Ray Buckner

Today (4/3/25) we learned that DOGE has begun terminating previously awarded NEH grants. We understand this includes operating grants to the state and jurisdictional humanities councils, scholarly societies, community orgs, & individuals.

Learn more & take action: nhalliance.org/federal-fund...

Thank you!! 😊

I am so happy to share that I received a Charlotte Newcombe Dissertation Fellowship. This fellowship will support the writing of my dissertation, which investigates how queer and trans Thai Buddhist artists in Bangkok are re-shaping their relationship to Buddhism through art-making. So grateful. 🥹💞✨

Recently engaged, beloved barber arrested by ICE | How his immigration story is questioning the system Rodney Taylor, a Georgia barber, has been pursuing permanent residency for years. Now, he faces deportation to Liberia despite being in the U.S. since childhood.

Rodney Taylor is a beloved Georgia barber who came to the United States from Liberia with his mother when he was only two years old. He applied for citizenship but was denied. But this year, ICE arrested him, locked him up, and has scheduled him to be deported to a faraway country he's never known.

What the Venezuelans Deported to El Salvador Experienced Exclusive photos of the arrival of Venezuelan detainees deported from the U.S.

“One young man sobbed when a guard pushed him to the floor. He said, ‘I’m not a gang member. I’m gay. I’m a barber.’ I believed him. *** He “began to whimper,” as his head was roughly shaved, “folding his hands in prayer as his hair fell.” He “asked for his mother & cried as he was slapped again.”

They were arrested during routine ICE check-ins. Then they disappeared. Deportation proceedings are often shrouded in secrecy. But lawyers say the lack of information about the Venezuelan migrants deported under the Alien Enemies Act is nearly unprecedented.

“The families and lawyers of dozens of other Venezuelan & Salvadoran men who had been detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement say their relatives and clients have similarly disappeared over the past week” www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/...

University presidents are "not going to go into resistance mode,” said former UNC chancellor “They have too much financial resources and people to protect to do that.”
How are they "protecting people"? "initiating hiring freezes, rescinding graduate admissions offers and pausing construction"

I study contemporary Buddhism, so I study the ways that current queer & trans people in Thailand take up Buddhism. So these people draw on Mahayana & Vajrayana Buddhism to craft their Buddhist practices. This is not a textual project. This is an ethnographic & lived study of contemporary Buddhists.

Hi! That's actually not true at all. My research reveals the ways that these Thai Buddhists actually draw on Vajrayana and Mahayana Buddhism. So to say it's "not here" actually isn't reflected in what I'm seeing. Buddhism is something that is alive and changing. I'm tracing how that is the case.

Haha ok! So sorry you don’t approve of my topic :( 😭😭😭

I know this is a very big question, and depends on the kind of grant, but for scholars who have been on grant committees before, what do committee members look for in "writing samples" of applicants? What kinds of qualities/skills? Would love to hear people's thoughts! 🙏🌸🌷

I know this is a very big question, and depends on the kind of grant, but for scholars who have been on grant committees before, what do committee members look for in "writing samples" of applicants? What kinds of qualities/skills? Would love to hear people's thoughts! 🙏🌸🌷

Trans man smiling while holding his hand up to his chin. He is showing his new black and grey rose hand tattoo

Trans man is smiling while wearing a green shirt. His left arm crosses over to his right shoulder to show off a new black and grey rose elbow tattoo

A white hand showing a new black rose tattoo

Standing up and showing the back of an elbow. The elbow has a black rose tattoo on it

Newly tattooed!!! I love it so much ☺️✨🏳️‍⚧️💕 🥰

Trans man smiling while holding his hand up to his chin. He is showing his new black and grey rose hand tattoo

Trans man is smiling while wearing a green shirt. His left arm crosses over to his right shoulder to show off a new black and grey rose elbow tattoo

A white hand showing a new black rose tattoo

Standing up and showing the back of an elbow. The elbow has a black rose tattoo on it

Newly tattooed!!! I love it so much ☺️✨🏳️‍⚧️💕 🥰

Oscar Isaac is so hot send post!!!

High and watching #Midsommar for the first time and this is INTENSE.

He is soooo precious!!!

After 50 successful years, Feminist Studies faculty vote to disestablish the formal department, making way for more wide-ranging feminist scholarship across campus Feminist Studies faculty and staff are committed to helping current students enrolled in the department's programs earn their degrees

For those of us who think about the institutional life of women's/gender/sexuality studies, this is interesting (and, I think, sad) news: news.ucsc.edu/2024/11/femi...

i have been a dedicated libro.fm user for over a year now and at no point do i feel that i am missing out on anything from not using audible. also! if you subscribe you can direct a part of your subscription a local book shop

I was watching this movie Ida from 2013 which was both absolutely remarkable and devastating. And then this lesbian/queer film called NINA from 2018! Do you have any recommendations for other Polish films? ☺️

This looks fantastic!! Can’t wait to read! 🌸

Getting into Polish cinema for the first time in my life and this shit is GOOD!!!!

OpenAI's Transcriptions Make Up Things You Never Said to Your Doctor Let's hope your physician isn't transcribing your conversations with Whisper.

The doctor asked me today if I consented to him using an ai program to transcribe our appointment and I politely said absolutely not.

au.lifehacker.com/ai/111719/ne...

Next up at #aarsbl24: standing room only (and just barely) to talk about US borders and borderlessness, particularly in US-Israel relations & the reification of US Christian nationalism

not a big shock that a serial plagiarist is impressed by two dumb guys

Donate to Family of 5 lose everything in house fire, organized by Samantha Wade Hi my name is Sam, I am the sister-in-law of Veronica and her beautiful family… Samantha Wade needs your support for Family of 5 lose everything in house fire

We have a GoFundMe running to help cover costs while we're homeless (because of course - it's not like actual charities work in this country) but you are absolutely NOT allowed to send money if you are in dire straits.

www.gofundme.com/f/3ts69u-fam...

and none of those pieces are being written by people who understand how that level of constant abuse CHANGES you

it’s not a mere tedious cleanup process, blocking today’s round of trolls just like sorting out the junk mail from the bills and birthday cards

it does not live on you that lightly

Hey everyone! I’m putting together a thread of different #AAR #aarsbl panels that seem interesting to me, and may interest you too! These will focus largely on studies of Gender and Sexuality and Buddhism but will include other panels too! Feel free to tag people who are part of the panels I listed!

I feel bad because the panel actually seems interesting and is doing interesting work around religion in southeast Asia, but it's drawing on a reference that seems to have no place in it