Laura Swift

We now have a presentation from @lauramswift.bsky.social from @openpress.bsky.social on 'Open educational resources as a chance to do things differently'!

openpress.sussex.ac.uk

#OERs #OpenAccess #DiamondOA #OAWeek

'The British Library...has taken years to recover from a major cyberattack that disrupted its services and restricted access to its collections. The walkout is set to take from 27 October to 9 November, coinciding with the two-year anniversary of the cyberattack.'

ONLY migrants though, no one else is to study English because it's a rip off and a waste of time, am I getting this right.

Did you know that if you buy my book on Amazon, Jeff Bezos makes 5 times as much as I do on each copy sold? Sharing some behind-the-scenes book math on why buying directly from presses is best for EVERYONE (except Bezos) in my newsletter today! aubreyhirsch.substack.com/p/book-math

Gaza’s education system has collapsed under the weight of war. Nearly 658,000 school-aged children and 87,000 university students have been left without access to learning as classrooms and campuses lie in ruins.

🔗: aje.io/r00cl2

WHAT YOU FAIL TO SEE MR POPE

UC Berkeley shares 160 names with Trump administration in ‘McCarthy era’ move Prominent professor Judith Butler among students and faculty investigated for ‘alleged antisemitic incidents’

Berkeley.

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

In the past few days, Israel has bombed Doha, struck Tunis over the humanitarian flotilla headed to Gaza and assassinated Yemen’s Prime Minister.

These are clear violations of international law.

Which other state is allowed to commit such crimes without any consequences?

after merely 13 years living in Manchester I'm excited to finally set foot inside Beetham Tower tomorrow #alpsp2025

Shame on this whole government, may they never know peace. We'll see you in the Hague.

Manchester’s chief flag-raiser has put his people smuggling days behind him Flags protesting unchecked immigration have gone up across the city, led by a man caught smuggling migrants into the country in the back of a van

Top local journalism by The Mill in Manchester

manchestermill.co.uk/manchester-f...

"I'm being as racist as I can" tearful Starmer tells voters

Even if you've never set foot in Oklahoma and likely never will, this is a hell of a read

@supitslois.bsky.social

Call for Applications: Editorial Fellowships at History Workshop, 2025 History Workshop is advertising two part-time, paid Editorial Fellowships in 2025, open to early career historians.

Are you an early-career historian interested in radical, public and digital history?

We are currently looking for two part-time, paid Editorial Fellows to join History Workshop.

Deadline is at midnight on 15th August. See below for more details!

www.historyworkshop....

This is centrism posing as radical utopianism: Let's redeem the university! Let's redeem our institutions! Let's redeem the state! I say: Let it all burn. May our gardens not be small and tended, but a flourishing sanctuary of invasive species, weeds, brain-eating fungi, ecosystem pirates, unleashed across the world.

works.hcommons.org/records/jg2a...

I wrote something for The Sunday Times's style section about how men have been undressing for over a hundred years. And how they should go further and show a little cleavage.

Link in the next post.

what a staggeringly strange thing to say out loud

NEW on Wonkhe: The lessons of decades of research into assessment and feedback haven’t tracked across into the practice of peer review. Madeleine Pownall wonders why not buff.ly/D7hmHQP

The good news: I'm alive. The bad news: I'm in England.

Helsinki goes a full year without a traffic death A city traffic engineer credits the success to lower speed limits and smarter design.

Helsinki hasn't had a traffic fatality in a year: "Helsinki's current traffic safety strategy, covering 2022–2026, is nearing completion. It has focused on improving safety for children, youth, pedestrians and cyclists with safer crosswalks and smarter intersection design."

All famines are man-made, all famines are political. Historians of empire and humanitarianism have known this forever. Gaza is not starving, Gaza is being starved, by Israel, and this starvation is enabled by our government and by every other government that does not step in to force food and aid.

I'm seeing an uptick in journal editors inquiring about @openlibhums.bsky.social and scholar-led, non-profit diamond #OpenAccess as a direct result of the Trump administration's crackdown on EDI and academic freedom. If we want research integrity, we need an independent academic publishing sector.

Revealed: Harvard publisher cancels entire journal issue on Palestine shortly before publication As Harvard’s feud with Trump escalated, so did tensions over an ‘education and Palestine’ issue of a prestigious journal. Scholars blame the ‘Palestine exception’ to academic freedom

This is so much more grave of a violation of academic freedom than a few Oberlin students protesting a speaker. And yet the “Free Press” crew will be completely silent about it. www.theguardian.com/education/20...

The entrance sign at the University of Sussex

A pile of badges in the HR office saying things like "trans ally" and "my pronouns are..."

BEWARE SEAGULL ATTACKS warning sign

a terrifying wax sculpture of Virginia Woolf

I work here now!

there's toxic human sludge and then there's Tony Blair helping out in the Middle East

I know where I stand. I stand with Palestine Action.

A Palestine Action solidarity march in central Manchester

Author Statement on the Right to Freedom of Speech Author Statement on the Right to Freedom of Speech 27 June 2025 Sign the statement here. We are writers, editors, publishers and organisations who care about freedom of expression. Between us we ho...

I've signed this open letter for writers and publishing workers against the proscription of Palestine Action and so should you: docs.google.com/document/u/0...

reminder that today is the last day to respond to the EHRC consultation on its updated Code of Practice around the Supreme Court ruling on 'biological sex'. You can respond in as much/little detail as you want and there are loads of helpful prompts here: transactual.org.uk/equality-act...