Deleting my account on here in the next few weeks. :( Gave a bigger speech on Instagram. For a million reasons, I'm not in the mood for social media anymore.

Re Holyrood polls: long arc of nationalist historiography says Scotland is different. In many ways, its institutions are very different from rUK, but these institutions often inc Labour & the Conservatives. These polls, then, are a real "mask off" moment re the hopes & dreams of Scottish Tories.

Super excited for this future @ijhs.bsky.social special issue on women’s basketball 🏀 history. If you’re working on this topic, please submit an abstract before the Dec 17 deadline! #sporthistory #skystorians 🗃️

I didn't know about Buxton, but I'm not surprised. Curling was big in Preston & Blackburn, which had decent-sized Scottish diasporas, and (if we're using a comparative example) it was also big in Malton, which did not have many Scots. Stay tuned (in a few years from now) for *that* article.

Touchdown! 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

I get some media personalities (& "journalists") are fascinating car crashes that you want to comment on a great deal, but what you're actually doing is providing them publicity. And, as we know from the past few years of politics, certain folk have learned that ridicule is nothing to be scared of.

The Society currently invites applications for its David Berry Fellowship in the History of Scotland and the Scottish People. The Fellowship, for up to £2500, supports research by historians of Scotland at any career stage: bit.ly/4ns6LJj Closing date: Friday 6 March 2026 #Skystorians

There was a time (2012-15) when on Twitter I would comment on current events in the earnest belief that someone might be educated by something I said. Obviously I was naive, that never really happened (it cannot happen) & my reluctance to comment on here stems from knowing it won't change anything.

🚨We’re looking for editors to join our team at The International Journal of the History of Sport @ijhs.bsky.social - if you work on sport history in Latin America or Asia (any countries) please apply for these 2 roles by Dec 3 #sporthistory #skystorians 🗃️ think.taylorandfrancis.com/editor_recru...

Today was the day I first noticed Xmas decorations in Edinburgh. It's over. Everything is over. Cancel everything.

Today marks publication day for my book When Fitness Went Global! It explores how physical culture travelled the world, how ideas about health circulated across continents, and how we arrived at today’s global landscape. Bloomsbury have it at 10% off today: www.bloomsbury.com/uk/when-fitn...

The value of reading history is you know that in 1860 there were abolitionists who were so demoralized that they thought chattel slavery would be permanent. 5 years later those still alive had lived to see its end.

Mapping Identities Conference 9/02/26-10/02/26 Call for Papers. We warmly invite expressions of interest in the form of 250-word abstracts and 100-word short biographies Wednesday 17/12/25 tinyurl.com/3nnacccd

I'm on and off on here, but not spending a lot of time lately. Seems like we're all talking about various professional and political miseries, but I have absolutely nothing to add to any of it, and I'm unlikely to be able to successfully change the subject.

Expertise in the history of Sport in Asia or Latin America? We are looking for new editors to join us in these areas. Details can be found via link below Deadline is 3rd Dec think.taylorandfrancis.com/editor_recru...

This afternoon's work. In this morning's seminar work, we'll be discussing the National Football Museum in Manchester.

Tomorrow, bringing Paterson, New Jersey (where I lived the first five years of my life) into a 1st-yr Edinburgh Uni sport history/management classroom. We're discussing Larry Doby, via @profloumoore.bsky.social's article on him, and a few articles from the New York Times and the Afro-American.

At conference one day (probably over drinks), we can trade stories about stressful housemoves and the Scottish property system. Anyway, it's done. Now taking part in a perfectly normal commute.

Wow. Directed at women and girls, no less.

Moving tomorrow (I think). Let's get this over with. Then we can sort everything else out afterward.

ICYMI

If you have a uni login, check out my upcoming article from @scottishhistreview.bsky.social, now up in draft form (paywall). It examines the historic relationship between Scottish curling, customs and personnel related to Freemasonry, and the Royal Caledonian Curling Club.

