Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

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Louisa @louisathelast.bsky.social · 15h

Samuel Beckett was neighbors with Andre the Giant when Andre was a child, and would sometimes give him a ride to school

rax ‘levon honkers’ king @raxkingisdead.bsky.social · 17h

you ever think about those real weird overlaps. like tennessee williams might have listened to the ramones

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Dr Hannah Čulík-Baird @opietasanimi.com · 23h

It is my pleasure to share the CFP for a special issue of #ResDiffJournal guest-edited by Yusi Liu, Chris Gipson, and Najee Olya, building on the Mountaintop Coalition's panel at the SCS earlier this year. "International Scholarship in a ‘Globalized’ World?" resdifficiles.com/internationa...

International Scholarship in a ‘Globalized’ World? CFP

At the 2025 annual meeting of the Society for Classical Studies and the Archaeological Institute of America in Philadelphia, the Mountaintop Coalition sponsored the joint panel, “Internationa…

resdifficiles.com

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Working Classicists @workingclassicists.bsky.social · 1d

👋

Newspaper article about the Working Classicists Guide to National 5 Classical Studies, in today’s Courier (Dundee).

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Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 1d

so, that drive by Lawrence.

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Ada Palmer @adapalmer.bsky.social · 1d

I see pieces like this a lot, often w/ a spin of lamenting cultural degeneration, but reading is a LABOR issue, it’s declined because so many people are working overtime or two jobs & employers expect after hours work. France has Earth’s highest reading rate b/c long lunch breaks & labor protections

After Dinner Conversation® @afterdinnerconversation.com · 1d

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Paul Barrett ❌👑 @paulthedogman.bsky.social · 1d

"Who Goes Nazi?" by Dorothy Thompson, Harper's, August 1941. Give it a read, play the game, see if you recognize anyone you know today. Sadly, it's going to matter. Brilliant, uncanny, timeless. Oh, and btw, RESIST like your life depends on it, bc it might. harpers.org/archive/1941...

Who Goes Nazi?, by Dorothy Thompson

harpers.org

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CUNY Graduate Center @thegraduatecenter.bsky.social · 1d

Provost Joel P. Christensen (@sentantiq.bsky.social) explains what Odysseus’s violent homecoming reveals about autocracy, memory, and the impossibility of resolution neoskosmos.com/en/2025/10/0...

When kings return: Homer's lesson for divided societies - Neos Kosmos

What Odysseus's violent homecoming reveals about autocracy, memory, and the impossibility of resolution

neoskosmos.com

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Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 1d

...Interfering with that process by forcing knowledge to pass through a political filter is a tactic adopted by the Soviet Union and other authoritarian states"

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Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 1d

"Universities and colleges have one mission: to advance knowledge. Faculty carry out the mission by conducting research and teaching students. The knowledge they produce and circulate is independently assessed by professional peers."

www.acls.org/news/acls-st...

ACLS Statement Regarding White House “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education”

ACLS stands firmly against this latest White House effort to divide faculties by giving special privileges to students in “hard science programs” and its demand that institutions abolish “units that p...

www.acls.org

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Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 1d

“They were not happy with freedom unless they might also rule and be masters”

nec iam libertate contentos esse nisi etiam regnent ac dominentur #Livy

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Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 1d

Amazon's push notification on my phone for "epic deals" unfortunately leads neither to Homer nor to hekatombs

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jeff computers @helldude.bsky.social · 2d

its truly remarkable, you have to really take the measure of it and it's almost hard to comprehend it, but the president of the united states is having texas invade illinois and oregon just to make twitter content

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Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 3d

"The Enlightenment hope—that the world would become more enlightened with prosperity, education, and growing social equality—has been proven to be a myth."

devastating interview with a scholar of fascism

intpolicydigest.org/rebirth-and-...

Rebirth and Ruin: Understanding Fascism's Appeal with Roger Griffin

In this interview, Roger Griffin examines the psychological and ideological roots of fascism and terrorism, emphasizing how modernity's existential crises drive radicalization and extremist violence.

intpolicydigest.org

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Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 4d

"As political allegory, then, the return of Odysseus could be the reassertion of a monarch over a fractious oligarchy. The Odyssey could be seen as advocating for the expedience of autocracy over the corrupted dangers of oligarchy (or, perhaps, a proto-democracy)."

neoskosmos.com/en/2025/10/0...

