Technical question: around 1912, how many Americans would have known or been able to transcribe Morse Code? How saturated was that knowledge — or, where would I look to get some sense of that? Any ideas very appreciated! I haven’t dug into it yet…

Call for chapters! Amy Tooth Murphy and I are editing the Routledge Handbook of Oral History Theory, and we are seeking contributions from a range of scholars and practitioners. See our full call here. oralhistory.org/2025/11/11/c...

Flashback to late June/early July heatwave and the time I worked on indexes for @jameskneale.bsky.social’s fascinating book on temperance, life assurance and life stories to be told within these. Great book for those working on c19th, spatial histories or telling life stories from unusual sources

If you use digital newspaper collections this new OA paper is for you - it’s full of great insights into how to understand what’s in them and the many hidden perils of digital search (like the systemically poorer OCR for cheaper and more left-leaning newspapers - who knew?). Please share

People keep telling me that GenAI is the inevitable future but if that’s true, why does it need so many government subsidies and other assistance ? (rhetorical)

All set for this evening’s seminar for @cont-brit-hist.bsky.social with Dr Katerina Papakonstantinou. Looking forward to hearing her fascinating paper, & thanks to our fab Chair Prof Pat Thane & Term programme organiser @helenglew.bsky.social

Still time to sign up for our seminar tomorrow, Wed 5th Nov, with Katerina Papakonstantinou, who will be speaking on 'Greek Cypriot Migration to London in the 1960s: Women’s Voices and Experiences' 5.30pm UK time, online and at @ihr.bsky.social. www.history.ac.uk/news-events/...

Your once-in-a-while reminder that I have some capacity for freelance work and I am here for all your historical research, indexing, copyediting and photographing documents in archives needs. Get in touch via my website: helenglew.com

Looking forward to giving the @ihr.bsky.social seminar! Hoping to see @caitbeaumont.bsky.social & @helenglew.bsky.social & others - in person or online #Archives #Activism #WomensHistory www.history.ac.uk/news-events/...

If you feel like it, will you show me how you annotate texts you read for research? I thought our first-year undergrads might be interested to see the variety.

In about three years the entire university pivot to AI curricula and schools and programs is going to be so deeply embarrassing. We will all pretend it never happened and I will be standing there, looking at people with a mirror in my eyes. This is all so embarrassing.

I'm designing a new course on Victorian Literature and Medicine next semester. I'd love any suggestions for texts to include (books and shorter things). It's a 300-level, so mostly Juniors and Seniors, but some Sophomores. Mostly English-Ed majors. Already got J&H!

We are delighted to announce that MBS2026 will be held at the University of Birmingham, 3-5 June 2026! Papers may consider the opening day's theme of 'Polycrisis', but we also welcome all submissions related to modern British studies. For any questions please contact [email protected]

We're excited to announce the call for papers for #MBS26, the next Modern British Studies conference, at Birmingham in June 2026. We'll be launching the #MBS Association at this event, to support further regular conferences in Modern British Studies. www.birmingham.ac.uk/events/moder...

We are thrilled to announce the shortlist for the 2025 Stansky Book Prize for best book in British Studies dealing with the period since 1800. www.nacbs.org/news/stansky... @uchicagopress.bsky.social @oxunipress.bsky.social @stanfordpress.bsky.social @princetonupress.bsky.social

Private Eye offers up an excellently scornful commentary on the relentless polling. It’s become ridiculous and has oversimplified our politics to dangerous levels of stupid and irresponsible.

I have a new article out. TLDR: Actively courting deportation by air is a way to claim rights as a stateless person and even as a refugee. academic.oup.com/past/advance...

Thank you to @katrinanavickas.bsky.social for a brilliant start to our seminar series last night! Next session is 22 Oct, 5.30pm UK time, online/in-person when @dohertyta.bsky.social will speak on The Fragility of Feminist Futures in Digital Collections. Sign up: www.history.ac.uk/news-events/...

On Weds we welcome @katrinanavickas.bsky.social to IHR @cont-brit-hist.bsky.social seminar Katrina will talk abt "Public space + popular protest in 20thC England: enclosure, resistance + commoning" In-person/hybrid. All welcome, register here! www.history.ac.uk/news-events/... @ihr.bsky.social

"She's the Rt Revd and Rt Hon Dame Sarah Mullally DBE, Archbishop of Canterbury, but she's Mrs Mullally to you."

This article manages to name her husband before it names… her.

Here's the full seminar programme for autumn 2025. Seminars are either hybrid or online only so plenty of opportunities for those not local to London to join us. Please sign up using the links for any papers you'd like to come to. www.history.ac.uk/news-events/...

📢 Applications are now open for the Joint BME Small Grants scheme, supporting research, events & activities by BME historians or on BME histories. 💸 Grants up to £1000. ⏰Deadline: 27 Nov 2025. #history #apply #funding #opportunity socialhistory.org.uk/funding/bme-...

This year’s programme for our IHR seminar in Contemporary British History is coming together This side of Xmas we’re excited to welcome @katrinanavickas.bsky.social @garylove.bsky.social @evansmithhist.bsky.social @dohertyta.bsky.social If you’d like to present next spring/summer, drop me a line!

