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Arielle Zibrak

@zibrak.bsky.social

2.5K followers 1.2K following 550 posts

feminisms, projects, pop culture 📚 | Literary Tour of the US, The Great Courses | 12 Stories by American Women, Penguin Classics | Avidly Reads Guilty Pleasures, NYU | Writing Against Reform, UMass Prof @ UWyo - views own 👐www.ArielleZibrak.com👐

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Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · Sep 3

Here's what I'm up to these days. SO EXCITED to write this book and talk about how the history of positive thinking in wellness impacts us all. Grateful for my agent @babedylan.bsky.social and my new editor Maria, who rocks.

Announcement of a deal report from Publisher's Marketplace that reads:
American Studies scholar and host of The Great Courses’ Literary Tour of the United States Arielle Zibrak’s WISHING OURSELVES WELL, a compelling look at the origins of the women's wellness guru archetype and "manifestation" movements through the complicated history of the 19th-century American women who pioneered the big business of alternative healing, from Mary Baker Eddy (the founder of Christian Science) to Dr. Alice Bunker Stockham (a sexual pleasure activist and eugenicist), to Maria Goldverg at Liveright, by Ayla Zuraw-Friedland at the Frances Goldin Literary Agency (USCOM).

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Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · 1d

I learned so much about Chicago and its history researching Lecture 15. Thinking today of Bronzeville, Humboldt Park, Little Village and what they meant to writers like
Richard Wright, Gwendolyn Brooks, and Sandra Cisneros to name a few-- to US literary history as a whole.

A Literary Tour of the United States

Journey from sea to shining sea to discover the richness and diversity of American writing in this deeply researched literary road trip.

www.thegreatcoursesplus.com

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Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · 1d

"The Silicon Valley heavyweight drew on a wide swath of religious thinkers, including the French-American theorist René Girard, whom Thiel knew at Stanford University, and the Nazi jurist Carl Schmitt, whose work he said helped create the core of his own beliefs."

Inside tech billionaire Peter Thiel’s off-the-record lectures about the antichrist

The political svengali and investor has been giving lectures on ‘an evil king or tyrant … who appears in the end times’

www.theguardian.com

Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · 1d

Folks watching global alt-right feminism, this is set for the 25th.
@reproutopia.bsky.social @milleridriss.bsky.social @fanniebialek.bsky.social @bardolator.bsky.social @katerqburns.bsky.social

The NAR Vows to Stage the Largest-Ever Gathering of Christian Women

Last year on Yom Kippur, leaders of the New Apostolic Reformation staged an all-day rally in support of Donald Trump’s bid for the presidency called A Million Women. As was the case with the Million M...

religiondispatches.org

Reposted by Arielle Zibrak

Hypervisible @hypervisible.blacksky.app · 1d

“Another former OpenAI employee who also was not authorized to speak publicly argued that releasing a deepfake AI social media platform was the right business decision, even if it contributes to the collapse of everyone's shared sense of reality.” 💀

Sora gives deepfakes 'a publicist and a distribution deal.' It could change the internet

OpenAI's new hit app has unleashed a new wave of AI slop across the internet. But what happens when there are no rules over hyper-realistic synthetic videos?

www.npr.org

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Reposted by Arielle Zibrak

Anne Applebaum @anneapplebaum.bsky.social · 1d

Congratulations to Maria Corina Machado, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize - her incredible optimism has already changed her country. I spoke to her, and wrote about her, at the beginning of this year:
www.theatlantic.com/internationa...

The ‘Anthropological Change’ Happening in Venezuela

Maduro is still in place, but a pro-democracy movement is transforming the beleaguered country.

www.theatlantic.com

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Reposted by Arielle Zibrak

Deidre Lynch @drbibliomane.bsky.social · 2d

With its "medico-electrical apparatus," was Dr. James Graham's "celestial bed" in his "Temple of Health" in 1779 London a prototype for DJT's "med bed"?
There are just too many ways in which the #18thc is a useful guide to the hucksterism of 2025 America.
daily.jstor.org/the-prince-o...

Black and white image showing a nubile woman, in deshabille, reclining on the Celestial Bed, a kind of couch with a canopy over it. Statue of Mercury in a niche behind her.

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Reposted by Arielle Zibrak

Maggie Blackhawk @maggieblackhawk.bsky.social · 2d

New essay in the Atlantic today: How Native Nations Shaped the Revolution by Ned Blackhawk (with many lessons on how we ended up where we are as a nation, and a gift link) www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...

How Native Nations Shaped the Revolution

The Founders were inspired—and threatened—by the independence and self-governance of nations like the Iroquois Confederacy.

www.theatlantic.com

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Inquest @inquest.bsky.social · 2d

"When feminist struggles enter phases of rapprochement with the state, they throw Indigenous, 'deviant,' Black, sexualized, sex-working women and other gender minorities under the bus." @reproutopia.bsky.social talks with Aya Gruber about truly abolitionist feminism.

Leaning In to State Violence - Sophie Lewis interviewed by Aya Gruber - Inquest

In ‘Enemy Feminisms,’ philosopher Sophie Lewis engages with the feminism of racists, colonizers, fascists, cops, and jailers to better understand what a truly liberatory politics needs to look like.

inquest.org

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Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · 5d

Come hang with us! I am going to show pictures of "Live, Laugh, Love" art and explain how Ella Wheeler Wilcox's poetry impacts your own personal and specific life.

