Remind me why we have the House of Lords again? So nice having all these ‘experts’ weighing in on the issue of UK Higher Education. It’s a wonder how we got here given that we clearly have such astute, informed, members in the Lords… www.timeshighereducation.com/opinion/hous...

Ahead of England v Norway in the World Cup, enjoy this classic from my old pal Patrick Kidd in The Times

(1/)The special issue of @scottishhistreview.bsky.social on smell history and heritage that I co-edited with Xuelei Huang is out! www.euppublishing.com/toc/shr/curr... There’s an introduction by the both of us followed by some cracking articles.

Oh go on then, if we must 😉 Sniff: A History of Smells, out 8th September yalebooks.co.uk/book/9780300...

Politicians with some left wing ideas: dangerous, unserious, not sensible. Comedy bin idiot: very good, hero, potentially the next Zelensky. 👏 Know 👏 the 👏 rules.

Discouraging an activity with a benefit-to-cost ratio of nearly 10:1. A triumph of policymaking.

Lawrence Stone bloody ‘ell. Cutting edge stuff. Mind you the curriculum at Oxford doesn‘t seem to have changed much since I was an undergrad 14 years ago so…

Surely there must be another Labour mayor that can resign midway through their term to stand?

Not a 'difficult decision' for Bridget Phillipson to cut funding for university courses because a) it's not difficult in the sense that it's not personally difficult for her, it's no skin off her nose b) it's not difficult because it's based on easy, lazy, prejudiced, thinking about what matters.

(1/2) The madness of this is Phillipson's claim that this is being done to protect funding for STEM but another way of doing this is to support all subjects at universities, ensuring that they all thrive and therefore can cross-fund and support each other.

(1/2) Does anybody have a good standard email template that offers keys stats, links to information, that could be edited and sent to (clearly often clueless) Labour MPs about the financial, jobs, and broader crisis with UK higher education?

”This government is putting universities on a more secure financial footing”. This is simply barefaced-ly, brazenly, untrue and the evidence is all around us, at every institution in the UKHE sector. Simply saying it does not make it so.

Big thanks to David Hendy, @cathamclarke.bsky.social, and @rummage.bsky.social for their kind words on Sniff: A Hidtory of Smells, out 8th September and pre-orderable from all good bookshops. yalebooks.co.uk/book/9780300...

It appears that nobody has really written a history of air pollution in Britain that goes much beyond the first few years after the Clean Air Act in 1956, which feels... crazy? I must be missing something? There's stuff by Jackson, Mosley, Mills, but most stops just around or shortly after 1956.

Ok hear me out. What about if we all started making steel or cars in universities? Then the government might step in?

Your June reminder that if you're a UK-based holder of an Arts, Humanities or Social Science (SHAPE) degree, or equivalent, within 10 years (excluding career breaks) of your PhD, you are warmly invited to join the British Academy's Early Career Researcher Network. 1/2

That the author Marriott reaches for is Carlyle is surely a bit of a tell.

Really cool call for papers here at York - I'm sure it will be a fantastic event!

Job Opportunity! Lecturer in Early Modern British History University of Sheffield - School of History, Philosophy and Digital Humanities Fixed term www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DRZ392/l...

'On average the raw lifetime earnings gap for those aged 37 in 2022 who went to university, and those who could have but did not, was £290,000. And this includes a 3.5 per cent discount rate (applying Treasury Green Book rules) that lowers the value of earnings in later life'. 1/3

If I had a wish for Andy Burnham's ed policy, it would treating universities like the valuable sector they are - socially, culturally, economically - rather than using it as an opportunity for political point scoring over immigration or 'man of the people' zero-sum game support for apprenticeships.

Noticed a weird thing today: advertising that is clearly not made with gen-AI taking on the aesthetics of AI-slop? I wonder if this speaks more to the influence of slop-aesthetics or to a shifting of my own perception so that the I see aesthetic markers of slop everywhere...

Sensing the 17th Century: Smelling Vanilla and Listening to Chocolate: a blog post about @susannah-lw.bsky.social and @laurenworking.bsky.social's #StudentSalon cabinet outing with @willtullett.bsky.social in the atmospheric @merchantshallyork.org at @yorkfestofideas.bsky.social buff.ly/FMMVRqN

the implication being that when Andrew Marr travels to an orgy he does so naked, ready to hit the ground running, and doesn’t bring any drinks or snacks? www.newstatesman.com/politics/202...

