Thinking about personhood and interdependence at the JFK Institute today and tomorrow with a stellar group of people
Alexander Starre
@astarre.bsky.social
Asst Prof, American Studies @ JFK Institute, FU Berlin - knowledge cultures, book studies, literary institutions, AmLit C19-C21
A snack-sized new book and a bespoke set of snacks (caramel cold brew m&ms!) courtesy of the brilliant Eurie Dahn. What a tasty object lesson!
A snack-sized new book and a bespoke set of snacks (caramel cold brew m&ms!) courtesy of the brilliant Eurie Dahn. What a tasty object lesson!
📖Talking Books: The Paratextual Communication between Edward P. Jones, Richard Wright, and James Baldwin📖 Learn more in Dustin Breitenwischer's article in the March 2026 issue of PBSA - Link in Bio🔗 🔍 DOI: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/739947
The summer semester just started here in Berlin, which means our annual speaker series is about to kick off. If you're in the area, feel free to join us at the JFK Institute for any (or all) of these colloquium sessions (Wednesdays at 4pm). Link: www.jfki.fu-berlin.de/en/faculty/l...
Carnegie Mellon’s literature PhD is being liquidated in favor of “computation,” casualized labor, and AI. That has profound ramifications for, students, faculty, and program alums like myself. I wrote it about it (w/ Catherine Evans, a current PhD student). www.chronicle.com/article/a-co...
Opinion | A Coup at Carnegie Mellon?
The university is replacing the humanities with more computers.
chronicle.com
Turns out sans serif is woke. At least they didn't switch to White House gilded script. At State Dept., a Typeface Falls Victim in the War Against Woke www.nytimes.com/2025/12/09/u...
At State Dept., a Typeface Falls Victim in the War Against Woke
nytimes.com
By accident, I discovered that if you google the names of some standard typefaces, the search results will appear in this very font. See below Time New Roman and (of course) Comic Sans.
Thrilled to announce my new book (electronic version out now, print next month) — it proposes a new value theory grounded in the longue durée of literary institutions, 1800–present.
New at PB: As part of a series exploring higher ed under Trump, curated by Dennis M. Hogan (@dennismhogan.bsky.social), Christopher Newfield tells us how waiting out Trump will inevitably fail. Instead, we must build a new cultural order.
Academics Must Seize the Means of Knowledge Production - Public Books
Trumpism has canceled the knowledge society.
publicbooks.org
The language of the AI policy for my fall courses is really taking shape.
🎓✨ Apply Now: PhD Scholarships in Literature ✨🎓 Fully funded 3-year PhD scholarships at our Graduate School Practices of Literature @uni-muenster.de in Germany, with the possibility of a 4th-year extension. Apply by December 31, 2025! #PhD #Scholarship #LiteraryStudies More info: uni.ms/gssp
Life's little victories: writing n+1 headlines 4 months in advance.
Alexander Starre@astarre.bsky.social · last yr.Large Language Muddle
Hello. I wrote a nice long essay about AI and this very strange moment where we're constantly told we're living in the dawn of a strange new future but the only thing that's actually clear is that everyone feels pretty unmoored and uncertain. I hope you'll read it
AI Is a Mass-Delusion Event
Three years in, one of AI’s enduring impacts is to make people feel like they’re losing it.
theatlantic.com
After Robert Gooding-Williams’ stint at the @ktbberlin.bsky.social summer school, @schlawinerkreis.bsky.social, Andreas-Johann Sorger and I are hosting a discussion at the Kennedy Institute on his new book @columbiaup.bsky.social www.jfki.fu-berlin.de/faculty/cult...
#dgfa2025 if I didn't shove a flyer into your hand the last few days, let me make up for that digitally: the volume co-edited with @improbable.bsky.social has finally seen the light of day and you can see it, too, at 30% off if you add EVENT30 at checkout www.manchesterhive.com/display/9781...
Day 3 of #DGfA2025: Alexander Starre @astarre.bsky.social introduces the conference's 3rd keynote - Kinohi Nishikawa on Toni Morrison's Beloved.
That's a wrap on our panel on literary institutions & periodicals. Great turnout, innovative contributions. C19 studies going strong! #dgfa2025
I have a chapter in here on Du Bois and his first, unpublished novel. Not open access, but I'm happy to share.
Manchester University Press@manchesterup.bsky.social · last yr.Out now! Speculative endeavors, Cultures of knowledge and capital in the long nineteenth century By Selina Foltinek Karin Hoepker and @katrinhorn.bsky.social Analyses insider information, rumour, gossip and slander in #C19th #AmericanSociety ⬇️ manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/9781526182159/
Only now seeing this advertised on Bluesky. Get your open access essays from this wonderful volume ⬇️⬇️
Katrin Horn@katrinhorn.bsky.social · last yr.Update: my chapter on #gossip and @gothamscholar.bsky.social 's chapter on financial knowledge of immigrants are now #openaccess
Great recs from @mattseybold.bsky.social on resisting technofeudal education: prioritize print, practice ungrading, "Luddify" the classroom; de-mobilize computer infrastructure (root technology in social place!); faculty governance over SaaS subscriptions; instructor choice re: ed-tech
Against Technofeudal Education
Pillars For Protecting Our "Core Infrastructure" From OpenAI
theamericanvandal.substack.com
More than 30 years worth of data on UK literary prizes (and their winners) goes live today @post45data.bsky.social! Bravo to researchers Katherine Binhammer, Kanika Batra, Theo Gray, and Maryse Jayasuriya for compiling and publishing this incredible resource! data.post45.org/posts/britis...
Selected British Literary Prizes (1990-2022) – Post45 Data Collective
The Selected British Literary Prizes (SBLP) dataset contains information on nine major literary prizes in the U.K. from 1990 to 2022 and demographic information on 682 prize winners and shortlisted au...
data.post45.org