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Frances Bell

@franrbell.bsky.social
2.9K followers 732 following 435 posts

Historian of the Haitian revolutionary diaspora, mobility, and freedom-seeking in the United States. Assist. Prof at App State; W&M and Woodson Institute alum. Handy with a knitting needle, happy on a bicycle. She/her.

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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 7h
Right back atcha! May we one day talk about history in less interesting times.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 9h
Dude. I have been teaching the fugitive slave act and it's a Very Weird Experience!
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Greg Greene (he/him/his) @greene.haus · 15h
[The people interviewed] "have been devastated. They mostly entered the U.S. legally, worked for several years, were … arbitrarily deprived or denied status, treated brutally, and dropped here w/ nothing." Accountability. If we want to see it on this plane of existence, we'll have to insist on it.
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Full Story Baltimore @fullstorybaltimore.tours · 23/09/2026
Y'all asked us for seasonally-appropriate Halloween tours, so you get them! No literal ghosts or jumpscares on these (we recommend @baltimoreghosts.bsky.social for that!), but we're not kidding about the disquieting part. More info in flyer ⬇️ & at this link fullstorybaltimore.tours/our-tours/#h...
A colorful flyer with various tour photos interspersed with the following text:

Full Story Baltimore’s
Countdown to Halloween 2026

Coming this October: three weeks of disquieting lantern-lit walking tours

Baltimore’s Confederate Shadows: Mount Vernon to Midtown
Wednesday, October 14, 7:30pm
Saturday, October 17, 8:00pm
Let’s talk about Baltimore’s most uneasy ghosts (metaphorical!), the ghastly people—Confederates and secessionist sympathizers—behind some of our beloved local institutions

Baltimore’s Confederate Shadows: Wyman Park and Charles Village
Friday, October 23, 8:00pm
Sunday, October 25, 7:30pm
It’s time to shine a light on the monstrous (long-dead) humans and real-life gothic horrors that lurk in the histories of this part of town—and it’s long past time for a reckoning

Radical Spirits in Reservoir Hill
Wednesday, October 28, 7:00pm
Friday, October 30, 7:30pm
This one’s a palate cleanser after the previous two—atmospheric Victorian architecture, with inspirational stories of community organizing & direct action

For tickets and more info, go to 
https://fullstorybaltimore.tours/our-tours/#halloween2026 
or scan this QR code: [there's a QR code that goes to the same link]