Woo hoo! I'm also going to be revealing some of the research I've been doing this year on the 1980s, unpublished work in progress, to get feedback from you contemporary historians out there.

A new academic year is here, and so is our autumn term programme! A thread of our speakers follows. Sign-up links available soon but note dates in diaries now! 📆

We're grateful to @ukri.org and @worcesteruni.bsky.social for supporting this conference. Please share widely and email us [[email protected]] with any questions!

A great thread applicable to scholars outside the US. Much of the work that historians do is not strictly what they’re paid for. Being able to do it depends on historians being stably employed, with access to resources, and with flexibility built in their schedules. All of those things are at risk.

Any suggestions for how and where to organise a promotional tour for my new book? Fellow scholars and writers seem to have extensive tour dates - how did you organise it?

Cover reveal for my forthcoming book, WE HAVE COME TO BE DESTROYED: GROWING UP IN COLD WAR BRITAIN which tells the history of Cold War Britain (c.1956-89) through the eyes of children & young people! Out with @yalebooks.bsky.social 28 April 2026 #booksky #skystorians yalebooks.co.uk/book/9780300...

This is disgraceful - both the workload and the AI ‘workaround’

Conscious of the limitations, lecturer A proceeds to put in at least the same amount of work they would have had to invest to master this task without AI, just to make sure that AI is being used

The launch of my new @manchesterup.bsky.social book Songs of Seven Dials will be at 6pm, Tues 21 Oct, at Waterstones Covent Garden. I'll be in conversation with the wonderful @julialaite.bsky.social. Please do come along. Free tickets, but register in advance www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/songs-of-s...

Join us on 23 September for the start of our CLACS Caribbean Studies Seminar Series 2025/26 @ilcs.bsky.social / @soccaribbeanuk.bsky.social The Long Road from Bog Walk: Electricity and Electrification in Jamaica, 1890s–1970s w/ Andrew Williams (University of the West Indies, Mona) shorturl.at/euVXU

It really bothers me how the skill of summarising is devalued. It is a hard thing to do well and it is important to learning. Ughhhhhhhhhhhh

We're very much looking forward to having @garylove.bsky.social join us for the @cont-brit-hist.bsky.social seminar on 19 November! Sign-up links for this and the rest of our programme this term coming very soon.

Finally got my hands on a copy. I will discuss the book & my work in this area at the Contemporary British History Seminar at the IHR on 19 November. Sadly I’ll have to do it online because I’ve used up my travel quota (have a small baby). But thanks to @helenglew.bsky.social for the invitation

I can't believe I need to have an AI policy! I made it pretty short though: Using AI is cheating, yourself mostly. In addition to the environmental blight created by AI, it makes no sense to use it in your intellectual and creative work. Why would you outsource your innate intelligence?

Warsaw opens metro station ‘express’ library to get commuters off their phones

Just finished reading Vera Brittain’s first novel ‘The Dark Tide’ (1923). I’ve been interested in both Brittain and Winifred Holtby for work and non-work reasons for a long time and had read a lot of Brittain’s journals and autobiographical writing but this was the first novel of hers I’ve read.

Here's a #GiftLink for those who want to read the full NYT obit of historian of science & gender, Margaret Rossiter. www.nytimes.com/2025/08/29/s... #histSTM 🧪🗃️

I want to explain a few things and then it might be clearer why UK trans people are upset. In 2001 I married my wife, Sylvia. In 2005 I started medical transition. (1/13)

Anyone out there familiar with my book on handwriting and has done research since? I am still getting requests for interviews—increasingly high profile—and my work is over a decade old now. +

The Call for Papers for 'Talking Records: Pollution in the Archive', a symposium at The National Archives in London, 4 December 2025, is now open! Submission deadline: Friday 19 Sept See the CFP and details about bursaries for speakers here: orlo.uk/Z8StS #envhum #envhist

Every time you submit a large application for research funding the university should send a team to spring clean your house imo.

This post made me realize that I don't know enough about the British context for mail-order! I've seen mail-order book catalogues + newspaper ads inviting people to order books by mail from 1840 or so — I've assumed that that's when it really takes off b/c of the penny stamp, better infrastructure +

New cover reveal! Publishing this November, Postcards, Translators and Esperanto Pioneers: An Alternative History of International Communication explores the writing and lives of John Beveridge (1857–1943) & his family. #OpenAccess & published w/ @ihr.bsky.social 😊 uolpress.co.uk/book/postcar...

"We Are The Lions, Mr. Manager!" is hitting the road this autumn. Telling the story of Jayaben Desai and the Grunwick Strike, the production celebrates migrant women, worker solidarity and the fight for union recognition. 🎭 Find a date near you: www.townsendproductions.org.uk/shows/we-are...

Having sat with it for a bit, I'm still struggling with this document. The document is at once very cautious, and effusive. The text of the guidance itself is pretty good--in fact, I think they point out a lot of ways in which generative AI is a terrible thing for doing history.