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Benjamin Bland

@benjamin-bland.bsky.social
256 followers 219 following 65 posts

Historian (identity, race, popular culture, cities, memory, politics) trying to survive the times. Writing a book about transatlantic hip-hop. Work at @yorknsc.bsky.social‬ but views own.

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Reposted by Benjamin Bland
Dr Dave Hitchcock @davehitchcock.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
"AI has not rescued the humanities. What it has done is reveal, with unusual clarity, what happens when societies allow the institutions that cultivate judgement to erode."
corp.oup.com
AI just made the case for philosophy majors; the humanities should not waste it - Oxford University Press
Sophie Goldsworthy, Global Academic Publisher, explores how AI companies hiring philosophers may have made a compelling case for the study of humanities disciplines.
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Charlotte Lydia Riley @lottelydia.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Suella Braverman was the first MP to be sworn in on a copy of the Dhammapada! That's hardly paying lip service to the supremacy of Anglicanism in the UK, is it.
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lewisryder.bsky.social @lewisryder.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Proud of this one - my new article in The Historical Journal is out on first view. It's a historiographical review of the literature on British colonial spoils, or 'loot'.
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The Guardian @theguardian.com · 27/09/2026
Britain knew about the Holocaust as it happened. A new exhibition reckons with that truth
theguardian.com
Britain knew about the Holocaust as it happened. A new exhibition reckons with that truth
Research draws upon reporting and witness testimony, while a permanent memorial is planned for London The “complex and unsettling” story of what Britain knew during the Holocaust is being explored amid plans to create a new permanent national memorial. An exhibition highlighting how news of the atrocity reached Britain much earlier than is commonly understood will tour the country after being viewed privately by MPs at Portcullis House on the parliamentary estate at Westminster in September. Continue reading...
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John E. Richardson @discodiscourse.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
'Just ordinary men, with their faces concealed, wearing outlawed political uniforms and mobilising like a private army. Not to worry about'
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Manchester University Press @manchesterup.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
'Pubs for the people' is a fascinating trip into the world of the English pub, tracing its past and exploring how it represents the hope of a more equal, sociable and comfortably multiracial England. Publishing this October, pre-order today from all good bookshops & online. #booksky
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Sam Wetherell @samwetherell.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Some incredibly exciting news! My book about how Liverpool's history makes us think differently about Britain's past, present and future has been shortlisted for the Wolfson History Prize!
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Saima Nasar @saimanasar.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Please join us in celebrating the Centre for Black Humanities’ tenth anniversary. CBH is holding a two-day symposium titled ‘Collectivity, Community, Collaboration’. Our keynote will be Professor Christina Sharpe. Cfp below. Please spread the word!
CALL FOR PAPERS
Centre For Black Humanities 10th Anniversary Symposium: 
‘Black Humanities: Collectivity, Community, Collaboration’
Keynote Speaker: Professor Christina Sharpe
8-9
th April 2027
University of Bristol

The Centre for Black Humanities is an interdisciplinary research collective dedicated to 
advancing scholarship on the artistic and intellectual contributions of people of African 
descent. It is inspired by and expands legacies of scholarship, art, and activism relating 
to Black lives across time and space. Building on our international and multilingual
networks, and our home in the port city of Bristol, our research often engages with 
communities beyond traditional academic settings and addresses inequality and social 
justice through innovative collaborations. By centring an ethics of care and generosity, 
despite the chronic conditions of life in and beyond the academy, we support earlycareer scholars and visiting scholars/practitioners. In turn, we seek to interrogate and 
repurpose institutions of knowledge production such as universities, museums and
publishing houses, within entangled contexts of reparative justice, decolonization, and 
the climate crisis. We imagine collectivity, community and collaboration as methods for 
Black Humanities research going forwards.To celebrate the Centre’s 10-year anniversary, we will be holding a two-day symposium 
entitled: ‘Black Humanities: Collectivity, Community, Collaboration’. The keynote 
will be Professor Christina Sharpe, Research Chair in Black Studies in the Humanities at 
York University (Canada), and author of In the Wake: On Blackness and Being (2016) and 
Ordinary Notes (2024). We invite scholars and practitioners (at all levels, independent 
and affiliated) to submit abstracts for presentations of 15 minutes. The event will be 
held in person at the University of Bristol. We invite presentations that speak to Black 
Humanities in its multi/anti/undisciplinary forms. We are particularly interested in work
that speaks to the following themes:
- Collectivity, Collaboration and/or Community in Black Humanities
- Black Humanities/Studies in times of polycrisis
- Black Health
- Environmental Justice
- Radical Imaginaries (how creative works make sense of Black pasts/present and 
help to shape Black futures)
- Methods for solidarity and/or incompleteness
- Folklore and storytelling as method
- Translation and multilingual solidarities
- Beyond critique
Please submit your abstract of no more than 250 words, along with a short bio of no 
more than 100 words, to cbh-publicity@bristol.ac.uk. Abstracts should be submitted 
no later than Friday 30th October 2026. A publication and podcast series are planned to 
follow on after this event.
