Emily Harmer

‘If I think about what this means, I want to cry’: what happens when a city loses its university? When Essex University’s Southend campus opened, it was a message of hope for a ‘left behind’ UK seaside town. Its closure will be felt far beyond its 800 students, some of whom will not get their degrees

‘If I think about what this means, I want to cry’: what happens when a city loses its university?

NEW: NEW: Standards commissioner finds Nigel Farage committed seventeen breaches of MPs code of conduct.

He failed to declare £333,000 in outside interests (more than 3x MPs annual salary)…

We're recruiting!

Please do spread the news far and wide. We're excited by the prospect of being joined by another great new colleague!

“Twitter to Yell at Them, Facebook to Ask Questions and Instagram to Show Support?” Exploring Platform Effects in Responses to Women Politicians On Social Media Previous research has shown that women politicians are often subject to more incivility, hate speech, and sexualized abuse on social media. Until now, studies tend to analyze one platform, and ther...

New publication in Political Communication by department members Dr. Emily Harmer and Dr. Rosalynd Southern!

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

All the supposedly progressive people saying 'Nigel Farage's racism doesn't matter. His fans love it'.

It matters whether the leader of the party leading all the opinion polls is an outright racist. It matters if he called black people 'wogs' and said 'gas them' to Jews. Not everything is a game

The AI Turn in Journalism Abstract: Unlike previous changes in digital media technologies over the past few decades, this AI “turn” in journalism forces us to rethink journalism’s identity and its relationship with audiences. While AI complicates and challenges some existing professional, social, political, and economic structures, it also offers new ways to realize desired journalistic objectives that were previously considered to be impractical, if not impossible. Drawing on four orienting ideas—adoption and hype, power and dependency, audiences and democratic implications, and education and empowerment—I unpack the implications of this AI turn in journalism and the consequences for the future of the journalistic field.

Dear colleagues, we are delighted to invite you to our DigiPol research seminar given by DigiPol visiting fellow Tomás Dodds. Wednesday 3.30pm to 5pm School of the Arts Library or email rsouth@liverpool.ac.uk to join online. Abstract below. Please re skeet!

When benefits are denied by data not humans: In a botched 'crackdown' on benefit fraud, a woman who booked a flight from London to Oslo but never got on the plane had her child benefit stopped by the UK government - because she didn't 'return'. HMRC told her their records showed she had emigrated!

For anyone in the Liverpool area, we are hosting a conversation and hands-on workshop on abortion rights and creative methods as part of the ESRC Festival of Social Science - come join us! Sign up here: www.ticketsource.co.uk/claire-piers...
@livunihss.bsky.social @livunipol.bsky.social

Framing and Argumentative Strategies in Modern Slavery Statements: Debating Sustainability or Avoiding Responsibility? This chapter develops an analysis of the linguistic content of modern slavery statements by UK-based businesses, which represent a genre of sustainability communication that has emerged in recent year...

New publication from faculty members Dr. Rudi Palmieri and Dr. Ekaterina Balabanova!

link.springer.com/chapter/10.1...

If any Government can just snatch basic human rights away from any section of society when it pleases then none of us has rights – just privileges that can be taken away by people in power whenever they want

You are pretty iconic though 😆

Why is @ucu.org.uk engaging in the very behaviour that we/it publicly call out when members’ employers employ such tactics?

It is shameful. It undermines every branch of #UCU

It’s utterly destructive to staff morale and our branches’ leverage

Not in our name.

Solidarity @uniteucu.bsky.social

Reminder! ⚠️ The deadline to submit your abstract and/or panel to our joint conference "Navigating Digital Democracy" with @psampg.bsky.social is fast approaching! ⌛ Full details on the CfP, with info on the topics for consideration, fees and prizes here 👉 www.bournemouth.ac.uk/navigating-d...

Trump Ambassador’s Fortune Intertwined With Big Tech Trade Push President Donald Trump’s UK ambassador holds investments in the companies set to develop flagship tech projects across the country. U.S. financial records show that Warren Stephens’ family-owned inves...

🔴 NEW 🔴

Trump’s ambassador to the UK has hundreds of millions invested in the Big Tech companies that will benefit from this week's trade deal.

📝 @desmog.com story 👇

🌟Submissions open: "Anti-Racist Feminist Politics: Thinking with Backlash, Creating New Worlds" at ECPG 2026 🌟

ecpr.eu/Events/Event...

Organised by @drashleec.bsky.social Akwugo Emejulu, Leah Bassel & me

@ecprgender.bsky.social @nclpolitics.bsky.social @psa-race.bsky.social @bsarace.bsky.social

#meccsa2025 | Dr Antje Glück Very humbled to be awarded the best journal article of the year 2025 by #Meccsa2025 for "Fighting Against the Machine," an article having been a collaborative work with my fabulous COJO against COVID ...

Congratulations to Dr Antje Glück and her co-authors for winning Journal Article of the Year at MeCCSA 2025 for their Journalism Studies article 'Fighting Against the Machine: Inside a Solutions Journalism Campaign in UK Local Newsrooms'.

www.linkedin.com/posts/dr-ant...

