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Christine Ferguson

@cferguson.bsky.social
870 followers 781 following 215 posts

Professor of English, specialising in Esotericism Studies,Victorian Literature, and History of Spiritualism & Occultism. Fan of Indian cinema and all things horror related. Based in Glasgow

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Reposted by Christine Ferguson
Kate Manne @katemanne.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
I wrote for @thecut.com about the Cornell case and what it says that, at my institution and many others like it, protesters are often punished more harshly than sexual assailants www.thecut.com/article/what...
thecut.com
What It Feels Like at Cornell Right Now
As a professor at the Ivy League school, Kate Manne has known many, many victims. There’s a palpable feeling on campus, she writes, that this is big.
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University and College Union (UCU) @ucu.org.uk · 22h
Our members at Nottingham University commence strike action today over threats to hundreds of jobs and course closures. Please show them solidarity as they head onto picket lines this morning.
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Christine Ferguson @cferguson.bsky.social · 21h
Dundee suffering from Schrodinger’s deficit- it’s there when management want to cut staff, but on SFC’s closer inspection not enough to qualify for SFC relief. Which is it?🤔 Solidarity with @ducuuo.bsky.social as they fight for their jobs and their institution
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Dundee UCU @ducuuo.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Dundee University is continuing with compulsory redundancies. It argues this is required for the financial survival. However, the University’s cash is so high they may not qualify for £27m of the £40m additional SFC funding. The SFC have asked PWC to investigate. www.theferret.scot/dundee-unive...
theferret.scot
Dundee university might have too much cash to qualify for its taxpayer bailout
The university has continued to argue staff cuts are needed to make ends meet. But a growing cash balance has raised questions about the need for more redundancies, and whether it qualifies for millio...
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Plashing Vole @plashingvole.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Great news: the School has sacked a third of its academic but we've acquired 2 new interim managers on top of the extra permanent ones. Fine work all round.
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Christine Ferguson @cferguson.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Solidarity to @ucuedinburgh.bsky.social as they fight what have clearly been proven to be unnecessary and disproportionate cuts within an institution that remains the wealthiest university in Scotland. Victory to the strikers! www.ucuedinburgh.org.uk/blog/five-we...
ucuedinburgh.org.uk
Staff at the University of Edinburgh start five-week strike — UCU Edinburgh
Members of the University and College Union (UCU) at the University of Edinburgh today (Monday) start five-weeks of strikes in a dispute over £140million cuts and compulsory redundancies. The strike f...
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UCU Edinburgh @ucuedinburgh.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Day 1 of the strike by the workers of UCU Edinburgh against the manufactured deficit (which is not really a deficit), and against a senior management earning millions while staff disappear and education suffers. Solidarity against this parasitical form of management of our higher education.
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Christine Ferguson @cferguson.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
If Ed Miliband wants to be taken seriously on this-- as I sincerely hope he does-- then the proscription on Palestine Action has to be dropped right away www.theguardian.com/politics/202...
theguardian.com
‘You were right’: Ed Miliband tells critics Labour was wrong on Gaza
Foreign secretary will tell party’s conference ‘we are not here to accept the status quo but to change it’
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Paul Bernal @paulbernal.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
Empty words whilst Shabana Mahmood remains in post.
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Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
'University and College Union (UCU) branches refused to grade coursework and exams at the universities of Nottingham and Edinburgh and Goldsmiths, University of London, in response to managers’ plans for sweeping job cuts.'
timeshighereducation.com
Hundreds of students still without marks after boycotts – union
Learners left unable to graduate or progress by ‘last resort’ industrial action
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Stephen Shapiro @stephenshapiro.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
bbc.co.uk
Edinburgh University lecturers begin five-week strike over cuts
Members of the University and Colleges Union are walking out in part of a long-running dispute over job and course cuts.
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Peter Geoghegan @petergeoghegan.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Hmmm on what is arguably the biggest issue in British politics right now, Andy Burnham’s government sounds a lot like Keir Starmer’s…. Wild thought, but maybe this is what happens when you keep the same people in post?