You may reach us at cbh-publicity@bristol.ac.uk in case of any questions or 
observations.
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Farrukh @implausibleblog.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
I quite like the Belgian approach to capping political donations
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The Welfare, Citizenship, and Intersectional Feminism Project @wcifproject.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
We’re looking forward to welcoming everyone to the ‘Healing a Nation? Rethinking Histories of Race and Healthcare Activism’ workshop tomorrow! Many thanks to @leverhulme.ac.uk for making it possible!
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Mark Williams @mrfw17thc.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
When your institution links to 'Guidance on Using AI' but adds to a series of waffling non-positions 'student' statements hyping what GENAI can do for you. Just a total abdication of critical responsibility. Universities have to do better.
Sample text from a 'student' noting 'The emergence of Open AI and its ease of access to it [sic] for students like myself, dramatically changed how I accessed information and engaged with learning. It was exciting to provide the AI Source with prompts, suggestions and ideas and develop them into something tangible that could develop research ideas, and support with assignments.'
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John Oxley @joxley.jmoxley.co.uk · 09/09/2026
Also, why is this basically written up as "quirky crowd make an embarrassing mistake" and not "violent racists form mob because Asian people use hotel"?
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Nadine Batchelor-Hunt @nadinebh.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
Ed Miliband’s parents survived the Holocaust, Ed Miliband is Jewish - that is immutable Questioning his Jewishness like this tells you all you need to know about people like this, and what their values are - and what they truly think about Jewish people that don’t behave how they want them to
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Giles Wilkes @gilesyb.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
It's always the way, isn't it giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...
Graph shows far right support higher where the number of foreign nationals is lowest
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Sam Wetherell @samwetherell.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
My latest post: On the deindustrialisation of the university. And on being "in defence of history" at a time of extinction. thehistoryfactory.substack.com/p/the-histor...
thehistoryfactory.substack.com
The History Factory 2: The Deindustrialisation of the University
A few years ago, my employer, the University of York, commissioned a civil engineering firm named Tilbury Douglas to build a new nursery for the children of its employees and students.
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Robert Saunders @robertsaunders.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
The really alarming figure here is the 48% of Conservatives who apparently DO think masked gangs marching through the streets are legitimate. The radicalisation of the right goes far beyond Reform and Restore.
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nataliethomlinson.bsky.social @nataliethomlinson.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Unreservedly brilliant news...turns out there is still power in a union. hoping this leads to lots of new members.
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Mikko Tolonen @tolonen.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
We are hiring! Permanent position for a University Lecturer in Digital Humanities at the University of Helsinki. The application period is open and closes on 3 October 2026: jobs.helsinki.fi/job/Helsinki... Please read the job description carefully and feel free to spread the word widely.
jobs.helsinki.fi
University Lecturer in Digital Humanities
University Lecturer in Digital Humanities
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Hypervisible @hypervisible.blacksky.app · 25/08/2026
This weekend, Palantir posted a (now deleted) photo of Raekwon in their offices. “A company whose products expand the reach of the state is borrowing the cachet of a culture born in communities subjected to aggressive policing and surveillance.”
rollingstone.com
AI Optimism Has a Hold Over Hip-Hop's Mogul Generation
From Raekwon’s “return” to Palantir’s offices, to Dr. Dre’s embrace of AI, rap’s pioneers are carrying an old faith in new machines into a new era
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Lauren Brown @laurencochrane.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
My first journal article is officially out today in @genderandhistory.bsky.social 🎉🎉🎉🎉 I discuss the visual representations of white settler women during the Kenya Emergency and their role in violence. Very pleased to see this out!
onlinelibrary.wiley.com
‘Brave, Armed and Watchful’: Domestic Militarization and Contested Femininities During the Kenyan Emergency
This article examines the militarization of white settler women during the Kenya Emergency (1952–1960), analyzing how their armed participation disrupted and reconfigured colonial gender norms. Drawi...
