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Lesley A Hall

Lesley A Hall

@erinacean.bsky.social

12K followers 460 following 3.7K posts

Archivist, historian, reader, Londoner, feminist
@erinacean
@[email protected]
www.lesleyahall.net
https://lesleyahall.blogspot.com/

History 49%

Political science 20%

more

Posts Replies Media Videos

Lesley A Hall @erinacean.bsky.social · 20h

Is there a specific period after which 'eyesores' finally become treasured specimens of heritage? (and do a certain number of instances have to be pulled down first?)
(I noted this when gasometers suddenly started getting preserved.)

Edwin Heathcote @edwinheathcote.bsky.social · 1d

www.ft.com/content/93a0... Once reviled, now celebrated, London’s Southbank Centre is a genuine civic wonder.

Once reviled, now celebrated, London’s Southbank Centre is a genuine civic wonder

The cultural complex’s national importance has belatedly been recognised

Lesley A Hall @erinacean.bsky.social · 21h

Goes back even further: a good deal of material on remedies to restore male vigour was collected by the Mass Observation Sex Survey ('Little Kinsey') of the late 1940s. 'Glands and hormones' were the touted products of the day.
Pretty sure there is even earlier evidence!

Lesley A Hall @erinacean.bsky.social · 21h

Oh dear.

Reposted by Christopher Wright, Lesley A. Hall

Elisabeth R. Anker @libankerdc.bsky.social · 22h

This is hands-down the best thing I’ve read on Epstein‘s worldview and those of his fellow tech, finance, and academic elite. It’s a rough read, but at least every paragraph is a banger. 🔥🔥🔥😭

The billionaires' eugenics project: how Epstein infiltrated Harvard, muzzled the humanities and preached master-race science

Edge - Jeffrey Epstein's favourite intellectual salon - was sold to me as a gathering of the world's finest minds, writes Virginia Heffernan. The files reveal it was something far darker: a decades-lo...

www.thenerve.news

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

Ankaret Wells @ankaret.bsky.social · 22h

I know I keep saying this, but: if there seem to be a lot of people around now who you didn't notice before, the likelihood is that either

(a) more of them now know there's a name for what it is they're experiencing

or

(b) more of them are surviving.

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

VictorianLondon @victorianlondon.bsky.social · 23h

zeppelin spas sadly never came to pass.

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

Elizabeth Darling @archhistdarling.bsky.social · 23h

Good to see an article on SBAC listing that acknowledges its significance as one element in a landscape of publicly-funded culture. Re-posting the link to my Co-authored article that explores this idea in detail - www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
Open Access so freely available.

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall, Diane Watt, Kathleen Kennedy

Dr Tess Machling @tessmachling.bsky.social · 1d

The other thing I've been thinking about that hoard - there was no opportunity, none at all, for the heritage community, the public to intervene to stop this. 1/4

#Archaeology #Detecting #Treasure

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

Professor finds Iron Age coin hoard near Bury St Edmunds

Tom Licence says he feels a personal connection to the coins, which are to be auctioned.

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall, Nick Pearce

Edwin Heathcote @edwinheathcote.bsky.social · 1d

www.ft.com/content/93a0... Once reviled, now celebrated, London’s Southbank Centre is a genuine civic wonder.

Once reviled, now celebrated, London’s Southbank Centre is a genuine civic wonder

The cultural complex’s national importance has belatedly been recognised

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

David Henig @davidheniguk.bsky.social · 1d

Or to put it another way, is part of our malaise that we think our successes are the wrong ones and attention should be elsewhere, when actually clever folk are still finding ways to create new value.

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

Athene Donald @athenedonald.bsky.social · 1d

It's not easy to avoid a whole host of different biases when judging others. I've seen some shocking examples at grant-giving committees. Some reflections on Conflicts of Interest occamstypewriter.org/athenedonald...

Conflicts of Interest | Athene Donald's Blog

occamstypewriter.org

Reposted by Will Jennings, Steve Peers, Christopher McCabe , and 3 more Will Jennings, Steve Peers, Christopher McCabe, Martin Paul Eve, Lesley A. Hall, Michael H. Whitworth

Caroline Russell @carolinerussell.bsky.social · 1d

Politics London discussing driverless taxis casually referring to “jaywalking pedestrians”.

