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Bryan Banks

@bryanbanksphd.bsky.social
2.2K followers 505 following 133 posts

Historian of France/Atlantic World, Assoc. Prof, Book on Huguenot refugees. Working on a book about the Great Pigeon Massacre of 1789. Co-founder www.AgeofRevolutions.com. Story teller.

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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
US Fish and Wildlife gave the university seized contraband made from endangered animals. I got to put together an exhibit for our students on it, which then encourages them to work with our conservationist efforts.pretty happy with how it turned out.
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ERC Project Atlantic Exiles @atlanticexiles.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
3/ @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social discusses the exodus of the French Huguenots as an antecedent to the modern concept of a "refugee crisis". He underscores how the Huguenots developed and appropriated a refugee identity for themselves that was not just religious, but also political in nature.
cambridge.org
Inventing the Refugee Crisis: Huguenots and the Rise of Refugee Identity | Itinerario | Cambridge Core
Inventing the Refugee Crisis: Huguenots and the Rise of Refugee Identity - Volume 50 Issue 2
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Nicolás A. González Quintero @nagonzalezq.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
I’m glad to see that our special issue, “Semantics of Refuge: The Shifting Labels of ‘Exile,’ ‘Asylum,’ and ‘Refugee’ during the 18th and 19th Centuries,” has finally been published in its entirety in the latest issue of Itinerario. www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
cambridge.org
Latest issue | Itinerario | Cambridge Core
Itinerario
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Age of Revolutions @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Can a mountain change the way people feel? Can volcanoes shape revolutions? This fascinating new essay connects environment, emotion, and political upheaval across the Age of Revolutions. 🌋⛰️📖 Read more by Charleton and Marissa Yingling: ageofrevolutions.com?p=47822&prev...
ageofrevolutions.com
Three Volcanoes: Two Revolutions, One Mountain, and the Emotional Environment
By Charleton and Marissa Yingling “It shows, in a strong light, the heaves and throes of the burning mountain, three years, at least, before the explosion of the volcano in Massachusetts or Virgini…
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Travis Hedge Coke @travishedgecoke.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
Always good to remember the joke about "underwater basket weaving" courses is that one of the first Native Studies programs in the US offered a course where you learned to soak the material and make traditional baskets as a less-major-oriented outreach.
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
We need more “underwater basket weaving” classes in college, not fewer. More flexible degree paths. Less degrees maxed out on program-specific courses.
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Age of Revolutions @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
ICYMI: Dr. Rob Taber (@robtaber.bsky.social) on the politics of clothing and locating connections among women of color in "What's in a Headwrap?: Using Mouchoirs to Illuminate Connections Between Women of Color in Colonial Haiti." ageofrevolutions.com/2026/09/02/w...
ageofrevolutions.com
What’s in a Headwrap? Using Mouchoirs to Illuminate Connections Between Women of Color in Colonial Haiti
By Robert D. Taber Dress and grooming standards are often political. In the contemporary United States, this ranges from Sikhs in the US military advocating to wear turbans as part of their uniform…
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
Why do pigeons matter to the story of the French Revolution and its legacy? Excited to plumb the archives at Stanford later this fall. francestanford.stanford.edu/projects/gre...
francestanford.stanford.edu
The Great Pigeon Massacre of 1789, and the Environmental Origins of the French Revolution | France-Stanford Center For Interdisciplinary Studies
This study reconstructs a largely overlooked episode of coordinated peasant action—the widespread destruction of aristocratic dovecotes in 1789—and argues that these attacks illuminate the environment...
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Quoted @thetattooedprof.bsky.social today. Sometimes it’s not enough to think outside the box. Sometimes you need to burn the box completely and think free from the box’s existence. Translation. Throw old practices out the window. Distill what the goal is and start from there.