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Pieter T. L. Beck @ptrbck.bsky.social · 05/04/2026
Last Thursday, the far-right student organization KVHV organized a public lecture by Nathan Cofnas. The lecture was an absolute train wreck. It will take a while to analyze everything, but here are some first impressions. /1
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Nathan K. Hensley @nathankhensley.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
Reminder for those who might not remember that a scholar in my subfield was, c2013, credibly accused of plagiarism, found guilty by an independent committee, had the book revoked by the press—& was not fired or dragged in the press but (over objections from 13 of her own colleagues) made into a dean
browndailyherald.com
After plagiarism allegations, prof. was named dean
Serving the Brown University community since 1891
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Charlotte Lydia Riley @lottelydia.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Or, in fact, not really a news story at all. I don’t believe at all that this was nationally important and certainly not “third on the BBC 6 o’clock news” important as a story. Cofnas started all of this because he’s a racist and the media ran with it.
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Sunder Katwala (sundersays) @sundersays.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
Netanyahu, the Prime Minister of Israel is stoking anti-Muslim prejudice with juvenile trolling of Britain as "an Islamic Republic", that plays mainly to the American far right www.theguardian.com/world/2026/a...
theguardian.com
Benjamin Netanyahu describes UK as ‘first Islamic republic to get a nuclear weapon’
Israeli PM criticised by political rival for attacking an international ally and overseeing ‘horrific diplomatic failure’
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Tom Roberts @tpgroberts.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
Look, put simply, people should not be comfortable saying that in public and the way to fix society runs directly through making them afraid to say it again.
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Aurelien Mondon @aurelmondon.com · 14/08/2026
Before they all quickly forget their role in this predictable tragedy, the issue is about the rightwing media only, it's about the media as a whole in a system in service of white patriarchal cis able supremacy
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Dmitry Grozoubinski @explaintrade.com · 14/08/2026
Don't mind me, I'm off to gut higher education, one of the UK's most successful and globally respected exporting industries, because I think doing so will let me defeat white nativism with immigration charts. I am the most naive human being alive.
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The London Journal @thelondonjournal.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
Call for chapters: Made Municipal: the LCC through its everyday objects. All reposts much appreciated. x
Made Municipal: the LCC through its everyday objects
Background
Following on from the Sixty Years on from the London County Council: Legacy, Impact, Learning film screening and conference in spring 2025, we are keen to capture and build on some of the histories and research that were represented, which highlighted the need for further and increasingly diverse scholarship about the London County Council.
The Council is often held in a certain degree of reverence regarding the achievements delivered across - and beyond - the boundaries of London from the time of its conception in 1889, and as being emblematic of a type of governance which may no longer be possible in a contemporary context. Since the publication of Andrew Saint’s edited book, Politics and People of London: London County Council, 1889-1965 in 1989, more research has emerged on the LCC, with the increasing availability of unofficial archives and the release of previously closed records revealing more nuanced narratives that have the potential to open up more diverse, representative histories.
We appreciate that talking comprehensively about the Council’s broad and interconnected operations is a monumental task, and thus we’re keen to find innovative ways to throw light on the panorama of its work, rather than focus on discrete, dislocated entities. To do so, we were inspired by Professor Andrew Saint, whose unusual contribution to the film screening night at The London Archives was a foot-long bar of LCC-branded soap. This sparked a wide-ranging discussion spanning issues of care, industry, and education in parentis, as undertaken by the LCC, and prompted us to consider that the operation of the LCC could perhaps be best understood through its material culture and its presence in residents’ day-to-day lives.Using a lens of material culture to explore the work of the LCC allows us to break out from the thematic silos which might otherwise be imposed upon its history, crossing between departments and people - whether LCC employees or those that used its services - that will result in some fascinating and revelatory perspectives.
