Dr. Lucia Akard

Fissures: Gender and Political Crisis 17-18 September 2026 Pembroke College, University of Cambridge Gendered work on medieval popular politics has tended to revolve around the exceptional. This workshop explores how studies of gender can reconfigure discourses of medieval political community. We ask how attending to gendered bodies and identities might help us better understand the fissures in political culture in medieval Europe. Marking, for example, women’s participation as either absent or rare confines their involvement to the historical margins. How did literary as well as non-literary texts from various genres, ranging from the thirteenth to the sixteenth centuries, engage with gendered political action? How did ideas of gender stabilise or destabilise political performances? We invite abstracts for 25-minute papers, as well as expressions of interest for participation. We welcome papers with a historical, literary, or interdisciplinary focus. Potential topics could include but are not limited to: • Frameworks for understanding non-normative gender expressions in political spaces. • Studies of politics at the intersection of gendered, queer, or trans methodologies. • Histories of masculinities in political community. • Emotion and/or Affect • Weaponized/defensive gender • Manoeuvring bodies through political crisis • Inclusion and exclusion • Different sites of political discourse, such as domestic and non-violent conflict. Collectively, the papers will interrogate the role of gender in political discourse. Selected papers may be considered for inclusion in an edited volume. Means-based bursaries for speakers may be available by further application. Please submit a title and abstract of no more than 200 words to Alice Raw (ar889@cam.ac.uk) and Abbie Fray (abigail.fray@unibe.ch) by 16 January 2026.

Call for Papers! Fissures: Gender and Political Crisis #medievalsky #Fissures2026

Inbox— next cover of the New Yorker: “Mayor Mamdani,” by Edel Rodriguez

A waiting list of thousands, and just five new homes for social rent: this city shows the depth of Britain’s housing crisis | John Harris Liverpool was once praised for its tolerance, but housing shortages are driving fearful, unsettling behaviours – and people are blaming outsiders, says Guardian columnist John Harris

Latest from me: on what Liverpool says about the housing crisis, and the uneasy state of politics www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

you don't understand. as someone who isn't inherently good at art, stealing paintings from the museum is the *only* way i'm able to express myself creatively. i wouldn't be able to paint beautiful portraits. but by breaking into a museum and stealing the paintings, now i am

@manongarcia.bsky.social @zoesqwilliams.bsky.social “It’s not because they’re dumb. It’s because there’s something about what it is for them to be a man, and to be entitled to women’s bodies, that makes them, I think, at least some of them, deeply convinced that they haven’t done anything wrong.”

How is this repeatedly made into a policy issue - by *all* parties - when the blunt fact of the matter is that grown adults who are obliged to pay for their own education, and relentlessly pursued to repay their loans, should be able to study whatever the fuck they want.

Mystified as to how they expect this policy to be implemented, and obviously they have announced it with 0 details

Oh, I was also double-paying into the system by paying into NI through my paychecks and also paying an immigration surcharge to access health care, while having an state-issued immigrant ID card which said 'NO ACCESS TO PUBLIC FUNDS'

The point was never to have workable rules: the point was to have rules that could be enforced selectively and cruelly and leave all trans people in uncertainty and danger. Cf. the same approach to immigrants - allow yourself to target who you like and assure 'the good ones' that 'it'll be fine'

When can we admit that it was weird to have a zoom event to announce that Chaucer wasn't a rapist. like. now that it's been a few years can we admit that was Not Good and that the evidence is still not as "clear" as was presented?

justice for the survivors

I have a global talent visa now which *should* mean that my path to ILR is safe, but I imagine Labour may change this as well. It really does suck giving so much of oneself to a country that clearly doesn't want you here

‘Paying twice’: workers face NHS bills of thousands in immigration crackdown Campaigners fear plans to make people wait longer for leave to remain could cost tax-paying skilled workers dearly

daily reminder that immigrants pay twice for the NHS and don't have access to public funds!

lol this happened to me when I was there in 2016. I stupidly assumed it had changed by now

AI Policy - The Medieval Academy of America 10/24/2025 » 10/25/2025Always Here: Non-Binary Gender, Trans Identities, and Queerness in the Global Middle Ages (c. 250–16

My main professional organization, @medievalacademy.bsky.social, has just pub'd a statement about the use of AI in its journal. Basically, DON'T! "AI tools cannot take ethical or legal responsibility for their output or enter into legal agreements." www.medievalacademy.org/page/AIPolicy #MedievalSky

all the best work happens that way

external monitor? no thanks, I prefer to do my transcribing hunched over my macbook on the couch, like god intended.