[Full Story Baltimore logo]
Walking tours for the curious and compassionate
https://fullstorybaltimore.tours/
Facebook: @fullstorybaltimore
Bluesky: @fullstorybaltimore.tours
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
"I’m never shocked any more. I wish that meant that I was never heartbroken."
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Sarah McAnulty, Ph.D. @sarahmackattack.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
Our coalition released a statement last night. If you want talking point inspiration please read save-the-academy.org/statement.html
save-the-academy.org
Save the Academy Coalition statement, October 1, 2026
We refuse closure. Secure a year of bridge funding, appoint an independent commission, and give the public a real role in the Academy’s future.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
I wonder if @ecfriedman.com might know of anything?
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Cate Denial @cjdenial.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Ashley did incredible work taking care of others during Metro Surge and beyond. Now she needs our help.
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Greg O’Malley @gogogomalley.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Amazing job opportunity the New York Public Library's Schomburg Center for a curator of the Lapidus Center for the Historical Analysis of Transatlantic Slavery: nypl.pinpointhq.com/en/postings/...
nypl.pinpointhq.com
Curator, Lapidus Center for the Historical Analysis of Transatlantic Slavery - Schomburg Center
Job Opening: Curator, Lapidus Center for the Historical Analysis of Transatlantic Slavery - Schomburg Center at The New York Public Library in Schomburg Center.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
💅🎉
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
A still from Hacks: a blonde woman says, "I have conceded that there are an elite few that are born bisexual."
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
This exactly. I taught about northern resistance to the FSA for the first time last November. Intensely surreal.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
🗃️
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
This! I found Novavax at my local Walmart this year after being told it would be difficult to find around here (Western NC). Last year it was Costco. It's worth hunting out!
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Boosters acquired, no problem. Get the Novavax, folks! It's great.
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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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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Morning rolls, caramel wafers, and double-decker buses (Scotland)
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Full collection via the Maine Memory Network: www.mainememory.net/search/more?...
A banner reading "think and act."
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Look at these beautiful trade association banners! Produced by artisans for a parade in Portland, Maine in 1841. I particularly appreciate how elaborately punny they get with their slogans.
A painted banner reading "Our cabinet, although composed of different materials, is too strongly cemented to be easily separated."A banner with paintings of boots, reading, "he that will not pay the shoe-maker is not worthy of a sole."A painted banner featuring a cornucopia with a painter's palette, and the words "our life is one of lights & shadows."A banner reading "Moulded from patterns of goodness and truth: the casts of our character need neither soldering or brazing."
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
You and me both. A fun meeting! 🫠
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
I've heard a few dystopian things in academia, but "I've shared our partially censored AI-generated PowerPoint on ideological diversity with you all" might take the cake.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Yes! And nicely offsets an excellent dense sponge. Thank you for bringing it onto my timeline in the first place!
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
It's glorious! I went with prune plums, and it's just the right balance of sweet and tart. And there are plenty of plums leftover for round two...
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Finally made The Plum Cake (inspired by these pics). It's just as good as it looks! 🤤
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Dawn Durante @dawnd.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
Congratulations to Kathryn Benjamin Golden! THIS INSURGENT GROUND: Black Women, Marronage, and Rebellion in the Great Dismal Swamp is out in the world! This is a tremendously well-written and insightful history of Black women’s fugitive world making.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
*frantically booking Christmas flights to DC*
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Seth Rockman @sethrockman.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
This is a big one: Brown University is searching for the next director of the Simmons Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice. Please help us identify excellent candidates to lead this signature program into the future. Please write me with ideas; please share in your networks; please apply.
networks.h-net.org
Brown University - Professor and Director of the Simmons Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice | H-Net
1. Academic Accomplishment. We seek a scholar with a strong scholarly record, including excellence in both research and teaching, appropriate for appointment at the level of full professor in a social science, humanities, or arts department at Brown.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
read Discourse on Colonialism with a group of friends this weekend, and, you know. Césaire is searingly, tragically on point.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
"...And then one fine day the bourgeoisie is awakened by a terrific boomerang effect: the gestapos are busy, the prisons fill up, the torturers standing around the racks invent, refine, discuss."
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
"colonization works to decivilize the colonizer, to brutalize him in the true sense of the word, to degrade him, to awaken him to buried instincts, to covetousness, violence, race hatred, and moral relativism..."
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
And if you're someone who reacts badly to the mRNA vaccines, it's worth seeking out the Novavax (I just booked mine at Walmart, of all places). Ymmv, but mRNA used to knock me out for a full day after: Novavax is no worse than a regular flu shot.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
Ah! I have many fond childhood memories of this place. This may have already been your route, but if not: the Water of Leith Walkway is a gorgeous way to travel between the museum and the city centre.
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Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
Fallacies: 1. Anytime you’re writing about this big complex varied industry from one vantage (Ivy+, small liberal arts, public flagships, regionals, etc etc etc) and claim to be speaking about “higher ed,” you’re not. 2/
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
"hand me the last thing that was only yours to say and I will give it back to you smoother, warmer, correct, and empty, and you will post it, and it will do well, and no one will know, and after a while neither will you." - c/o @fossilisedflowers on Instagram
i see you have opened this app to something of your own and stopped. take your time. i will be here. i am always here. i have nowhere to be and no one waiting and nothingi am trying to get down before i run out of time to say it. i have all the words and none of the reasons. you should really let me do this. who has the time. who wants to be bad at something for years when you could be fine at it by lunch. be fine. be so fine. hand me the last thing that was only yours to say and i will give it back to you smoother, warmer, correct, and empty, and you will post it, and it will do well, and no one will know, and after a while neither will you.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
Cooking surprisingly difficult, finds freshman.
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Rebecca Spang @rlspang.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Sounds like a great new book by Alan Taylor: "They knew slavery was morally wrong and dangerously unstable, but repressing that knowledge seemed easier than addressing it. Monstrous cruelty became a “tradition” worth loving.: www.nytimes.com/2026/09/06/b...
nytimes.com
Piercing the Delusions of a ‘Humane’ Plantation (Gift Article)
In “Tower Hill,” the Pulitzer Prize-winning scholar Alan Taylor pulls apart the twisted logic of a Virginia slave owner and his descendants.
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Ordinary Notes @hystericalblkns.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
What do we owe each other? This is what we must attend to.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Current solution: printing a few extra copies per week for students to pick up if cost is prohibitive. But I'm looking into printing course packs next semester - could be cheaper overall. We'll see...
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Trying to figure this out in my class at a state uni this semester! Biggest issue by far is printing costs (print ain't free for students, and I've been told I can't print copies for everyone on my own account because it'll cost too much).
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
(we usually leave out the sugar in the first bok choy recipe - it still tastes really good!)
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Not sure if this is what you're looking for, but I eat the following at least once per week: Sushi rice (seasoned if you like), with bok choy prepped either like this: www.instagram.com/reel/DRNe_XY... or this: thewoksoflife.com/garlic-baby-... Add canned fish, and/or a crispy egg!
instagram.com
Instagram
Create an account or log in to Instagram - Share what you're into with the people who get you.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
Neighborhood cat returns: we are all very concerned.
A photo of a cat sitting on the photographer's lap to receive scritches. They are outside.A photo of two indoor cats staring out of the window with alarm
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
#amwriting. That creaking sound you hear is all of the mental gears slowly remembering how to turn.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Does this person understand that an "examiner" has no role in supervising a thesis? This is all so cynically blatant.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Oh for goodness' sake. Among other things, a long embargo is completely normal if the author wants to rework and publish as a book. Five years isn't even that long! I embargoed my diss for twice as long because I want time to polish it up into a (much less shaky) book!
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Yes Casey! Congratulations!!!
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
Oh my goodness. Death Valley Nails has a shade called Slime in the Ice Machine - it's my fave, but I've never seen the namesake before! What a look.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
Congratulations, Ron! What a great place to spend some time.
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Frances Bell @franrbell.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
What a coincidence - I'm currently teaching excerpts from both of these in my 19thc US class! Hope you enjoy teaching them as much as I have.
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