Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Nick Fitzhenry

@nickfitzhenry.bsky.social

2.7K followers 13K following 41 posts

PhD student in Economic History, LSE. nicholasfitzhenry.co.uk Research: death, disease & doctors during Apartheid Methods: Applied econometrics and historical demography. Teaching: Industrial Rev., History of Middle East

Posts Media Videos Starter Packs

Pinned

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Nov 22

I've put together my personal website — rather proud of these (GPT-generated) icons for each of my research projects!

www.nicholasfitzhenry.co.uk

2 20

Reposted by Nick Fitzhenry

Hampton Gaddy @hggaddy.bsky.social · 4d

🚨 The Economist has been telling you for years that polygamy causes civil war by locking men out of marriage. A new article with @rebeccasear.bsky.social and @anthrolog.bsky.social explains that the demography of marriage markets doesn't actually work that way. 🧵

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

High rates of polygyny do not lock large proportions of men out of the marriage market | PNAS

There is a widespread belief, in both the scholarly literature and the popular press, that polygyny prevents large numbers of men from marrying by ...

www.pnas.org

3 48 120

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · 10d

I'm submitting my PhD dissertation today, with the defence scheduled in early December. Long years of work, but proud of the outcome and excited to develop it further. Thought I'd share the first few pages of the front matter:

4 1 23

Reposted by Nick Fitzhenry

Zohran Kwame Mamdani @zohrankmamdani.bsky.social · 14d

UNTIL IT'S DONE, Ep. 2

When the Brownsville Clinic opened in 1916, it was the first birth control center in America. Its very existence felt impossible. For young women, it was a lifeline.

109 years later, the Clinic is long closed—but Brownsville mothers are still struggling.

87 1.3K 5.4K

Reposted by Nick Fitzhenry

Evan @evansmithhist.bsky.social · Aug 12

Facebook reminds me that a year ago I started a project of scanning the journals of the Central African Historical Association, based at the University of Rhodesia/Zimbabwe, which ran from 1970 to the early 1980s. I have uploaded my scans to Dropbox here: www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ruzbp...

3 23 57

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Aug 8

Under-5 pneumonia and influenza deaths decline concurrently with diarrhoeal diseases, as observed in other countries. I suspect the spikes in the early 1970s are due to local waves of the H3N2 global (Hong Kong) flu pandemic.

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Aug 8

The decline (while far from fully converging) is also mysterious, especially given the Group Areas Acts, worsening economic conditions, and political unrest. ORT might be part of it, but it became readily promoted only in the late 80s.

1 1

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Aug 8

Under-5 diarrhoeal disease death rates in South Africa during the 70s and 80s for coloured (mixed-race), indian and white race groups (apartheid state did not collect complete data for the black majority).

The seasonality and heightened rates for the coloured population are quite shocking.

1 1 7

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Aug 7

Two come to mind, I’ll pass it on :)

Reposted by Nick Fitzhenry

Terry McGlynn @hormiga.bsky.social · Aug 4

When was the last time you've listened to Graceland. You might want to listen to Graceland again. It's really good.

the cover of the album, which is cream white and in the middle, a square image of 15th century Ethopian art depicting St. George, the Patron saint of ethiopia. The image is a cool piece of art, not as psuedophotorepresentative like you'd see coming out of europe at that time, it's been characterized as "proto-cubist" and it will make you want to look at more ethiopian art from that period of time, at least it is for me now after I looked this up to fill in the alt text.

10 6 96

Reposted by Nick Fitzhenry

Jenna @jennaonthenet.bsky.social · Aug 2

David Byrne came to my band’s show at a gay bar in Bed-Stuy and sang This Must Be The Place with us and I still haven’t processed it

280 2.1K 11K

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Jul 24

Source: Strebel P, Hussey G, Metcalf C, Smith D, Hanslo D, Simpson J. An outbreak of whooping cough in a highly vaccinated urban community. J Trop Pediatr. 1991 Mar;37(2):71-6. doi: 10.1093/tropej/37.2.71. PMID: 2027168.

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Jul 24

A striking visualisation of vaccine impact: Cape Town whooping cough deaths plummeted after DP (diphtheria and pertussis [whooping cough]) vaccine introduction (1950). Also reveals stark racial health disparities in South Africa, particularly in the first half of the 20th century.

The graph shows high mortality rates among 'non-white' populations (solid line) with significant peaks in the 1930s-1940s, followed by a sharp decline after the introduction of the DP vaccine in 1950. The dotted line represents White populations, which had much lower mortality rates throughout

1 1 5

Reposted by Nick Fitzhenry

Orkney Library & Archive @orkneylibrary.bsky.social · Jul 23

The shipwreck uncovered in Sanday, #Orkney last year has been identified as HMS Hind, later the Earl of Chatham which was wrecked in the Bay of Lopness in 1788.

More than 230 years buried in the seabed, before being released by a storm in 2024.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Archaeologists identify 250-year-old Shipwreck in Orkney

Scientific analysis and community-led research led to the identification of the Earl of Chatham, which was found last year.

www.bbc.co.uk

4 63 350

Reposted by Nick Fitzhenry

Prashant 🌊 @prasshant.bsky.social · Jul 22

That's the post !

13 75

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Jun 30

Clioguesser: guess the year based on a political map, ranging from 1000 BCE to 2024 CE.

I am 15th on the leaderboard ;)

clioguesser.azurewebsites.net/leaderboard

1 1 4

Reposted by Nick Fitzhenry

LSE Department of Economic History @lseechist.bsky.social · Jun 12

Congratulations to @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social and Mina Ishizu for receiving the 2025 #LSE Class #Teaching Awards 🧑‍🏫🥳
info.lse.ac.uk/staff/educat...
#econhist #education

LSE Class Teacher Awards

info.lse.ac.uk

1 6

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Apr 14

1 6 13

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Apr 11

A video I made for a job interview summarising my PhD work and its relevance to students of economics. youtu.be/r4U07e00oY0?...

Nick Fitzhenry - PhD Summary

YouTube video by Nick Fitzhenry

youtu.be

1 5

Reposted by Nick Fitzhenry

Jordan @jordanpfot.bsky.social · Apr 9

1 3

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Mar 30

Tom Hollander's is the best of the genre

14 8 230

Reposted by Nick Fitzhenry

Andrew Heiss @andrew.heiss.phd · Mar 20

I’ve long used FiveThirtyEight’s interactive “Hack Your Way To Scientific Glory” to illustrate the idea of p-hacking when I teach statistics. But ABC/Disney killed the site earlier this month :(

So I made my own with #rstats and Observable and #QuartoPub ! stats.andrewheiss.com/hack-your-way/

Screenshot of the linked Quarto website, with input checkboxes to change different conditions for a regression model that predicts economic performance based on US political party, with a reported p-value

58 440 1.5K

Reposted by Nick Fitzhenry

Jordan @jordanpfot.bsky.social · Mar 19

This reminds me of an Archbishop Desmond Tutu quote I hold close to my heart.

"I'm deeply committed to reconciliation and I care enormously for all the people in this country… You see, we can't go to heaven alone. If I arrive there, God will ask me: 'Where is De Klerk? His path crossed yours.' And he also – God will ask him: 'Where is Tutu?' So I cry for him, I cry for De Klerk – because he spurned the opportunity to become human."

3 20

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Mar 11

1 1

Nick Fitzhenry @nickfitzhenry.bsky.social · Mar 11