What a huge loss. NOT STRAIGHT, NOT WHITE was such an inspiration for me and many other historians. "Without an acknowledged heritage, at any moment one’s voice may be drowned out, one’s social standing is disabled, and one’s chances for civic belonging plummet."
I fell down a rabbit hole yesterday via Leslie Reagan's "When Abortion Was a Crime," and wondered if anyone knew of historical work that examined the use of Leunbach's Paste / Provokol (1930s) or potassium permanganate (1950s) to end pregnancies. Maybe @erinacean.bsky.social has an idea? #histmed
Happy publication day to @uobrishistory.bsky.social’s Professor Sumita Mukherjee!
It's v exciting to see this turn toward complexity in biology. @philipcball.bsky.social @wiringthebrain.bsky.social @duhe.bsky.social are among those pressing for change. Who else?
Historians can help here. We have rigorous ways of dealing w/ context & contingency. Life is historical!
We are advertising 4 jobs at York for historians (1 year medieval, 2 years modern Britain and public history, 3 years modern China, and open ended modern Middle Eastern) features.york.ac.uk/history-jobs/
@maryfissell.bsky.social
How did people in the seventeenth century understand ending a pregnancy? Find out tomorrow, Thursday 2/19, at Mary Fissell’s talk, ‘Savin, Sex, and Scandal: Rethinking Abortion in Early Modern Anglo-America.’ 4:00–5:30 PM in 470 Stephens Hall, UC Berkeley. #History #Gender #Medicine
I talked with podcaster Brad Carr recently, about genetic determinism, race and IQ, and James Watson. The title captures the gist, but the devil's in the details...
You can check out our conversation here:
YouTube: youtu.be/f8qiz1aCdno
Audio: bradcarr.transistor.fm/episodes/170...
Happy birthday to one of my favourite haters, Charles Darwin
The Tilburg Uni Econ Dept seeks to hire a Postdoctoral Researcher specializing in Economic History w expertise in causal inference, quasi-experiments & an interest in political preferences & racial attitudes, for the research project "The roots of prejudice in Europe: The role of WW II". 3 year term
Image of sunset, south bay of San Francisco, taken from inside Bart train. Reflection show passengers reading and the photographer.
Riding Bart yesterday evening past the sunset through the South Bay ... Beauty and Resilience
Schomburg Center Centennial Mug with broken handle. Picture of two sad pigeons in the background.
I broke my Schomburg Center Centennial Mug. Thanks 2026! I know, a minor thing in what's already shaping up to be quite a year ... but it brought me joy and I just saw, it's sold out. Anybody got a spare one?
I'm hiring 2 postdocs on my Wellcome project "How Did Infectious Diseases Become Wild?: Plague, Yellow Fever, and Disease Ecology in the Brazilian Hinterland (1920-1975)"
Department of Global Health and Social Medicine
King's College
3 years 01/10/26- 30/09/29
Deadline: 01/02/26
shorturl.at/KZ6Vh
OMG. I was not expecting this!
Blast from the past. Linz in the early 1990s.
I'm no purist when it comes to participating in things we all know are bad. I try to reduce my harm but I'm an honest hypocrite.
I won't judge you for still using Spotify, just try this rad alternative. I'm listening to music from Dar es Salaam. Where will you listen to? radio.garden/listen/furah...
Why Qobuz? Better pay for artists?
Happy Buy Nothing Day!
Black Friday reminder: You can support independent bookstores and get great deals without lining the pockets of billionaires 😌
Tapas, Cheese, Chickpea Confit and Broccoli with Almonds. Upper-Austrian Apfelschlangerl (apple strudel). GOAT-ing this lazy afternoon food day.
If you use GMail, AI (Gemini) was turned on yesterday by default and now scans all of your content for machine learning. To turn off, go to Settings>General and scroll down. Uncheck the box for "Smart features."
There's other "Smart" add-ons as well, but that's the one that reads your content.
Nobody wants this shit. Nobody.
The hostile reaction has been so pronounced, in fact, that it feels like a company announcing it would never force AI into its products would carve out a pretty good chunk of the market.
I didn’t know it worked this way. @nytopinion.nytimes.com first published my piece on Watson and genetic determinism on Sunday, but it came out in the paper today. Evidently each week the op-ed page is a mad shuffling scramble for Friday.
In New Orleans, at #HSS2025. The 1st #eugenics panel had many friends, colleagues, & students there—& 1 grandstudent!— in the audience and behind the podium, it felt like a big fuzzy eugenic family reunion. That's a thing, right?
@ederummadum.bsky.social @ayahnerd.bsky.social @jowiph.bsky.social
My brilliant friend @katewomersley.com worked on this course on integrating sex and gender in health research and policy. Please share widely.
www.imperial.ac.uk/admin-servic...
Happy news: My new book -- Humanitarianism: A Very Short Introduction -- now has a cover and is available for preorder! The book is a concise history of humanitarianism in an international and global perspective, from the 18th century to the present. More info here: global.oup.com/academic/pro...
A photo of a handwritten sign in black ink on white paper, posted on an arched window. The text reads '1st Conference Black Parents Movement 27th-28th October 1979'
What is the Black Archive? Reparations and Transformation
Sat, 29 Nov, British Library
On Presenting the Past: Black Archives in Britain Today – GPI Archivist will be talking at this first discussion of the day, along with the BFI and the Stuart Hall Archive
See British Library website to book
definitely worth the watch, especially if you know what it is to have your home destroyed
James D. Watson is dead. Stay tuned for some thoughts, based on my research on his biography, to be published soon.
While I write that up, y'all can throw tomatoes at this if you like. But I will offer a more nuanced take.
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/s...
