What academics see when universities prioritize AI over learning.

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The Galician words ‘palabra’ (“word”) and ‘parábola’ (“parable; parabola”) are so-called doublets: they stem from the same word, Latin ‘parabolam’. ‘Palabra’ was inherited from spoken Latin, while ‘parábola’ is a late borrowing from written Latin. Here’s episode 8 of my doublet series: Galician.

once upon a time when elected officials nominated anti-vaxxers to prominent roles in charge of public health newspapers would run entire front page stories asking every doctor in town how much of a menace to public health that person would be & gosh it would have been nice if they still did that

Professor's pro-tip for anyone with college-age kids: Tell your kids go to class. It's really that simple. If you show up, you'll do okay. You don't have to be smart, you just have to be there. Maybe stay off your phones for 50 minutes. Just listen. You'll absorb something. I have data to prove it.

If you’re wondering why your friends in academia are a little on edge right now, it’s because an eighteen-year-old who hasn’t done the reading, doesn’t look at the assignment, and has does no critical thinking skills more complex than “because I think it’s in the Bible” can literally end your career

Hell yes. This was precisely the point I was making in a paper that disputed efforts to “scientize” paleography computationally. static1.squarespace.com/static/55577...

Like, that's his thing, neh?

This Pope slaps

This is an excellent thread.

I posted this👇 to a claim that genAI is better than Ctl+F to search historical docs. @tristanpalmgren.bsky.social replied with a genAI summary of my document and @bookllyfr.bsky.social asked if it was accurate. It turns out that it did exactly what genAI does: made stuff up & got stuff wrong.🧵

I found a previously unknown document signed by John Milton while looking through a pile of receipts for hats and wine!

Ctl+F this

GEORGE: so there's this angel singing, but all these noisy men of strife are talking JERRY: those men of strife GEORGE: so, i turn around, and i hush them ELAINE: you HUSHED the noisy men of strife?! GEORGE: what was i going to do? an ANGEL was SINGING! KRAMER: oh you don't hush men of strife

No one can unconvince me that the study of paleography and codicology greatly enhances ones understanding of history and the transmission of ideas. Any history student should try to read 12th century handwriting at least once. And hold in their hands an 800 year old manuscript.

Medievalist friends! Applications are open until end of Feb for a fully-funded PhD in Arthurian Literature with the brilliant Louise D'Arcens @medievalafterlives.bsky.social and myself, based between Sydney (Australia) and Groningen (The Netherlands). Please share widely! tinyurl.com/f7su6urv

Absolutely nobody asked for this BUT English Anglican cathedrals that have burned down, fallen over, and sank into the swamp: a thread.

“We envision a resistance that is a repudiation of the efficiencies that automated algorithmic education falsely promises.” Universities are racing to AI in FOMO-like fashion. @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social & @cnygren.bsky.social look at ways to resist.

Conserving a medieval book binding found in the Thames London Museum video. 📜 youtu.be/8K2FgTUE9p4?...

What an incredible opportunity!

JOIN US for the CSM's annual conference at St F-X University in lovely Antigonish, NS, 26-28 May 2026! We welcome proposals for sessions or individual papers. Submissions due 15 January 2026. Details: www.canadianmedievalists.org/Annual

Henry V decreed #OTD in 1416 that John of Beverley’s feast days should be celebrated nationally. The king of England believed the Northumbrian saint helped him win the Battle of Agincourt, which took place on the feast of his translation. He similarly elevated St George’s status. #medievalsky

This is either psychopathic, heroic, British, or some combination thereof

Ditto

Vacancy: Assistant Professor of Celtic, with a specialism in Old Irish, University of Cambridge. #MedievalSky www.cam.ac.uk/jobs/assista...

I’m very pleased to announce the latest from me and the inimitable @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social. In it, we lay out vision for why and how faculty and students should be resisting the AI in education. Please share.

Just figured out that Outlook/CoPilot can't deal with the subjunctive.

"We envision a resistance that is...a repudiation of the efficiencies that automated algorithmic education falsely promises: a resistance comprising the collective force of small acts of friction." "How to Resist AI in Education" by me & @cnygren.bsky.social www.publicbooks.org/four-frictio...

BREAKING: Skate Canada is boycotting Alberta over the province's ban on Trans women competing in women's sports. www.cbc.ca/news/canada/...

"Počujte" (Hear) Beovulf: Staroengleski junački spev i odlomci iz junačkih pesama, 1982 Kovačević Ivanka 🇷🇸

My humanities dept was relevant. Majors were up. Courses were 100% enrolled. Revenue positive, GE serving, etc etc. We were still eliminated. The problem is ideological administrative destruction. Couldn’t write a report, a self study, or a spreadsheet against that.

What is the bigger threat? Nazis, or someone saying 'happy holidays'? Who can say, both sides really

—I’ve been asked to baptise the King of Spain’s daughter —Infanta? —No, holy water as usual. Weird thing to ask honestly

Extraordinary courage from Ahmed al Ahmed, a Muslim, 43-year-old father of two, who bravely risked his life to save his neighbors celebrating Hanukkah. Praying for his full & speedy recovery. And so deeply inspired by his example.

I think about it every so often, the argument that "Ai art can finally help the disabled create" But 100% of the people using that as a pro ai argument aren't disabled.

On this first night of Hanukkah I’m thinking about Ahmed al Ahmed, the brave Lebanese-Australian who reminds us that despite all the terrible horror—in Bondi today, in Gaza, in Ukraine, in Darfur…—that there is still decency and goodness in this world. Thank you Ahmed.

If Paul Hogan’s memoir isn’t called “That’s Not A Life, This Is A Life,” I’m going to be very disappointed.

We're hiring! Come work with us @engfac.bsky.social @ox.ac.uk @bkhistoxford.bsky.social !!! Professorship of Bibliography and Modern Book History www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DPP968/p...

One of the big deficits in the education sector is the critically underfunded humanities and social sciences area. You might want to focus on that a little, especially considering current trends in technology (AI) are undermining the critical thinking skills that are fundamental to our democracy.

Found when sorting an old drive. I still, very occasionally, say 'not many badgers in the House of Lords' and this is why:

Even apart from the catastrophic pedagogical & cognitive outcomes, it's completely psychotic that university administrators keep pushing this tech upon stressed & psychologically vulnerable students when its lack of safety standards make old Ford Pintos look like bumper cars at an amusement park.

You don’t write like AI—AI writes like you. Defend the em dash.

"I had never come across a Christ-figure quite like this." The latest in our series A Time Of Monsters, from @ebermichael.bsky.social

manifesting: 🕯 🕯 🕯 🕯 ai bubble 🕯 🕯 to pop disastrously 🕯 🕯 for all involved 🕯 🕯 🕯 🕯

#DigiBodAdvent day 10, one for the Middle English and Scots fans, the Sinclair manuscript (MS. Arch. Selden. B. 24). The earliest Scottish vernacular verse anthology and the unique witness to "The Kingis Quair" attributed to James I. digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/ea06...

The ad for the second postdoctoral position on our @leverhulme.ac.uk Britain’s Early Medieval Letters project is now live. We’re looking for an Old English specialist (who also works with Latin). 32-month FT post. Deadline for apps is 16 Jan 🙂 jobs.kent.ac.uk/Vacancy.aspx...

A national stain. www.ctvnews.ca/edmonton/art...

I want someone with more photoshop skills than me to put David Jones's chart of Arthurian Literary influence into the Always Sunny conspiracy wall meme