The alternative to "progressive" is not "moderate" and it's bananas that that's the framing

sometimes there is absolutely nothing more fun than understanding works of art through people's varied professional perspectives

Deidre Lynch@drbibliomane.bsky.social · 24h ago

You can/should read Emily Wilson's latest take on the Odyssey, but I'm logging on to convey my hairdresser's reaction. She was AGHAST that Nolan, with his million $ budget, gave Matt Damon ONLY 6 hair extensions. As a result, his hair did not blow around properly, & that ruined the film for her.

This level of spending actually makes me deeply angry. Let's never do this again in a primary ok

#StupidSuez@diplomatofnight.com · 14h ago

Unfathomable

Lloyd Robertson was a staple in Canadian news. He graced our lives with the day's headlines for over 60 years, first with the CBC and then CTV. We trusted him to bring us the facts. Lloyd was awarded the Order of Canada. Rest peacefully, old friend.💔 www.ctvnews.ca/video/2026/0...

CTV National News: Legendary former CTV News chief anchor Lloyd Robertson dies at 92

Former CTV National News chief anchor Lloyd Robertson has died. Genevieve Beauchemin reports on his extraordinary career in journalism and his enduring legacy.

ctvnews.ca

One day I will form a Monochord Ensemble, who's in? (Also Deirdre's work is wonderful and everyone should read it).

Britt Lundgren@brittlundgren.bsky.social · 23h ago

I've just started reading this fun and beautiful new book by my talented friend and former college roommate, Deirdre Loughridge. The first chapter is on Cosmic Instruments and has a 17th century artistic rendering of "fine-tuning" that I'm excited to share in my cosmology class this semester! 🔭🎶

But they will be

Steffen Rayburn-Maarup@rayburnmaarup.bsky.social · 3d ago

I don't think people are ready for this kind of joke yet.

"The idea of society may sound appealing, but it's old men who will take the hit, planting trees under whose shade they might never sit."

USA TODAY Opinion@usatodayopinion.usatoday.com · 2d ago

Opinion: Mamdani's idea may sound appealing, but it's NYC taxpayers who will take the hit, subsidizing discounts they may never even use.

My client Prof. Willoughby-Herard heroically stood up for students and was assaulted by cops. Then UCI tried to fire her. The Committee recommended unpaid suspension, but there should be no punishment for protecting students. Please sign and share to support her! sites.google.com/view/withdra...

Home

On May 15, 2024, several hundred heavily armed police were called in to break up a peaceful encampment at UC Irvine in solidarity with the people of Gaza. Among those arrested that day was UC Irvine G...

sites.google.com

when people say "do your own research" they generally mean "do not trust anyone with any relevant training or experience"

Marc Veldhoen@marcveld.bsky.social · 2d ago

I'm a full Professor of Immunology and fully vaccinated. I didn't get vaccinated out of obedience, but after decades of studying the immune system and evaluating all evidence. Calling that "lack of critical thinking" is not an argument. It's ideology masked as pretend intellect.

It's incredible is how little folks understand about academe. Peer review is brutal. Academic Q+A is Troy level slaughter. Bros attacking a lady academic for a fair review would shit themselves on stage after a paper and break down into toddler tears after their first conference paper w a mean Q+A.

These assholes are purporting to terminate her DACA status because they are claiming that her illegal deportation by the US government counts as her traveling outside the US and thus violated the conditions of her DACA status.

Valerie Gonzalez@valontheborder.bsky.social · 6d ago

New: An RGV mother deported to Mexico despite having DACA filed a lawsuit against the federal government after it notified her it would be terminating her DACA status because of “unauthorized travel” stemming from her deportation. apnews.com/article/daca...

“Getting rid of teachers because we all have chatbots is like getting rid of doctors because we all have the plague.”

By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C)@doctorow.pluralistic.net · last wk.

As far as I can tell, this dialog between MacArthur prize-winning mathematician Terrence Tao and Chatgpt about "the Jacobian conjecture counterexample" is very impressive: chatgpt.com/share/6a5fdc... 1/

I’m going to be sick. Even the photo they chose — I painted in that exact spot during a concert one of my summers. From the 1970s to the 2010s, which includes the three years I attended. When my friends were there. Back to when some of their *parents* were campers. www.mlive.com/news/2026/07...

Epstein, 46 others linked to decades of sex assaults at Interlochen, over 70 victims

An investigative report two years in the making was released Tuesday, July 28, detailing decades of sexual abuse at Interlochen Center for the Arts by staff, trustees, visiting artists and Jeffrey Eps...

mlive.com

Big fucking ups to this quote from Dr. Davis tho: “It’s bewildering. It seemed weird and laughable,” Davis said of the indictment. “It felt like the length of the indictment was a cover for how thin it actually was. I’m a professor. I’ve seen people pad out papers when they’ve got nothing to say.”

