Amy Blair

"Let me be clear: we have disappeared a man who has committed no crime of any sort simply because he is a political dissident"

Hi SHARPists! Check out our Starter Pack, and send us a message via chat if you'd like to be added!

go.bsky.app/KNSyCSb

Unusually powerful March storm threatens to create a blizzard, tornadoes and fires as it crosses the US

The rare fireblizznado on its way

I needed this...this is the energy I am taking into today.

Not a metaphor. Not at all.

Evergreen

HUZZAH!!

Teaching “Frankenstein” at the Flying University for Ukrainian Students | Los Angeles Review of Books English professor Deidre Lynch ponders the lessons her Ukrainian students taught her about the place of the humanities in difficult times — and ponders, too, how these students altered her reading of ...

At 1 point in Frankenstein Elizabeth says "now misery has come home, & men appear to me as monsters thirsting for each other's blood." When I taught the book over Zoom to Ukrainian students in summer 2022 this line grabbed us. Too many reasons to recall it today:
lareviewofbooks.org/article/teac...

Chicago protest feb 19 10am 828 s wolcott

protest the theft of public money + public goods! TOMORROW all over!

protests, rallies + press conferences coordinated by AFCSME, AAUP, AFT, UAW, HELU+ others, for researchers+ public servants + their supporters.

find your local action!
www.labor4highered.org

chicago join us at 10am!

Iowa Rushes, Advances Librarian Criminalization Bill Introduced last week, Iowa's librarian criminalization bill has already made it to the House floor.

Iowa's House File 274, which would criminalize librarians, passes out of the House Education Committee. It can now be heard on the floor.

What this bill is, what it would mean for library and school workers, and why it was rushed through.

bookriot.com/iowa-rushes-...

“Life under autocracy…is stultifying. It’s boring. It feels like trying to see and breathe under water — because you are submerged in bad ideas, being discussed badly, being reflected in bad journalism and, eventually, in bad literature and bad movies.”

(I know the world is burning...but little moments of joy...)

Giddy-delighted that TASTING AND TESTING BOOKS was awarded an honorable mention by the RSAP 2023-4 Book Prize. And the cover is gorgeous so I'll repost it here.

An answer to the question circulating this week about whether to use US flags at protests

this is an extinction level event for university budgets, and mid-year. I imagine there will be lawsuits fast

Cover image for TASTING AND TESTING BOOKS, just out from University of Massachusetts Press. Image of a woman sitting with a book on her lap, a contemplative look on her face.

Now that THE BOOK is out in the world, I think *I* can get back out in the world. Available now from UMass Press!

www.umasspress.com/978162534820...

It was a love letter to early-aughts Boston me.

"SWORDS INTO PLOWSHARES": An ingot made from the melted-down head and sword of Charlottesville's Robert E. Lee statue — via @socialistdogmom.bsky.social

Frequently, successfully.

It's the playbook. Wow.

Thank you Sarah! The pleasure was all mine. :-)

Thank *you*!! :-)

Don't miss a beautiful and brilliant article by @sarahpyke.bsky.social ("'The childhood I was meant to be in': The Queer Time of Reading") OR @seeshespeak.bsky.social reviewing BOOK MADNESS

Cover, RECEPTION: Readers, Texts, Audiences, History v15 (2023); Special Issue READING TIME: OR, TL; DR

I can't figure out this site yet (smile). Here's an overly-large and improperly-cropped picture of the cover.

Old-ish news but I'm pretty darn pleased with it: RECEPTION v15 (2023) Special Issue, READING TIME: OR, TL; DR. I co-edited this with @ikax.bsky.social; co-authoring intro with her reminded me: writing can be exhilarating. Contributors post tk

scholarlypublishingcollective.org/psup/reception

Was-15-is-now-16 suddenly somehow became obsessed with "Hey" in March, then the rest of the Pixies catalogue. IDK how it happened, good parenting I guess

Thank you, thank you...pointed to this by @ikax.bsky.social and it is more perfect for me right now than (my) (current) words can express.

😀

OK fine. I missed you people.