Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Reposted by Siân Adiseshiah

Loughborough English @lboroenglish.bsky.social · 5d

The Brontë Society's Annual Lecture was delivered this weekend by @drclaireocall.bsky.social 'A happy Heathcliff and Cathy': The influence of Emily Brontë on Sylvia Plath & Ted Hughes. Claire is also Editor of Brontë Studies, the journal of the Brontë Society. www.bronte.org.uk/events/bront...

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Ben Whitham @drbenwhitham.bsky.social · 5d

These cases of extreme, far-right racist violence targeting Muslims and people seeking asylum are being blithely ignored by most media and politicians because they see no political capital in addressing them.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Man arrested after fire at London asylum seekers' hotel

The blaze is being treated as a hate crime by officers investigating.

www.bbc.co.uk

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Ben Whitham @drbenwhitham.bsky.social · 5d

Men in balaclavas set fire to a mosque in East Sussex last night. It's only appearing on the BBC's local coverage, rather than its main national headlines, despite coming just a week after the (also under-reported) firebombing of an asylum hotel in London last week
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Peacehaven: Fire at East Sussex mosque probed as 'hate crime'

Video appears to show two people in balaclavas at the mosque before a large blaze spreads.

www.bbc.co.uk

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Ben Davies @bendavies.bsky.social · 10d

Pleased to announce @univeng.bsky.social small funding scheme now open to members. UE will fund up to 20 projects up to £250 each to support research/pedagogy/continuing professional development activities in Lit, Lang, Creative Writing. See details here: universityenglish.ac.uk/englishcreat...

University English Funding

universityenglish.ac.uk

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Health Humanities Research Group @healthhumslboro.bsky.social · 8d

CFP 📣 Join us in Loughborough 📍 for a day of Sensation fiction and health humanities organised by our very own @braddonite.bsky.social. ✨ See post below for details 👇

Victorian Popular Fiction Association @vpfa.bsky.social · 8d

🚨Call for Papers!
❓Sensation Fiction and the Health Humanities: A VPFA Study Day
🗺️Loughborough University
📅27 March 2026
💷 FREE
For full CfP: victorianpopularfiction.org/studyday/for...
Contact the organiser Anne-Marie Beller (@braddonite.bsky.social) at [email protected] for more information

Mentally ill patients dancing at a ball at Somerset County Asylum. Process
print after a lithograph by K. Drake, ca. 1850/1855.
https://wellcomecollection.org/works/xswz3swa

CFP: Sensation Fiction and the Health Humanities
A VPFA Study Day
Loughborough University, 27 March 2026

The Health Humanities and Victorian popular fiction intersect in revealing ways, offering insights into how 19th-century literature shaped and reflected contemporary understandings of health, illness, and the body. Popular narratives not only mirrored anxieties surrounding public health and medical progress but also contributed to shaping public perceptions of health and healing. Health Humanities approaches re-examine these texts to uncover how cultural narratives and literary representations influenced attitudes toward physical and mental well-being, gendered experiences of illness, and the ethics of care in an age of rapid scientific change.

Health Humanities is a particularly useful approach to sensation fiction because it illuminates the ways in which these emotionally charged, often morally ambiguous narratives explore and interrogate concepts of the body, illness, and mental health. Sensation fiction, with its focus on secrets, trauma, nervous disorders, and abnormal psychological states, frequently dramatizes the anxieties of Victorian society surrounding health, gender, and identity. By applying the lens of Health Humanities, scholars can uncover how these texts reflect and shape contemporary medical discourse. Interdisciplinary approaches also highlight how sensation fiction critiques institutional medicine, domestic care practices, and the pathologization of women’s experiences. Ultimately, Health Humanities allows us to see sensation fiction not just as entertainment, but as a culturally significant form that negotiates the meanings of illness, morality, and human vulnerability in a rapidly changing world.

