Hi Cath - I missed this first time round and I’m so pleased you reposted it. I have a friend who will also want to read it but who doesn’t do social media! Among your own striking way with words I also love the quote from Alison Light. Take care. Peter

@dukepress.bsky.social has some incredible work on sale! @pepepierce.bsky.social's Speculative Relations is a recent fave: www.dukeupress.edu/speculative-... annnnd I also have a book on decolonial possibility in the collapse of current aid relations included: www.dukeupress.edu/the-center-c...

"History shows that there has long been a blurry, moving line between the categories of human being and monster." I wrote a philosophical essay threading together monsters from antiquity to the present for @aeon.co: 8/ aeon.co/essays/those...

Questions to which the answer is not just no, but never. It doesn’t take any special knowledge to know that reducing people to faces, genes, genitals and/or any other physical attribute is not a wise move. And that’s before we even get to the actual history of science and biological tyranny.

the Duncan Tanner prize not only showcases the very best of early career scholarship in modern British history year after year, but the committee also give every entrant considered and generous feedback on their scholarship. it's win/win - do enter your work! academic.oup.com/tcbh/pages/e...

Ooooh. I’ve been waiting for this for ages! Glad to see it is now out.

*Globalizing Wildlife*, a book edited by @vbateman.bsky.social, Tom Quick, and myself, is now available for pre-order with @uncpress.bsky.social! Using code 01SOCIAL30 at checkout, you can save 30% www.uncpress.org/book/9781469...

Well, I can think of a WhatsApp group that is blowing up right now that the secret is finally out, and all the players can finally stop keeping so many secrets from the world.

The strangest thing to have happened since Vanished arrived is that two finalists in Celebrity Traitors have read it! David wrote a lovely blurb while Nick read it as a Trivedi prize judge. Still amazed at where my roar has reached. 🐯 Expecting Alan or Cat to win tonight. To the roundtable!

The strangest thing to have happened since Vanished arrived is that two finalists in Celebrity Traitors have read it! David wrote a lovely blurb while Nick read it as a Trivedi prize judge. Still amazed at where my roar has reached. 🐯 Expecting Alan or Cat to win tonight. To the roundtable!

Given that Tuvalu has already tried to protect its existence by going digital, this shows how badly the world’s leaders have failed *everyone*. Those now experiencing the first wave of dispossession due to climate change tried to save *everyone*, but were repeatedly ignored. www.tuvalu.tv

Raymond Briggs used to address his fans as ‘horrible’ and sign off ‘with worst wishes’. As tempting as it would be to follow suit, odds are that most people would have no idea why it was such a huge compliment. Alas drearies. Alas.

Yeah, slight issue with this. The individual in question made a claim that they were trafficked. That means they didn't pay up front. That means that payment is taken via long term exploitation via gangs, gangs which the Home Secretary just returned them to. Slow clap.

Interesting that the judge notes that it is a "political belief" Robinson holds and then proceeds to call it a "protected characteristic". Even though political beliefs are not in fact protected characteristics under the Equality Act – only philosophical ones are. Somewhat gives the game away.

New York! Even though it looked possible, it is quite something to see happen.

T+152 days. I can’t quite believe how quickly it has passed, and how chaotic it has been not finishing a book! This has partly because this term has involved launching a new module related to my next project. A quick thread sharing some things as Vanished has made its way into the world.

Misunderstandings of intersectionality as about identity (👎🏽) versus structure (👍🏽) are so frustrating. Even when people cite Crenshaw, they miss her theoretical sophistication because of their own preoccupation with identity. Here is the professor in her own words. youtu.be/uPtz8TiATJY

I’ve not had the chance to read this yet, but I expect it to be worth reading and of interest to many. Once an American citizen behind me in a queue at an American airport was very agitated when he realised how I was being questioned. He was furious that *he* might have to face the same treatment.

Hmmm. Perhaps companies would do better to increase the starting salaries for their employees and treat them far better instead of claiming that the minimum wage is too high and that graduates won’t want to work for these employers as a result.

Soil is wondrous.

The world's 10 richest people (nearly all from the U.S.) are collectively $500 billion richer this year thanks to growth in stocks tied to AI. Meanwhile, data centers are sucking up communities’ water and electricity. AI is making the rich even richer while everyone else pays the price.

Racists are not born, they are made.

Never take seriously those who ridicule low income people for having a smartphone or laptop. “If they’re so poor how did they buy an iPhone???” Because they’re trying to escape poverty, not the 1700s, genius. If you think basic tech access is luxury, survive a month without it.

Thinking of Dr. Imani Perry’s work on blue, I wonder if there’s a black environmental history of the color maroon?

For a moment, I thought someone had taken the place of Bentham in his box.