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Cllr Dr Alex Powell @apowelllaw.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
So, just to be clear, Daniel Thomas was: 1- Carrying a knife contrary to section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 2- Used that knife to commit criminal damage (Criminal Damage act 1971) 3- likely engaged in the criminal offense of endangering Life at Sea (Merchant Shipping Act 1995)
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flyingrodent @flyingrodent.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
How is this working out for everyone, by the way? Surely fifteen years of standing behind the Tories, Farage, the Sun and the Mail while they demand our lunch money has done the trick, so there’s no need to keep saying “Yeah, do what he says” or “Do you want me to hold your jacket for you, Nige”.
Our borders are porous. Why can't our politicians admit the problems of immigration?
Polly Toynbee
Migrant numbers matter. They depress wages and determine where state funds go. This can only be addressed with honesty
Sat 27 Feb 2010 10.00 GMTRemain needs to change tack on immigration - or risk Brexit
Jonathan Freedland
The hour is very late, but Labour remain campaigners need to address the number one concern of people who will vote to leave Europe next week Tue 14 Jun 2016 11.00 BSTTo help real refugees, be firm with economic migrants
Nick Cohen
By blurring the distinction between refugees and economic migrants, the left does little to advance its cause
Sat 6 Feb 2016 17.29 GMT
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Neil Mackay @neilmackay.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
This is terrorism. Jail him.
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Dundee UCU @ducuuo.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
We are pushing back the start of the picket line to 8:45am to avoid the worst of the rain this morning. It should be off by 10am. Please share with anyone planning on getting there earlier.
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Charlie Lynch @charlielynch.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
From the deerstalker to the séance. Arthur Conan Doyle’s last novel was intended to convert readers to spiritualism and help avert the apocalypse, but has bewildered publishers and readers ever since. I spoke to Prof Christine Ferguson to find out more: www.thenational.scot/culture/2656...
thenational.scot
From séances to print: The strange journey of a lost Conan Doyle chapter
YOU’VE surely heard of Sherlock Holmes, but what of The Land Of Mist? Over a century after his creation, Arthur Conan Doyle’s deerstalker-clad…
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Millions of Chopped Landlord Pieces @thirteentwelve.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
Charlotte Church roasting Ed Sheeran over a Dead Kennedy's cover
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Christine Ferguson @cferguson.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
So delighted to see this feature on my new scholarly edition of Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Land of Mist In today’s National! Thanks to @charlielynch.bsky.social for the interview!
A newspaper article with a photograph of Arthur Conan Doyle
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Dundee UCU @ducuuo.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Day 2 of 25 of our strike action. Students, colleagues, members come and join us on the picket line as e fight for the future of the University of Dundee. Who’s University. Our University.
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Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
I reviewed Miéville’s extraordinary, intimidating novel The Rouse here:
lareviewofbooks.org
Decolonizing the Dead | Los Angeles Review of Books
China Miéville’s first solo novel in over a decade is part Lovecraft, part le Carré—and quintessentially weird.
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Darryl Jones @profdarryljones.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
Hem hem. Me and him again. crimereads.com/darryl-jones...
crimereads.com
Darryl Jones on Discovering the Remarkable Ghost Stories of M.R. James
I didn’t know this until years later, but I first encountered Montague Rhodes James on Saturday 28 June 1980 at 10.30pm.  The BBC did my generation the lasting service of showing horror double bill…
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Kristof Smeyers @kristofsmeyers.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
6-year fully funded research and teaching assistant job at University of Ghent in the fields of English literature/cultural theory, history/translation history, linguistics, language acquisition, communication. Own projects are welcome! Details: jobs.ugent.be/job/Ghent-As...
jobs.ugent.be
Assistant English
Assistant English
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Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
'In the most notable case, the University of Nottingham’s University and College Union (UCU) branch has declared strike action of 67 days, expected to last for the majority of the autumn term, as the institution looks to cut 600 full-time equivalent jobs.'