If you have a uni login, check out my upcoming article from @scottishhistreview.bsky.social, now up in draft form (paywall). It examines the historic relationship between Scottish curling, customs and personnel related to Freemasonry, and the Royal Caledonian Curling Club.

Just before the TGV passed Tours. What a sunset tonight.

14 hours on a train journey to the west of France from Falkirk. I reckon it's going to be a bit like Snowpiercer, and my reserved seat won't have free champagne, unlike at the front of the train. (Eurostar might be like that, but not LNER... right?)

Anyway, back *on here* (I never really left anyway). Wish me luck; it's a big day today, and an even busier week next week.

When I left the Glasgow pub biz in 2012 we had hitherto the right to apply for late licenses but didn't do it. Which regular punters would come in the pub? How much would bosses have to pay staff? Costs of leaving the lights and heat on? All of this before Brexit, covid, tariffs, war in Ukraine, etc

Right, folks. Going to check out of here for a bit again. I'll see you when I see you.

Hi folks. We used to have a few good websites which were one-stop shops for conferences. Are there any good ones now? (Feels like I'm relying on folk to contact me.)

Will be discussing this in a few weeks, a section from Graham Foster's Hall of History in the National Museum of Bermuda.

If this was Twitter, we could have used polls to determine if our self-selecting group of followers believed that Andy Burnham was 1) the messiah, 2) a false prophet, 3) He Who Also Lost to Jeremy Corbyn. Alas, *our* ability to also create fake information is being restricted by this platform.

I was in the middle of a random thought before the outage rudely interrupted me.

I sometimes have this idea that, one day, I'm going to write a book on the history of sport in New Jersey. Was going over different chapters in my head last night. This isn't happening for at least over a decade or maybe two, or possibly longer -- I've got several other projects before then.

I'm going in for abolition and (I know this isn't popular, but...) hard enforcement. At the same token, this year I am giving more opportunities to submit informal work for feedback ahead of the formal submission of written work. I hope it's the latter that encourages students to do the right thing.

lol, I knew "unworkable" was going to be the first adjective Starmer used, he certainly can't change his tune now...

1) Gee, thanks. 2) I don't believe you.

At least the cat's among the pigeons now, and we have a clear idea of what's at stake. We have just under four years to fight this/prepare for this, and Labour aren't coming to our rescue (if they don't get there first).

I feel like showing up to work in teaching is a form of resistance. (You're free to disagree with that.) Somebody has to try and keep doing the work.

I'm very pleased to announce that the call for proposed Special Issues of the Historical Journal is now live, with a deadline of 12th December. Please do spread widely among your networks — @saracaputo.bsky.social and I look forward to reading your submissions! www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

When I interviewed older South Asian British people about their retirement decisions over a decade ago, a large number said they had kept a passport and land in India and Pakistan 'just in case' When I asked 'in case what?' they responded 'in case we are told to leave Britain'

The first results of my FIFA-funded project are out in the world! ⚽ Why the FA's takeover of women's football from the WFA in 1993 was a "Hobson's Choice" for the WFA, & a moment of disempowerment for #womensfootball ⚽ It's open access & available here: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

At least the cat's among the pigeons now, and we have a clear idea of what's at stake. We have just under four years to fight this/prepare for this, and Labour aren't coming to our rescue (if they don't get there first).

💯

As a Xennial, one of the things I resent the most is retiring the phrase and concept of "selling out" — which, in turn, has helped to dissolve the boundary between grafting and grifting.

****unable to perform marking MSc dissertations on Bluesky, please accept this performance of me being busy****

Some of you are rolling your eyes at the Trumpy stuff, and that's fine, but "transatlantic discourse" on here is doing my head in lately.

Am I right or am I right?

Going to try and not say anything about the state visit, because too much work. My prediction for today's online activities: rhyming-couplet posters slagging off Trump will go viral, as will semi-captioned memes implying Charlie giving vague disapproval through his facial expressions and clothes.

***teaching self-image*** (Let my students provide the reality. They're probably best qualified.)

First teaching day of the year tomorrow. Trying to refocus minds, in a time like this...