We are particularly interested in how this might better contextualise some of the under-represented histories of the Council, to reveal their importance within the wider spectrum of its work. Unlike histories that focus on particular departments or typologies, this enables us to shift towards traversing siloed narratives to provide a richer, more rounded perspective on the LCC, which we feel is more authentic to its operation, whilst also challenging how objects are often documented in museums and archives.Call for chapters
Using a material culture approach, the collected volume will present a history of the LCC through a significant physical manifestation of objects that denote its municipal authority across the County of London. Each chapter will start with an image of the everyday LCC object, setting the scene for a more diverse re-telling of its history. It will be edited by the organisers of the Sixty Years on from the London County Council: Legacy, Impact, Learning film screening and conference held in March 2025, Dr Ruth Lang, Dr Dawn Pereira and Dr Rosamund Lily West.
We invite 4,000-5,000-word chapters which use an everyday LCC object as a starting point. We encourage a range of methodologies for approaching how the objects will be used as catalysts for storytelling. We are particularly interested in including those covering the early LCC period (1889-1914) and the interwar period, which is often underrepresented in LCC histories. Suggestions of types of objects include:
Objects; heraldry, uniforms, school awards, furniture, cutlery
Ephemera; pamphlets, tickets, brochures, phonebooks
Documents; official publications, maps, memoranda and minutes,
We see this approach as offering a more accessible way to delve into complex discussions on topics that may, at first glance, seem less engaging, such as regulation, commissioning, deindustrialisation plans, procurement, etc. We’re also keen to identify controversial objects that open untold/silenced stories and to consider whether there are global implications for the different themes and subjects discussed.This publication would build upon Andrew Saint’s 1989 edited book, Politics and People of London: the London County Council, 1889-1965, which was the last book on the LCC to offer a broad history, so this would be a timely and much-needed re-examination of the LCC and its legacy. The book will be academic and rigorous and will include good-quality images to complement the visual, object-based approach. The aim of this book is to be an academic/trade crossover, with an audience of both specialist academics and an interested public.
Please email LCC60yearson@gmail.com with your name, a 50-word bio and a 250-word abstract by 31st October 2026.
Please include a clear indication of the object your chapter intends to focus upon (including images and potential sources/locations of the object itself where possible), along with a summary of its purpose and relevance, and the outline of your intended scope of investigation.
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Past and Present @pastpresentsoc.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
On advance access: "Bodies, Tides, Timber, and the Global History of London’s Docks, 1860–1928" by Simeon Koole (@uobrishistory.bsky.social) and @benmechen.bsky.social (@uclhistory.bsky.social) #OpenAccess doi.org/10.1093/past...
doi.org
Bodies, Tides, Timber, and the Global History of London’s Docks, 1860–1928*
Abstract. This article examines changes in the bodies and environment of labourers carrying timber imported into London’s docks in the 1860s to the 1920s t
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Baba Yaga's Hut @babayagashut.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
Seems on social media that Sensational has passed away. A strange & troubled guy no doubt but released some fairly unique records including maybe the heaviest thing we ever released on my old label Robot Elephant with production from Deadfader in 2012. deadfader.bandcamp.com/track/fischs...
deadfader.bandcamp.com
Fischsh Feat. Sensational, by Dead Fader
from the album Work it, no
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nataliethomlinson.bsky.social @nataliethomlinson.bsky.social · 27/07/2026
Chuffed to see my article on feminist responses to the unemployment crisis of the 1980s out in JBS:
cambridge.org
“Women, Where Are Your Jobs Going?”: Feminism and the Problem of Unemployment in Thatcher’s Britain | Journal of British Studies | Cambridge Core
“Women, Where Are Your Jobs Going?”: Feminism and the Problem of Unemployment in Thatcher’s Britain - Volume 65
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Modern British History Journal @mbhjournal.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
This year's Duncan Tanner Prize is now open! If you're a PGR/ECR working on an article on modern British history do consider entering! Deadline Sept 1st. #skystorians 🗃️ academic.oup.com/tcbh/pages/e...
academic.oup.com
The Duncan Tanner Prize
The Duncan Tanner Prize recognizes outstanding scholarship amongst postgraduate research students in Britain and abroad. Entrants submit an article manuscript.
