It's going to be another hot one today! 🌡️ If you're interested, here are some live temperatures from the coolest rooms in the Humanities Library: 🔹Multimedia Room - 20.9° 🔹Graduate Reading Room (Floor 1) - 22.2° 🔹Rare Materials Teaching Room - 22.6° Why not come along to cool down! ❄️

I emailed a library asking for a small but annoying favour, and they did me a big favour and it's provided absolutely crucial data for a new project and publication, and slopAI could never and yay for humans, and librarians and archivists in particular.

Nothing to see here. #solareclipse

Wearing 4 sunglasses 😎😎😎😎 is perfectly safe to watch the #solareclipse, right? 🤣

Today, Filippo de Vivo, Martin Conway, @faridahzaman.bsky.social and I, along with 30 other members of the Faculty of History at the University of Oxford have written to the leadership of the University of Exeter to express our deep concern about the proposed cuts to Humanities and Social Sciences

Good to see science and universities bundled into the same analysis rather than treated as separate entities (as they are by their dismemberment in separate government departments). But it would be QUITE NICE if 'science' could be construed in the European sense of science. It's not STEM alone.

Time for Andy Burnham to smile on UK science

Waning support for basic research threatens Britain’s technology ambitions

ft.com

Great discussion at the 'crisis in UK history' meeting hosted by @ihr.bsky.social, @royalhistsoc.org, @histassoc.bsky.social and History UK. Horror stories of closures and redundancies, balanced by new resources. Check out for ex. the new Independent Historians Network independenthistorians.org

Independent Historians Network

The place for independent and freelance historians to connect

independenthistorians.org

Do you use digitized medieval manuscripts in any capacity? Do you have opinions about the metadata that describes them? We want to hear from you! Please take a moment to fill out our very short survey. Please repost and share with anyone you know who might be interested! forms.gle/sBPXAnoRhwe1...

Digitized Medieval Manuscripts: Metadata Preferences

A brief survey about what metadata formats people prefer to go along with their digitized medieval manuscripts. The results of this survey will be used to consider what metadata we make available thro...

forms.gle

Great piece from @hetanshah.bsky.social in @financialtimes.com on the future of the Humanities. Hope the new Cabinet will read this! giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

We need humanities more than ever in the age of AI

Subjects like literature, languages and history are vital to a thoughtful and prosperous society

giftarticle.ft.com

📣 EThOS is back! 📣 This is brilliant news. And it has a new shiny (much better). And it has details of another 14K theses. What's not to like? Well done @bldigischol.bsky.social

Digital Scholarship @ British Library@bldigischol.bsky.social · last mo.

EThOS platform restored! 'Following restoration work, all metadata records previously available on EThOS have now been restored, along with an additional 14,000 records added since the service was taken offline' - more to come www.bl.uk/stories/news...

After months of gaslighting from my university, which thinks medieval things of little interest in an English Literature degree, it's validating/ extremely annoying to be 49,319th in the queue for tickets to see the Bayeux Tapestry.

3 yrs ago we decided to dedicate a small patch of our small lawn to wild flowers & leave it untouched. Yesterday I counted 6+ ladybirds, 1 cinnabar moth caterpillar & a grasshopper. We now have a variety of grasses from the original lawn. You too can choose to make a difference. #Biodiversity

Channeling 🧊 vibes by planning already for Freshers Week. 😃 #scorchio 🥵

🗺️ Who Is Using Arches? The GEMENE‑ST project maps the Genoese merchant network (1450–1530) & slave trade across the Mediterranean & the Atlantic, highlighting connections between thousands of historical records. 🔗 Explore the database, hosted by @dhiroma.bsky.social: gemene-st.dhi-roma.it/

The University of Oxford is advertising a 2-year Teaching Fellowship in Economic and Social History starting 1 Sep 2026. Applications close 1 Jul 2026. my.corehr.com/pls/uoxrecru...

🔔 We're hiring! 🔔 Would you like to join our team of evening & weekend staff? We're currently recruiting for 3 part-time posts, each with different hours! Closing: 22nd June 2026 See the listing for more details: shorturl.at/cP6fn

The belief that voters under FPTP "find a way of getting what they want" is just mysticism. It assumes that people whose votes are being ignored, backing parties that don't get represented, are somehow brilliantly manipulating the system to get an outcome different to the one they're voting for.

