URGENT: We may be facing an illegal eviction. It's a Saturday night and we've only just found out. If you know a housing attorney in NYC, who we could speak to re: the situation before Monday, please lmk, or send them my email lyra.d.monteiro at gmail (DM for my phone number).

@mxabdulaliy.bsky.social and I wrote a letter to the editor which ran in @inquirer.com today re: the Mütter Museum’s horrifyingly regressive new Human Remains Policy. The Mütter Museum needs to close. #FindingCeremony web.archive.org/web/20250902...

It's an embarrassment to Philly.

@mxabdulaliy.bsky.social and I wrote a letter to the editor which ran in @inquirer.com today re: the Mütter Museum’s horrifyingly regressive new Human Remains Policy. The Mütter Museum needs to close. #FindingCeremony web.archive.org/web/20250902...

I think if Britain colonised your country of origin you should get free BBC iplayer.

"The issue isn't whether we should or shouldn't exhibit human remains, but rather can we do so in a way that does justice to these individuals."- Sara Ray, director IE No, you can't do so! Because in the end, you're still displaying their stolen bones! So whose version of justice is this?

This is less of a human remains policy and more of a "we'll add more label text admitting that the bones were stolen in the first place."

If you're writing a syllabus in anthropology, public history/humanities, museum studies, etc., please consider these pieces about #FindingCeremony: 1. This short intro which I co-authored with Finding Ceremony's Co-Convener, @mxabdulaliy.bsky.social in @SAPIENS_org: www.sapiens.org/biology/find...

For classicists, historians, and others concerned with the politics of the past, here are links for my work on American whyte supremacy and ancient Greece and Rome that are frequently taught: 1. This January 2021 @hyperallergic.com op ed: hyperallergic.com/614175/how-a...

Syllabus material for Fall 2025 (and beyond!)

If you're writing a syllabus in anthropology, public history/humanities, museum studies, etc., please consider these pieces about #FindingCeremony: 1. This short intro which I co-authored with Finding Ceremony's Co-Convener, @mxabdulaliy.bsky.social in @SAPIENS_org: www.sapiens.org/biology/find...

CW: more theft of human remains by a Philly museum + medical examiner in the 1980s. Tell me again why it’s ok for this museum to exist. And if they go public with this, think about what isn’t being shared—maybe isn’t even known yet, by current leadership. #FindingCeremony

they got thesw skulls in 1999??? y'all, just play the recording of me last the mütter town hall meeting at the next one. just play it on loop until the end of time and all the stolen bones are laid to rest

Do you hear this, Mütter Museum???

Thanks for recommending! Just to clarify, there are no images of human remains accompanying the piece; the photos are of wax or plaster models. (But they look close enough that the warning is appropriate!)

TW: link has images of human remains Excellent piece in today's @newyorker.com by @rachelmonroe.bsky.social re: Philadelphia's Mutter Museum. No coincidence it's in the same city that was home to Samuel George Morton & is home to the Penn Museum. #FindingCeremony www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

With thanks to @mxabdulaliy.bsky.social, @intersectionist.bsky.social, @geedee215.bsky.social, @hystericalblkns.bsky.social, @philaprint.bsky.social, and everyone else working to make sure MOVE and its people aren't forgotten religiondispatches.org/remembering-...

Anyone have access to the Philadelphia Inquirer & able to send me a PDF of this article that was published today? inquirer.com/health/move-... re: Katricia Dotson's brother's lawsuit against Penn for keeping his sister's remains after she was murdered in the MOVE bombing. lyra.d.monteiro at gmail

lol fb failed this assignment by just leaving the question blank 😩—can Bluesky do any better? I know that such books exist--I've seen one! Just dunno where to find them...

It's #WomensHistoryMonth so I'm sharing this short piece I wrote about my experience of gender as a not-woman who lived as a woman for most of my adult life: My gender is ‘nope.’ medium.com/p/my-gender-...

The list on the webpage has been updated to reflect the expenses we still need help covering--anything you can offer to support the work of caring for ancestors who are currently held as the property of the Penn Museum, is appreciated--including a retweet! #FindingCeremony

We've just posted an updated list of #FindingCeremony ongoing expenses on our website--please share this post and contribute if you can! Amounts range from $8.80 to $174.54: findingceremony.com/support-find...

So grateful for a large contribution that has allowed us to cover many of #FindingCeremony Zoom, travel, and mail merge costs from 2024. The webpage is now updated with remaining expenses (incl some in these areas--don't worry, they aren't duplicates!): findingceremony.com/support-find...

If you live in New York State and think Gov. Kathy Hochul should remove the corrupt mayor of NYC, give her a call or send her a letter.

🏺 📜 If you’re a museum professional or archaeologist who is committed to more ethical practices in our sector, the least you can do is donate to a group that is on the ground doing the work to centre descendants in calls for repatriation.

We've just posted an updated list of #FindingCeremony ongoing expenses on our website--please share this post and contribute if you can! Amounts range from $8.80 to $174.54: findingceremony.com/support-find...