We have an exhibition accompanying our events at the British Science Festival this weekend about the voyager space probes! It explores the ideas and legacy of the Voyager space probes. You can read more context (and view the exhibition!) here: digitalheritagelab.liverpool.ac.uk/voyager

Actively resent the fact we’re expected to listen to a press conference on “mass deportations” as if this is a perfectly normal, mainstream thing and not the unhinged rantings of a racist who is somehow on my television.

Did Tommy Robinson put together this lead story? Half the British press seems to actively want pogroms

This Bloomsbury writing fellowship sounds great. It is 'open to UK-based, up-and-coming authors and researchers who identify as Black, Asian or Ethnically Diverse (BAED)' with a 1 October deadline.

www.bloomsbury.com/uk/discover/...

Where Is the Political Leadership Against This Violent Far-Right Movement Terrorising Britain? The silence of senior mainstream politicians and media organisations against the rise of a new well-organised far-right movement on Britain's streets is a disgrace, argues Adam Bienkov

Far right groups are threatening to burn down hotels full of refugees at events attended by senior politicians, while people of colour live in fear after being falsely labelled as paedophiles

How mainstream politicians and media organisations are allowing a violent far right movement to spread

As asylum seekers are engulfed by slurs and lies, our leaders shrug. Truly, this is shameful | Frances Ryan The narrative that they are a threat to women and girls has no basis in fact, but bad actors peddle it, and ministers encourage them, says Guardian columnist Frances Ryan

As asylum seekers are engulfed by slurs and lies, our leaders shrug. Truly, this is shameful | Frances Ryan

The Online Safety Act is Forcing Brits to Hand Over Personal Data to 'Unregulated' Overseas Corporations With Questionable Privacy Records The age verification services used by social media platforms include a company funded by a Trump-supporting billionaire and a firm set up by former Israeli intelligence officers

🔴Online Safety Act is Forcing Brits to Hand Over Their Data to ‘Unregulated’ Overseas Corporations With Questionable Privacy Records

Age verification firms used by social media platforms include company tied to a Trump-supporting billionaire and a firm set up by former Israeli intelligence ...

Do you identify as a woman and are aged between 18 and 30? Do you use social media? How do you feel about representations of paid work on social media? I am looking for women (including those identifying as non-binary and trans women) from all backgrounds who engage with work-related content on social to discuss their experiences. You do not need to be currently employed to take part in this study. The interview will take approximately one hour and will be conducted online. You will be asked to bring in a meme relating to work – either one you found, or one you created yourself. You will receive a £30 voucher for taking part in the interview. Sign up to show interest by filling out this form: https://surreyfbel.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_aY6hOtqQ7BAaLQy For more details, please contact the researcher Nathalie Weidhase at n.weidhase@surrey.ac.uk The project is funded by a British Academy Small Research Grant, and has received ethical approval from the University of Surrey Ethics Committee (Ref. Ethics RM ID: 1298). End of recruitment period: December 2025.

📢 Please share with your networks and anyone you think might be interested! 📢 I'm looking for participants for my research project on young women's understanding of paid work on and through social media, including phenomena such as the #girlboss #corporatequeen or #lazygirljobs.

Palestine Action co-founder wins permission to challenge ban Huda Ammori argued that home secretary’s decision to proscribe group under terrorism laws was ‘abuse of power’ The co-founder of Palestine Action can bring a legal challenge to the home secretary’s decision to ban the direct action group under anti-terrorism laws, a high court judge has ruled. Lawyers for Huda Ammori argued at a hearing in London last week that the proscription of Palestine Action, placing it on a par with groups such as Islamic State and Boko Haram, was “repugnant” and an “authoritarian and blatant abuse of power”. Continue reading...

Palestine Action co-founder wins permission to challenge ban

📣 Working on tech, journalism and politics. Making sense of the implications of tectonic changes?

Submit to our @digitaljournalism.bsky.social special issue

Info: drive.google.com/file/d/182p3...

🗓️ Abstracts: September 15

@curdknupfer.bsky.social @lenafrescamente.bsky.social @gehrke.bsky.social

‘Worse than anything under the Tories’: changes to welfare bill anger disability campaigners Government concessions fail to appease disabled people’s groups, concerned that disabled people in the future will be condemned to poverty

Disabled people’s orgs have told the Guardian that plans to exempt only existing claimants from the cuts will create a “two-tier” benefit system that “condemns” future disabled people to poverty. As one said, “Is it even legal?”

My story on the fallout: www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

"Cutting disabled people's benefits won't magically create suitable jobs, particularly in those parts of the country that have long had weaker jobs markets. It's little wonder so many disable people are fearful of the impact of the government's cuts" - Abby Jitendra, Principal Policy Adviser

Ahead of a crucial vote on cuts to disability benefits, our new evidence casts doubt on whether jobs are even available for disabled people facing cuts 📢

The analysis found that the parts of the country among the hardest hit by the cuts have fewer job opportunities 1/3

Liverpool Hope University cuts 'devastating' for its reputation - BBC News Liverpool Hope University says it is planning cuts "to ensure financial and academic stability".

39 lecturers at Liverpool Hope face redundancy.

“This will devastate our community, the university’s reputation, and the local economy.” Roberto Catello, branch secretary.

#StopTheCuts #UCU

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

#Dreamteam 😍

Yesterday @digipol.bsky.social hosted the launch of the Online Safety Toolkit - a training resource for all those working in politics and how to stay safe online.

Make sure to check it out here: saferpolitics.org