I am BEGGING news outlets to hire some actual experts on religion (and maybe some editors?) The world should not be forced to read headlines like this: “Lost sermon by Saint in Pope Leo-JD Vance debate found 1,600 years later”

I want this description on the back of my SBU hoodie. It's perfect!

Sara Lipton@medievalsara.bsky.social · 2d ago

Please leave room for big ugly state universities with bad furniture and too big classes…where students from 100+ family/national backgrounds read and discuss texts they never heard of…and often find them very cool.

Isn't lovely how little has changed?! Notice in the bottom right corner the makeup "compact" with six pigments and a protective lid! Above it the funny thing like a thumb is the pestle of a mortar for grinding fine powders. BM 1861,0523.2

Where's the righteous anger the news about Exeter has engendered? Where are the think pieces about learning loss and unconscionable redundancies? The problem will never be understood or *addressed* if we do not, collectively, respond to the full scale of it.

Glen O'Hara@gsoh31.bsky.social · 3d ago

So it's farewell to the History subject area at the University of Hertfordshire, not the first nor the last to go. One of the best departments in the country, just extinguished like a snap of the fingers. Think of the waste. (1/2)

Where's the righteous anger the news about Exeter has engendered? Where are the think pieces about learning loss and unconscionable redundancies? The problem will never be understood or *addressed* if we do not, collectively, respond to the full scale of it.

Glen O'Hara@gsoh31.bsky.social · 3d ago

So it's farewell to the History subject area at the University of Hertfordshire, not the first nor the last to go. One of the best departments in the country, just extinguished like a snap of the fingers. Think of the waste. (1/2)

Between the 1970s and 1990s the UK state made a strategic bet to expand Higher Ed. They poured in untold billions of your money. Now it's been handed over to private creditors to burn in a furnace. Then they just laugh at you: at all the taxes you've ever paid or will ever pay. True story. (2/2)

100% this. See also Life of Brian and Holy Grail.

David M. Perry@lollardfish.bsky.social · 5d ago

And both A Knight's Tale and O Brother say interesting things about the source material without making authenticity claims, so they're useful as well as fun.

My illustrations for the Odyssey.

What this world really needs is an “Odyssey” spoof movie from Mel Brooks.

I'm always on about this, but I'm kind of salty about the fact that the public has no idea how HARD it is, and how much work it takes, to actually produce new knowledge in the humanities.

First, popularizing publication of our @unileiden.bsky.social project 'From 𐤀 to Α'. Co-written by the whole team, we introduce some of the questions surrounding the birth and spread of the early alphabet that the project tackles. Get the whole issue at www.karwansaraypublishers.com/products/anc...

A revolution in writing: the spread of the alphabet

A paper surveying the spread of alphabetic writing throughout the ancient Mediterranean, the possible genealogy of the various alphabets, and the mechanisms behind and dates of their dispersal.

academia.edu

I bought one of these to wear on my conference lanyard at EABS2026 last week – I got compliments every day! 10/10 highly recommend.

Robin Hayward 🌳 🏳️‍⚧️@canopyrobin.com · last mo.

Just realised it's graduation season so I should probably share these cool pins I make again. They make great gifts and help to fund my transition canopyrobin.etsy.com/listing/1841...

Colleagues: if you do #GlobalMiddleAges work, this is an urgent case where you can use your expertise to support cultural conservation & Indigenous peoples. If you don't know Chaco Canyon, look it up. But do so quickly. The Comment period ends 29 July. #MedievalSky

Kelly Lynne D’Angelo ✨@kellylynnedang.bsky.social · 3w ago

Please blow up the public comment (included below): BREAKING NEWS (7/15) — The administration wants to destroy Chaco Canyon without consulting Tribal Nations. It’s an irreplaceable historic & cultural site with 4,700 archeological sites that could be lost to the bulldozers of oil & gas development

WANT.

Studies of Biblical Interest@biblicaljournal.bsky.social · 3w ago

How do we read the Jewish texts that shaped the world of the New Testament? The new Jewish Annotated Apocrypha offers fresh commentary on Second Temple literature, bridging the Hebrew Bible and early Christianity. @academic.oup.com #BiblicalStudies

This, in particular. Increasingly of the view that government policy towards universities is the test case of whether it really has a wider economic policy.

Jonathan Portes@jdportes.bsky.social · 3w ago

"A closed country will be poorer. A country that underinvests will not grow. A state that refuses to reform tax will ration ambition. And a Labour government afraid to say these things will discover once again that caution, too, has costs." www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

The Argentinians love having a go at the REF so much that you‘d be mistaken for thinking they work in a UK university.

Argentina really see this as a Falklands mulligan.

The (Protestant) Christian impulse to focus on the internal state of one's soul and whether they sought forgiveness from God – rather than on the impact of their actions and whether they enacted repentance through repair – is how we end up here.

100% this. Working on it every day.

A. M. Vincent@vincent.northsky.social · 3w ago

It took me until I was over 40 years old before I could bring myself to say "No, that task demands a huge amount of ongoing executive function and will destroy my ability to do other things"; I'm still working on being comfortable with it and not hearing "If you just applied yourself..."

The (Protestant) Christian impulse to focus on the internal state of one's soul and whether they sought forgiveness from God – rather than on the impact of their actions and whether they enacted repentance through repair – is how we end up here.

Does anybody have a good reference image depicting a Roman military officer (Equite class, c. 1st century)? Preferably in either ceremonial garb (muscled cuirass) or in armour worn during travelling. #AncientBluesky #History #Classics #RomanArchaeology

Does anybody have a good reference image depicting a Roman military officer (Equite class, c. 1st century)? Preferably in either ceremonial garb (muscled cuirass) or in armour worn during travelling. #AncientBluesky #History #Classics #RomanArchaeology

Had a meeting this evening with my new Councillor who told me that he couldn't read my recent email because there were "too many paragraphs".

Had a meeting this evening with my new Councillor who told me that he couldn't read my recent email because there were "too many paragraphs".

One of my very favourite places in London!

Dr Anna Reeve@cypriotartleeds.bsky.social · 3w ago

Ensconced in my own study carrel at Senate House Library. So much writing is going to happen here…

I'd love to read your TTRPG newsletter. unfortunately you've chosen to host it on substack, the Nazi website, so I won't be doing that. sounds so interesting though. wish I could!

Indeed we do! docs.google.com/document/d/e... I would add a line about the stupidity of cutting even further in the Strategic Priorities Grant, but may need to stop seething about that first. Do contact your MPs, many of them are too reliant on deeply stupid briefings from the DfE.

Will Tullett@willtullett.bsky.social · 4w ago

(1/2) Does anybody have a good standard email template that offers keys stats, links to information, that could be edited and sent to (clearly often clueless) Labour MPs about the financial, jobs, and broader crisis with UK higher education?

Anybody know Andy Burnham's position on Higher Ed?

The more I learn about the "Religion & Worldviews" approach to teaching RE, the more I realise it's just Philosophy dressed with the decor of "religion".