I didn’t realise but Daston has also contributed to an LRB podcast about my book. Check it out here: www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and... After listening, I felt like she had come away thinking deeply about lots of issues I’d raised, such as the nature of epistemic injustice, which is amazing!

I didn’t realise but Daston has also contributed to an LRB podcast about my book. Check it out here: www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and... After listening, I felt like she had come away thinking deeply about lots of issues I’d raised, such as the nature of epistemic injustice, which is amazing!

CW: rape/suicide Woke up to a distressed email from a young person after a racist incident and news that a woman has been raped in a racist attack in Birmingham, just a few weeks after the last one. These are the incidents we know about. There are many more that will never be shared.

Donate here to help keep Dar Al Taqwa, London’s oldest independent bookstore devoted to Islamic literature, open. They’re going to raise 25k. daraltaqwa.com/pages/don-t-... More on the store, and how special it is, here. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

I’m glad my home town, where I was born in the Miners Hospital, is not going to be forever associated with bigotry and ignorance because it elected Wales’s first Reform MS. Can’t help thinking most of the British media is disappointed though.

Reminder that Powell was dropped like a hot potato for giving this speech while current Tories face no consequences and are more likely to be given an endorsement from the party leader or discussed as future party leaders in the press.

It is absolutely that infuriating. Higher Ed is slow moving institution. And it sat right up real quick for the tech companies. It wasn't the faculty. We can't make much happen unless it is on a geological timespan. I don't how long it took the admin to start shilling genAI, but it was FAST. Months?

A huge thank you to @saranahmed.bsky.social for your book tour and kindly signing my book. Oh my word! If you can go, do. Sara’s such a wonderful writer and speaker, and it always feels like the audience cherishes her words and, of course, her. Details of the book and tour here.

While other cities across the country are potentially destroyed by hollowing out UK HE.

While overall higher education rates have increased dramatically, from 5% into the 1960s, 20% by the 90s & hitting 50% recently, among powerful and influential ppl, the rate has long been 90%+ Low income ppl have accessed HE more recently, tho gaps remain large & haven't budged for a decade+

A headline exemplifying the astounding cruelty of Tory party policy, and British politics, at the moment. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Amazing! A huge congratulations to Sunil!

Great reveal for Black History Month 2025: Bandsman at Waterloo, Thomas James is wearing a ring and in a relaxed pose, : “He comes across in the painting as quietly confident – a soldier who is dignified and has a real sense of pride.” in rare 1821 painting www.theguardian.com/culture/2025...

I cannot quite describe how it feels to hear a proposal to deport millions of people coming from the ostensible 'right of centre' party. I cannot tell you how it feels to know this while waiting for my son's heart surgery: a claim on healthcare that would see me deported under this proposal.

Ostensibly the party of law and order with a plan to deport migrants even if they’ve done nothing more than live here legally and claim support to which they’ve contributed and are entitled. Years of targeting migrants disguised as concern about legality paving the way to this and open violence.

It's straight up islamophobia. Call it what it is. It's a far right soundbite, and Islamophobic. Also, ignores that many women choose to wear one. I wouldn't want my daughter or grandkids to have to live in any country where the "society" was built on the type of division and racism Jenrick promotes

Wow. Harvard nuking its PhD programs - Science PhD admissions reduced by more than 75% - Arts & Humanities reduced by about 60% - Social Sciences by 50–70% - History by 60% - Biology by 75% - The German department will lose all PhD seats - Sociology from six PhD students to zero

Sounds like a must read for me, and someone I’d love to do an event with.

🎓Fully-funded PhD studentship: 'A reparatory history of the Manchester Royal Exchange in collaboration with the Royal Exchange Theatre Supervisors: @sadiahqureshi.bsky.social @sadiahabib.bsky.social & Kerry Pimblott Apply by Fri 14 Nov 2025 www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

(1/3) Stolen Relations has been launched for a month! Thanks to the hard work of hundreds of partners and researchers, stolenrelations.org currently has records of upwards of 7,000 individuals and many pieces of art and storytelling that help to flesh out the stories of unfree Indigenous people.

Folks on the @rsaorg.bsky.social mailing list: check your email! @cathfletcher.bsky.social and I are doing a webinar, "Pitching a Nonfiction Book for General Readers," free for members. Nov 6, 12pm ET (recorded). 💙📚 🗃 #earlymodern Join/renew your membership to register. www.rsa.org/events/Event...

Starmer’s rumoured ruthlessness seems like nothing more than the unyielding rod of a weather vane directed by the most furious political winds and pointing towards utter misery.

I'm actually quite angry now. In the last year, we have moved from far right riots drawing broad condemnation from across the spectrum to mass deportations being not just a policy platform, but one the government do not feel able to condemn. This is both an absurd radicalisation, and pure cowardice.