Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 17h

Throwback to when I was an insufferable theory bro humanities grad student living in Bushwick

Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 1d

Brilliant interview with Ben Ratskoff on how the Nova Exhibition commemorating October 7 “invites visitors to participate affectively and imaginatively in immersive theatrics as a kind of vicarious victimhood.” @thediasporist.bsky.social
thediasporist.de/schlock-and-...

Schlock and Awe – the Diasporist

Ben Ratskoff on the immersive traumatization at the Nova Exhibition

thediasporist.de

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 2d

Happening tomorrow, on what happens to be the two year anniversary of October 7 and all the horror that has ensued from it. We hope to have a timely conversation about new work in Holocaust studies and why it still matters in this moment.

Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 5d

Please join me for a virtual conversation with Dan Stone on Tuesday, Oct. 7, 12:15pm Eastern, about his many new publications on the Holocaust in Romania, the International Tracing Service, and volume 1 of The Cambridge History of the Holocaust. Register here:
events.rochester.edu/event/the-ho...

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 4d

Drove past this evangelical church today outside Chicago and was blinded by a dozen giant Israeli flags
ingrace.us/about/

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 5d

Please join me for a virtual conversation with Dan Stone on Tuesday, Oct. 7, 12:15pm Eastern, about his many new publications on the Holocaust in Romania, the International Tracing Service, and volume 1 of The Cambridge History of the Holocaust. Register here:
events.rochester.edu/event/the-ho...

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 7d

Pleased to share my interview with Kathryn Brackney about her award-winning new history of Holocaust consciousness from @uwiscpress.bsky.social & @glmosseprogram.bsky.social. The spooky cover art is from a 1966 edition of Damiano Malabaila (a pen name of Primo Levi).
www.jhiblog.org/2025/10/01/s...

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 7d

The powerful moral legacy of Yeshayahu Leibowitz lives on: "We also must resist the inclination, as the Israeli thinker Yeshayahu Leibowitz admonished in his famous 1953 article 'After Kibiyeh,' to wrap state actions in the veil of religious sanctity." @forward.com
forward.com/opinion/7726...

'For the sins we have committed': Reimagining Yom Kippur liturgy in a post-Oct. 7 world

Hovering over this 5786 holiday season is a sense of moral and spiritual crisis that calls out for liturgical innovation.

forward.com

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 7d

Tomorrow (Thursday, Oct. 2) is the last day to submit abstracts for our ACLA seminar on new concepts and representations of catastrophe. Please join us!

Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · Sep 5

Together with Karyn Ball I'm organizing a seminar on "The Catastrophic Event in Times of Permanent Catastrophe" for the next ACLA in Montreal in Feb. 2026. Please consider sending in a short paper abstract by 10/2 to join us. Theory folks from all disciplines welcome!
www.acla.org/seminar/f9b3...

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 8d

Me when university admin suggests I tone down the wokeness

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 8d

“Judge rules non-citizens have the same free speech rights as US citizens under the first amendment”
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Judge issues blistering opinion against Trump policy to deport pro-Palestinian students

Judge rules non-citizens have the same free speech rights as US citizens under the first amendment

www.theguardian.com

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 8d

New York friends and colleagues: I'm presenting my work on the failures of German Holocaust memory culture at Columbia in two weeks! Register here: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

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Reposted by Jonathon Catlin

Journal of the History of Ideas @jhideas.bsky.social · 9d

In a new think piece for the JHI Blog’s forum on political economy, Marek Maj discusses how, before the Soviet Union's détente with the West, Polish scientists attempted to render intellectual labor more efficient by adapting and revising the Western managerial turn to motivation.

The Brain as Economy: Intellectual Labor and Mental Efficiency in Twentieth-Century Poland

by Marek Maj This think piece is part of the forum “The Return of Political Economy in Intellectual History”

www.jhiblog.org

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Reposted by Jonathon Catlin

Joel S. @joelhs.bsky.social · 10d

The separation of antisemitism from all other bigotries in the US, by banning DEI for other minority communities while effectively mandating it for Jews, is unfair to all those other communities, but it also ensures a whole generation will not truly understand antisemitism.