When kings return: Homer's lesson for divided societies - Neos Kosmos

What Odysseus's violent homecoming reveals about autocracy, memory, and the impossibility of resolution

neoskosmos.com

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Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 4d

"The logic of violence and erasure at the end of the Odyssey operates still today. The resurgence of autocracy worldwide imposes an order that makes erasure of history and obliteration of difference the cost of mere survival."

neoskosmos.com/en/2025/10/0...

When kings return: Homer's lesson for divided societies - Neos Kosmos

What Odysseus's violent homecoming reveals about autocracy, memory, and the impossibility of resolution

neoskosmos.com

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biftechnoir @kenmegalopsuxos.bsky.social · 3d

I love it whenever aporia is structurally load bearing in story. From cosmic horror to Ithaca having no solution to blood feuds blending into Odysseus's raison d'etat.

Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 4d

"As political allegory, then, the return of Odysseus could be the reassertion of a monarch over a fractious oligarchy. The Odyssey could be seen as advocating for the expedience of autocracy over the corrupted dangers of oligarchy (or, perhaps, a proto-democracy)."

neoskosmos.com/en/2025/10/0...

When kings return: Homer's lesson for divided societies - Neos Kosmos

What Odysseus's violent homecoming reveals about autocracy, memory, and the impossibility of resolution

neoskosmos.com

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Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 4d

some of them will die, and those who survive will have to forget it."

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Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 4d

"... it is also possible that the end of the epic aims to emphasise the cost of capitulating to the demands of autocracy. Such a reading shows us both the extremes a king will go to in order to protect his own privileges and the cost his people must pay in order to enjoy the benefits of his rule...

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Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 4d

"As political allegory, then, the return of Odysseus could be the reassertion of a monarch over a fractious oligarchy. The Odyssey could be seen as advocating for the expedience of autocracy over the corrupted dangers of oligarchy (or, perhaps, a proto-democracy)."

neoskosmos.com/en/2025/10/0...

When kings return: Homer's lesson for divided societies - Neos Kosmos

What Odysseus's violent homecoming reveals about autocracy, memory, and the impossibility of resolution

neoskosmos.com

4 5 32

Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 4d

"The logic of violence and erasure at the end of the Odyssey operates still today. The resurgence of autocracy worldwide imposes an order that makes erasure of history and obliteration of difference the cost of mere survival."

neoskosmos.com/en/2025/10/0...

When kings return: Homer's lesson for divided societies - Neos Kosmos

What Odysseus's violent homecoming reveals about autocracy, memory, and the impossibility of resolution

neoskosmos.com

3 19

Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 5d

Truth be told, the butlerian jihad was the part of Dune i found most relatable. But that's probably because my earliest exposure to "AI" was skynet

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Philip A. Suggars @felipeazucares.bsky.social · 5d

I bet when you first read #Dune you didn’t realise that you’d end up on the side of the #ButlerianJihad.

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CUNY Graduate Center @thegraduatecenter.bsky.social · 6d

Great article by our summer intern Grace Burke on the TikTok trend that is sparking new interest in the Odyssey – with insights from Classics scholar and Provost Joel Christensen

A woman sitting in a chair reading The Odyssey

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Joel @sentantiq.bsky.social · 6d

Hunter College, setting the right priorities

Picture of neon sign saying in latin "mihi cura futuri" meaning something like "concern for the future is mine" or perhaps "i care about the future"

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CUNY Graduate Center @thegraduatecenter.bsky.social · 7d

A rare feat: Every fellow from one Leon Levy cohort has turned their “kernel of an idea” into a published biography — with critical acclaim. That’s what we call a launchpad www.gc.cuny.edu/news/how-leo... @lancerichardson.bsky.social

A collage of book covers published by the 2020-2021 Leon Levy Center for Biography fellows.

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