timeshighereducation.com
UK universities face autumn of chaos as ‘prolonged’ strikes planned
Unprecedentedly long strikes at Nottingham, Edinburgh and Dundee could be the shape of things to come, observers say
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David Veevers @davidveevers.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Think of the combined CENTURIES of expertise lost here, the creativity, the knowledge, the depth and breadth of cultural learning and understanding, the generations of minds enriched and enlightened, the sheer weight of history that led to the establishment of these programmes. Purged. Destroyed.
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Aberdeen City Arts Board @adeencityartsboard.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Join us and AK Press, Greenhouse Records and Seditionist Distro.! Stalls from campaign groups, workshops/skill-shares, craftivism and also food and drink and lunch. See you there Aberdeen
Aberdeen Social Centre Activist Fair 2026 poster - Saturday 10th October 11am - 5pm. Dunbar Hall - Kings Campus Old Aberdeen
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Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
'The register...includes 45 C of E clergymen, whose investments helped fund hundreds of slaving voyages and a 1720 relaunch of the RAC. Among them was Henry Brydges, later a canon at St Paul’s Cathedral, who bought half of his £10,000 shareholding on the day he became the Archdeacon of Rochester.'
theguardian.com
Fresh evidence of C of E’s role in enslavement uncovered as church wrestles with reparations debate
Register of British Slave Traders shows clergymen financed company that trafficked enslaved Africans on hundreds of voyages
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Matt Bors @mattbors.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
It was exactly ten years ago today, on my 33rd birthday, that I posted this comic online.
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David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
If you work at an oil major, I urge you to think hard about what the next decade will feel like. Do you want to greenlight another decades-long extraction project without reckoning with its full climate cost? Or use this moment to demand a different path?
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The Tennessee Holler @thetnholler.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
9/11 victim Michael Massaroli’s son: "You do my dad's legacy & the legacy of all victims no honor using this tragedy to spread hate. I've had to spend 25 years seeing people use it to hate on our Muslim brothers & sisters, people who don't look like them."
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Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
'In some respects, what we are seeing resembles a form of collective grief. Not only grief for colleagues who have left, but grief for ways of working, professional identities and communities that once gave meaning to academic life. This creates an important challenge for university leaders.'
wonkhe.com
The loss of staff belonging in higher education
Nick Hulbert-Williams argues that what looks like low morale and change fatigue in HE may really be a crisis of belonging
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Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Businesses are 'clear that universities should do "more to help students to gain workplace experience".' Are they clear that such workplace experience needs to be provided by, ahem, businesses?
ft.com
UK universities pledge work experience to more than 1mn students
Initiative comes amid growing concern among employers about young people’s readiness for workplace
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Plashing Vole @plashingvole.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Is it OK to have 7 supervisors in 2 years? Asking for a PhD student who has been told there’s nothing to complain about.
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Thomas Lecaque @tlecaque.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
The people building the plagiarism-driven bullshit machine that keeps convincing people to kill themselves think that there's a 10% chance their product will kill all humans but the people who think the product is garbage and doesn't belong in education are the backwards whackjobs?
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Christine Ferguson @cferguson.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
It lives! I hope Conan Doyle would be pleased to see what he came to see as his most important novel receive serious scholarly treatment here, even if he might not have approved of all my editorial decisions. If you’re interested in spirits, science, and the end of the world, do check it out!
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Paul Bernal @paulbernal.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
See also Starmer, Burnham and Mahmood thinking a ‘tougher line on immigration’ would lower Farage’s support. Idiotic.
