Catherine Baker

I wrote down some preliminary thoughts on how to understand the place of anti-trans ideology in far right as well as left-wing and liberal politics. This form of reaction is fundamental to the right, but its potential is much broader, as the UK demonstrates.

Genuinely surprised they didn’t ask her about trans diagnoses too…

Media must stop normalizing the far right Every uncritical mention of far-right rhetoric is an editorial decision with political consequences.

Must read from @gsamaras.bsky.social

"Every uncritical mention of far-right rhetoric is an editorial decision with political consequences. Every headline, every clip, every click adds weight. This is how the line gets crossed"

www.politico.eu/article/medi...

How I'm Teaching About Generative AI Every choice I make about how to discuss GenAI with my students is predicated on trusting them

New today in TIW: Historian @cjdenial.bsky.social on teaching about AI. "in every iteration of this conversation I have had with students in the last two years, there is one constant: almost no one knows about the ethical issues surrounding GenAI before they delve into the readings I’ve assigned."

CFP: Sounding Things: Props, Material Culture, and Accessories in Popular Music

Abstract Deadline: May 1, 2026
Abstract Length: 350–500 words
Editors: Kate Galloway, Paxton Haven, and Mike Levine

Full call here: drive.google.com/file/d/1mfyd...

A family with 3-d glasses shocked by what they see on their mobile devices screens

The far right in Spain and Portugal didn’t go mainstream alone.

The Iberian media system played a key role in their normalization 📺📻📰

2 new publications out now🔥

This marks the closing chapter of my project POLAR, a research journey that began in 2021.

A 🧵on how Vox and Chega became mainstream 👇

‘With YLE satisfied that their demands from the EBU have been met for this year’s contest, the protesters’ demands instead get pushed onto the winning act … like many others, they will have to act as unwilling diplomats in this fractured geopolitical landscape’

But fair enough as a reaction - that’s been a lot of people’s…

Is Terry as disappointed by Eurovision as a number of people on here currently…?

"Everything is politics...You don't get to make art in a fascist state"

CMAT delivering, mar is gnách. 👏

(Same goes for sport btw)

#Speirgorm

Half Excel, Half Imagination: UMK's Quirky Confidence And Rebellion Promotional image for an article prvieiwng UMK 2026 (photo: Ben Robertson)

What sets UMK, Finland’s selection show for Eurovision, apart from the others is the quality of its staging concepts, argues @bensvision.bsky.social. Here, he speaks with Show Producer Matti Myllyaho to learn how Yle finds each act, the quality-over-quantity approach, and how it all comes together.

"He propagates what we call cyborg conservatism."

I spoke with @quinnslobodian.com and @bentarnoff.com for this week’s @verfassungsblog.de editorial about their new book "Muskism" and the fusion of political authority and machine power.

📖 Read the full interview here: verfassungsblog.de/muskism/

…or of European public broadcasters?

I loved this article, particularly this: "In highlighting the ways some fans endeavour to minimize or avoid contributing to harm, even as they continue to watch to the contest, I do not aim to let people off the hook for more complicit actions, but to show that complicity and resistance coexist"

“I was completely heartbroken”: Trans woman forced to stop playing cricket for fun | Good Law Project When the ECB banned trans women, Lily’s amateur club barred her from the team where she had played for years – we’re helping her hit back

"These rules are hurting women who just want to play sport with their friends.

"We’re helping Lily sue the ECB for discrimination under the Equality Act 2010. Lily, and players like her across the UK, are pillars of their community, and excluding them is a stain on women’s sport."

*agrees in historian*

Not been following Eurovision much for obvious reasons, but this long read from Catherine is a great exploration of the complicated cultural history some ex-Yugo nations are struggling with on the musical front <3

Few in this country have worked to promote the understanding of race and class as historical phenomena in Britain as long, or as well, as Catherine Hall.

None of it is a fad. It is all politics, in the hard, real sense.

Witchiness, feminism, ethnonationalism, Balkan religious and historical messiness, the intersection of art and politics, complex messaging and the lack of it, etc etc
There's no politics in Eurovision though.

Teaching Slavery Teaching Slavery offers ground-breaking research and practical guidance for teaching Britain’s role in transatlantic slavery. Combining historical analysis with classroom strategies, it equips educato...

I cannot recommend highly enough this free, open access resource for anyone teaching about slavery in the UK

uclpress.co.uk/book/teachin...

It certainly took me back to when I was writing mine!

‘Why is history writing itself all over again?’: 37 things about Lelek which can all be true at once This year’s Eurovision Song Contest will be taking place without five of its most regular participants, including one from the post-Yugoslav space: Slovenia’s broadcaster was one of the earliest to…

Since Lelek became Croatia’s #Eurovision entry, I’ve been trying to think through where they sit in 🇭🇷 and 🇪🇺 cultural politics right now.

New blog post: ‘Why is history writing itself all over again?’: 37 things about Lelek which can all be true at once bakercatherine.wordpress.com/2026/02/26/w...

Policy priority 2 after 4 years of Russia’s war against Ukraine: Stop relying on 🇺🇦's ‘resilience’ to ensure its survival. European leaders should not look at the dogged endurance of Ukraine’s armed forces & civilians & assume that it is infinite.

Read here: buff.ly/6RWmjER

Whatever else you’ve done today, you probably haven’t had a £2m Fabergé egg nicked out of your handbag.

There’s more to say about how the Fabergés were helping a Russian Empire that was colonising Ukraine, the Caucasus etc assert itself as an imperial power, but that’s a whole other conversation.

And he got away with her laptop. How big was this handbag…?

Queer histories in the farm records What can farm records teach us about same-sex relationships? Researcher Tim Jerrome shares his work exploring queer rural experiences.

If you're researching queer history in England, farm records might be one of the last places you'd check.

Yet for #LGBTQHistoryMonth, @timjerrome.bsky.social shares how he's tracing queer histories within our farm archives, and gives tips for future research.

merl.reading.ac.uk/news-and-vie...

Politics take center stage at 2026 Winter Olympics From JD Vance at the Opening Ceremony to athletes refusing to shut up and ski, politics has been a major story at the 2026 Olympics.

‘In other words, the Olympics has always been about more than just the sports athletes compete in, and the Games have always been political. So, too have sports outside of the Olympics … “Everyone’s humanity is worth more than sports.”’ awfulannouncing.com/news/politic...

YouTube video by Festival of Tomorrow Festival Of Tomorrow - Eurovision and the future of broadcast entertainment

One of the exhibition curators was speaking a few weeks ago - it takes so long to develop exhibitions like these that this is legacy from #Eurovision being in 🇬🇧 in 2023 www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9HI...

I was *just* at a wonderful event on queer cultures and the post-Yugoslav space at the IAS last week.

Firmed up some ways of thinking with Bosnian queer ideas of possibility, connected an activist and researcher who didn’t know each other, and that’s just what one person got from being there.

‘The turn of c20/21 witnessed mainstream politicians hype the far right & use it as a scarecrow, while they positioned themselves as the bulwark: vote for us to save democracy!… Yet as crises remained unaddressed & things worsened, the far right found itself increasingly legitimised & mainstreamed’