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Jay Roszman @jayroszman.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
1/5 📣 An article I've written about the Queen's University in Ireland, its constituent colleges, and their relationship to the British Empire has been published with @jbritishstudies.bsky.social. The article makes the case for rethinking about the Queen's University's purpose in Ireland. 🗃️
cambridge.org
Institutions of Empire? The Foundation of the Queen’s Colleges and British Imperial Service, 1845–85 | Journal of British Studies | Cambridge Core
Institutions of Empire? The Foundation of the Queen’s Colleges and British Imperial Service, 1845–85 - Volume 65
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Olivia Wyatt @oliviawyatt1999.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
My article — “Black is Beautiful”: Gender, Pigmentation, and Political Blackness in Modern Britain — is now available to read! It reinserts the politics of complexion into our narratives of the Black Power and Black Women’s movements. #BlackBritishHistory academic.oup.com/histres/adva...
academic.oup.com
‘Black is beautiful’: gender, pigmentation and political blackness in modern Britain*
Abstract. By examining political literature, ephemera and oral histories, this article investigates the politics of pigmentation within the Black Power and
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Stefan Mohamed @stefmowords.bsky.social · 08/08/2026
"the right to protest is fundamental to our democracy" will come as a surprise to all the grannies in wheelchairs who were bundled into police vans for holding a sign
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Quinn Slobodian @quinnslobodian.com · 08/08/2026
“The Cold War is everywhere and nowhere these days...” I reviewed Penny von Eschen’s Paradoxes of Nostalgia networks.h-net.org/group/discus...
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Prof Dave O'Brien @drdaveobrien.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
“The standard explanation for Britain’s declining graduate wage premium is that higher education expanded too fast & too far, & too many people now go to university. But similar expansions elsewhere have not produced the same outcome. Instead, the evidence points primarily to problems in the economy
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Joel S. @joelhs.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
This story reflects a larger crisis in the field of Holocaust studies, about why we study the Shoah and what, if any, implications it should hold for the present. www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-i...
theguardian.com
An Israeli professor lost a prestigious US job offer after speaking out on Gaza. Now the university is paying him $250,000
The University of Minnesota withdrew an offer for Raz Segal to lead its Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies after an organized campaign against his hiring
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Emilie K. M. Murphy @emiliekmmurphy.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
And yet the Cambridge #earlymodern historian William O'Reilly, proven without doubt to have plagiarised an undergraduate student's essays in published academic work, remains in post. Go figure eh.
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Prof Katherine Schofield 🇬🇧🇦🇺🇪🇺 @katherineschof8.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
This is hands down the best opinion piece you will read on the Arday case. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
theguardian.com
The takedown of Jason Arday has overjoyed the right, and must be a wake-up call for the left | Jason Okundaye
The Cambridge academic has rightly now resigned. But that won’t end the targeting of senior black figures or the lazy way institutions promote faux equality, says Guardian columnist Jason Okundaye
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Aparna Nair @disabilitystor1.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
"History involves sorting and organizing hundreds of thousands of facts" I remain astounded by how loud and wrong people are about what history actually is.
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Megan Stevenson
@MeganTStevenson
I haven't heard people talking about this, but AI is an absolute game changer for doing historical research. History involves sorting and organizing hundreds of thousands of facts— a massive logistical/memory problem made so delightfully easy with agentic research. 1/
1:31 PM · Jul 29, 2026
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Megan Stevenson
@MeganTStevenson
·
Jul 29
I did an OCR conversion of all my PDFs to make text files, built a semantic search index, and can just let my agents roam free to answer questions, fact-check, dig up interesting stories, quotes, etc. It takes a lot of the hard work out, as well as a lot of the human error. 2/2
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David Higham @oldtrotter.bsky.social · 01/08/2026
This should be self evident but clearly isn’t. From @lewisgoodall.com
The problem is not that higher education has failed as an engine of social mobility. It is that, for too long, it has been treated as the only engine. The curriculum is not the problem which is driving our NEET malaise; the weakness of local economies is. Any Labour administration should therefore tread very carefully before dismantling any part of the comprehensive educational settlement created by the Labour governments of the 1960s. Burnham's proposals also misunderstand the multi-layered nature of the modern university, which in many cases is as likely to offer vocational courses as strictly academic ones.
In any case, let's stop the obsession with STEM subjects and
"practical" training. There is already too much snobbery in the assumption that working-class students are somehow less interested in the arts and humanities. And we've never needed those graduates more. In an age in which we are already outsourcing so much of our critical thinking to machines, and in which none of us can be entirely sure of the truth of what we see, where the world's complexity is ever deepening, subjects like philosophy, history, political science, linguistics, classics and literature have rarely been more important.
