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Sam Grinsell

@samgrinsell.bsky.social

970 followers 1.8K following 860 posts

Historian trying to help build better worlds 🇵🇸🌈✊🏳️‍⚧️

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Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 16d

Very pleased that my piece 'Urban history as urgent work, an argument for disciplinary promiscuity' has been published in @urbanhistory.bsky.social doi.org/10.1017/S096...
Many thanks to @mctom.bsky.social for organising the roundtable that got these thoughts going back in 2023! #UrbanHist #EnvHums

Urban history as urgent work, an argument for disciplinary promiscuity | Urban History | Cambridge Core

Urban history as urgent work, an argument for disciplinary promiscuity

doi.org

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Reposted by Sam Grinsell

Sardonicus @sardonicus.eu · 11h

Letter from the advertising department at The Lady magazine, 1977

Our Ref: Sit/QC
22nd March 1977
Mrs A. Miconi,
Flat 17, Lyncourt, The Orchard,
Blackheath,
London SE3
Dear Madam,
We thank you for your letter and payment of £3.80, received on 21st March.
Before proceeding, we must whether you would agree to a slight wording amenament of the wording in order that the advertising conforms to our normal style. The words "Socialist feninist" we would prefer to read "Friendly, motherly," thereby allowing the wording to conform.
We now look forward to your further instructions, whilst advising you that our next issue is 7th April for which we close for press upon receipt of the first post Tuesday 29th March.

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Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 11h

One thing that hasn't been raised yet is that the Melton Mowbray pork pie, widely sold now as the mainstream pork pie, has a firmer crust than many I've had from other places. For me heating brings more to a flakier crusted pie, and those I've had hot were usually more in that style

Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 12h

Real jump back to John Howard that isn't it!

Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 12h

www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4... wide-ranging exploration of whether the various artificial intelligences around us are on any sort of road towards artificial desires, and what that might mean

James Meek · Computers that want things

For all the fluency and synthetic friendliness of public-facing AI chatbots like ChatGPT, it seems important to remember...

www.lrb.co.uk

Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 13h

Five prime ministers of course 😁

Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 13h

The US is yet to have a president born later than 1961. The UK has had five, including one born in the 70s and one in the 80s

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Ordinary Notes @hystericalblkns.bsky.social · 1d

Love after Love. Derek Walcott.

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Rebecca Tamás @rebeccatamas.bsky.social · 2d

What a beautiful day to be Hungarian 🥲🇭🇺

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Scott Myers @gointothestory.bsky.social · 3d

Greta Gerwig: "Whenever I have trouble writing, I think about the pace of baseball. It’s slow, just grinding out another play. You strike out a lot. This, for me, is very helpful to have in my mind while writing.” gointothestory.blcklst.com/screenwritin... #screenwriting

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Asheesh Kapur Siddique @asheeshksi.bsky.social · 2d

Every year around this time I think about how bad for the discipline it would be if there was a Nobel Prize in History. I don’t think it’s good for knowledge production in a humanistic discipline to do incentive a particular elite’s definition of what constitutes a worthwhile scholarly ‘problem’

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Liesbeth Corens @onslies.bsky.social · 9d

REALLY appreciating Lucy Noakes's clear connecting of the dots between the announcement of maintenance grants for 'priority courses' and the Cold Spots mapping by the @britishacademy.bsky.social.

You can't ensure access in a system that ties disciplinary coverage to competition.

On the ground, this fall in total enrolments is sharply exacerbated by changing recruitment practices, as previous high-tariff institutions revise their offers to secure larger undergraduate intakes. Those bearing the brunt are, of course, the institutions which currently serve the most disadvantaged and least mobile students. The risk is now of a worsening spiral of decline—driven by a failed policy of institutional competition and marketisation—which results in options for the most in-need aspirant history students being, quite literally, closed down. Without this core provision, any lingering question over which subjects might qualify for maintenance grants becomes obsolete.

If, as the Education Secretary claimed this week, the government is serious about choice, social mobility and access to education it needs to appreciate that the provision of local universities and courses is now at considerable risk given the financial turmoil affecting UK higher education. What’s clear is that our current situation and trajectory is not a route to greater choice and accessibility. Rather, it is a potential channelling of resources and students into an ever narrowing range of options deemed by policy makers as being in the country’s best interests for the future.

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Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 2d

An urgent read with a call for government action. Will be sending this to my MP

Royal Historical Society @royalhistsoc.org · 9d

This week the Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson, announced the return of maintenance grants for students in greatest need.

