dr. meg smith

Framing GenAI as a battle between teachers and students is a red herring. Students and educators are on the same side. The real opposition are the data extraction firms and brokerages and their allies among the managerial class.

Call for Papers 13th Annual Symposium on Medieval and Renaissance Studies 8-10 June 2026 Saint Louis University Representing the Past: Material and Digital Surrogates in the Practice of History Organizers: Thomas Morin, Saint Louis University, and Margaret Smith, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville Increasing reliance on surrogates has transformed historians' avenues for inquiry and methodologies for interpreting information. The creation of digital surrogates has increased access to historical materials, but also raises questions about representation, conservation, and democratization. Parallel to these developments, the production of physical replicas of historical objects has also expanded immensely in the last several decades, bringing with it new teaching tools and research aids. But the production of these material surrogates has also heightened the tensions between access and authenticity. These replicas, both in the physical and digital spheres, have opened new paths and discussions about how scholars engage with history both academically and pedagogically, and in public spaces.   These sessions invite papers that explore the creation, use, and interpretation of surrogates in historical practice. How do digital and material surrogates mediate the relationship between researchers, objects, and audiences? How do they complement or challenge one another as forms of preservation and interpretation? We welcome contributions that address the processes of surrogate creation, the theoretical and ethical dimensions of representation, and the role of surrogates in pedagogy, public history, and digital humanities.   By bringing together scholars working across media, these panels seek to create dialogue on how historical knowledge is shaped through acts of reproduction, translation, and substitution. Prospective presenters should email their 100-200 word proposals to either thomas.morin@slu.edu or margars@siue.edu by 15 December 2025.

CFP alert! If you're working on digitization, replicas and reproductions, living history practices, or other forms of surrogate sources, we'd love to see a proposal for organized sessions at the 2026 Symposium on Medieval and Renaissance Studies. #DigitalHumanities #LivingHistory #CFP #MedievalSky

Digital humanities and transit. Yup, that tracks.

A note I sent to Walgreens corporate: Hi there, I'm writing with a safety and maintenance issue. Last year, the Walgreens at 3920 Hampton Ave, St. Louis, MO 63109 never cleared their sidewalks, even as repeated blizzards dropped several inches of snow at a time. As a result, the sidewalks became incredibly hazardous, coated in over a foot of crunchy snow and ice — the kind that briefly holds your weight before breaking and dropping your foot. This made the sidewalks not only unpleasant, but unsafe. This store is located at a major intersection and has bus stops on both sides of its corner. The failure to clear snow last year created huge hazards for patrons and pedestrians. This year, the store is again falling behind in its obligation to clear its sidewalks, as required by city ordinance. I'm flagging this now in the hopes that the problem is addressed before it becomes dire.

St. Louis is getting an early start on snow accumulation, and I’m still holding a grudge towards businesses who utterly neglected their obligation to clear their sidewalks last year. If you’d feel inspired to badger some big box stores about their sidewalks, feel free to adapt! #STL #stlouis #stlwx

Recovery Hub for American Women Writers - SIUE Connect

Your gift supports the Hub’s free services for digital recovery practitioners, including consultation, scholarly and pedagogical peer review, and long-term cultivation of digital projects. Donate here: connect.siue.edu/g/recovery-h...

A picture of me wearing the Recovery Hub for American Women Writers t-shirt. The front features the hub logo in three shades of blue, along with a quill pen

The back of the shirt reads “Disrupt the canon one digital project at a time”

The tote bag is an undyed canvas with the hub logo and the “Disrupt the canon one digital project at a time” slogan

Hey, do you want to wear your love of digital humanities and cultural recovery on your sleeve? @recoveryhubaww.bsky.social has you covered! Make a donation of $50 or more between now and Christmas and receive your choice of a tote bag or t-shirt!

#DigitalHumanities #AmLit

Southern Illinois University Edwardsville - SIUE Connect

It's #GivingTuesday! Every dollar that comes into IRIS goes back out into community-engaged research, digital pedagogy, and #DigitalHumanities infrastructure. Throughout the day, we'll share some of the ways that your giving helps us support our communities. You can give to IRIS through fund 4332.

A picture of me smiling, wearing an indigo blue scarf and an ugly knitted hat. The hat is mostly a sort of beige yarn, with stripes along the fold in random colors, probably leftover yarn - red, charcoal grey, lime green, navy, and maroon. It is a thick, lumpy hat.