I'm sure our English graduate prime minister might agree.
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Glen O'Hara @gsoh31.bsky.social · 02/08/2026
So it's farewell to the History subject area at the University of Hertfordshire, not the first nor the last to go. One of the best departments in the country, just extinguished like a snap of the fingers. Think of the waste. (1/2)
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Cordelia Beattie @cordeliabeattie.bsky.social · 02/08/2026
I see some people are reading this post as being about Exeter but it’s referring to the University of Hertfordshire. And that’s Owen’s point. Less coverage about the axe falling there but it’s equally sad.
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Robert Saunders @robertsaunders.bsky.social · 29/07/2026
The front page of the Daily Telegraph, standing up for the real victims in modern Britain.
Headline reading "Britain's most persecuted minority? Millionaires".
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Financial Times @financialtimes.com · 16/07/2026
We need humanities more than ever in the age of AI ft.trib.al/SDdQK9q | opinion
ft.trib.al
We need humanities more than ever in the age of AI
Subjects like literature, languages and history are vital to a thoughtful and prosperous society
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Bianca Michelle Parker 🏳️‍⚧️📚 @bumblebigirl.bsky.social · 16/07/2026
Feels bad that a director of a major studio film is perfectly comfortable saying that casting non-white actors is just something you do to look woke and otherwise isn't remotely necessary
variety.com
Andy Serkis Gets Asked Why New ‘Lord of the Rings’ Cast Is All White Actors: ‘I Don’t Think We’ll Be Doing a Politically Correct Casting-for-the Sake-of-Casting Version of the Film’
Andy Serkis' 'The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum' has only announced white actors for its cast, following the lack of diversity in other flms.
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elia ayoub @ayoub.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
Jesus. 35 UK universities quietly- without debate - joined the Ministry of Defence’s “Battlefield Alliance” which seeks to “reorientate academia towards Defence and National Security” They’re destroying the social sciences and humanities while militarising the institutions
• Durham University
• Newcastle University
• Northumbria University
• Lancaster University
• University of Cumbria
• University of Lancashire
• University of Liverpool
• University of Manchester
• University of Huddersfield
• University of Sheffield
• University of York
• Loughborough University
• University of Lincoln
• University of Nottingham
• Aston University
• University of Birmingham
• University of Warwick
• King's College London
• Kingston University
• Queen Mary University of London
• University College London
• University of Oxford
• University of Portsmouth
• University of Surrey
• University of Bath
• University of Bristol
• University of Exeter
• University of Plymouth
• University of Edinburgh
• University of Glasgow
• University of Strathclyde
• Cardiff University
• Swansea University
• Queens University Belfast
• Cranfield UniversityFOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
14 July 2026
UK Universities Betray Public Trust by Joining MoD's 'Battlefield Advantage' Alliance
Without Debate
A coalition of campaign groups has accused UK universities of quietly integrating themselves into Britain's defence infrastructure after 35 institutions signed up to the Ministry of Defence's Defence Universities Alliance (DUA).
The Ministry of Defence says the alliance aims to "reorientate academia towards Defence and National Security", strengthen links between universities and the defence sector, and translate research into "battlefield advantage".
Campaigners say the move represents a significant shift in the role of higher education and has taken place without meaningful public debate.
Among the founding members are the University of Oxford, University College London, King's College London, the University of Manchester, the University of Edinburgh, Cardiff University and Queen's University Belfast.
"We are witnessing the formal incorporation of Britain's universities into the defence ecosystem," said Jinsella Kennaway, Founder and Executive Director of Demilitarise Education.
"The Ministry of Defence is explicit about its intentions. Universities exist to advance knowledge and foster critical inquiry, not to become pipelines for military research and defence recruitment.
Students and staff deserve to know who agreed to this and why."
Campaigners are calling on all 35 universities to publish the governance documents and board minutes relating to their decision to join the alliance, and to explain whether staff and students were consulted.
Many UK universities already maintain relationships with major defence companies, including BAE Systems, Rolls-Royce, Leonardo, Thales, Lockheed Martin and QinetiQ. Critics argue that the DUA formalises and accelerates the integration of academia, industry and the state.
The coalition warns that, at a time of rising defence spending, universities risk becoming increasingly aligned with governme…
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