Seriously, fuck off.
I say that with all due gravity.

A Fish Falls From the Sky and Sparks a Brush Fire in British Columbia

For a medieval monastic chronicler, a headline to die for

I'm so tired of hearing that we need to "teach our students how to use AI" when the thing they most need to use it is a critical-thinking skill set that can only be acquired by NOT using it. I'm tired of hearing that it's inevitable. I'm tired.

Why isn’t bell hooks’s writing around men and love not seen as a progressive text on how men can get laid, i.e., form healthy romantic relationships with people in their lives?

Not so fun fact: in the Middle Ages people hated procuresses. I knew this, and wrote about it with @lollardfish.bsky.social for @slate.com slate.com/news-and-pol... Another not so fun fact I learned this summer. While there was a lot of hatred of procuresses they sometimes pardoned them.

Subway-style map of the itinerary in The Hobbit. The main journey is show in three different lines: red (Hobbiton to Goblin Town); green (Goblin Town to the Elvenking's Halls); and blue (Elvenking's Halls to Erebor). There are multiple stops on these lines. There is a yellow line going back from Erebor to Hobbiton, making stops at Beorn's Hall, Rivendell, and the Troll's Lair. There is an orange line directly from the Iron Hills on the map's right side to Erebor, and a purple line from Gundabad directly to Erebor. The map's title reads: "Hobbit Transit Map" and there are directions for both There and Back Again listing the lines and transfer points. Between them, in the middle of the page, is a dragon drawn to resemble the dragon on Thror's Map from The Hobbit. A key shows the names of each colored line: Red: Western Lands Line Green: Mountains and Forests Line Blue: Barrel Line Yellow: Gandalf Express Orange: Iron Hills Business Line Purple: Orc and Goblin Reserve Line Text at the bottom right reads Surprised Eel Maps, 2025

Subway style map to go with The Lord of the Rings, showing the different pathways of various parties throughout the book. The title reads: "Lord of the Rings Transit Map: One Does Not Simply Walk Ino Mordor When One Can Ride." The map takes up the middle part of the page, and there are two keys. The one on the left is titles "Standard Service Lines, and has color keys matched to the subway lines on the map. Lines are named: "Shire-Bree Commuter Line Old Forrest Crescent Wildland Scenic Line Fellowship Line Gollum / Sméagol Line Uruk Hai Express Three Hunters Line Fangorn Slow Service Rohan to Gondor Business Line Black Ships Ferry Service Oliphant Direct Line Army of the West Line Gandalf Express A smaller key on the right side of the map is labeled: "Limited Service Lines" and has color keys matched to the following names lines: "Eagle Express Paths of the Dead Line Nazgûl Search & Resuce Valinor Ltd." Two notes at the bottom read: "* Mount Doom station only accepts Rings of Power in payment. Plan accordingly. + Transfer voucher for ferry service at Grey Havens station is for outbound tafle only."

Over the weekend I drew these two subway maps for The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, and shared them. A lot of you asked about purchasing them, and now you can!

You can buy one or both (as digital files or as prints) at my brand new Etsy shop:

surprisedeelmaps.etsy.com

also, they definitely wage fix these jobs (illegal) because they effectively all agree (via the conference of colleges) to pay on the stipendiary lecturer scale.

it is also astounding that these tutors are, on top of teaching duties, often expected to perform welfare duties for students and provide them with guidance. it makes me think Oxford colleges dgaf about their students! bc they pay the staff helping them so little.

thinking about this as there's a Christ Church stip in medieval history up at the moment. if you ask fellows of such colleges why they continue to pay so little, they are incapable of giving a coherent answer. they are incapable of supporting their junior colleagues & changing things, too.

never not insane that Oxford colleges that have endowments in the hundreds of millions of pounds continue to pay lecturers salaries that are near impossible to live on in one of the most expensive cities in the UK.

4. Every other discipline thinks they can do history but they often cannot

I'll be researching communities of sex workers in Dijon in the 15th century. Excited to finally get back to the archive there and get to work on the project that I've been dreaming about for years.

Thrilled to announce that for the next three years I'll be a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow at @york.ac.uk!
www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/funding/post...