Vanessa Freedman

Letter by famed Jewish mystic sells for nearly $400,000 at auction Ramchal manuscript was quietly sold by Jewish Theological Seminary during financial crisis; scholar decries transfer of text to private owner as a 'scandal'

Letter by famed Jewish mystic sells for nearly $400,000 at auction https://www.timesofisrael.com/letter-by-famed-jewish-mystic-sells-for-nearly-400000-at-auction/

Getting a lot more people on this list for sharing antisemitic lies about the Talmud over the past couple of days.

Reminders:

1. The entire Talmud is public and freely available online. This Anyone claiming to know about "secret" or "hidden" Jewish teachings from it is lying to you.

Happening this Sunday!

Don't miss your chance for a behind the scenes tour of our latest exhibition, and to speak to members of our team about the vital work we do and how it can support your own research: wienerholocaustlibrary.org/event/interg...

Wonderful to see this finally come to fruition (I worked in the library from 2000 to 2007 and it was under discussion then!) @leobaeckcollege.bsky.social

And the new reading room here: lbc.ac.uk/reading-room...

#Archives #JewishHistory #JewishCommunity

Leo Baeck College Library - hiddentreasurenew Leo Baeck College Library, part of Leo Baeck College, contains 60,000 volumes exploring Jewish civilisation. The great texts of Jewish tradition are supported […]

Congratulations and good luck to our friends @leobaeckcollege.bsky.social who are opening their new reading room this week. We'll have more about it in our next Archivist in the Spotlight but in the meantime, find out about their library collection here: celebratingjewisharchives.org/archives/leo...

Paul Ayris obituary Other lives: Library leader at UCL committed to the movement for open science

Nice obituary of @ucllccos.bsky.social Pro-Vice Provost Paul Ayris by our former colleague Ben Meunier www.theguardian.com/books/2026/f...

Celebrate Hebrew International Language Day with us on 21 February!

Experience Bialik, King of the Jews - a powerful film by Yair Qedar - followed by a Q&A and poetry readings in Hebrew and Yiddish.

Secure your spot: buff.ly/leE7wk6
@uclhjs.bsky.social

Age verification?

My first work computer had no hard disk and had to be booted up from floppies

Spotlighting The World Factbook as We Bid a Fond Farewell Somewhat devastating news today from the CIA: One of CIA’s oldest and most recognizable intelligence publications, The World Factbook, has sunset. There's not even a hint as to why they …

The CIA just stopped publishing their World Factbook and took every page, including the archived copies of previous versions!

This sucks. It was public domain, so I recovered the 2020 edition (the last one published as a zip file) and shared it to GitHub simonwillison.net/2026/Feb/5/t...

I'm finding that searches on Google Books now don't even pick up metadata, including for books that I'd expect to be out of copyright. Searches return lots of periodical literature and little else.

Come Fill Your Dance Card: A Celebration of Jewish Dances Cards in the Library Special Collections 5 February 2026 at 18:00

Looking forward to tomorrow's 'Come Fill Your Dance Fill Your Dance Card'.
Hosted by @uclhjslibrary.bsky.social, @uclhjs.bsky.social and the IJS.

We're all booked up, but you can sign up for the waitlist (or let us know if you'd like a similar future event).

www.tickettailor.com/events/uclin....

Colne and Ver

Do you have reading suggestions for articles that underline the importance of (academic) libraries for students/staff? There exist a lot of articles, but I wonder what colleagues suggest as useful articles for students on this topic. Extra: master students in the humanities, not in library science.

This year's theme for LGBT+ History Month is Science and Innovation, celebrating the contributions of LGBT+ people throughout history and raising awareness of their discoveries. Share your book recommendations here: https://ucl-global.libwizard.com/f/LGBTplus2026

Why Authors Aren’t Disclosing AI Use and What Publishers Should (Not) do About It - Part 2 - The Scholarly Kitchen Current AI disclosure guidelines are failing and driving AI use underground rather than making it transparent. In this follow-up post, I turn to the more challenging question: what publishers should d...

Why Authors Aren’t Disclosing AI Use and What Publishers Should (Not) do About It – Part 2 scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2026/02/03/w...

Spotlight on Joanna Baines: joint UK Wikimedian of the Year for 2025 | UCL Open@UCL Blog UCL Homepage

@wikipedia.org recently celebrated its 25th birthday, so it felt fitting that we had the honour of speaking to Joanna Baines, joint UK Wikimedian of the Year 2025, for our Spotlight series!

Read the highlights of this conversation on our blog now buff.ly/XZVMoE8

@uclspeccoll.bsky.social

Scary

Why Authors Aren't Disclosing AI Use and What Publishers Should (Not) do About it - The Scholarly Kitchen Only a negligible percentage of authors seem to actually be disclosing their AI use. Here's why I think that's the case.

Why Authors Aren’t Disclosing AI Use and What Publishers Should (Not) do About it scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2026/01/27/w...

Come learn Edwardian ballroom dances from a 1909 Jewish dance card in the Gaster Papers!
With dance instructor Susan de Guardiola (USA), Subject Librarian @vrfreedman.bsky.social and myself (talking about Jewish balls).

@uclhjs.bsky.social @artshumsucl.bsky.social @biajs.bsky.social

!!! 10 days left for submitting proposals !!! #BIAJS2026

An introduction to Jewish terminology for cataloguing - hiddentreasurenew Workshop: Jewish terminology for cataloguing

Jewish material can present unique challenges to those working with it.

This blog runs through some top tips for archivists and others working with Jewish material, including reading Hebrew and caring for sacred texts.

Read more here: celebratingjewisharchives.org/blog/an-intr...

#Blog #Archives

International Fellowships 2026 The International Fellowships Programme enables researchers to work for two years at a UK institution with the aim of building a globally connected, mobile research and innovation workforce. Funding status Open for applications Career stage Early-career

Please help spread the word on this, especially to those who may be feeling cold winds towards their research.

We’ve opened the call for our International Fellowships, enabling early career researchers to work for two years at a UK research institution
www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/funding/sche...

UK academia’s presence on X is reaching a tipping point - Impact of Social Sciences Data collected on UK universities’ use of social media shows academic engagement with X is at a tipping point with more institutions off the platform than on.

💥New: UK academia’s presence on X is reaching a tipping point

✍️ @andytattersall.bsky.social

#X #AcademicSocialMedia #AcademicSky

A Bluesky challenge!

We've got so many great heritage/GLAM accounts here now, that some are flying under the radar

From national organisations to niche collections, these active accounts are all (at time of posting) under 500 followers-lowest at 9-how many can we get over 500?

go.bsky.app/U16Nwsw

Please Stop Calling Things Archives – AHA What do historians mean when they say "archive"? One archivist makes the case for a more precise use of the word.

Today, this made me happy 🥰 @brimwats.com

#museumlife

Some years ago I was in a restaurant in California with two small children. They wouldn’t accept my British credit card and I didn’t have enough cash. A complete stranger paid for our meal and refused our offer to pay her back later

You've never seen an LLM fabricate with more gusto than when you feed it a Judeo-Arabic text from the Cairo Geniza and ask for a translation. Absolute fantasy, confidently delivered.

Just arrived at #Limmud and already seen about 10 people I know - then I realised I’ve been coming for THIRTY YEARS

When we say "no, everything hasn't been digitized," I need you to understand that we really mean is that virtually nothing has been digitized. This is because the realm of primary sources that historians use is incomprehensibly large.