20-minute papers are invited on any aspect of the health humanities and sensation fiction. Topics may include, but are not limited to the following:

• Madness, Hysteria, and the Sensation Heroine
• The Role of Doctors and Medical Authority in Se…

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Prof Katherine Schofield 🇬🇧🇦🇺🇪🇺 @katherineschof8.bsky.social · 13d

I am genuinely baffled and distressed as to why the UK government is intent on destroying UK's genuinely world-leading universities, who bring £265 billion into the economy and support more than 250,000 jobs.

This tax will kill us.

www.standard.co.uk/news/politic...

Student visas crackdown and new levies to cause ‘£1.8bn loss’ to UK economy

The Government has proposed a 6 per cent tax on international student tuition fees and a reduction in graduate visas

www.standard.co.uk

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Loughborough English @lboroenglish.bsky.social · 13d

It was a real pleasure welcoming English and Liberal Arts students to our department today. After a welcome from @justin-waring.bsky.social, @sadiseshiah.bsky.social, Barbara Cooke, Rachael Grew, and our English Committee, some of our academics shared their favourite text to teach! #EscapedAlone

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Jenny Richards @jennyrichards.bsky.social · 17d

Helpful summary in @timeshighered.bsky.social about why portability matters to humanities and social science scholars at every stage of career with a quotation from me at the end about exceptions expected for "long form and/or longer-process outputs”. www.timeshighereducation.com/news/use-ref...

Use REF pause to review non-portability of outputs, urge scholars

Breaking the link between researchers and their outputs harms academic mobility and disciplinary excellence, argue professors

www.timeshighereducation.com

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Loughborough English @lboroenglish.bsky.social · 21d

Fantastic to meet prospective students and their families and friends at our Open Day today. There was a real buzz and the sun was shining! ☀️

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Siân Adiseshiah @sadiseshiah.bsky.social · 23d

"the cumulative impact of this silence is a deepening sense that Palestinian suffering is institutionally unrecognisable: too controversial to name, too politically fraught to mourn, too inconvenient to address."

wonkhe.com/blogs/gaza-h...

Gaza, higher education, and the ethics of institutional neutrality

Institutions are wary of speaking about Israel's actions in Gaza, but that silence has consequences, argues Aneeza Pervez

wonkhe.com

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Prof. Ben Pohl @benpohl.bsky.social · 28d

A polite reminder that some of the most fundamental and field-shaping research is UNfunded—or rather core-funded through institutional research leave—precisely because it doesn’t have to abide by the fickle trends and tickboxes that govern UKRI & Co. Frankly, this is an insult to the profession.

Research Professional News @resprofnews.bsky.social · 28d

Ministers ‘want to shift funds away from low-quality research’ .

Universities UK president says institutions cannot afford “unfunded hobbyist research”.

www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-u...

Ministers ‘want to shift funds away from low-quality research’ - Research Professional News

Universities UK president says institutions cannot afford “unfunded hobbyist research”

www.researchprofessionalnews.com

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Emily Mark-FitzGerald @emilymfg.bsky.social · 28d

This is a jaw-dropping statement from anyone in a uni leadership role — but also — what exactly is ‘low-quality’ and ‘hobbyist’ research? Nearly every academic I know is burning the candle at both ends and STILL producing important work in their fields. This feels like an anti-humanities dog whistle

Research Professional News @resprofnews.bsky.social · 28d

Ministers ‘want to shift funds away from low-quality research’ .

Universities UK president says institutions cannot afford “unfunded hobbyist research”.

www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-u...

Ministers ‘want to shift funds away from low-quality research’ - Research Professional News

Universities UK president says institutions cannot afford “unfunded hobbyist research”

www.researchprofessionalnews.com

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Will Tattersdill @tattersdill.bsky.social · 28d

The last REF found that 98% of UK research was either "internationally recognised", "internationally excellent", or "world-leading". If you think low-quality research is the noteworthy challenge in UK higher ed right now, you are wilfully looking in the wrong direction

Research Professional News @resprofnews.bsky.social · 28d

Ministers ‘want to shift funds away from low-quality research’ .

