David Abulafia (1949-2026)
Professor David Abulafia CBE has died. He was 76.
A great historian, and a great friend of @bsrome.bsky.social, passes from us.
David Abulafia 1949-2026
www.cai.cam.ac.uk/news/david-a...
26.01.2026 12:20 β π 7 π 0 π¬ 0 π 0
The James Ford Lectures in British History
The Language of Social Science in Everyday Life - Peter Mandler (Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge)
Prof @petermandler.bsky.social will give the James Ford Lectures 2026 @oxhistoryfaculty.bsky.social
Peter Mandler will chart the spread & use of the language of social science into everyday life in 20th-century Britain.
Thursdays, 5pm
Weeks 1-6 Hilary Term
π www.history.ox.ac.uk/james-ford-l...
21.01.2026 10:21 β π 22 π 10 π¬ 0 π 3
O Wert Thou In The Cauld Blast by Robert Burns - read by Professor Peter Mackay, Scotland's Makar β our national poet. π΄σ §σ ’σ ³σ £σ ΄σ Ώ
Happy #BurnsNight from everyone at the University of St Andrews.
#EverToExcel
25.01.2026 12:21 β π 18 π 8 π¬ 0 π 0
'The editors of this volume have laid down a challenge, nothing less than the promotion of a new late antiquity: Eurasian Late Antiquity... the continental regions of Eurasia were subject... to forces bringing them together... a βhidden gridβ of linkages connecting them.' Averil Cameron, p. 419
24.01.2026 16:26 β π 38 π 13 π¬ 5 π 3
A view along the lower deck context gallery, with the ship sort-of visible through a smallish window. It's also covered in ducting, which isn't ideal.
The Mary Rose from the lower deck context gallery now, with full views of the ship.
Did you last visit when the ship was covered in ducting and visible through small windows?
Time for a return visit...
maryrose.org/Visit
24.01.2026 09:15 β π 37 π 9 π¬ 1 π 0
Congratulations to Karen Solie on winning the TS Eliot Prize for her most recent collection Wellwater, published by @picadorbooks.bsky.social
Karen Solie teaches for half the year at St Andrews University and lives the rest of her time in Canada. Karen is part of @northseapoets.bsky.social group.
20.01.2026 13:44 β π 45 π 18 π¬ 2 π 0
Happy to share that there will be MORE funding and MORE support than ever before for highly innovative creative organisations looking to build their businesses and have an impact. Many details to work through but this is a clear statement of intent and framework for brilliance π Thanks @ukri.org !
20.01.2026 17:15 β π 4 π 2 π¬ 0 π 0
Sad news; I worked with John Wallace to establish higher degrees at RSAMD, now the Royal Conservatoire of Music, validated by @uniofstandrews.bsky.social . He was funny, determined and passionate about music and education. RIP.
12.01.2026 19:39 β π 3 π 0 π¬ 0 π 0
So... I've created a starter pack of UK government organisations currently on Bluesky: go.bsky.app/JHsY1Wz
(Currently includes all those listed under ministerial and non-ministerial departments here www.gov.uk/government/o... - let me know any I've missed, or got wrong)
11.01.2026 19:09 β π 177 π 122 π¬ 19 π 8
Wonderful to see a shout out to Hay Castle, run by the excellent Tom True, in this super piece.
12.01.2026 07:35 β π 1 π 0 π¬ 1 π 0
Why I canβt walk past a tiny second-hand bookshop: a romance
The first one set the template for this romance.
Canβt write much about what Iβm reading till weβre done on the judging of @womensprize.bsky.social for non fiction - but hereβs something I wrote on Substack. The process helped me make sense of how much of my reading, and my life, has been shaped.
open.substack.com/pub/thangamd...
11.01.2026 16:01 β π 149 π 15 π¬ 7 π 1
Sean Scully | Blue
Somewhere, in the middle of the song,
people held hands, the hall turned Blue.
Sean Scully
ropac.net/online-exhib...
12.01.2026 06:18 β π 2 π 0 π¬ 1 π 0
Text Shot: The results showed that the most prominent use of AI in academic libraries is for reference and information services. Furthermore, it was found that 48.28Β % (14) of the articles cited Funding as the major institutional challenge to AI adoption in academic libraries. A cluster of studies included in the review emphasized the need for more user-driven research on AI applications in academic libraries. This study reflects the importance of retraining librarians to develop new competencies in managing AI-enhanced communication tools, including chatbot integration and prompt engineering.
Adoption of artificial intelligence in academic libraries: A systematic review of current practices, challenges, and research opportunities www.sciencedirect.com/science/articl⦠#AI #libraries
11.01.2026 06:31 β π 10 π 7 π¬ 0 π 1
Anyone interested in #AI and #libraries should also have a look at the superb and balanced overview published by the Conference of European National Librarians CENL, arising from a meeting @natlibscot.bsky.social
www.cenl.org/artificial-i...
11.01.2026 07:18 β π 2 π 1 π¬ 0 π 0
βInconsistencyβ fears after REF retreat on environment metrics
Clear guidance needed on how narrative-based submissions will be graded to avoid accusations that judgements are overly subjective, say experts
'Limited use of metrics in the UKβs Research Excellence Framework (REF)βs revamped environment section has raised concerns about how it will be consistently evaluated.'
Or, 'Two men make some comments about SPRE, with a bit of reference to the PCE pilot report released in December 2025.'
