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Helen McCarthy @historianhelen.bsky.social · 44m

Wisdom, moral imagination, an enlarged sympathy for those who live or have lived differently from yourself. This is what you get from studying the Humanities. So quite important, actually.

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John Munro @johnmunro.bsky.social · 24m

That we share this planet with people brave enough to join an unarmed flotilla attempting to get aid into Gaza but also with cowards as craven as these guys is really something of a wonder to behold.

Alejandra Caraballo @esqueer.net · 2h

ICE is not only chasing down every random brown person in Chicago, they have a cameraman following them to film this for social media. Cruelty and inhumanity as content.

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Royal Historical Society @royalhistsoc.org · 3d

Booking is now open for this year's Royal Historical Society Public History Lecture, with @greshamcollege.bsky.social:

'Minor Criminal: The Trial of the Man Who Murdered My Grandmother', with Daniel Finkelstein bit.ly/4op6Wpd

6-7pm, Tuesday 4 November: in person and online #Skystorians 1/2

Minor Criminal: The Trial of the Man Who Murdered My Grandmother

This is the annual Royal Historical Society Lecture.

bit.ly

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Mark Thomas @markthomasinfo.bsky.social · 1d

When I was 12 nanny gave me a “wank rag”…

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Patrick Dunleavy @patrickdunleavy.bsky.social · 1h

Yes, Yes. When you are the least popular government of all time, especially with your 'natural' supports, it's such a great idea to keep digging your own party's grave with even more crazy and unenforceable laws
www.theguardian.com/world/2025/o...

Starmer targets inflammatory chants at Palestine protests for further curbs

PM says Labour will address suggestions of antisemitic hate as he orders review of protest policing powers

www.theguardian.com

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Gareth Hooper @garethhooper.bsky.social · 1h

Don't park on my drive, but I'll park on the footpath. Birmingham Car Culture is optimised on Willows Road

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Matt Houlbrook @tricksterprince.bsky.social · 9h

As well as designing the Cambridge Theatre's interiors, Chermayeff also designed the striking cover art and map included in the programme for the opening night of the theatre's first production - Charlot's Masquerade.

#20s30s #SevenDials

The striking modernist design for the cover of the programme of the first show staged at the new Cambridge Theatre in 1930.

A map of Seven Dials and the West End of London drawn for the programme of the first show staged at the new Cambridge Theatre in 1930.

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Matt Houlbrook @tricksterprince.bsky.social · 9h

Serge Chermayeff also designed the astonishing interiors for the Cambridge Theatre, opened in Seven Dials in 1930.

This ‘remarkable building’ was lauded as the ‘first masterpiece in theatre design we have produced in the so-called “functionalist” manner.’

#20s30s

A black and white photograph of the spellbinding foyer of the Cambridge Theatre, opened in Seven Dials in 1930.

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Matt Houlbrook @tricksterprince.bsky.social · 8h

Chermayeff's arresting cover captures how commentators made the building a central character in stories of the remaking - the gentrification - of #20s30s Seven Dials.

As interconnected cogs turn upon the axles of a stylised ‘CT’ logo the ‘Cambridge Theatre’ drives ‘The Wheels of Progress’.

The striking front cover for the programme of the first show staged at the new Cambridge Theatre in 1930.

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John Munro @johnmunro.bsky.social · 3h

For those wanting more information about who the police deem worthy of an escort in this city.....

Kings Heath United Against Racism @khuar.bsky.social · 11h

Birmingham 'Raise the Flags' founder was at Solihull asylum hotels protest

The businessmen behind a Raise the Colours organisation have come under fire from anti racists concerned about the 'divisive' role of the flags now lining city streets

www.birminghammail.co.uk

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Matt Houlbrook @tricksterprince.bsky.social · 3h

Weaselly little coward.

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The Warehouse - Birmingham Friends of the Earth @inthewarehouse.bsky.social · 4h

Privileged to be at the launch of this exhibition celebrating the city's anti racism pioneers - many familiar to our building's community over the decades. Particularly in the face of sickeningly regressive racism from Robert Jenrick & others this week, this is affirming & well worth coming to see.

Kings Heath United Against Racism @khuar.bsky.social · 2d

Birmingham, 6 October 2025 – After two years of planning and dedication, the Birmingham Race Impact Group (BRIG) is proud to unveil Seeking the Pioneers: Routes of Resistance, a landmark exhibition opening at the Library of Birmingham

Seeking the Pioneers: Routes of Resistance — We Are BRIG

Press Release Seeking the Pioneers: Routes of Resistance – Birmingham’s Untold Legacy of Activism New exhibition explores 80 years of solidarity and the fight for racial justice “We are here b...

www.wearebrig.co.uk

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Mark Williams @mrfw17thc.bsky.social · 4h

Some would say it was foolhardy - maybe even deeply insensitive and cruel - to conduct a survey about a given university's 'Values' while a large section of its staff is in scope for redundancy.

