For History Today, I wrote about what happened to ‘illegitimacy’ in mid-twentieth century Scotland, tabloid fuelled moral panic, ‘problem girls’ in Moray and elsewhere, ‘respectable housewives’ and ‘living with Granny.’ www.historytoday.com/archive/feat...
This is Sadie. She was finally reunited with her human, astronaut Christina Koch, after her mom’s voyage around the moon took her the furthest any human has ever been from their dog. She can't wait to hear all about the universe. 14/10 (IG: astro_christina)
Street in Pompeii, facing Mt Vesuvius.
Lovely day in Pompeii
I waited 8 months for the reviews of an article. It sat with the editor for final decision for 6 weeks. 4 job apps where this was 'under review' rather than 'in press'.
I think students are genuinely shocked/appalled when they occasionally, usually by accident, discover how badly their adjunct professors are paid.
📣 Call for papers: Caring Communities: Rethinking Histories of Care, Class, and Kinship, 1800-present
Newcastle University, Thursday 3 - Friday 4 September 2026.
Deadine for submissions: Friday 24 April 2026.
caringcommunities.co.uk/conference/
By popular demand, here is the full, glorious message from Aberystwyth University Library, on their blog:
wordpress.aber.ac.uk/librarian/?p...
Hat tip to @walkyouhome.bsky.social for prompting me to realise it was a blog post, and thus available to you all ❤️
So, BlueSky, one of my passions is the study of tea in WW2. I need you to watch this oral history from three ex-tea ladies from the Bermondsey WVS.
Because you could guess for ONE THOUSAND YEARS and you would not guess where it is going... #skystorians #history #tea
«We call these people “strong” and “independent.” What we’re actually looking at, in many cases, is someone whose nervous system learned very early that help isn’t coming...»
«...And it is devastatingly lonely.»
siliconcanals.com/sc-a-childre...
Poster for Medieval Women module
My new module, Medieval Women, is available to book via Aberystwyth Lifelong Learning www.aber.ac.uk/en/lifelong-...
More than 1.5 million girls were sent to maternity homes during the Baby Scoop era, where they were kept in seclusion, told they didn’t deserve to be mothers, and returned to their lives to pretend none of it happened.
This is the America the GOP wants to make great again.
Poster for Medieval Women module
My new module, Medieval Women, is available to book via Aberystwyth Lifelong Learning www.aber.ac.uk/en/lifelong-...
A recipe from Hannah Wolley's 1672 "The Ladies Delight" To make the Hands White. Take the flour of beans, of lupines, of starch-corn, rice, smalbedus, orris, each six ounces. Mix them and make a powder with which wash the hands in water.
EM hive mind - any ideas what Hannah Wolley means by "Smalbedus" here in this 1672 recipe for a powder to whiten hands? I'm stumped! I'm asking my plant scientist sister as well in case she has any ideas.
An advertisement for the polio vaccine which reads: "they all got vaccine except dad...don't take a chance...take your polio shots!" It depicts a photo of a family gathered around a father who is in an iron lung.
With science falling under increasing attack, this medical historian is here to remind people of the power of vaccines. THREAD👇
Hard-hitting polio advert from 1958. In the first half of the 20th century, polio was the leading cause of death in children and young adults. 1/7 #history #skystorians
The BAVS/Rosemary Mitchell Prize for a Second Monograph 2026 is now open! If you published your second scholarly monograph in Victorian studies between 17 February 2025 and 17 February 2026, please do consider submitting! You can find more information here: bavs.ac.uk/book-prize-2/
You know who really has a good vantage on what universities can and should be? Faculty. Not always the organizational structure and operation, because that's not the job, But what it takes to educate? Yep. Yet the overwhelming media coverage is by and about ppl w very little to no experience.
Ah, yeah, I understand that.
FACT OF THE DAY. 21 February 1946. Aneurin Bevan announced the Labour Government’s proposals for a National Health Service. The service began on 5 July 1948. Its introduction represented one of the greatest social reforms in British History which helped every citizen.
Same. I hate making phone calls.
On the pioneering post-war survey of teenagers and young adults in Birmingham, funded by the Edward Cadbury Charitable Trust in 1950 archive.org/details/b327... Hope the new wave of strategic plans for England will commission similar. @oneplacestudies.bsky.social @historyandpolicy.bsky.social
For more examples see our post, thornton.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/posts/blog/2...
Image: Alice Thornton, Book of Remembrances, 137. © Derek Beattie. 2/2 📜 🗃️
Threatening to defund the Welsh university widely perceived to be a bastion of the Welsh language - it has one of the highest proportions of Welsh speaking students - isn’t a great look for a party looking to sweep the Senedd in May
Thank you to everyone who shared their research with us yesterday! We enjoyed a brilliant first day of papers and a fantastic keynote from @sarahcrook.bsky.social. Looking forward to starting Day 2 shortly - look at this wonderful line up: 😊 voicesofmotherhood.wp.worc.ac.uk/index.php/20...
This is good, as far as it goes - but sometimes the only way to avoid burnout and stress is for there to be more staff to do the work. That does not seem something that is of interest to university SMTs at the moment.
This is Zeus. He's 13 and can't howl quite like he used to. But that doesn't stop him from stepping pup when his community needs him. 14/10 #SeniorPupSaturday (IG: zeustheoldiegoldie)
a phd
One week left to sign up for our conference!
We will be emailing everyone who has registered early next week with all the details and the Zoom link 📩
Call for papers for one-day colloquium: Charity, Humanitarianism, and Childhood. Monday 22nd June 2026. Centre for the History of Childhood, University of Oxford Magdalen College Oxford, UK, and online. We welcome papers that consider the theme of ‘Charity, Humanitarianism, and Childhood’ from a wide variety of perspectives. Areas that papers might explore include: Children’s experiences as recipients of charity and humanitarianism, including in the context of conflict and displacement. Children’s experiences as charitable and humanitarian actors and providers. Representations of childhood within charitable and humanitarian discourses. Institutions and communities that mobilise around charitable and humanitarian relief for children. Memories, intergenerational transmission, and legacies of charity and humanitarianism. Failures, limitations, and tensions resulting from charitable and humanitarian actions. Archives for, approaches to, and public engagement with the study of charity, humanitarianism, and childhood in the past. Conceptual connections between care, vulnerability, and age. We welcome papers from any disciplinary or professional background and career stage, including advanced undergraduate and graduate students. We encourage papers that engage with the diversity of children’s and young people’s experiences in any historical period and place. Please send abstracts of c. 250 words for a fifteen-minute paper and a brief bio to sian.pooley@magd.ox.ac.uk by midday on Friday 13th March 2026. We plan to offer in person and online participation, so please indicate your preference when submitting. Organising Committee: Charlotte Canizo, Joseph Leidy, Siân Pooley, Susannah Wright
📢Call for papers📢 for this year's Centre for the History of Childhood colloquium on Charity, Humanitarianism, and Childhood on 22 June 2026. Please send us your abstracts by midday on Friday 13 March. We look forward to hearing from you! More details here: www.history.ox.ac.uk/centre-histo...
