is, for clarity, exactly my position. A lot of machine learning is amazing (and has been for years!) - you will pry google lens from my cold dead hands f.ex. But poor quality, unnecessary, forced on you, misleading, thieving slopAI is stealing its valour & spoiling the whole brand/concept.

If you're on here you've probably already seen, but there's a 25% discount on these pre-orders at Waterstones, with the code OCTOBER25, until the end of the day on Friday.

If academics could put their energy into one place, it should be toward decentralizing university governance. This won't stop what's about to happen, but it can help make uni restructuring more humane and transparent, and reduce the odds of another HE boom and bust cycle.

I've lived in Birmingham six years. In that time, so far two cyclists have been killed directly along my short commute. Here's wishing big lawsuits on the people who have the power to prevent these results but prefer car owner convenience instead.

In 1776, a Scottish housepainter called James Aitken set out on a secret mission to destroy the British navy and win the War of Independence for the United States. His story is the core of my book, EMPIRE ABLAZE: The American Revolution and the Atlantic Working Class, out next summer with Verso!

UCU hasn't focused on university governance, but it should. Like their Australian counterparts, British universities are "profoundly undemocratic." @markpendleton.bsky.social is right we should learn from those in Australia who are taking the fight forward on this! ucucommons.org/2025/10/03/s...

Meanwhile people are out here writing books in stolen moments, between meetings about steering and assessment, 200 words at a time

Terminal manager-brain, I'm afraid. What's seen as important is not research but the apparatus around research. Partnerships! Capacity-building for these partnerships that you just forced these institutions to form! Assessing and steering!

Tory conference has "8.45am session on the last day of your discipline's big annual meeting" vibes.

📢Call for papers! Benjamin Franklin House is hosting a conference, “Remember the ladies”: Women and Revolution, in London in May 2026! Details are available here: benjaminfranklinhouse.org/event/spring... If you have any questions, please email me at [email protected].

Let's make hope normal again. youtu.be/qxt4HCjd7VA?...

Low speeds save lives; asking for higher speeds is a pro-death position, especially for your children and elderly family.

We are building an eco socialist Green Party and we need your help to do that. Still think the party isn’t perfect? Well come help us make it perfect. @frankadlingtons.bsky.social