The slight problem with the ludicrous media circus around Burnham is that the public may get sick of him before he’s even in office…

Another book tour event for Sniff. On the 23rd of September I'll be at Chorleywood Bookshop chatting about the history of smell! chilternbookshops.co.uk/event/an-eve... @yalebooks.bsky.social @chorleywoodbooks.bsky.social looking forward to it!

Frankly £5k seems like a bargain for this www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

We have an 18-month temporary lectureship in early modern British and European history just advertised at Newcastle - closing date 9th July www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DRW166/l... #skystorians

General editors: @willtullett.bsky.social & @manonraffard.bsky.social Editorial board: @drallylouks.bsky.social, @sandrabarre.bsky.social, Jayanthan Sriram, Chanelle Dupuis, Hsuan Hsu, Andrew Kettler

We're starting a journal! We're looking for ideas for pieces that we can fold into the proposal that will go to an interested press, with the hope that if the press take the journal on we'll starting publishing in 2028. #smellstudies #sensorystudies #smellhistory #smells

Got hard copy proofs a week or so ago, which was fun, so Sniff is slowly but surely getting closer to publication on September 8th. It's nice to hold something physical with all the words in (but the hardback cover will be shinier and more colourful looking!). Struggling to index it at the moment...

Even if all of the teenagers are banished from BlueSky, which they were never on anyway, it will do nothing to stop the appalling annual tradition of earnest middle-aged people handing out patronising life advice on GCSE and A-Level Results Day.

Would anyone be interested in being part of a panel for SRS next year that speaks to 'theories of history' #earlymodern

This is outrageous. When I hire KPMG to validate my priors I expect to receive the wildly overconfident lies of a 23 year old MBA, not those of some stinking robot.

well would you look at that

The real issue, unexpressed in P*licy E*change report on unis, is successive governments, think tanks, and commentators have been unable to accept the basic premise that universities are for research and education and that these are good in themselves. Instead unis have to be for something else.

(1/3) Quite funny that I*n M*sfield piece in The Spect*tor discussing the crappy P*licy Exchange report on universities starts with the frankly insulting claim that Britain 'does not have a world-class higher education system', when previous research has said it's precisely the obsession with...

We are running a survey to capture the impact of EAD (Enhanced Audio Description) and I'd really appreciate your help. The survey is open to everyone. If you can help please do and if you can share/repost this message that would be fantastic. Thanks! forms.gle/YebpzES14mwe...

It's funny isn't it - people talk about changes in higher education (e.g people inside universities who say we should scrap the REF or those outside universities who argue for cutting provision or that we might to many people in university etc) and what I hear is 'I want people to loose their jobs'.

I’m actually ok thanks, I like my job as it is.

Well that was a depressing interview with Gareth Southgate on Radio 4 just now. Apparently we lack stable heteronormative families, too many people are going to university, men are told ‘don’t’too often, and it’s all the fault of modern feminism. Expert on education is he?

My first book, "Inspecting the home: Urban poverty and public health in nineteenth-century France", will be published by @manchesterup.bsky.social in February 2027 To find out more (or to add it to your wish lists...) see the link below: manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/9781526183149/

Starting to get book 'tour' dates for the release of Sniff on the 8th of September. A few already online - David's Letchworth (my 'home' bookshop) on the 16th September (www.davids-bookshops.co.uk/products/eve...) and Blackwells Oxford on the 16th of October (www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/william-tu...).

What a great thing to note down in official board meeting minutes.

Going through lots of Mass Observation material the last few days and, as somebody who started their historical work in the 17th and 18th centuries, I find it so hard not to be utterly transfixed by the intricate detail of people's daily lives, imaginings, memories, perceptions in MO material.

✨ Out today! ✨ Happy publication day to #AGoldenWorld @faberbooks.bsky.social 🎉🎉 uk.bookshop.org/p/books/a-go...

Pretty embarrassed for the Today program this morning. A police values statement is not the same as training materials, a riot is not the same as a protest, and intimidation and death threats are not an appropriate response. Come on guys grow up and do some proper, analytical, reporting.

Good news, we noclipped through the wall in one of our strongrooms and found all this empty space ready for more archive storage! We'll be expanding our shelving capacity as soon as we've found a way back to the front desk.

I had a great time talking in Linz - thanks so much to the super interesting and interdisciplinary OLFAC project for inviting me! This is definitely a project to watch - they’re doing really cool things.