Episcopalians going *hard*

I stopped using Canvas this year; instead of uploading documents, I made a PRINTED course packet. More work up front, but then it's all done and everything is in one place; schedule adjustments can be made in person/in class. Students liked it; they actually wrote on the text, engaged with it.

i refuse to give canvas any more of my labor/date or my students'. i use it as a gradebook only and update every 3 weeks. takes away grade anxiety, too, i've found... students don't get notifications on their phones about their grades. they get the grade in class, on their assignment, from me

One of the reasons I push back as hard as I do on "cities are scary" nonsense is that I do not accept the view that we should treat unfounded fears as legitimate, and we have too long indulged the unfounded, racist fears of conservatives. And that in turn is leading to a moment...

Related: are there folks who are making a shift to bypass Canvas for uploading assignments this term? I haven’t yet, but considering. Shared folders instead?

I have to say, as a man with two mothers, I find the derisive deployment of language like "lesbian" and "lover" by those on the far right who are trying to justify Renee Good's death particularly disgusting and dehumanizing. These women. They are wives. They are a family. That's it.

We should stop giving guns and billions of dollars and total legal immunity to men who fantasize about murdering women.

"Queer theories demand 'an ongoing reconfiguring an iterative reworking of past, present, future.'" Our research and teaching should support students' and researchers' need to "birth our biases and subjectivities into being," allowing us to "connect with those creations rather than abhor them." 5/

DELL EXEC: Consumers are “not buying based on AI. In fact I think AI probably confuses them more than it helps them understand a specific outcome." @pcgamer.com #CES www.pcgamer.com/hardware/del...

Today is one of those days where I’m struck anew by how *bad* the internet has gotten. It’s almost unusable. Clouds, apps, advertising — nothing is where it should be and it’s nigh impossible sometimes to do basic tasks online.

This part is important. The regime issues many decrees/speech acts. The media print/post headlines for clickbait. May we counter the regime with affirmation of laws and the constitution in 2026 rather than rage posting and doomscrolling that concretize the regime’s formulations.

We have published the following update to our article following an email response from the New York Times. Trans News Network has a policy against platforming bigotry. As such, we have declined to publish the Times' statement which included blatant transphobia.

It's the first #ModWrite of the New Year! Let us know what you're working on using the hashtag 📚 (and don't forget to sign up for the BAMS New Work in Modernist Studies conference, held online this Friday 9th January, here: forms.gle/RQEkATXgkGcg...)

The President's powers come from the Constitution and Congress. There's no third source. If neither grant a power—and, more importantly, if either prohibit it—then the President doesn't have it. Full stop.

In a study following 23 million people age 18-59 (pretty young) for 4 years…despite the fact that the ones who got the COVID vaccine were overall older and sicker at baseline, they not only had 74% lower risk of dying from COVID than the unvaccinated but 25% lower risk of dying from any other cause!

Okay it's officially time for the MANY terrible recent takes on fandom to stop. There are literally decades of academic work and reams of fandom journalism by ppl like me and @gavia.bsky.social and @fansplaining.bsky.social that are intended to save you from embarrassing yourselves to this degree!

it says “NEW!” on the box and is simultaneously discontinued, so you know it’s good

2025 was mostly garbage, but there were some good moments. One of my favorites was when a family of beavers built a dam in just a few days, saving the Czech Republic 30 million Czech koruna (US$1.2 million) for a wetland restoration project the government had been planning for 7 years. 🦫 🌿

It's not your fault. Our health care system sucks, and doctors like to gaslight women into thinking it's just "anxiety" when things are medically wrong!

Reading Agatha Christie’s A Murder is Announced and damn if it isn’t a post-war murder mystery version of Between the Acts

on this sunday-est of sundays, syllabus-ing for a new term you're not alone against the oligarch agenda of cognitive deskilling, data capture, surveillance, and bias: we've got assignment ideas, memes, recommended readings, o' captain speeches, syllabus policies, and so much more against-a-i.com

(This is also about news outlets that decide their role should not be to talk to people who actually understand the world but to people who think they do.)

This bit is so important:

No more photos, no more feeding Altman’s or Musk’s or Zuckerberg’s or anyone else’s rape computer, no more masturbation fodder for these freaks, no more. If no one in power will do anything then I’m slamming the door behind me. I am opting out. I encourage other women to do the same.

@rethinkingschools.bsky.social's winter issue is devoted to AI: "We would love to live in a world where advances in technology change our lives and schools for the better, rather than enrich corporate executives at the expense of children and educators. But that is not the world we live in..."

Quite a day to get offline and go the re-opened Studio Museum in Harlem and think about AMERICA

to anyone wondering whether the decision to come out in favor of this or condemn it will look worse, historically speaking, may I refer you to *gestures to the entire history of american foreign policy and also the track record of the goons in office*

Candid answer - as someone who handled constituent affairs calls for years - while they’re not checking the phone right now, the urgency of the moment is important. Show them you care enough to make the weekend call, and be counted that way. Staffers will clock and report this upstream.

this is your mission. our pedophile president needs you to jump out of a helicopter to kidnap a head of state and his wife so some oil ceos can make a lot of money. we’ll be watching from a resort in florida that still serves wedge salad and checking how many retweets we get. good luck soldier

New Interview: www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a...

This is iconic. This and the WSJ article about Wall Street queuing up investment trips to Venezuela are it. That’s what’s happening. Everything else is fake.

I was watching this two days ago and musing to myself about what big distraction might land this weekend.

*endless screaming*

Just watched the movie Mountainhead and assuming similar sociopath conversations happening around this.

Totally normal things to say about a POTUS or any human.

Friends, IT BEGINS (...next week). We are reading Mary Shelley's ultra relevant The Last Man. One chapter a week, Details below. Basically Friday check-ins using #LastMan200

(Doing it in 2 pieces)

it’s stupid to not use ai just because it can induce psychosis and generate child porn. it’s like saying you’re hungry when there’s a hot dog on the ground outside that induces psychosis and generates child porn

To paraphrase a line from one of the great American films of the 20th century (Ghostbusters): Reuters has gone bye-bye

“Grok says”???

“many angry posts should have been naps or little packets of crackers” is deep wisdom and you don’t need to reproduce to embrace it!

I think we’ve given “gamification” quite a run. Let’s make 2026 a new era of being serious.

A week after immigrant groups filed a lawsuit, California said Tuesday it will delay the revocations of 17,000 commercial driver's licenses until March to allow more time to ensure that truckers and bus drivers who legally qualify for the licenses can keep them. https://to.pbs.org/3LrgfXA

One thing I’m noticing is that setting up a course in an LMS like Canvas forces you to think about the course and its interaction with students *in terms of* that LMS. It shapes your course, limiting it, actually. Interested in removing that limit and thinking differently about the shape of a class.

“You can’t just get these things online,” said Dr. Williams...Older material hasn’t been converted to a digital format, while many recent scientific & engineering journals and texts are behind a digital paywall and will be harder to access from outside the library. #histsci #histSTM #humanities 🗃️📜📚

Flu numbers are high in most states and almost all cases are variants of H3N2 and the vaccine includes H3N2 Get your flu vax if you haven’t already! Even if you still get the flu, the symptoms will be easier to manage if you get vaccinated!

It is Happening

Not quite the same but this self-referential-ish sign had me laughing too

Saw Bluesky described as where elder millennials go to retire from the internet, and immediately felt the peace that passes all understanding wash over me. None of have to struggle any longer. We completed our time.

Is billionaire positivity the same as pluribus happiness? In this paper I will