John Rentoul@rentouljohn.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Mischievous by Andrew Grice, pointing out Burnham agrees with Blair (past) and Farage (more recent past) about proportional representation – but sound conclusion www.independent.co.uk/voices/andy-...

Engaging the public in humanities & social sciences feels more important than ever. So we are offering £8k grants for researchers to work with galleries, libraries, archives, museums or performing arts organisations to do this. Please help spread the word! www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/funding/sche...

SHAPE Involve and Engage

A funding programme for innovative public engagement from the British Academy.

thebritishacademy.ac.uk

Let's prioritize installing solar panels on structures like car parks and building rooftops instead of agricultural land, as this approach embodies sustainable development.

We are stronger, and better historians, together. Historical societies abound in the UK, and we've listed 150 with BlueSky accounts in this updated Starter Pack. go.bsky.app/AZaYQDd Other societies appear on a new listing of subject societies on the RHS website bit.ly/4ebwP9r #Skystorians

This is a tasteful display at Heathrow T5 to welcome newly arrived passengers to the UK. Just a bit OTT, no? 😂

🗺️ Our interactive Refugee Map allows you to browse and search a selection of our rich collection of family papers, including diaries, photo albums, identity and emigration papers, Red Cross letters and recorded interviews... www.refugeemap.org

Refugee Map | Documents from the Wiener Holocaust Library

refugeemap.org

The Society is pleased to publish the Shortlist of its 2026 First Book Prize for early career historians: bit.ly/4dARJO1 This year's list includes eight monographs published in 2025 and follows an open call for submissions. Our two prize winners will be announced in July #Skystorians

Recently, FamilySearch digitized and uploaded tons of microfilmed records, including many from 18th-century Massachsuetts. They're using some sort of AI to transcribe/summarize the handwritten documents. I've noticed that the AI strips out references to race and enslavement in 18thc documents.

If you like C17 paintings, esp portraits, you must go to the RA's exhibition on Michaelina Wautier's work. A truly astounding artist of her time but little known until now. www.royalacademy.org.uk/exhibition/m...

Michaelina Wautier | Royal Academy of Arts

A 17th-century trailblazer rediscovered.

royalacademy.org.uk

Last chance to book! Join Bodley's Librarian Richard Ovenden as he talks about knowledge, power and why libraries still matter - now more than ever. 🗓️ 14 May, 5.30-7.30pm 📍 Weston Library Book now: https://visit.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/fob-annual-lecture

Prof. Lyndal Roper deserves this honour so much. Nobody is more inspiring, enthusiastic, and encouraging, and she is such a brilliant scholar. I'm honoured and very glad to have had the opportunity to pay tribute to her (even under an alias?!). Congratulations Lyndal!

Meet the 2026 Holberg Prize Laureate, Professor Lyndal Roper.

YouTube video by Holberg Prize

youtube.com

University of Hertfordshire closes a swathe of Humanities courses, accelerating the sweeping tide against Human-centred disciples in the UK. Because understanding humans is so yesterday today. With such happy consequences, as we see when we look around us.

Owen Davies@odavies9.bsky.social · 3mo ago

Aye. Heard today that my university is closing UG History, Philosophy, English Lit, Linguistics, and Creative Writing in one go.

Exciting new census-linking project about to start at @camunicampop.bsky.social !

Cambridge University History Faculty@camhistory.bsky.social · 4mo ago

How @camunicampop.bsky.social researchers are turning static snapshots of Victorian Britain into dynamic life histories. The team are linking over 200 million census records, revealing how people moved, worked and lived in ways never before possible. 🔎 Read on 👉 www.hist.cam.ac.uk/news/tracing...

“Our intellectual, psychological and physical well-being requires taking this algorithmic vice very seriously.” A must-read.

The Conversation U.S.@us.theconversation.com · 3mo ago

Everyone likes being told they’re clever, even if it’s coming from an AI chatbot. But their sycophancy has serious consequences for truth and trust.