Joel S. @joelhs.bsky.social · 10d

This sort of thing is unfair to these students, but it is also ultimately going to backfire against Jews: www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Northwestern students blocked from enrollment after refusing controversial antisemitism training

Students say mandatory training video is biased in favor of Israel and could inflame campus tensions over Gaza

www.theguardian.com

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 10d

Overseen at Berlin’s 100,000 strong demonstration in solidarity with Gaza

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Reposted by Jonathon Catlin

Joel S. @joelhs.bsky.social · 10d

This sort of thing is unfair to these students, but it is also ultimately going to backfire against Jews: www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Northwestern students blocked from enrollment after refusing controversial antisemitism training

Students say mandatory training video is biased in favor of Israel and could inflame campus tensions over Gaza

www.theguardian.com

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 11d

From Moira Wegel’s talk this morning at the GSA: Andrew Breitbart on his hatred of the Frankfurt School (aka “Berlin Franklin School”)

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Reposted by Jonathon Catlin

Joel S. @joelhs.bsky.social · 12d

JD Vance appropriating the term "blood libel" to describe legitimate criticism of ICE agents is one of the most antisemitic things I have heard in US politics in the past few weeks. Yet this administration has somehow managed to convince a lot of people it actually cares about fighting antisemitism.

Joel S. @joelhs.bsky.social · 12d

JD Vance is now using the term "blood libel" to describe criticism of ICE, saying, "The Democrats and the media — because they so hate the idea of a real border — are engaging in a kind of blood libel against ICE agents."

Somewhere, our ancestors wept.

"VP Vance tells The Ingraham Angle: "The Democrats and the media — because they so hate the idea of a real border — are engaging in a kind of blood libel against ICE agents. They're accusing them of engaging in crimes, they're accusing them of being part of the Gestapo. They're actually inciting violence against our law enforcement. They know exactly what they're doing, and now it's time to stop.""

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 13d

Smart piece from @schuneke.bsky.social on the naughty bad gays (closets full of them, even) pervading the second Trump administration. “It’s a pattern that repeats again and again: elites fuck who they want, regardless of what the law says.”
thebaffler.com/latest/the-f...

The Fruits of Rank | Samuel Huneke

The A-Gays of Trump’s Washington are nothing the new—the past is littered with homosexual hypocrites.

thebaffler.com

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 13d

Hire me!

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 13d

"A question of intent: Is what's happening in Gaza genocide?"
www.npr.org/2025/09/25/g...

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 14d

For the first time in a while, Ezra Klein platforms a brilliant scholar with sharp political instincts (Corey Robin) rather than right-wing demagogues. The analogy for our post-Kirk moment isn’t the Reichstag Fire or Grynspan assassination but McCarthyism.
www.nytimes.com/2025/09/24/o...

Opinion | Trump Is Building the Blue Scare

www.nytimes.com

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 14d

Catastrophe for sale once again in Deutschland.
www.the-berliner.com/politics/is-...

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Reposted by Jonathon Catlin

Joel S. @joelhs.bsky.social · 16d

I'm in the "Guardian" writing about Judith Butler and the new McCarthyism: www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Judith Butler is being targeted by the US government. We must stand up | Joel Swanson

What is happening to Judith Butler – a Jewish intellectual – in the name of fighting ‘antisemitism’ is outrageous

www.theguardian.com

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 15d

“Staatsräson presents the irresistible temptation of turning guilt into self-righteousness. Horror and self-hatred are transubstantiated into pride and patriotism when the Great National Genocide becomes an origin story for how and why Germans know better about antisemitism.”

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Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 16d

Tomorrow (Tuesday, 9/23) on Zoom!

Jonathon Catlin @joncatlin.bsky.social · 26d

I'm pleased to announce the first *virtual* event in a speaker series I'm organizing on New Histories of Fascism, Nazi Germany, and the Holocaust: Federico Marcon on his new book, "Fascism: The History of a Word" @uchicagopress.bsky.social
Register here via Zoom: events.rochester.edu/event/fascis...

Fascism: The History of a Word–Federico Marcon

events.rochester.edu