05.01.2026 07:28 β π 5 π 4 π¬ 0 π 0
The perfect opportunity to remind you that there's a big Gwen John exhibition coming up in the spring at Amgueddfa Cymru in Cardiff and then later in the year @nationalgalleries.bsky.social in Edinburgh.
03.01.2026 18:59 β π 37 π 11 π¬ 1 π 0
What a phenomenal resource. Working as an independent historian has its positives. My research interests largely overlap with those of clients and, when they don't, I make enough to fund my own research, but I can't imagine undertaking something on this scale.
02.12.2025 16:14 β π 22 π 3 π¬ 2 π 0
Doctoral Landscape Awards
Applications are invited for three fully-funded Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Doctoral Landscape Awards (DLA).
Applications are invited for three fully-funded Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Doctoral Landscape Awards (DLA). Deadline is 9th February 2026.
Proposed projects must be arts & humanities-led
#PhD @findaphd.bsky.social @dcahf-met.bsky.social
More details:
#PhD www.mmu.ac.uk/study/postgr...
08.12.2025 17:06 β π 13 π 14 π¬ 0 π 0
Is that ladle, perhaps, a runcible spoon?? π€
01.12.2025 21:19 β π 1 π 0 π¬ 0 π 0
'December, 1854. A hard winter in Lincolnshire. The lane-side trees, at the village edge, are caves of white above the dark figure, bundled in shawls. She has seen many things in her calls at cottages. But never before a woman on fire...'
Alison Brackenbury, 'Village'
What next? LINK IN COMMENTS!
30.11.2025 11:18 β π 5 π 1 π¬ 3 π 0
EN THP 2025 - Fondazione 1563
Turin Humanities Programme call for application 2025 "After the Enlightenment: Histories, Debates, and Reinterpretations"
The Turin Humanities Programme again offers two-year #postdocs, this time with a #CFA on the topic "After the Enlightenment: Histories, Debates, and Reinterpretationsβ.
Sponsored by the fabulous Fondazione 1563, deadline 16 February. #skystorians
www.fondazione1563.it/progetti/en-...
30.11.2025 08:21 β π 17 π 11 π¬ 0 π 1
We shed as we pick up, like travellers who must carry everything in their arms and what we let fall will be picked up by those behind. The procession is very long and life is very short. We die on the march. But there is nothing outside the march so nothing can be lost to it.Β
Tom Stoppard 1937-2025
29.11.2025 19:03 β π 25 π 4 π¬ 0 π 0
A blog about art exhibitions around Britain and Europe written by Eddie Buckle and Lydia Lancaster. Read it at https://art-exhibitions.blogspot.com/
More a jazz and easy listening Liberal than a classical Liberal. Cricket (Northants fan), literature, economics, politics & anything that takes my fancy.
Scottish poet and musician
Technology, Software, Policy, Security, Universities, Art, Antiques, Cats. https://finkelstein.uk
Post-Canadian poet, Cavafy translator, author of Men of the Same Name (Carcanet 2025). Iβve published in the Guardian, TLS, Malahat Review and PN Review.
News and events from the UK's national centre for the support and promotion of humanities research. We monitor our profiles, more here: http://bit.ly/3q8WHYm
I write novels (eg The Power, new novel is The Future), I make games (eg Zombies, Run!), unorthodox Jew. not-getting-into-pointless-arguments-on-the-internet is an act of revolution. However complex you think things are, they're more complex than that
Fast forward thinking for people and the planet https://bennettinstitutesussex.org/
A new collaborative led by ten of the UKβs leading research focussed universities β ResearchPlus is committed to making a significant and distinctive contribution to UK research and innovation. #ResearchPlus
writer, translator, and researcher whose work unfolds at the crossroads of literature, philosophy, and critical theory (currently writing about relics and time)
President,The British Academy.
Writes about housing and economic inequality.
Life Fellow at Girton College, Emerita Honorary Professor in the Dept of Geography, Cambridge University, UK.
(Views my own).
- Director @adalovelaceinst.bsky.social:ensuring data & AI work for ppl & society
- Stint in government - led #NationalDataStrategy; roles in Cabinet Office, ONS & MHCLG
- Charity roles inc. Samaritans Trustee; staff @ The RSA, Centrepoint, ParkinsonsUK
MP Arbroath & Broughty Ferry, International Relations Professor, University of St Andrews, VP European Movement
Poet & broadcaster. New non-fiction prose book, 'Village', OUT!
Witches and wheelbarrows: women's history in my village, 1841-1971: cheerful survival!
To buy, search for
ALISON BRACKENBURY VILLAGE AMAZON
Dean of Arts and Sciences, University at Buffalo
University Librarian at the University of the West of Scotland, Doctoral Student, Historian and Photographer. Researching the impact of public libraries on loneliness and social isolation in communities. SCURL Vice Chair and Director at SUP.
The UKβs largest public funder of research
#FundedByYou
Also autoposting to @news.ukri.org, @funding.ukri.org, @blogs.ukri.org and @events.ukri.org. Topic specific feeds coming soon!
Social/Cultural Historian.
Press/populism/Romani history.
Lecturer in Environmental Literature at the University of Glasgow's School of Social & Environmental Sustainability: ecopoetry, walking, place - environmental humanities
Richard Fisher on publishing/policy/politics/the past. Plus poor putting and very slow bowling. Also Associate Editor (sport) for Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