UPDATE: I found a place to stay, thanks for considering and sharing!

Hi Philly folks: This is an Old Twitter-style request, so 🤞🤞🤞it'll work here: Does anyone have a couch or other space where I could stay this coming Sunday (2/16) or Monday (2/17) night? I'm in town for #FindingCeremony research. Please RT & share elsewhere! DM or lyra.d.monteiro at gmail tia!

I can't see beyond the firewall to read this piece, but I'm glad to learn that it's written by @cmonstah.bsky.social! If you want to dig more into the classical architecture aspect of it, here's my piece on Trump's executive order mandating its use: hyperallergic.com/614175/how-a...

Trying again. It'll be free to read, but WaPo will make you create an account to read it unfortunately... wapo.st/437a7uj

I can't see beyond the firewall to read this piece, but I'm glad to learn that it's written by @cmonstah.bsky.social! If you want to dig more into the classical architecture aspect of it, here's my piece on Trump's executive order mandating its use: hyperallergic.com/614175/how-a...

And @intersectionist.bsky.social wrote at @hyperallergic.com about the whole web of mainstream white supremacy, past and present, that the executive order plugged into. hyperallergic.com/614175/how-a...

I'd like to offer some Luigi content in the midst of a bleak week. This comes with questions: 1. Is this Luigi? (the pic was taken at Penn in Dec 2018, while he was a student there) If it is him...let's talk about question 2 (in reply)

A year ago today, I was teaching my repatriation class when I got a call from a reporter who'd just gotten Penn Museum to confirm they'd already buried the crania that they announced they'd bury on February 3. The only interview I've done during class. That was a terrible week.

might be a good time to remember that last time there was an executive order to make federal buildings in the neoclassical style. see Lyra Monteiro (2020): intersectionist.medium.com/american-pow...

Harvard wants to do just enough work to get plaudits from a credulous and easily manipulated national press. They will not tolerate any calls for actual change or accountability. Anyway, buy Tamara Lanier's book!

Don't take my word for it! Listen to Richard Cellini, the director of the Harvard Slavery Remembrance Program. But also, I was the lead researcher on the Harvard and the Legacies of Slavery Project for two years. I stand by Richard and his team. www.thecrimson.com/article/2024...

Please do not misunderstand what is happening here. Harvard is hiring American Ancestors to compile authoritative genealogies that fall within Harvard's own limited, ahistorical parameters. They have fired the researchers who were telling them very clearly that the parameters were inappropriate.

ugh disappointed in white classicists’ “hot take” that “Roman salute” isn’t really Roman. But not surprised. This is all about so much more—see Trump’s just-reinstated executive order for classical architecture I wrote about in 2021 for @hyperallergic.com hyperallergic.com/614175/how-a...

I wrote about this newly reinstated executive order requiring classical architecture for federal buildings in 2021 for @hyperallergic.com: hyperallergic.com/614175/how-a...

ugh disappointed in white classicists’ “hot take” that “Roman salute” isn’t really Roman. But not surprised. This is all about so much more—see Trump’s just-reinstated executive order for classical architecture I wrote about in 2021 for @hyperallergic.com hyperallergic.com/614175/how-a...

I wrote about this newly reinstated executive order requiring classical architecture for federal buildings in 2021 for @hyperallergic.com: hyperallergic.com/614175/how-a...

BREAKING: NY Times Tries to Kill Me! A public Bad History post with links to articles by @matthewstoller.bsky.social @robtsullivan.bsky.social @intersectionist.bsky.social, @rebeccaonion.bsky.social, others: t.co/nxfXHPYXtk

Super warm fuzzy feelings rn for @internetarchive.bsky.social, cuz it really does catch so much--including the now defunct website for "Westminster Stories," #TheMuseumOnSite's project in and about downtown Providence, RI, in 2010. I wonder where Juliette is now? web.archive.org/web/20100329...

if you have any tears left in you, look up DTMF Palestine videos. so much grief + thank fuck for artists + tech dystopia loopholes that make something like this possible.

Yesterday, I put out a box of free books and movies and by sunset everything was gone except anything by Neil Gaiman. My neighbors have good taste. It’s all in the trash now where it belongs.

Bearing witness does not have to mean reading the horrible details. Bearing witness can be trusting people about their pain WITHOUT having to hear every detail. Love to all struggling with this piece today. DM if you need someone to hear you and believe you.

An annual subscription is $40, or about 77c PER WEEK.

People asked Meryl Streep how she could REALLY not have known about Weinstein, and she was basically like “because I’m fucking Meryl Streep, and I didn’t know because he NEEDED me not to know.” she was vital as part of the cover story

TW: references to sexual abuse I am up far too early (late?) because having started the Neil Gaiman article in @nymag.com @vulture.com yesterday, I apparently needed to finish it. Actually, I've needed to finish it since I learned about it on Monday. This is what surviving looks like.