In a new blog post, RHS President Lucy Noakes considers the state of access to history and the humanities in UK HE bit.ly/3KP5WMe #Skystorians

@artsandhums.bsky.social

Opening section and abstract of RHS blog post: 'The value and provision of history and the humanities: it’s time for a political response': "This week the government’s Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson, announced the return of maintenance grants for students in greatest need. While we welcome recognition of the financial pressures and impediments many student face, it’s clear that this is a policy with nothing for the arts and humanities, including history. However, as Lucy Noakes, President of the Royal Historical Society, explains here, these pressures are equally acute for students in the arts and humanities. Moreover, as a new British Academy report on ‘Cold Spots’ shows, choice—in subjects including history—is being further eroded for many as the provision of higher education contorts to the financial crisis facing UK higher education. If the government is serious about choice, social mobility and access to education it needs to appreciate that provision of many degree subjects is now at considerable risk in a growing number of regions across the UK. For students to have greater choice and access we need the environments in which choices are made to be fair, balanced and accurate. For this we require political leadership to help us address structural failings and false narratives."

Reposted by Sam Grinsell

Sam Wetherell @samwetherell.bsky.social · 2d

This essay by @sonalidhanpal.bsky.social on the relationship between decolonisation and mass council housing is one of the most exciting works of British urban history I've read in a long, long time. It points the way to a different kind of future for our work. direct.mit.edu/grey/article...

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Richard Fallon @richardfallon.bsky.social · 2d

A literary Iguanodon at the Earth Sciences Library. Do any other libraries have dinosaurs or other antediluvian creatures carved into the furniture?

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Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 3d

I think of Winnie-the-Pooh and his permanent state of feeling a little eleven-o'clockish

Reposted by Sam Grinsell

Simon Wyatt 🇺🇦 @drsimonwyatt.bsky.social · 3d

There's a real danger though that the bubble is so large that it kills otherwise very productive and valuable tech players

Reposted by Sam Grinsell

Simon Wyatt 🇺🇦 @drsimonwyatt.bsky.social · 3d

There very much is an AI industry in the field it emerged from: computer programming. I think that has decent prospects beyond the market crash, whereas creative media slop certainly does not

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Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 3d

There is no AI industry, there is an AI bubble with a handful of minor uses or creative experiments happening around the edges. The bubble bursting will be our next global market crash

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Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 3d

Those Other Humans Are Humans

Advanced Ecohumaning: Those Things That Aren't Human Matter Too

Reposted by Sam Grinsell

folukeifejola @folukeifejola.bsky.social · 3d

Manifesto for when I rule the world: All humans must take CPD-like courses all through life called Continuing Human Development.
Courses include:
how to human properly
we all matter
racism is bad
greed is bad
destroying the planet also bad

Other suggestions on what the curriculum should include?

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Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 3d

And isn't elevenses more of a snack between meals while brunch generally replaces either lunch or breakfast or both?

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BBC Newsnight @bbcnewsnight.bsky.social · 4d

“You described Reform and other parties across Europe today as among the 'right wing equivalents of the fascists in the 1930s'. Why?”

“Because that’s what they are”

@vicderbyshire.bsky.social asks Lord Heseltine about remarks he made at Conservative Party Conference.

#Newsnight

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Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 4d

Haven't actually listened to this for a while, so my mind got blown anew! His guitar is like a backing band and another singer all at once

Ethan Hein @ethanhein.bsky.social · 4d

Listen to this! RJ changes his swing feel dramatically over the course of this recording. In the first ten seconds he goes from triplet swing to completely straight eighths. His tempo is flexible too. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ccfz...

Terraplane Blues

YouTube video by Robert Johnson - Topic

www.youtube.com

Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 4d

We already did a version of this when Uber et al used to claim they weren't taxi companies because, get this, they did everything on an app!

Sam Grinsell @samgrinsell.bsky.social · 4d

If, say, a very talented mimic make a podcast claiming to be Robin Williams, no one would claim they were the future and had to be appeased. That you can get a machine to do something does not make it a different thing!

Tea Junkie @teajunkie.bsky.social · 4d

"And for the love of EVERYTHING, stop calling it ‘the future,’ AI is just badly recycling and regurgitating the past to be re-consumed. You are taking in the Human Centipede of content, and from the very very end of the line".
www.theguardian.com/film/2025/oc...

Robin Williams’ daughter Zelda hits out at AI-generated videos of her dead father: ‘stop doing this to him’

Film-maker tells the public to stop sending her videos, saying: ‘You’re not making art, you’re making disgusting, over-processed hotdogs out of the lives of human beings’

www.theguardian.com

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