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Age of Revolutions @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
In this fascinating new Age of Revolutions essay, explore how mouchoirs in colonial Haiti served as more than fashion, illuminating networks of identity, culture, and connection among women of color. @robtaber.bsky.social ageofrevolutions.com/2026/09/02/w...
ageofrevolutions.com
What’s in a Headwrap? Using Mouchoirs to Illuminate Connections Between Women of Color in Colonial Haiti
By Robert D. Taber Dress and grooming standards are often political. In the contemporary United States, this ranges from Sikhs in the US military advocating to wear turbans as part of their uniform…
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
Excited to head to Stanford in November to do more research for my book on The Great Pigeon Massacre of 1789! francestanford.stanford.edu/projects/gre...
francestanford.stanford.edu
The Great Pigeon Massacre of 1789, and the Environmental Origins of the French Revolution | France-Stanford Center For Interdisciplinary Studies
This study reconstructs a largely overlooked episode of coordinated peasant action—the widespread destruction of aristocratic dovecotes in 1789—and argues that these attacks illuminate the environment...
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
Martha was the last known passenger pigeon, and she died on September 1, 1914 in the Cincinnati Zoo. She was named after Martha Washington. 3 centuries earlier, the number of passenger pigeons in North America was in the hundreds of millions.
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Age of Revolutions @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
James Madison didn’t develop his political ideas in isolation. "When Madison Looked to Europe" examines the transatlantic influences that helped shape the American founding and reminds us that revolutionary ideas rarely stop at national borders. ageofrevolutions.com/2026/08/24/w...
ageofrevolutions.com
When Madison Looked to Europe
By Charles Edward Andrew Lincoln IV A map of the Holy Roman Empire near the end of the eighteenth century does not resemble a modern national map of Europe. Its surface breaks into electorates, duc…
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Age of Revolutions @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
Enter our raffle for a chance to win a copy of Patrick J. Mahoney's The Fenian Empire: A Hemispheric History of Irish Republican Nationalism (NYU Press, 2026). Raffle closes this Friday (8/21) at 11:59 PM Eastern. ageofrevolutions.com/2026/08/17/f...
ageofrevolutions.com
Fenian Empire Book Raffle
Patrick J. Mahoney, The Fenian Empire: A Hemispheric History of Irish Republican Nationalism (NYU Press, 2026). In the aftermath of the American Civil War, the Fenian movement stood at a crossroads…
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Sarah E. Bond @sarahebond.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
Fourth Lateran Council 🥖 be like
FULL OF
EXISTENTIAL
BREAD

Sticker
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Age of Revolutions @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social · 03/08/2026
How do constitutions teach societies to imagine change? This new Age of Revolutions essay explores the tension between transformation and revolution in Indian constitutional history, highlighting the pedagogical power of constitutional thought & political change. ageofrevolutions.com/2026/08/03/t...
ageofrevolutions.com
Transformation Contra Revolution: Locating the Pedagogical Aspects of Revolution in Indian Constitutional History
By Shubham Yadav The imagery that revolution invokes depends on the standpoint of the spectator. Revolution, for the elites and powerholders, is bloody, chaotic, disruptive, and tumultuous.[1] For …
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 30/07/2026
Anyone have recommendations for histories of libraries, especially over the last 50 years?
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Age of Revolutions @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social · 27/07/2026
A thought-provoking read on memory, history, and the many ways Simón Bolívar’s legacy has been interpreted over time. The Other Bolívar: From Bronze to Ink is well worth your time. 🔗 ageofrevolutions.com/2026/07/27/t...
ageofrevolutions.com
The Other Bolívar: From Bronze to Ink
By Hugo Sanchez Aranguren American audiences often know Simón Bolívar as the “George Washington of South America.” The analogy orients, but it compresses a life of revolution, contradiction, and st…
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
To keep pigeons in their dovecotes, some French farmers reportedly "used a goat's head, which they boiled thoroughly in water with salt, cumin, hempseed and urine. Then they placed it in the dovecote to serve as an amusement for the pigeons." Just thought some of you might want to know. #18thCentury
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
Salt = preservative Cumin = antioxidant, boosts gut health Hempseed = superfood Urine = cured meat and reduced bacteria
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
To keep pigeons in their dovecotes, some French farmers reportedly "used a goat's head, which they boiled thoroughly in water with salt, cumin, hempseed and urine. Then they placed it in the dovecote to serve as an amusement for the pigeons." Just thought some of you might want to know. #18thCentury
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
Working on my Great Pigeon Massacre book. In trying to describe French farming practices and how pigeons became such a politicized subject, I find myself pushing back against the narrative that French farmers were somehow behind English ones. /1
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Age of Revolutions @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social · 20/07/2026
The Firearm Revolution traces the rise of firearms from Renaissance Italy to the expansion of European empires, revealing how debates over self-defense, public order, and gun regulation are far older than many realize. Learn more about Catherine Fletcher's work! ageofrevolutions.com/2026/07/20/t...
