So, historian here looking for more freelance work over the next few months. I’m a very experienced RA and have done lots of things, including numerous oral history interviews, editing, co-authoring a book, public history journalism, archive work…

Bad science (aka bollocks) cant and should not be written out of the history of science because it came to be revealed as bad or incorrect science. This sets us up to believe that science is infallible, a dangerous and ahistorical framing.

📢 Doctoral and early career historians: submit your abstracts for the 1-day Cambridge-based workshop examining the history of Black health and healthcare in 20th-century Britain. Submission deadline: 1 April Workshop date: 29 May More info and contact info👉 histmed.org/call-for-par...

Goodwin’s argument seems to be that because this is a trade book reaching tens of thousands of people [citation needed] then he can use AI hallucinations instead of research. It’s certainly… a take?

This thread on Cofnas at Ghent University is a must read

On Thursday I will be chairing our online session on writing history aimed at a wider audience with guests Elliot Prior and Sabhbh Curran from Curtis Brown Literary Agency. All welcome - sign up here: www.history.ac.uk/news-events/...

It's already clear that @jofvictculture.bsky.social is in excellent hands - good luck to the new co-editors! Send them your papers, reviews, and ideas for round tables, special issues, and more

Deploring Israel's actions as a state isn't antisemitic. Attacking Jews and symbols of Jewish culture in supposed retaliation for Israel's actions is however *textbook* antisemitism and these are not complicated thoughts to simultaneously hold in one's head.

early thoughts on ‘Belfastmen: An Intimate History of Life before Gay Liberation’! 🥰 I am hearing that copies are starting to land stateside already… official publication date is April 15 www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501...

This is absolutely horrific. www.bbc.com/news/live/cz...

#MedievalSky I received a very important announcement today. Feminae, the bibliographical database on medieval women created and run by Margaret Schaus for the past couple of decades, is going offline as of 1 April. Download as much as you can ASAP: inpress.lib.uiowa.edu/Feminae/Adva...

This is significant, because Matt Goodwin is regularly platformed by the BBC as an "expert". That his new book is demonstrably racist fiction is very unlikely to make the headlines. And this grifter will continue to spread his racist lies on national platforms.

🚨What you won't read in the British media: on X, journalist @twelves.bsky.social has looked at Matt Goodwin's new book, Suicide of a Nation, and found that is packed full of fake quotes and material that appears to have been made up by AI.

OTD in 2020, the UK's first COVID-19 lockdown began. In this article from the archives, Jesse Olszynko-Gryn and caitjan.bsky.social explore how familiar debates about the use of face masks shaped responses to the Influenza Pandemic of 1918.

“Every empire, however, tells itself and the world that it is unlike all other empires, that its mission is not to plunder and control but to educate and liberate.” Edward Said’s words are as relevant today as they were a few decades ago.

Layers of history: All Saints', Hough-on-the-Hill, Lincolnshire has a late Saxon circular stair turret. Much of the lower fabric of the tower is also Saxon. The church is embraced by earthworks from a Norman motte and bailey castle.

It’s the last week to see Emergency Exits at the Imperial War Museum, which explores decolonisation in Kenya, Cyprus and Malaya and which I was lucky enough to consult on as a part of a team of imperial historians. Go and see it if you can — it’s really great!

We truly live in an age that proves that destruction is much easier than construction, that creating negativity is much easier than positive affirmation, and that no man is too stupid or too evil to wreck things for all. And I have several candidates in mind here.

Amazing piece giving examples of how the closure of the Strait of Hormuz is hitting South Asian nations that rely upon liquified petroleum gas and liquified natural gas 🧵 www.ft.com/content/d3fc...

And many of those attitudes may be found among liberals and progressives. Something we will have to take seriously if we are to mount meaningful opposition to the ascendant right. “Researchers’ hyper-focus on populism risks blinding them to the genuine heterogeneity of illiberal attitudes.”

As I learned from the research for my recent book on early psychiatry, race, and Black religions, the mainstream medical journals were full of articles many would now want to dismiss as pseudoscience.

'Every life is limited by its refraction through light. We pour our guts into it and in the end ... it is just light flickering on a wall, a game of shadows, a half-remembered dream.' I wrote this piece about light, life and islands (open access): www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Here’s the registration link for my talk on Tuesday in Leeds. I think it’s possible to join on line - email or message me for link ahc.leeds.ac.uk/events/event...