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Marijke Valk @marijkevalk.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
I'm excited to share the CFP for this year's BSLS Winter Symposium, which I'm absolutely thrilled to be organising with @thebsls.bsky.social! Occult Science: Disenchantment, Re-Enchantment, and the Persistence of Wonder Abstract deadline: 31 October 2026 Full CFP: www.bsls.ac.uk/2026/09/bsls...
bsls.ac.uk
BSLS 2026/27 Winter Symposium Call for Papers – The British Society for Literature and Science
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Darryl Jones @profdarryljones.bsky.social · 06/09/2026
Hem hem. ‘It is difficult to imagine a better account of James’s life ever being written.’
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Darryl Jones @profdarryljones.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Hem hem
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Dundee UCU @ducuuo.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Congratulations! Hoping that at the University of Dundee we will see the same movement.
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Roger Luckhurst @theprofrog.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Day conference on Conan Doyle and the Orient comin’ up
ies.sas.ac.uk
Conan Doyle’s Orient
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Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
'Unions say more than 1,000 staff members will have departed the institution by the time this redundancy round is finished. Last Tuesday, the reported number still sat at 675. The perceived disparity is symptomatic of a crisis mired in mistrust.'
thecourier.co.uk
Scale of staff exodus at Dundee University revealed
The reporting of employee figures has become central to the fractious dispute between the institution and unions.
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Plashing Vole @plashingvole.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Head of HR is moaning to our union Chair that press coverage of our situation is lies. But can't point to any.
static.klipy.com
Data: No Lies Detected
ALT: Data: No Lies Detected
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Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
'I have made such a nice little purchase today--two little girls of seven years old....I gave three pounds for the pair--dirt cheap! as I think you will own. They are two little orphans.' (Emily Eden, sister of the governor general, writing in March 1839: "Up the Country", 1866 1: 275).
archive.org
Up The Country Vol 1
This book was copied from the amazing and wonderful PAHAR: Mountains of Central Asia Digital Dataset, a labor of love by two dedicated and talented historians. We encourage you to visit them, and subs...
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Charlie Lynch @charlielynch.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
“The former Tory PM, who only lasted 49 days in office, interviewed the Glasgow nightclub owner for her YouTube show…” www.thenational.scot/news/2650927...
thenational.scot
Glasgow nightclub mogul appears on Liz Truss podcast to attack 'Nico-liar Sturgeon'
LIZ Truss has mocked Nicola Sturgeon and claimed that Scotland is "going down the drain" under the SNP on a podcast.
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Dundee UCU @ducuuo.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
The University of Dundee is failing to comply with information governance law. This is due to a reduction of staffing in the team responsible. Staff reached zero in 2026. Compliance issues will become more and more regular if the current redundancies are approved by Court. Say no to redundancies.
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Jim Pickard @pickardje.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
we are keeping tabs of what Andy Burnham says vs what Andy Burnham actually does www.ft.com/content/4371...
ft.com
Andy Burnham’s summer of quietly backing away from radical pledges
From Thames Water to electoral reform, the prime minister seems to be diverging from his campaign rhetoric
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Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
'Chiefs at the University of Exeter said they had met their commitments for students guaranteed accommodation - those who applied before a 31 July deadline.' If all publicity is good publicity, Exeter's PR strategy has been on fire this summer. 1/2
bbc.co.uk
University of Exeter students left scrambling for accommodation
Dozens of prospective university students have been left with nowhere to live ahead of the new term.
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Naomi Simone Borwein @nsborwein.bsky.social · 22/08/2026
Contemporary Indigenous Horror (UPM) is looking for original, unpublished short horror fiction, poetry, and experimental works by self-identifying Indigenous creatives. Honorarium: $250 (CA) per accepted piece Deadline: Aug 30, 2026 @lnuonhorror.bsky.social www.cfplist.com/CFP/46993
cfplist.com
The CFP List
An academic call for papers database.
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Prof. Liz Oakley-Brown @earlymodlancs.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
And yet... the University is making staff redundant? Make it make sense! "University of Exeter students left scrambling for accommodation" BBC News share.google/wiDkoIPWiD4q...
share.google
University of Exeter students left scrambling for accommodation
Dozens of prospective university students have been left with nowhere to live ahead of the new term.
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