My genuinely brilliant colleague in Southeast Asian studies, Dr. Erik Davis at Macalester College in St Paul, faces a federal indictment and a possible six-year prison sentence, for having "ties" to "antifa" (i.e. for organizing anti-ICE protests). www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-i...

The professor facing prison in ‘antifa’ case: ‘They want to scare all who oppose ICE’

Erik Davis is accused by the government of a ‘conspiracy’ to obstruct ICE – experts say it’s part of a pattern to criminalize lawful organizing and ruin activists’ lives

theguardian.com

47. The rot runs so deep.

The Detroit News@detroitnews.com · last wk.

Independent report released Tuesday finds there's at least 47 alleged offenders, including faculty, board members, administrators and counselors.

A short story of dogs doing things (in a manuscript of 1300 AD). #dogsky

I was in a working group this summer on AI resistant assignments. I focused on low stakes course work that could then be scaffolded into my formal assignments. I teach literature, so things like social annotations, concept mapping, and commonplacing academictech.uchicago.edu/2024/06/24/u...

As next school year draws closer (eek), I'm curious to hear an update on your anti-AI defenses, if you're teaching? Policies, sure, but also how you're redesigning assignments and building guardrails. I might write something about all this.

The use of extremely online memetic aesthetics to support far-right political goals is like something out of Walter Benjamin’s nightmares.

Ezra seems unable or unwilling to understand that putting the teleological development of the nation-state at the heart of historical inquiry is itself an ideological commitment. Or he’s smart enough to know this but choosing to sound this stupid because it sells.

interesting to me that as the administration treats democratic-voting states like conquered or occupied territories, you don’t have pundits demanding the president respect “half the country”

tony romm@tonyromm.bsky.social · 2w ago

NEW: In a stunning admission, the Trump administration admitted in court documents that it canceled billions in energy grants to states "based solely" on politics -- and whether that state was represented by Democrats and backed Harris in 2024. www.nytimes.com/2026/07/24/b...

shutting down academic programs is virtually never about the quality of those programs and often it’s not really even about their actual student numbers or “appeal” very little management policy towards the humanities is specifically “about” research or teaching in the humanities at all, in fact

Matt Gabriele@profgabriele.com · 2w ago

just got an email from my (former) chair that the university has acted & the state has approved the formal closure of my department. this was done without any faculty input on the decision or the process, & has ended a vibrant, growing (!), humanities department that won teaching and research awards

I have a 'History Department in UKHE' joke but it's been reduced from 250 characters to 50 and is now merged with jokes from across ten other largely-unrelated disciplines while still being expected to be Just As Funny.

I do not use ChatGPT as my search engine because, among other things, I understand the difference between looking for the correct thing and looking for the most frequent thing

Holden Thorp@holdenthorp.bsky.social · 3w ago

Hi, this is Holden emerging from my Bluesky hiatus to tell everyone that when checking the links in the piece, I used ChatGPT as my search engine (does anyone use Google anymore?). The piece was written by me and edited by humans. So all the links were checked by me and again by our copyeditors.

Thinking about this in relation to the divide between the impossibility of assigning physical books in classes at UMass-Amherst (bc no student will buy them) and the fact that at Amherst College that is not an issue since the College just buys the books for students: www.amherst.edu/academiclife...

Let's do some Canadian pipeline-wildfire math. The Canadian Energy Center says growing oil exports by 1.5M barrels/day **could** boost GDP by ~31B annually. Meanwhile, wildfire smoke health costs alone - just the health costs, nothing else - averaged 23B/year, past tense. And they're growing fast.

Ontario hardest hit as wildfires cost Canada billions | NOW Toronto

A new report estimates wildfire smoke has cost Canada $231 billion since 2014. See how much each province has spent.

nowtoronto.com

This is leadership.

Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani@mayor.nyc.gov · 3w ago

Free KN95 masks will continue to be available at hundreds of locations citywide: on.nyc.gov/freemask. For air quality guidance, visit on.nyc.gov/firesmoke.

Genuinely losing my mind watching Carney's announcement today. Canada is burning, our prime minister says we can't afford climate action, and today he ANNOUNCES MORE DEFENCE SPENDING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Carney: Wildfires are really bad and I care about the people affected by them. Me: Reminder that Carney, who says this about wildfires, has cut every relevant federal agency, is rolling back climate protections, and pushing more pipelines. Carney fans: YoU sHoULd BLaMe tEh PrEMiErS.