Universities UK president says institutions cannot afford “unfunded hobbyist research”.

www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-u...

Ministers ‘want to shift funds away from low-quality research’ - Research Professional News

Universities UK president says institutions cannot afford “unfunded hobbyist research”

www.researchprofessionalnews.com

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Siân Adiseshiah @sadiseshiah.bsky.social · 28d

Congratulations!

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Siân Adiseshiah @sadiseshiah.bsky.social · 28d

🤦 Some of the most exciting, highest quality, and impactful research I know of (in the humanities) has not been externally funded.

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Dominic Dean @drdominicdean.bsky.social · 28d

I disagree profoundly with the view that all research in universities should be externally funded. I'm also curious about why such a view needs to be expounded in the most provocative and insulting terms, rather than presented e.g. as dry financial pragmatism -what is the point of the obnoxiousness?

Research Professional News @resprofnews.bsky.social · 28d

Ministers ‘want to shift funds away from low-quality research’ .

Universities UK president says institutions cannot afford “unfunded hobbyist research”.

www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-u...

Ministers ‘want to shift funds away from low-quality research’ - Research Professional News

Universities UK president says institutions cannot afford “unfunded hobbyist research”

www.researchprofessionalnews.com

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Siân Adiseshiah @sadiseshiah.bsky.social · 28d

Actually a lot of it world-leading (in our disciplines at least). A high percentage of monographs in the humanities are not supported by external funding.

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Faisal فيصل @faisalhamadah.bsky.social · 29d

Teaching a lit class for the first time in ages and the students so far seem positively shimmering to simply read a book, then talk about it.

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Loughborough English @lboroenglish.bsky.social · 29d

Two of our academics - @wvmierlo.bsky.social and Dr Barbara Cooke - will be speaking at the Centre for Book Cultures and Publishing (CBCP) Modernist Editing Symposium on 23 September. More details here: research.reading.ac.uk/centre-for-b...

CBCP Modernist Editing Symposium, 23 September 2025 - Centre for Book Cultures and Publishing

This symposium brings together leading scholars and practitioners in modernist textual criticism and scholarly editing. Organised by Dr Buxi Duan and Lawrence Jones at the Centre for Book Cultures and...

research.reading.ac.uk

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Siân Adiseshiah @sadiseshiah.bsky.social · 29d

This has cheered me up :)

www.independent.co.uk/tv/culture/g...

Gary Linker appears to take swipe at BBC as former MOTD presenter collects NTA

Gary Lineker appeared to take a swipe at the BBC as he collected his National Television Award (NTA) for Best Presenter. The former Match of the Day (MOTD) pundit ended Ant and Dec's 23-year reign as ...

www.independent.co.uk

Siân Adiseshiah @sadiseshiah.bsky.social · Sep 4

Thanks, David! Can’t quite believe it

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Loughborough English @lboroenglish.bsky.social · Sep 4

Our own Head of Department @sadiseshiah.bsky.social has been appointed as a member of the REF 2029 sub-panel for UoA 27: English Language and Literature 2029.ref.ac.uk/panels/main-...

Main Panel D – Arts and Humanities – REF 2029

2029.ref.ac.uk

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Hetan Shah @hetanshah.bsky.social · Aug 30

Life’s getting a bit more crap here if you are a person from an ethnic minority 🧵

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Siân Adiseshiah @sadiseshiah.bsky.social · Aug 30

Ours is going to Leeds Uni this year. I’m feeling very wobbly!

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Loughborough English @lboroenglish.bsky.social · Aug 23

Our BA programme lead, Barbara Cooke, has been finishing her book ('Love and Landscape: Iconic Meeting Places in Classic and Contemporary Literature' with Bodleian Library Publishing), and was able to draw on it for the Jane Austen 250 series for The Conversation theconversation.com/in-jane-aust...

In Jane Austen’s Persuasion, respite is a key ingredient for romance

Jane Austen’s novels work a romantic alchemy, and travel is their catalyst.

theconversation.com

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