'Still Employed' or 'Not Working Under Threat' are values, of course. Especially with Free Text options

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Dr Fabiola Creed @fabiolacreed.bsky.social · 7h

📙 Bluesky is the only platform where I haven’t circulated my book, as I’d recently joined and was waiting for the physical copy. So here it is (last book post, I promise) 📙

☀️ Sunbed in Britain: Tanning Culture from Fad to Fear is free to download via: dx.doi.org/10.5040/9781...

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Keith W. Dickinson @keithwdickinson.bsky.social · 8h

Today is a day when arts degrees are worthless, but the product of those degrees is so valuable it would kill an entire industry if they were made to pay for it.

The Verge @theverge.com · May 26

Nick Clegg says asking artists for use permission would ‘kill’ the AI industry

Paul McCartne, Elton John and others signed an open letter.

buff.ly

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Alison Young @youngalison.bsky.social · 1d

Great ‘Spotlight on MUSIC HALL’ exhibition @thelondonarchives.bsky.social - small but perfectly formed!

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Alan Owlport 🦉 🎃 @alanallport.bsky.social · 7h

If anyone abroad thinks about the modern UK they think about Harry Potter (yeah I know but still), the BBC (see previous), actors, music, football, the Royals, tourism.

Absolutely no-one thinks about British steel (sorry Nigel).

John C @badsocialism.bsky.social · 8h

Again, it's really important to understand that anyone who hates theatre, art and academia - three things Britain is still *really bloody good* at making - just hates Britain.

The Bear @bearlypolitics.co.uk · 14h

So, the plan is to cut English, the arts, and sociology - the degrees that actually study culture - while on another part of your platform claiming to “defend” British culture.

It’s performance nationalism with a reading age of seven.

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Ben Ansell @benansell.bsky.social · 7h

Spot on from @stephenkb.bsky.social. And the other aspect of this nasty turn is the eliding of British ‘culture’ with ‘white British’, which will shock anyone who has watched TV or football, or listened to music, or read a book, or indeed breathed since 1980.

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Colm Murphy @colmpm.bsky.social · 1d

*Calling PhD students of modern British and imperial history in London*

The @ihrbritainseminar.bsky.social's first session this Thursday (9 Oct.) is dedicated to PhDs, at any stage, for elevator pitches and meet-and-greet. Do come along! Details in the link.

www.history.ac.uk/news-events/...

New PhD Student Session

For the first session of term we will be hosting a meet and greet at the IHR for all PhD students in modern British and imperial history.

www.history.ac.uk

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Matt Houlbrook @tricksterprince.bsky.social · 8h

Chermayeff's arresting cover captures how commentators made the building a central character in stories of the remaking - the gentrification - of #20s30s Seven Dials.

As interconnected cogs turn upon the axles of a stylised ‘CT’ logo the ‘Cambridge Theatre’ drives ‘The Wheels of Progress’.

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Matt Houlbrook @tricksterprince.bsky.social · 9h

As well as designing the Cambridge Theatre's interiors, Chermayeff also designed the striking cover art and map included in the programme for the opening night of the theatre's first production - Charlot's Masquerade.

#20s30s #SevenDials

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Matt Houlbrook @tricksterprince.bsky.social · 9h

Serge Chermayeff also designed the astonishing interiors for the Cambridge Theatre, opened in Seven Dials in 1930.

This ‘remarkable building’ was lauded as the ‘first masterpiece in theatre design we have produced in the so-called “functionalist” manner.’

#20s30s

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Caroline Dodds Pennock @carolinepennock.bsky.social · 9h

God bless The Church Times for their ongoing insistence on responding moderately but forcefully to the Reverend Canon Nigel Biggar’s nonsense. www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/202...

Even given all that Biggar writes about the universality of slavery and the complicity of Africans, three things might be said. First, Britain played a key part and, however others may want to respond to their own history, it is morally responsible to face up to our own heritage. Second, as a Tory, he might have made more of Burke’s view that society is a partnership not just between the living, but between the living, the dead, and those still to be born. Third, guilt is not the only spur to action. There are the obligations that we owe one another irrespective of any personal responsibility for atrocities in the past.

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Jo Kershaw @mthrjo.bsky.social · 10h

I live one town over from Dewsbury. Batley and Dewsbury have their problems, but it's not true that you just see "a single ethnicity", and there are plenty of people working hard to promote integration. There are, of course, some people who resist it, _and some of them are white_.

Saul Staniforth @saulstaniforth.bsky.social · 10h

"You go to some places like Handsworth.. parts of Dewsbury, Bradford, Leicester, where you see.. a single ethnicity.. we don't think that's healthy thing"

Kevin Hollinrake is MP for Thirsk and Malton, which according to the 2021 census is 98% white.

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