A photograph of the poet Ella Wheeler Wilcox, a white woman wearing a white dress and holding a wreath garland on top of her head.

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Long Lead @longlead.com · 16d

Two survivors — George Takei and Jo Anne Naka — recall living in the horse stables at the Santa Anita racetrack before they were moved to their incarceration camps.

Read THE AGE OF INCARCERATION to learn more about Japanese American incarceration from some of the last survivors of it.

Japanese American Incarceration Survivors Remember What the US Forgot

During WWII, President Roosevelt invoked the Alien Enemies Act and incarcerated 125,000 Japanese Americans. Eighty years later, some of the camps’ last survivors reflect on lives scarred by injustice.

age-of-incarceration.longlead.com

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Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · 16d

Lovely to see my book reviewed alongside Faye Halpern's in a review essay on realism by Melanie Dawson in ALH. (Two scholars I so admire!) Unfortunately I don't have institutional access yet. Can anyone out there DM a pdf?
academic.oup.com/alh/article-...

#academicsky

Realism’s Vexed Relations with the Popular

Abstract. This essay assesses the centrality of popular idioms such as sentimental sympathy (discussed by Faye Halpern’s The Afterlife of Sympathy) and soc

academic.oup.com

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Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · 22d

Is Christine Baranski literally just the reincarnation of 19th- century New Thought novelist Clara Louise Burnham?

Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · 22d

Catch me at the Mahindra center next month! The first lecture in the series by Kendra Field was extraordinary. This will be ok. If you can't make it and want to hear about eugenic feminism and positive thinking, invite me to your spot.

mahindrahumanities.harvard.edu/event/ariell...

Arielle Zibrak: Exceptional Thinking: Eugenic Feminism and the Poetics of Positivity | Mahindra Humanities Center

mahindrahumanities.harvard.edu

Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · 24d

I think we've all had way too much screen time and should be made to play outside for the rest of the year.

Reposted by Arielle Zibrak

Virginia Heffernan @virginiaheffernan.bsky.social · 26d

Groypers, gopniks, and the Kirk-Fuentes beef.

The American right is one nutty hospital. Me @newrepublic :

newrepublic.com/article/2004...

No Avoiding It: Post-Kirk, We Have to Learn About the Groyper Wars

We still don’t know Tyler Robinson’s motivation. But we know we need to learn about the Charlie Kirk–Nick Fuentes Armageddon, dammit.

newrepublic.com

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Heather Froehlich @heatherfro.bsky.social · 26d

Call for applications: Endangered Archives Programme
eap.bl.uk/applicants

For Applicants

eap.bl.uk

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Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · 26d

A nice little write-up on A Literary Tour of the United States from the University of Wyoming! 🤠

UW English Professor Releases 24-Episode Literary Series with The Great Courses

Arielle Zibrak, a professor of English at the University of Wyoming, has released “A Literary Tour of the United States,” a 24-episode lecture series produced by The Great Courses.

www.uwyo.edu

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Reposted by Arielle Zibrak

Cynthia Miller-Idriss @milleridriss.bsky.social · 28d

I wrote about the groypers and the Fuentes-Kirk fight years ago, in Hate in the Homeland. Cautioning here that there is still a lot to know about the shooter’s motivation, I’m sharing these two paragraphs here to set the history of this fight in context:

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Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · 28d

🙏🏽

Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · 28d

What reading would recommend of yours or anyone else’s on these topics?

Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · Sep 10

Historically, in the United States, has a conservative activist (unelected) been publicly assassinated before?
#academicsky #historysky

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Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · Sep 10

#academicsky #blacksky

Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · Sep 10

Very excited to be a part of this series and looking forward to all the talks this year.

Joseph Rezek @rezekjoe.bsky.social · Sep 5

Thrilled to announce the 25/26 schedule at the American Literature and Culture Seminar at the Mahindra Center at Harvard. Please join us if you are in town for any of these events! Many thanks to my co-organizer @notsorry-sari.bsky.social, and to all our presenters!

American Literature and Culture Seminar, Mahindra Humanities Center, Harvard
2025-2026 seminar schedule (all events are in-person at 12 Quincy Street, 6pm):

September 17: Kendra Field (Tufts/Hutchins Center); response by Tiya Miles (Harvard)

October 15: Arielle Zibrak (U-Wyoming); response by David Frank Holland (Harvard)

November 12: Kelly Wisecup (Northwestern/Radcliffe); response by Christopher Pexa (Harvard)

March 24: Bonnie Costello (BU); response by Carrie Preston (BU)

April 15: Sven Beckert (Harvard); response by Kaveh Yazdani (UCONN)

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Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · Sep 10

People teach it so much, no one wants it out.

Arielle Zibrak @zibrak.bsky.social · Sep 10

If you're thinking about Spring adoption already, please consider adding some stories by American women. Grateful for this lovely review by @davidataylor.bsky.social

David Taylor @davidataylor.bsky.social · Aug 14

I reviewed @penguinclassicsusa.bsky.social 12 STORIES BY AMERICAN WOMEN WRITERS for @wirobooks.bsky.social: www.washingtonindependentreviewofbooks.com/bookreview/t...

Book cover of Penguin Classics "Twelve Stories by American Women" shows a woman in 19th-century clothes facing a typewriter and looking out a window, where a variety of eight women of different skin tones in long 19th-century dresses are on a hillside doing various activities: reading, talking, walking along a path.

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