Aine Bennett

Very excited to be a new co-convenor of GIRWG! Stay tuned for our plans for the year

Yesterday morning I woke up from a being chased dream where the only escape was on the ferry to "dissertation island" (no joke) but I couldn't get on the ferry...
In unrelated news, today I submitted my PhD thesis

Keep in mind that when we talk about family reunification routes, they only apply when someone has been granted refugee status. That means this government is saying, "we know you have fled persecution. We know your family remains at risk therefore. We are going to ensure you cannot see them again".

This is a 5-year postdoc position! One for the queer STS / medical humanities and other scholars out there. What a cool opportunity

Proud of the work we've done on this report and hope it's useful for people in the youth sector!

Israeli plan for forced transfer of Gaza’s population ‘a blueprint for crimes against humanity’ Military ordered to turn ruins of Rafah into ‘humanitarian city’ experts call an internment camp for all Palestinians in Gaza

Important that you keep any protests against this quiet and discreet, so that nobody notices.

Cold comfort I'm sure but I do think you've produced fascinating work in that time!
Just would be nice if the employment overlords could recognise that too

Feinberg, Leslie; Fianna Fáil is a personal fave

Reading this immediately after receiving another rejection
At a recent conference, everyone else I spoke to who's on the market this year talked about it being harder than other years
Glad 10 years of higher education are paying off!

Trans Feminism and the Women's Liberation Movement in Britain, c. 1970–1980 The history of the British women's liberation movement (WLM) is a growing field of study, but it has had little to say about trans participants in the movement. Drawing on feminist and LGBT+ archives...

👀👀👀

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

EHRC Drops Workplace Toilet Advice Amid Legal Threat - Law360 Britain's equal rights watchdog has dropped its advice to employers that they must provide single-sex toilets in the wake of a landmark U.K. Supreme Court decision in the face of a court challenge.

None of those newspapers (or the BBC) that gleefully ran stories when the EHRC gave trans people a shoeing will now report on the EHRC admitting they (and hence those stories) were wrong. Are those outlets craven - or dishonest?

Thank goodness for the legal press. www.law360.com/articles/235...

Short thread on Yvette Cooper's decision to ban Palestine Action. 🧵

In the Linen Hall library finishing prep for this roundtable and panel I am very excited to be on tomorrow at #BISA2025
If you're also in Belfast, come and join us! 🌈🎓

"diverted" is when the 75 bus goes through an alternative route due to roadworks, not when a boat is seized in international waters

Very proud seeing some former students' work included here!

Open letter to Julie Saunders, Vice Chancellor and Principal and Andrew Boggs, University Secretary, about the hosting of a talk on "Trans-scepticism" Please note: Dr Gascoigne is an active member of teaching staff. We have therefore allowed the option for anonymous signatures. We would encourage initials for those who are comfortable, or otherwise ...

An academic in our department gave a "trans-sceptical" talk on campus today. We have written an open letter to the Principal and University Secretary expressing our opposition to transphobia on our campus - we hope others in the RHUL community will sign: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Open letter to Julie Saunders, Vice Chancellor and Principal and Andrew Boggs, University Secretary, about the hosting of a talk on "Trans-scepticism" Please note: Dr Gascoigne is an active member of teaching staff. We have therefore allowed the option for anonymous signatures. We would encourage initials for those who are comfortable, or otherwise ...

An academic in our department gave a "trans-sceptical" talk on campus today. We have written an open letter to the Principal and University Secretary expressing our opposition to transphobia on our campus - we hope others in the RHUL community will sign: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Today! Oxford people, see you there!

Closely followed (for no immediately pressing reason 👀) by thinking whisperers and gum chewers in libraries should be banned

This has gone some way towards dissuading me from my (I hope) most reactionary opinion that you should have to pass a cycling proficiency test before renting a lime bike...

Just going to slowly introduce some of my research to BlueSky.

I'm a critical theorist interested in political possibilities of new media, particularly memes. My first journal article was a theoretical framework for the political study of internet memes.

www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Not In Our Name: Feminist Academics and Educators Speak Out Against Transphobia We call on all trans-inclusive feminist academics and educators to sign this statement: ‘Not In Our Name’ We are non-trans feminist academics and educators. We write in support of trans rights, tran...

I have just signed the open letter "Not In Our Name: Feminist Academics and Educators Speak Out Against Transphobia" in response to the recent hateful and harmful Supreme Court ruling
I hope others will too: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Trans women are women and no court judgement can change that. Without wanting to diminish the negative effect that legal oppression has on trans lives, there is no reason why lawyers and judges are qualified to make this argument over actual experts in the field.

regardless of today’s outcome, it is morally indefensible to have a court ruling on something that affects a population, using evidence and findings that did not consult a single member of that population.

And then we were 91.

Royal Holloway already has had so many interventions and threats of redundancies in recent years. 😥

Statement on the Importance of Sexuality and Gender Research Published in The Journal of Sex Research (Ahead of Print, 2025)

“Research into sexuality and gender is vital for identifying social, cultural, and medical needs of populations, and addressing inequalities across populations.”

It’s good to see editors of academic journals refuse to comply with increasing state censorship of sexuality and gender scholarship.

🌈🎓

Statement against the Repression of Academic Freedom in the United States and its Disproportionate Impact on Racialized Peoples Please fill out the Google Form hyperlinked in the statement to add your name as a signatory to this statement.

I have signed this statement "Against the Repression of Academic Freedom in the United States and its Disproportionate Impact on Racialized Peoples" and strongly encourage fellow academics to do so too: twailr.com/statement-ag...

Thank you to the organisers for bringing this together

Congrats Tom, really important work!

At least 326 killed as Israel unleashes wave of attacks on Gaza Israeli assaults across Gaza resume, effectively shattering the fragile ceasefire with Hamas.

The unspeakable evil of this settler colonial genocide 💔

www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/3/...

Trump is using Mahmoud Khalil to test his mass deportation plan | Heba Gowayed The Palestinian student’s arrest at Columbia University is a harbinger of what’s to come on college campuses

For the @theguardian.com I wrote about the abduction of Mahmoud Khalil & Trump's exploitation of anti-Palestinian racism to descend the nation into authoritarianism, with the full collaboration of academia.

No one is free until Palestine is free.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...