They'll probably never repeat that episode of 8/10 Cats with Brand, Walliams and Noam Chomsky

"How can funders avoid crossing the Szilard point?" The Szilard point is "the threshold at which the total cost of competing for a grant equals (or surpasses) the value of the available funding."

When will this crisis get any attention whatsoever!? A THOUSAND ACADEMIC STAFF AT ONE INSTITUTION SERVED REDUNDANCY RISK NOTICES! And that's not counting what's surely being visited on professional services staff too. This is an economic catastrophe, to say nothing of the intellectual catastrophe!

"the Student Loans Company (the taxman in plastic glasses and fake moustache)"

i do wonder how much of this supposedly counter-intuitive effect is about the social capital a lot of humanities graduates - who tend to skew very middle-class - have, though?

RIP Martin Luther, you would have loved Papal Audience Black Friday deals.

As we move into “foreigners are cancelling Christmas in the name of political correctness” season it’s worth remember that Christmas was indeed once banned in England, by Christians and the man who enforced the ban has a statue in his honour outside the Houses of Parliament.

I really love this from Keith G (and not just because it's nice about my book!). Properly insightful in a way that alas, quite often writing on the miners' strike is not...

Is this the result of under-awarding or over-applying? It’s both of course but it’s a particular problem that institutions require evidence of applying as part of promotions: they incentivise activity which cannot in all cases pay off, using up resources in performative performance review (1/3).

Really looking forward to Scott Anthony's seminar @ihrbritainseminar.bsky.social tomorrow at 5:30 - sign up below!

jenrick calling 80s football hooliganism 'good-natured fun' is both absolutely insane and the best #accidentalpartridge i've heard in a while

ah, i'm pleased to see this - read with great curiosity the book 'we pretty pieces of flesh' that this story is from as i went to school with the author, and it was great (as well as totally surreal to read a book set in a not-really-fictionalised-at-all version of the school you went to)

'They have imagined a socially authoritarian working class Labour voter who really is long gone. And as they ventriloquize through their creation, they are following their fantasy’s grievances. The Andy Capp in their head has left containment and is making increasingly incessant demands.' So good.

an amazing essay from Joan Scott here

kinda feel that Elizabeth Gilbert has seriously overestimated the relatability of 'i planned the murder of my life partner' here

🧵1/ Our branch just passed a motion condemning the stealth closure of the MA in Black British History. We did this to demand accountability — for the future of the MA and for the College’s promises on racial justice and equality. shorturl.at/gIUVG

Maybe Eric Cantona’s trawler statement was actually an attempt to warn Man United about Grimsby

holy fuck

Fantastic 4 year full-time PDRA position here in the lovely School of Humanities at Reading on the UKRI-funded 'Nation of Refuge' project - please share widely.

The University of Warwick has paid a lot of money, I'm guessing, for their internet banner ads on the Guardian and elsewhere. But they can't spell "curiosity". This isn't a US-UK variant. They just, genuinely, have a massive spelling error in their banner ads.

Can't fault the clarity of Labour's message on protest. There are BAD protesters who must be punished (Irish musicians, anti-genocide vicars) and there are GOOD protesters whose views deserve respect (masked thugs with petrol bombs trying to start a pogrom)

because I like depressing myself, last week I was looking at UKRI data on grant success, and saw that in the November 2024 round of AHRC awards, only 1 - one ! - out of the 35 applicants was successful...

god i am so obsessed with imagining the chain of events that led to this. the visionary who came up with it in the first place. the various senior figures who said 'looks great!' and signed it off. the comms team who wanted to tell the world. all of it. just delicious.

has someone worked out what michelle agyemang's goals-scored-per-minutes-played ratio is yet?! insane

Finally.

God bless the Leverhulme Trust (but it's not good we have to increasingly rely on a charitable foundation to make these points and provide academics with money)

did always think there was something a bit fishy about the fact that the bloke seemed totally a-ok despite the fact that he'd been diagnosed with a terminal illness over a decade ago

Please help my brilliant PhD student @sineadcarter.bsky.social by sharing widely!

Really looking forward to speaking about this in person at the IHR tomorrow - all welcome.

Will they accept me just sending a word document with the word "money" in it?

I am really looking forward to speaking in person at the IHR's @cont-brit-hist.bsky.social on 25 June - please come if you can make it!

Really looking forward to hearing Ria Kapoor speak at @ihrbritainseminar.bsky.social this Thursday (in person, 5:30 pm). All welcome! www.history.ac.uk/events/burea...

Now emancipated from its paywall. www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-v...

thank god for this (hardly a good night though) www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Really sad to hear this - Anne was a wonderful person and a true hero of the working-class struggle.

📢 Wowzers 😮! What a line up we have for @cont-brit-hist.bsky.social @ihr.bsky.social Term 3. Fab speakers incl: @racheljcollett.bsky.social @nataliethomlinson.bsky.social @lauratisdall.bsky.social Lucy Robinson Lukas Herde + Jennifer Wallis. Join us via link below 👇 www.history.ac.uk/seminars/con...

I was unaware until now that Ros Delmar had died a few months ago - I worked with Ros co-ordinating the digitisation of Red Rag, where she was a member of the editorial collective. She was intellectually fierce, and never less than incredibly interesting and insightful about feminism in the 1970s.

REF2029: concerns about the implications of decoupling | The English Association : Please read this important joint letter we have written (on behalf of us, our chair @jennyrichards.bsky.social ) along with @ies-sas.bsky.social & @univeng.bsky.social englishassociation.ac.uk/ref2029-conc...

Excited for the @ihrbritainseminar.bsky.social seminar on 6 March. @saracaputo.bsky.social will present on "foreign" British Navy seamen in the Napoleonic wars and the 'instability of national boundaries'. You can join us in person or online. Sign up via the link. www.history.ac.uk/events/forei...

Really looking forward to this at the IHR tomorrow - details below...

University history lecturers spend much of the first year survey courses unravelling students' conviction that a source is useless because "it is bias (sic)". No, the bias or perspective is precisely what we're interested in.

'The truth is, a political project based on preserving a broken economic order and catering for every presumed reactionary inclination certain voters might have, like a gruesome tick box exercise, will never offer Britain stability-and paves the way for a very dark episode in our country’s history'

the phrase 'oxford-cambridge growth corridor' is beginning to right get on my tits, let me tell you

The Derek Keene London Lecture 2025 is now open for booking! Join us on 16 July to hear Prof Matthew Worley on #PUNK... This free event is part of our @ihr.bsky.social #London #SummerSchool, this year on the theme of #Rebels (info: www.history.ac.uk/ihr-london-r...) www.history.ac.uk/events/keene...

this whole case is just unbelievable @lucydelap.bsky.social hope your family bearing up ok x www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

Really looking forward to this tomorrow!