A picture of the hat from the side, where you can see that instead of being knit in the round, it has been ungracefully joined at the top in a strange four way fold.

Most midwestern families have a stockpile of Ugly Hats. (If you think you don’t, check your grandparents’ closet.) I am here to tell you: keep the Ugly Hat! What it lacks in form, it more than makes up in function. You will not find a warmer hat than the Ugly Hat. And your grandma probably made it.

Two texts. Mine, in green, reads “This might sound odd, but when you watch Kpop Demon Hunters, I think the cat is Bubba and the bird is Cricket.” My sister responds “WE SAID THE SAME...Just finished”

500 miles apart but completely in sync, all the Smiths have finally watched Kpop Demon Hunters and come to precisely the same conclusion about my sister’s animals.

And for my next trick, sweet potatoes with whipped feta and hot honey! Now that we’ve eaten it, I don’t think the overpriced hot honey was a necessary purchase. You could totally just add chili flakes to the whipped feta and use regular honey.

Gotta make room for the custard!

A custard pie in a tart dish with chopped pecans peeking through and halved pecans arranged on top

Managed to squeeze a couple recipes into my sister’s packed and highly regimented cooking schedule today. First up: a custardy pecan pie, a century-old recipe from @tastinghistory.bsky.social.

A teams notification on my Lock Screen telling me to “check out a frequently opened report” titled “AP and PO Data”

Automated teams notifications the night before Thanksgiving are violence

A grey dog sits in the back seat of a small car. She’s draped in a towel. The driver’s seat is draped in a towel. The whole backseat is draped in a fleece blanket. We are prepared for nearly any incident she can projectile puke at us.

Dogs who get carsick ride in the hazmat zone.

Parents who draw the short straw also ride in the hazmat zone, along with a minimum of six emergency towels in easy grabbing distance.

Look, requiring four letters at the time of application is whack. (Inspired by one job ad in particular, but also evergreen advice for all the hiring committees out there.)

It has entirely shifted my first book project. Dissertation book is off the table - the timing really sucked in that regard! I was actually on a research trip for that project about to visit the BL when it happened.

Man, I love museums. My partner told his aunt about the exhibit, and now she’s digging into the history of urban renewal in Atlanta, to understand how policies of displacement have shaped her community.

A section of the Mill Creek exhibit at the Missouri History Museum. This shows a segment of a timeline focused on a cartoon of Louis IX looming over a neighborhood labeled a slum and removing it. He’s smiling and looks relatively benevolent. The cartoon is titled “How To Make A Great City Greater” Exhibit text: Editorial cartoon showing King Louis IX of France, St. Louis's namesake, clearing a slum area A survey conducted by the St. Louis Star and Times, a white newspaper, shows wide support for the bond issue with two conditions: "interracial co-operation of the 'highest type'" and retention of some historic churches. Mill Creek residents do not appear to be included in the survey. St. Louis Star and Times, May 28, 1948 Newspapers.com MCV406

The new Mill Creek exhibit at @mohistorymuseum.bsky.social is a beautiful combo of calling out injustice while celebrating Black community and placemaking.

And for my medievalists, here’s a reminder that STL is full of medievalisms that are easily and often wielded as a tool of white supremacy.

The concluding paragraphs of an article from the NYT on the current funding habits of the NEH. “A majority of the awards, which the agency has not publicized, are to scholars with ties to religious or conservative institutions, and support work on topics including the Bible's influence on the American founders, the history of the parental rights movement and the current ills of the humanities. Four are to people listed only as "unaffiliated independent scholar." Some of the agency's longstanding competitive grant programs remain. But Dr. Vanessa Northington Gamble, a physician and medical historian who served on the council from 2022 until she was fired October, said there had been a "chilling effect." "I know scholars who, seeing what has happened, are asking, why apply?" Dr. Gamble said. "The N.E.H. does not seem as open to a larger swath of humanities anymore."”

I’m well beyond “why apply,” I’m at “I cannot in good conscience apply.”

Gift link to the NYT piece on the NEH’s awarded projects since it was gutted:
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/15/a...

Consequences — Careful Industries A free tool to help you rapidly assess potential risks and issues with AI-powered products, tools and services.

