Sam Agbamu

Very excited to be part of the next iteration of the amazing Res Diff series!

Mamdani: "New York will remain a city of immigrants, a city built by immigrants, powered by immigrants, and as of tonight, led by an immigrant."

Ancient Rome's legacy looms large in Italy's history, from colonising North Africa to Mussolini's fascist reign and modern anti-immigration movements

Historian @samagbamu.bsky.social explains the long, dark shadow cast by the imperial eagle.

🔗 rdg.ac/467hym7

#AncientSky

it's eye-catching and encourages reading on, I suppose?

Nice of the anti-refugee nationalists to ensure that St. George's flag is trampled underfoot

Congratulations to everyone getting their #Alevel results today!

We look forward to welcoming our new Classics Department students in September.

If things didn't quite go to plan but you're interested in coming to @uniofreading.bsky.social you can call Clearing on: +44 (0) 118 402 0900

Letter of the day (in the Times)

Join Workers for a Free Palestine at Pelican House, Fri 8 Aug, for an evening of live music, dancing and solidarity.

All ticket sales support legal fees for the WFFP9, our friends who got arrested protesting arms sales to Israel, and who will go to court soon.

ra.co/events/2223482

60,000 Gazans have been killed. 18,500 were children. These are their names. Palestinian children have been killed at a rate of more than one per hour since the war began.

This is a remarkable document for a mainstream media outlet to publish.

(gift link)

wapo.st/3IRLZn6

happy les aristocrats à la lanterne day to all who celebrate

To Kill a War Machine

Essential viewing on what Palestine Action do, why they do it, and why they must have our unwavering solidarity

tokillawarmachine.com

I can't believe Staten Island is Hamas

We are all Palestine Action.
🇵🇸

Red arrows fly over a London residential street

What a weekend of fascistic parades in DC and warplanes flying over my street to finish @profdanhicks.bsky.social ’s breathtaking new book. Such a clear articulation of the tenacious, cold grip of the death cult of ‘militarist realism’. Will be returning to this a lot. Also big up Sylvia Wynter.

Grants | Raymond Williams Foundation Home

THE RAYMOND WILLIAMS FOUNDATION TARGETED GRANTS SCHEME 2025
The RWF invites applications for up to eight grants of max £1,500 to support self-organised adult learning activities to help realise social justice aims. Deadline: 29 June 2025. More info at:

Carbon footprint of Israel’s war on Gaza exceeds that of many entire countries Exclusive: The climate cost is more than than the combined 2023 emissions of Costa Rica and Estonia, study finds

Today the guardian is debuting our new calculations of climate damage caused by Israel's genocide in Gaza. Greenhouse gases are not the most important reason to demand a permanent ceasefire and Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, but this data shows yet another way that genocide harms us all.

Oh wow, RIP Ngugi wa Thiongo!! A brilliant writer with so many faces

In the light of recent news from Cardiff University it seems timely to re-post this letter championing the work of colleagues in Ancient History and Religion from CUCD, CA, FIEC, @ics.bsky.social @theromansoc.bsky.social @hellenicsociety.bsky.social

Update at: www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

If your medieval studies project has been impacted by the NEH cuts and you would like your fundraising project amplified by SSMLL, please contact us at ssmll[AT]history.ox.ac.uk.

SSMLL stands in solidarity with our colleagues.

(5/5)

Combined Classics Library Bursaries (up to £300) now accepting applications to assist unfunded scholars who wish to visit the Combined Classics Library in summer 2025 in order to advance or complete a project of research or scholarship.

Details here: https://shorturl.at/XRjqg

Looking for reading on the term "Amerindian". Seeing it being used in recent scholarship by great scholars whose judgements I trust, but intuitively - from a place of ignorance - it seems outdated? Any tips much appreciated!

This is what a leader does.
This is what a leader sounds like.

THERE ARE MORE OF US THAN THERE ARE OF THEM

DO NOT OBEY.
SPEAK YOUR MIND.

Generative Al Statement: The goal of this course is to help you improve as thinkers, scholars, and community members. The use of generative Al and LLMs (including Chat GPT) is antithetical to these goals. I strongly encourage you not to use generative Al to complete readings or assignments. There is growing evidence that the use of generative Al facilitates labor exploitation of workers in the Global South, causes severe local and global environmental damage, relies on stolen labor of writers and artists, fails to provide accurate information or citations, and may be causing a microgeneration of students to struggle to think/write critically and become less employable after college. Beyond all of these, generative Al-written papers are (more often than not) poorly argued, woodenly and generically written, and obvious to humanities professors. This course aims to help us practice the acts of critical thinking, analyzing, discussing, producing knowledge, and engaging with the communities in which we live. Accordingly, I ask that you embrace the difficulty of that process rather than attempt to outsource these skills. At the same time, I am not interested in attempting to surveil you through Al-detection software because this creates a hostile classroom environment between students and their professor. College is a time for you to decide who you want to be and how you want to engage the work set before you.

Draft of an AI statement for future syllabi (building on what others have done & shared)

UK risks becoming ‘island of strangers’ without more immigration curbs, Starmer says PM unveils policies to ‘significantly’ drive down net migration including English tests and degree requirements

Disgraceful

www.theguardian.com/world/2025/m...

RACING THE CLASSICS Racing the Classics began as a conference series. The summer seminar takes up the mantle of that series by inviting fellows to gather in-person for intensive, sustained conversation.

Call for applications for the inaugural Racing the Classics cohort-based fellowship (funded by a major award won by Dan-El Padilla Peralta and Sasha-Mae Eccleston). Mentorship, summer seminar, monthly practicum, stipend/travel, and more www.racingtheclassics.com

You guys, a conclave of old cardinals can decide on a POPE faster than an academic search committee can decide on the four people we're bringing to campus for an assistant professor search.

Early exit polls suggest the new pope did particularly well with male voters aged 45-79.

Wow is this how I found out I didn't get the job? A fucking chimney?

monsignori in the attic by the lightswitch
who watches over you
make a little conclave in your soul
north of here you might meet @calculizer.bsky.social*
rallying votes for Fr. Pizzaballa
make a little conclave in your soul

*it rhymes if you replace the handle with his name leave me alone

Enjoying witnessing this project massively but I have to ask because it’s been on my mind: do you now have an amazingly well-stocked cupboard with ingredients from around the world? Asking for a friend with minimal kitchen storage…