Jaywalking is not a thing in UK law.

Transport for London and Government had better not be asleep at the wheel on this.

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall, Keith Lilley

Dr Matt Pope @mattpope.bsky.social · 1d

Hey UK archaeology. Let's all just cash in our years of knowledge, understanding, professionalism, trust, integrity, stakeholder partnerships, land owner networks, Professorial privilege, university accreditation.
Buy a metal detector and make some (more) money. 🏺

Durotriges Dig @durotrigesdig.bsky.social · 1d

*Academic sells history off to the highest bidder*

There, BBC, we sorted that headline for you

If he truly feels *a connection* to the find, as the article claims, would he not have donated it to a museum?

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

Professor finds Iron Age coin hoard near Bury St Edmunds

Tom Licence says he feels a personal connection to the coins, which are to be auctioned.

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

BeardedGenius @beardedgenius.bsky.social · 1d

Incredibly powerful front page from the Sunday Post

‘These are the faces of the close to 200 women killed by men in Scotland over the last 16 years. Many were murdered in the one place they should feel completely safe - their own home. Today, we ask for your help in ending misogynistic violence’

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

Rev Darren Jalland @oldmacharrev.bsky.social · 1d

To show the tone of the coverage, this story which is apparently about her leaving the NHS is almost entirely giving Sandie Peggie's side to the case with quotes from supporters, refers to Beth Upton solely by her surname and Sandie Peggie only by her first name www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottis...

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

Nina Baker @ninabake2.bsky.social · 1d

Gotta love the political stability we have here in the UK. 1 cat, 15 years, a gazillion largely awful PMs.
youtube.com/shorts/D3Fh3...

Congratulations to @number10cat.bsky.social

15 years of Larry the Downing street cat

YouTube video by The Scotsman

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

will pooley @willpooley.bsky.social · 1d

OMG what an amazing thing to stumble upon! if only someone had noticed this before

(other than a whole field of historians)

Screenshot of a skeet:

I was compiling data on witch burnings, as one does, and stumbled upon an important truth

Graph entitled:
the little ice age burned women
witch trials and european temperature

The Little Ice Age Burned Women
European witch trials mapped against climate data. When temperatures dropped, accusations rose.
© dr.eamer.dev
5:54 PM • Feb 14, 2026 ® Everybody can reply
56 reposts 7 quotes
138 likes
8 saves

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

James Elder @jameselder.bsky.social · 1d

Followers will know that my views on AI are nuanced, but it does seem to me that this should be given a higher profile.

Related: AI companies keep knocking library, archive and museum catalogues offline by their relentless and inconsiderate automated scraping of content.

Ed Newton-Rex @ednewtonrex.bsky.social · 1d

When OpenAI released ChatGPT, it was trained on pirated books.

This finally came to light in a lawsuit three months ago, but it has gone essentially unreported.

🧵 1/5

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall, Keith Lilley, Catherine J. Frieman , and 2 more Lesley A. Hall, Keith Lilley, Catherine J. Frieman, Klaus Oschema, Aidan O’Sullivan

Durotriges Dig @durotrigesdig.bsky.social · 1d

*Academic sells history off to the highest bidder*

There, BBC, we sorted that headline for you

If he truly feels *a connection* to the find, as the article claims, would he not have donated it to a museum?

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

Professor finds Iron Age coin hoard near Bury St Edmunds

Tom Licence says he feels a personal connection to the coins, which are to be auctioned.

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall, Catherine J. Frieman

Dr Tess Machling @tessmachling.bsky.social · 1d

This is what happens when 'treasure' can't be bought by a museum - the hoard has been broken up into individual auction lots & will disappear into many different hands, some overseas.

When do we start saying enough is enough??

www.noonans.co.uk/auctions/cal...

#Archaeology #Treasure #Detecting 🏺

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

Alex von Tunzelmann @alexvont.bsky.social · 1d

A reminder that if you live in England or Wales & were born between 1970-1990 – or even before 1970 – you can help protect your community by getting the MMR vaccine free from your NHS GP now. I did last year. www.nhs.uk/vaccinations...