If you are in Leeds, this is in a couple of weeks:

From a disability studies scholar and cs professor: bsky.app/profile/frac...

A thread from a philosopher of science on the topic, which lays out the basic problems with this framing bsky.app/profile/shen...

Sharing some of my fav comments to this debate here: bsky.app/profile/bmce...

We’re saying it was science because Science has ALWAYS been capable of horrendous things and implicated in slavery, colonialism, the Holocaust. Not because we believe that racism, ableism etc are scientifically ‘valid’ or ‘defensible’ Begging you to think beyond memes.

But it was a science. That’s the thing, that this sort of stuff can be legitimized and indeed it has been legitimized before. I cannot stress enough that just about every intellectual in the early 20th century at least dabbled in a little eugenics, as a treat.

I’m autistic but maybe the most problematic type of neurodivergent discourse online is this weird impulse to defend Elon Musk when he behaves like the entitled racist he is. The man behaves the way he does because he’s morally repugnant.

OHNI has extended our call for participation for our annual meeting in Tralee until Sunday March 29th. All proposals on oral history are welcomed and we hope to see you in Tralee on June 18th and 19th #OralHistory #Tralee

We've extended the deadline for submitting abstracts to the @oralhistoryie.bsky.social annual meeting! New deadline: Sunday, 29 March

YOU CANNOT PANDER TO FASCISTS

The problem is that we have to have hyperlinked reading lists because everything else not on the lists is deemed non essential in the library, and is in danger of being removed to save space (or money in the case of online resources). So serendipitous or bluesky research becomes less possible

Vile stuff from HEPI. There is no version of Higher Education as a vibrant, autonomous public good that would be acceptable to Reform. www.hepi.ac.uk/reports/prep...

When we accepted the premise that humanities and arts degrees are just a vessel for teaching generic transferable skills, we lost a battle that means we now can’t fight against AI. Because if students don’t actually have to learn anything why shouldn’t they use the plagiarism machine. Who cares.

And it’s increasingly hiding the point of their degree from the students, too. A history degree is about learning to research and write — it’s also about learning about the past! — it’s not actually about vague “transferable skills” and it’s certainly not about a transcript of marks gained via AI.

We’ve tried to make academic research entirely frictionless for our students — online reading lists with hyperlinks, individual book chapters scanned online, journal articles that never require learning what a journal is, online primary sources curated for them — and it’s just made them helpless.

We can all complain about university library catalogues — why so many book reviews? why? — but when students regularly had to *search* a library catalogue they were developing important research skills and also finding more diverse and interesting resources to read. Which is, you know, the point.

Yep. In fact, the real failing of students was when we stopped requiring them to regularly search a library catalogue for their reading and instead produced lists with hyperlinks that students simply had to click. As soon as they have to go off list, they’re lost.

This week we released a select listing of 100 national history societies active in the UK & Ireland bit.ly/4rANJ52. These subject specialist societies enable research and promote the value of historical knowledge. Many are membership organisations and invite historians to join them #Skystorians

Professors & university staff were targeted & fired for less than this just a few months ago.

The fact that race science and eugenics are inextricable from this technology is also why its makers and sellers and pushers do not want you looking too deep into its histories and/or consequences, why they shout you down so hard, why they demonize critics.

Jesus lord

“It’s clear that user feedback is influencing Microsoft’s moves around AI on Windows... The Copilot rollback is just one of the changes being made.” Keep it up, haters🤗 techcrunch.com/2026/03/20/m...

I'm happy to present here the new special issue of Studia Rosenthaliana on the early modern rabbis of Amsterdam. On how a new model of urban rabbinate was created. www.aup-online.com/content/jour...

If you’ve never given birth or witnessed a birth, let’s just say labor is a wild time to have your body taken over by the state.

aren't you all forgetting something

For those who may be interested, the eventual introduction of the 1994 Stillbirth Act means that if you experienced a #stillbirth in #Ireland before 1995, you are still able to retrospectively register your baby's birth. #ReproHist #HistMed #MedHums #HistMidwifery #ReproductiveLoss #Miscarriage

I’ve been out of the game for a while and lost track of people in the move to this place, so if you’re an adjunct/VAP/postdoc in history, can you reply and let me know what you work on? I am an editor at @contingent-mag.bsky.social and we are often looking for book reviewers etc.