Thomas S. Davis
@thomassdavis.bsky.social
2K followers 570 following 660 posts
English/Env Hum Prof. The Extinct Scene: Late Modernism & Everyday Life (Columbia 2016). Finishing: Forming Attachments: Aesthetic Education & Ecological Crisis. Starting: Irrelevance: Art & Literature in the 21st Century.. www.thomassdavis.net
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thomassdavis.bsky.social
Oh my god. This is so horrifying and also unsurprising. I really do think the drift if neolib/technofeudal higher Ed is out of joint with what students want and need, to say nothing of faculty. This is a snake eating its own tail.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
We definitely need better policies & support at the institutional level, but I think our more immediate impact is in what @gmacdonald.bsky.social once called "our shop floor," our classrooms. A lot of what I value pedagogically is now asymmetrical with the technofeudal university.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
It's a good question. I'm at Ohio State: large public R1. Socio-economic status varies wildly class to class, year to year. This might be unsatisfying, but I think we can do a lot by building trust with students, explaining why we do what we do, inviting their input, & being flexible.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
I'll also say on the occasions when I have said "I'm not available then" it seems to be the academic version of "I'd prefer not to." Just stares and silence and then, yes, adaptation (and maybe resentment?).
thomassdavis.bsky.social
Following for tips. A colleague of mine once told me that she eventually convinced herself that her writing time meant she wasn't available to do other things just like she couldn't do other things while in the classroom. "They adapt with you or without you." I aspire to that.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
I think we all need to collectively author a manifesto on the return of analog pedagogy in the wake of edtech delusions & AI snake oil.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
It has been a bit of a revelation, honestly. The students were kind of hungry for it & they're so dialed in. They just did blue book in-class midterm essays theorizing the relevance of lit & art for the polycrisis & not a single person left before the full 80 minutes. And the exams are 🔥
thomassdavis.bsky.social
Not a lot to pass out this go round: today was Benjamin's "ON the Concept of History" & maybe 20 pages from Alva Noe's "The Entanglement" and that's been the most in one go. I will also say that this experiment with zero tech has resulted in one of the most engaged classes I've had in a while.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
I have a colleague here in art that only does physical materials & still uses course packets. OSU used to have a service that contacted us every semester about course packets, but that's gone. I've been handing out copies of things to students this semester & doing mostly analog style teaching.
Reposted by Thomas S. Davis
chanda.blacksky.app
🚨🚨 My dear friend and fellow academic, the Palestinian American sociologist @emanabdelhadi.bsky.social has been taken by the Cook County Sheriff near Chicago. They have not mirandized her. Please signal boost. All eyes on Broadview for Eman and the community she was defending 🚨🚨
thomassdavis.bsky.social
Indeed. So glad to know I got a PhD to assist in the deskilling of our students😢🤮
thomassdavis.bsky.social
Looking forward to responding to this paper & hopefully initiating some discussion that is worthy of it.
mhs1791.bsky.social
Join us on Oct. 7 for our next seminar on modern America, "Crisis Politics and Everyday Life in "Middletown."" Authors @patcollier.bsky.social & James J. Connolly, with comments by @thomassdavis.bsky.social. Register: www.masshist.org/eve...
thomassdavis.bsky.social
Yes, we are the vanguard of AI fluency…will report back from the fallout soon.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
Among other things, the AI boosterism & the eagerness of folks to play ball is so so depressing. I sometimes have to adopt the “I just work here”’posture to actually do any work. But yes, the students are awesome & so many of them see through all of this fraudulent bs.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
The slow civil war feels like it shifted to a higher gear in the last 24 hours or so.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
I still don’t understand why orgs insist on hotels for conferences given the exorbitant AV rates, bed night requirements, etc.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
We went into the hills and the caves and found large wolf spiders and something close to silence.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
i love that you are and wish that i was there too. I will have to settle for Carcass and Necrot on Monday.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
Well, that was surprisingly easy to delete, I must say.
thomassdavis.bsky.social
I thought he had vanished too. There was a flyer around the neighborhood a few years ago of his face after someone punched him. I guess he is all healed up and ready to educate the masses again….
thomassdavis.bsky.social
Is that Brian Grossman? He has held up conspiracy theory signs around there in the past, including ones with openly antisemitic and white nationalist slogans. He also lived across the street from me for the first year we lived in our house. Stories….
Reposted by Thomas S. Davis
calebwellum.bsky.social
New pub: @culturalstudies.bsky.social has just posted the interview that @imreszeman.bsky.social and I did with Andreas Malm re: Fossil Capital, the development of his thought, and plenty more. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.....