ageofrevolutions.com
The Firearm Revolution: From Renaissance Italy to the European Empires
By Catherine Fletcher The title The Firearm Revolution arose from my observation that guns got significantly less attention in the scholarly literature than the parallel “print revolution”. In the …
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Age of Revolutions @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social · 29/06/2026
New on Age of Revolutions: a digital mapping of Lafayette’s 1825 journey through Georgia, tracing his route and highlighting the communities that welcomed the “Guest of the Nation.” A great example of how spatial history can bring Revolutionary memory to life. ageofrevolutions.com/2026/06/29/m...
ageofrevolutions.com
Mapping Lafayette’s Journey Through Georgia
By Laura June Davis Living in the state of Georgia—the newest, most remote, and most intimately connected colony to Great Britain during the Colonial and Revolutionary Eras—students often view the …
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 13/06/2026
I was driving down the road last night and the sound of bugs splattering on the car sounded like rain.
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 09/06/2026
Would love to publish an essay on Gordon Wood’s life work on @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social! Any one interested? @asheeshks.org?
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 01/06/2026
Sometimes the research process brings you into unusual spaces like an eighteenth-century French dovecote built for the royal family…
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 28/05/2026
Picked up @davidandress.bsky.social’s lovely, well-written book at Shakespeare and Co today in Paris. The prose, as with all of his books, is something to admire.
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 05/02/2026
In 2018, I heard a story of tunnels beneath Columbus, Ga. They were used to transport enslaved peoples before the Civil War, this person told me. What followed was my pursuit of the truth. www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzbP...
youtube.com
Folklore matters—here’s why | Bryan Banks | TEDxColumbus State U
YouTube video by TEDx Talks
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 09/05/2026
A eulogy is often the first—and oftentimes the only—biography written about a person.
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 08/05/2026
Reality is just a mirror of our senses. Love live catcopus
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American Historical Association @historians.org · 08/05/2026
“History is not merely a collection of dates and events; it is a rich tapestry woven by countless individuals across centuries.” In a 2024 #AHAPerspectives piece, @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social delivers end-of-year remarks to his department. 🗃️
historians.org
Guardians of the Tapestry of Time – AHA
As the academic year ends, one history department chair reflects on the work of history.
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honor sachs @drhonor.bsky.social · 04/05/2026
In the age of AI, I find myself becoming quite fond of and sympathetic to sloppy but honest undergraduate prose.
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 27/04/2026
I've been awarded a research fellowship to work with the Gimon Collection on French Political Economy at the Stanford University Libraries! Going to be looking at 18th century pamphlets on agrarian reform for my book project, The Great Pigeon Massacre of 1789. @stanfordulibraries.bsky.social
AI generated image of pigeons participating in the French Revolution.
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American Historical Association @historians.org · 24/04/2026
Want to learn how to craft a compelling op-ed? Watch “Op-Ed Writing for Historians" with @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social, @jelaniya.bsky.social, @mauracunningham.bsky.social, @franhirsch.bsky.social, @brianros1.bsky.social, and moderator @lmansley.bsky.social. #AHAOnline 🗃️
youtu.be
Op-Ed Writing for Historians: How to Pitch, Write, Revise, and Get Your Ideas to the Public
YouTube video by American Historical Association
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Duygu Yıldırım @duyguyildirim.bsky.social · 23/04/2026
Normalize reviewing as a form of procrastination.