Who should have the MMR vaccine

The MMR vaccine is recommended for adults and children born on or before 31 December 2019 who did not have the MMR vaccine when they were younger.

It's especially important to make sure you're vaccinated if:

you're a child, teenager or young adult
you could become pregnant
you're travelling to, or living in, a country where there is a higher risk of getting measles, mumps or rubella
you're a healthcare worker
you were born between 1970 and 1990 (as you may not have been vaccinated against all 3 infections)
Your GP surgery should be able to tell you which vaccinations you've already had.

If you were born before 1970 and have not had measles, mumps or rubella (german measles) or the vaccines that protect against these diseases, you can ask your GP surgery for the MMR vaccine.

Reposted by Christopher McCabe, Lesley A. Hall

Dan Sohege @danielsohege.bsky.social · 1d

Imagine being so "patriotic" that you protest the Royal National Lifeboat Institute for saving lives.
Racist morons fuelled by hate.

Screenshot from the Telegraph saying

Protesters accuse RNLI of being 'taxi service' for asylum seekers

Dozens of campaigners accuse charity of using lifeboats to 'facilitate' illegal immigration

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

will pooley @willpooley.bsky.social · 1d

with a great demo of a @julialaite.bsky.social -esque small history embedded in the story doi.org/10.1093/jsh/...

The Emmet’s Inch: Small History in a Digital Age

Abstract. Digitization has usually been considered a facilitator of what has been called “big” history. While digital history projects increasingly make go

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

KPD Max von Sydnow 🇨🇦🇵🇸🇹🇼🇺🇦🇬🇱 @mpdeejay.bsky.social · 1d

Everyone thinks that Nazism is just boots and braces skinheads and 14/88 chuds but the esoteric variant that dresses itself up in new age spirituality, health neuroticism, and woke blood and soil nationalism is far more pernicious.

Lesley A Hall @erinacean.bsky.social · 1d

I think there was a statistic cited, some years back, that when the proportion of women in a group reaches something like 30% men perceive it as woman-dominated.... i.e. not even 50%.

Lesley A Hall @erinacean.bsky.social · 1d

Thanks for the warning, I will go and bury myself in the works of Naomi Mitchison....

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

Michael Lombardi-Nash @lombardinash.bsky.social · 1d

A testament to Magnus Hirschfeld's enduring commitment to understanding and advocating for the rights of all individuals, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity. 🌈🏳️‍⚧️Ο #lgbtqReads #lgbtqHistory #MagnusHirschfeld
www.amazon.com/dp/B0DY1JD5Y8

The Homosexuality of Men and Women: Volume II: Chapters 19-31 of 39 Chapters

Amazon.com: The Homosexuality of Men and Women: Volume II: Chapters 19-31 of 39 Chapters eBook : Hirschfeld, Magnus, Lombardi-Nash, Michael: Kindle Store

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

Sarah Bull @sarahebull.bsky.social · 1d

I swear that the timing isn't deliberate, but if you're in London and looking for a different kind of walking tour on Valentines Day, voila:

sarahbull.me/mapping-nine...

Mapping Nineteenth-Century Obscenity - Sarah Bull

Last summer I discovered the National Library of Scotland's Georeferenced Maps and had a lot of fun plotting addresses I found in my research for Advertising Pornography and Obscenity Trials. I found ...

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

Lloyd Meadhbh Houston @lejhouston.bsky.social · 1d

Nothing says Valentine's Day like a discussion of sexually pathological corpses...

Delighted to receive my contributor's copy of this fantastic collection.

Congrats to Chris, Bridget, and Matt, and to everyone whose work features.

Reposted by Lesley A. Hall

Dr Mary McAuliffe @drmarymcauliffe.bsky.social · 2d

All these right wing white men concerned about birth rates-look in the mirror & see why women choose not to give birth in the world of inequality you support; a world of virulent misogyny, racism, anti-migrant, anti environmentalism, & hate towards LGBTI kids. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

‘Handmaid’s Tale future’: Reform’s Matt Goodwin sparks outcry with fertility comments

Byelection candidate accused of indulging ‘alt right fantasy’ by suggesting women need ‘biological reality’ check

www.theguardian.com