The BSLS and the JLS are pleased to announce the opening of the 2026 PGR/ECR Essay Prize Competition! Entries should be between 4,000-5,000 words in length, and are due by 5 June. More details here: www.bsls.ac.uk/2025/04/call...
If you are an ECR or PGR who presented at this years' conference at @unistrathclyde.bsky.social, please do consider submitting a polished draft of your paper!
Shannon Lambert at Ghent University wins the @thebsls.bsky.social book prize for her first book, Science and Affect in Contemporary Literature. Congrats to Shannon!
#EnglishCreates: Futures continues with this post by Francesca Mackenney and Jamie Castell (Cardiff University):
'How do representations of sound in literature shape our awareness of the natural world?'
Read the full post here: universityenglish.ac.uk/englishcreat...
#EnglishStudies
#Ecocriticism
My January Crime Club author newsletter is out, so check your inboxes or sign up on my website to get my latest newsletter now:
www.lucyandrew.com/crime-club
#authornewsletter #cosycrime #booklaunch #janeausten
Final publication of the year: I examined 10 years of panellists on BBC Question Time. Some interesting findings - thread below:
(1/6)
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
🦇 Do you love bats and enjoy writing? Join us in celebrating bats in creative writing through our Bat's Laureate Competition!
There are two categories: one for adults/young people over 12 and one for our younger supporters, under 12 years old.
More info: www.bats.org.uk/our-work/con...
CfP Deadline Approaching! The deadline to submit an abstract for this year's BSLS conference is this Friday (12th Dec) more details here: www.bsls.ac.uk/conference20...
Mills on the Water of Leith; including paper, snuff and grain. #Edinburgh
My years of research give me the authority to say that the most realistic part of Down Cemetery Road (ep1) is Ruth Wilson's character getting lost while trying to chase someone through an NHS hospital.
Call for Papers: British Society for Literature and Science (@thebsls.bsky.social) 21st Annual Conference, University of Strathclyde, 9th-11th April 2026. 200-word abstracts due by 12th December 2025.
www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=6183
Perhaps you’ve gone beyond study, beyond the department, beyond even the university. Maybe you’ve reached the ultimate: a state of beyondness.
Illustration divided into two frames. The upper frame shows a cut-through depiction of a flooded village with intact church and stunted trees, green in hue under the water as fish swim past. Below is an innocuous, conventional scene of a peaceful reservoir in sunlight
I used to find this picture - and the whole concept - of a flooded valley quite haunting.
Actually, I still do
Artist: Ronald Lampitt
(Our Land in the Making, 1966)
A flow chart titled 'What to call your Academic Event', poking fun at academic event titles.
I had not seen this before, and it made me smile...
ECRs and PGRs - you have three days to submit your 4k-5k word essay to the BSLS/JLS essay prize! Tidy up those conferences papers and send them in! Deadline is THIS FRIDAY.
www.bsls.ac.uk/2025/04/call...
In case you want proof, here's an article i wrote years ago about Victorian eugenicists wanting to found a religion centred on "the human body is god". (I'll cheerfully admit that it has a genuinely terrible title. I don't know what I was thinking.) www.literatureandscience.org/wp-content/u...
Citizens of Glasgow! I will be in the big Waterstones on Sauchiehall St on 3rd July, chatting to the outstanding @lesleymcdowell.bsky.social. Hope to see you there if you can make it…💙📚
Very pleased that my article 'Facts and Fictions: Emotional Authenticity and Narrative in Natural History Exhibitions', which close reads the displays of the NHM and the Loch Ness Centre, has been published today!
journals.le.ac.uk/index.php/mas
Me and the jury.
The doctoranda pictured in front of slides on the five magazines her dissertation focuses on, moments before a small constrictor attacked for the "snake fight" portion of the defence.
Dr Guyton at last!
On Tuesday I defended my dissertation, "Popular Astronomy: Mediating Outer Space in German and British Periodical Culture, 1890-1950."
#PhDone
Taking today's date as an opportunity to thank my lucky stars that I was taught "Shakespeare" by the terrific triumvirate of Catherine Belsey, Martin Coyle and Terence Hawkes at @cardiffuni.bsky.social
Always grateful 🙏
The first day of the conference is already over - with a fantastic plenary from @profmhwhitworth.bsky.social and two panels of amazing papers. It's #BSLS2025 to follow along!
Hand holding up a copy of The Good Father by Liam McIlvanney against background of living room
I’m extremely lucky to have an early preview of ‘The Good Father’, the new novel by my brilliant colleague @liammcilvanney.bsky.social. It’s his fault if I’m late for work because I stayed up all night reading…
UK universities are in crisis.
Dave Hitchcock (@davehitchcock.bsky.social) on how the sector became 'broken' and why it must be approached as an interdependent system.
www.historyworkshop....
Great to see the EA offering strategic support to all colleagues in arts and humanities whose jobs are under threat.
Calling all #literaryagents!
A northern Literary Festival is looking for agents to present and do author one-to-ones.
The all-day event will be at Leeds Trinity University, Sat 6th Sept 2025.
It’s partly to fill the gap in the North of England now that #JerichoWriters have relocated to London.
1/
As promised, here are the slides I shared with students to convince them to NOT use chatGPT and other artificial stupidity.
TL;DR? AI is evil, unsustainable and stupid, and I'd much rather they use their own brains, make their own mistakes, and actually learn something. 🪄
2/ “They need ethics, philosophy, language and history to guide them. Universities like ours, cherishing the full range of academic disciplines, will have a vital role in showing how sciences and humanities can inform and strengthen each other.” Words that might be heeded by VCs elsewhere.
1/ Lord Hague, speaking as he becomes Oxford University Chancellor: “the pace of change in sciences and medicine will mean we need humanities and social sciences more than ever. New technologies are changing politics and transforming the way culture is developed and communicated…”
🚨 A CONFERENCE ABOUT RAIL TRAVEL THAT TAKES PLACE ON A TRAIN!!!!!!!! 🚨