The Careful Consequence Checker,
a free, self-directed tool for understanding the impacts of building, buying or adopting an AI-powered product or service www.careful.industries/consequences Thank you @rachelcoldicutt.bsky.social

IRIS Center Morning Bytes Jill Anderson, Ph.D. Department of English Friday, Nov. 14 10:00-11:00 AM IRIS Center (Peck 2226) Grappling with Contexts for an Archive of 19th-Century Letters In this Morning Bytes, Dr. Jill Anderson (English) will present her Spring 2025 sabbatical project, a series of contributions to the Catharine Maria Sedgwick Online Letters project contained within the Primary Source Cooperative at the Massachusetts Historical Society. The presentation will include a brief introduction to this influential early American writer and a discussion of Anderson's process in producing a biographical chronology connecting Sedgwick's early letters with 19th-century historical and personal contexts.

This Friday! Join us for our next Morning Bytes, where Dr. Jill Anderson (English) will present on her work producing a biographical chronology for the Catharine Maria Sedgwick Online Letters project.

#DigitalHumanities @mhs1791.bsky.social

The “no, this is Patrick” meme. In the top cell, Patrick from SpongeBob answers the phone. The text reads “is this the end of the last phase of the late woodland period?” In the bottom cell, Patrick responds “No, this is Patrick!”

The “no, this is Patrick” meme. In the top cell, Patrick from SpongeBob answers the phone. The text reads “is this the end of the last phase of the late woodland period?” In the bottom cell, Patrick responds “No, this is Patrick!”

An excerpt from Pauketat’s The Ascent of Chiefs, a monograph on political authority in Cahokia, describing the archaeological chronology of the American Bottom. The highlighted text reads “In the Northern Bottom Expanse, the end of the last phase of the Late Woodland period, called Patrick…”

My new favorite fact about the archaeological chronology of the American Bottom. What other names should we give to archaeological periods? Our current moment gives strong Chad energy.

Call for Papers 13th Annual Symposium on Medieval and Renaissance Studies 8-10 June 2026 Saint Louis University Representing the Past: Material and Digital Surrogates in the Practice of History Organizers: Thomas Morin, Saint Louis University, and Margaret Smith, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville Increasing reliance on surrogates has transformed historians' avenues for inquiry and methodologies for interpreting information. The creation of digital surrogates has increased access to historical materials, but also raises questions about representation, conservation, and democratization. Parallel to these developments, the production of physical replicas of historical objects has also expanded immensely in the last several decades, bringing with it new teaching tools and research aids. But the production of these material surrogates has also heightened the tensions between access and authenticity. These replicas, both in the physical and digital spheres, have opened new paths and discussions about how scholars engage with history both academically and pedagogically, and in public spaces.   These sessions invite papers that explore the creation, use, and interpretation of surrogates in historical practice. How do digital and material surrogates mediate the relationship between researchers, objects, and audiences? How do they complement or challenge one another as forms of preservation and interpretation? We welcome contributions that address the processes of surrogate creation, the theoretical and ethical dimensions of representation, and the role of surrogates in pedagogy, public history, and digital humanities.   By bringing together scholars working across media, these panels seek to create dialogue on how historical knowledge is shaped through acts of reproduction, translation, and substitution. Prospective presenters should email their 100-200 word proposals to either thomas.morin@slu.edu or margars@siue.edu by 15 December 2025.

CFP alert! If you're working on digitization, replicas and reproductions, living history practices, or other forms of surrogate sources, we'd love to see a proposal for organized sessions at the 2026 Symposium on Medieval and Renaissance Studies. #DigitalHumanities #LivingHistory #CFP #MedievalSky

I’m watching a very old Jeopardy episode with a contestant who, when she was in high school, mailed her fingernails to a lady in California who would use them as false nails for celebrities. And like… I don’t think that lady was real?

Let this be a lesson to us all 🚵🍷

No bulb, no cord - what I’m hearing is I can light my home with the eerie glow of ectoplasm and cut my utility bill

A tall, sort of old-fashioned bronze lamp with no shade or bulb sitting on the sidewalk against the metro station fence. Oddly, no visible cord either — probably powered by ectoplasm or something

Happy Halloween from the definitely-not-haunted lamp that appeared at my metro station this morning!

Poster for a lecture co-sponsored by African American Literary Studies, the IRIS Center, and the Black Lit Network Dr. Howard Rambsy "The Literary Navigator: Curation and Discovery on the Black Literature Network" Wednesday, October 29, 11:00 AM Redmond Center classroom, Lovejoy Library 2nd floor

This Wednesday! @hrambsy.bsky.social will share his work on the Black Lit Network, a #DigitalHumanities project that brings scholarship on African American literary studies to public audiences and provides innovative discovery tools that link people to books based on their interests.