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Cindy Ermus @cindyermus.bsky.social · 20/04/2026
So excited to see the cover for this fascinating, touching book on the hist of schoolhouses in the south, beautifully co-authored by my brilliant colleague & spouse, @abegibson.bsky.social, & his pops Benny Gibson. The Vanishing Schools of Franklin County: A History of Public Education in Rural VA
upress.virginia.edu
The Vanishing Schools of Franklin County
<p><b>An in-depth history that assesses the price of progress and the legacy of lost rural American communities</b></p><p>Nestled among the foothills
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 19/04/2026
Every time I feel like I screw up as a parent, I remind myself that Hemingway used to leave his kid with his cat as a babysitter.
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honor sachs @drhonor.bsky.social · 17/04/2026
Rumors are that it’s finally happening…
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Thomas Mareite @thomasmareite.bsky.social · 28/03/2026
🗣️ New publication! In this introduction, @nagonzalezq.bsky.social and I revisit the historiography on refugees and explore how the category of “refugee” (or its historical equivalent) was constructed in Atlantic and Mediterranean societies (18th–19th c.) ... www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
cambridge.org
Labelling and Looking for Refuge during the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries: An Introduction | Itinerario | Cambridge Core
Labelling and Looking for Refuge during the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries: An Introduction
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Laura Ansley @lmansley.bsky.social · 24/03/2026
@bryanbanksphd.bsky.social pitches me the best pedagogy pieces. Don't miss the latest in #AHAPerspectives!
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Age of Revolutions @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social · 20/03/2026
Age of Revolutions has had the same look for a decade. It was time for a refresh. New Design! Same Revolutionary Content! ageofrevolutions.com
ageofrevolutions.com
Age of Revolutions
An Open-Access, Peer-Reviewed Journal
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Age of Revolutions @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social · 16/03/2026
Images don’t just document history—they create it. In “Maduro Captured: On Film and Mythmaking” @danielrunnels.bsky.social examines photography, mythmaking, and the construction of public authority. ageofrevolutions.com/2026/03/16/m...
ageofrevolutions.com
Maduro Captured: On Photography and Mythmaking
By Daniel Runnels The photo of a detained Nicolás Maduro circulated worldwide on the morning after his capture is visual evidence of the definitive end of what was once called the Pink Tide in Lati…
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Thomas Lecaque @tlecaque.bsky.social · 13/03/2026
It's really fun to be citing my friends while fleshing out footnotes for the chapter draft. If you haven't read @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social 's Write to Return: Huguenot Refugees on the Frontiers of the French Enlightenment, I highly recommend it.
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Sarah Sussman @sussman72.bsky.social · 06/02/2026
🎉🇫🇷The call is open for the 2026-2027 Gustave Gimon Collection on French Political Economy short-term visiting fellowship at Stanford University Libraries. Deadline: March 15, 2026. guides.library.stanford.edu/gimoncollect... Reach out with any questions about the collection or the fellowship.
guides.library.stanford.edu
Guides: Gustave Gimon Collection on French Political Economy: Short-term fellowship
A brief description of the Gimon Collection, with links to materials in the collection and information about the short-term fellowship
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 11/03/2026
Advice: End virtual meetings with "last one off the call is a rotten egg." Trust me.
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Prof.dr. Beatrice de Graaf @beatricedegraaf.bsky.social · 09/03/2026
If the closing word is written by the inimitable Lynn Hunt, the volume is edited by @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social ans @cindyermus.bsky.social - who wouldn’t want to devour this volume that just arrived! (and we are in it as well 🤗)
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Age of Revolutions @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social · 09/03/2026
Enter by 11:59 PM EDT on Friday, March 13 for your chance to win a copy of Carl P. Borick's Backcountry Resistance: South Carolina's Militia and the Fight for American Independence! ageofrevolutions.com/2026/03/09/b...
ageofrevolutions.com
Book Raffle: Carl P. Borick, Backcountry Resistance: South Carolina’s Militia and the Fight for American Independence, University of South Carolina, Press, 2026.
*** Enter by 11:59 PM EDT on Friday, March 13 for your chance to win! About Backcountry Resistance: The British capture of Charleston, South Carolina, in May 1780 appeared to be a major blow to the…
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Bryan Banks @bryanbanksphd.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
Teaching classes on the history of revolutions? Consider assigning this book and couple it with essays from @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social.
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