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Nick Admussen

@nadmussen.bsky.social
1.1K followers 308 following 410 posts

Associate Professor of Chinese literature at Cornell, poet, translator. My current project is "On Stricture: Chinese Poetry and American Culture." More (incl links to open-access research) at nickadmussen.com.

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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Very strongly recognizing the narratives and feelings in this. Why do our best students get punished for speaking truth to power while those who loathe and abuse women get the benefit of the doubt? 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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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
I strongly believe this in my own field, from the bottom to the top. "The AI invented this citation" is neither a relevant defense nor true. You put it in the essay without reading, checking, or engaging with it. It only became a citation when you made the claim yourself in research under your name.
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Brendan O’Kane @bokane.org · 25/09/2026
been a while since I saw a mutant character that really delighted me
new to me: one 或 on top of another 或 that's been turned upside-down. It is apparently writing the homophonous 惑, "confusing."
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Craig @craigpearson.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Death at the Console: The Fiscal Impact of Exploding Screen Technology and Replacement Bridge Crews.
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Translating Wookie Prosody: Three Experiments
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Cheburashka @leshij.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
Having consumed actual Chinese army rations before, this could not be further from the truth (though maybe they’ve upgraded in the years since)
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
Picked this up at the Chinese supermarket out of curiosity and just realized it comes packaged with its own heating unit. Very convinced this is the consumer version of a PRC MRE ration
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Eli Friedman @elifriedman.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Apparently not intended a joke, Cornell University has set up an Expressive Activity Area just in front of the police station
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
新書 📢《背誦與辭演:當代中國散文詩》 ——比散文更凝練,比詩歌更自由 歷經五四啟蒙、社會主義與先鋒文學的洗禮,散文詩可謂 20 世紀中國最難以定義、卻又始終生機勃勃的文學類型。中大出版社 9 月新書《背誦與辭演:當代中國散文詩》,由學者兼詩人安敏軒(Nick Admussen)撰寫、麥熙雯翻譯。 作者提出顛覆性的理論視角,主張散文詩的本質不在於固定形式,而在於「背誦」(重複與彰顯前人)與「辭演」(拒絕完全相同並重組創作)之間的張力。 本書從毛時代郭風、柯藍的實踐,談到劉再復的告別,再到歐陽江河與西川的先鋒語言實驗,細緻重繪當代中國散文詩的歷史版圖,深刻揭示文學脈絡與政治語境的複雜互動。
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eileen chengyin chow @chowleen.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
Don’t let folks tell you Gen Z students can’t read. Kicked-off my Duke first-year class with this favorite Lydia Davis story - projected text onto a whiteboard so we could annotate by hand. So many smart and insightful readings, by a group of 18 year-olds in their first week of university life.
If you ask her what is a favorite story she has written, she will hesitate for a long time and then say it may be this story that she read in a book once: an English-language teacher in China asked his Chinese student to say what was the happiest moment in his life. The student hesitated for a long time. At last he smiled with embarrassment and said that his wife had once gone to Beijing and eaten duck there, and she often told him about it, and he would have to say the happiest moment of his life was her trip, and the eating of the duck.

-Lydia Davis, Happiest Moment
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amulya.bsky.social @amulya.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
My husband Drew wrote this at breakneck speed while moving cross-country and caring for an 8 month old, bc he felt it was necessary, ethically and politically, to correct the record. If you read Tyler Austin Harper's piece, I hope you'll read this.
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
Very rich and affecting selection of poems by the factory poet Xiao Hai in brand-new translations by @myetcetera.bsky.social -- my favorite is "nonfiction," most of which feels like he is literally spitting the words: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 16/08/2026
A great essay whether or not you live in DC -- a case study in what migration means for ideas and communities. Also recommended: the JF Books youtube, where you can see the events they run: www.youtube.com/@JFBooks%E5%...
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
New wrinkle in the Google AI update: it is scraping Bluesky, which means you absolutely can, trivially, plant false information into it, all you have to do is account for its propensity to garbage up the false information you feed it.
The google AI notes correctly that I have been making fun of it for hallucinating me incorrect spouses, but continues to hallucinate me incorrect spouses, and also confuses me with someone else who has been making fun of it for hallucinating incorrect spouses.
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eileen chengyin chow @chowleen.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
“A Man in a Rush” by Wang Jibing 趕時間的人 王計兵 Rushing wind from air
Rushing knives from wind
Rushing fire from my bones
Rushing water from flames Seasons don’t exist for a man rushing for time #everynightapoem trans. EC
Photo of Wang Jibing in delivery man uniformRushing wind from air
Rushing knives from wind
Rushing fire from my bones
Rushing water from flames
Seasons don't exist for a man rushing for time
Only one stop and then the next stop
The world is but an address
As is Wang zhuang Village
Every day I run into delivery men flying here, flying there
Striking the earth with their feet Setting off endless sparks
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Dr. Han VanderHart @hanvanderhart.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
you cannot even afford to live in your own poem Johannes Göransson
From the book SUMMER

When I read the lilacked message from my mother of pearl father to my daughters of pearl döttrar they are in the painting they invented the painting I invented döttrarna you didn't invent us you cannot even afford to live in your own poem when you wake up gravitysick with images of children by the border pöbeln you wake up with a toxic virginity yes I wake up with treasonous
lilacs 1 want summer to go on forever I can't
pay for it there are two girls in the painting that failed to become a master
piece I don't own it I don't own a gun I don't even own this poem summer does
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 30/07/2026
Glad to announce that the Cornell University department of Asian Studies is hiring -- the position is a three-year visiting assistantship in contemporary Taiwanese humanities: asianstudies.cornell.edu/visiting-ass.... 2/2, assistant professor salary and benefits, many disciplines welcomed!
asianstudies.cornell.edu
Visiting Assistant Professor in Contemporary Taiwanese Humanities
Position announcement
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 30/07/2026
Things I learned from the online Tiananmen Massacre museum, #15: Wang Fei performed a protest duet with the guitarist from Beyond in 1989, called "An Unsettled Heart" 为平复的心: www.youtube.com/watch?v=JD-Q.... Source (the whole museum is terrific) here: 8964museum.com/art/en/a-c01....
youtube.com
王菲《王靖雯》專輯_未平復的心 [動態歌詞]
YouTube video by milly music
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 27/07/2026
Little AI update. First, Google AI mode is still bringing the heat. Definitely the absolute best at being absolutely, unrepentantly shit at almost everything it does, while simultaneously being the least avoidable chatbot in the world. They are absolutely gonna get sued over this stuff eventually.
A Google AI answer to the question "who is Nick Admussen married to" which says "Nick Admussen is married to a man, though his specific spouse's full name is kept private outside of mentions regarding his husband and family life." Every piece of this is wrong, and the false information actually answers questions that nobody asked.
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
Very proud to present two translations of the Taiwanese poet Tang Juan in the brand-new sixtieth issue of the translation journal Asymptote: www.asymptotejournal.com/poetry/two-p.... They are good ones! And Tang Juan recorded audio, so you can hear him read them! A moment on Asymptote, too: 🧵
asymptotejournal.com
Two Poems - Asymptote
Autumn Rain                        My essays are dust—where should they go?
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Brendan O’Kane @bokane.org · 12/07/2026
Literary Chinese for When You're Glad:
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Tammy Lai-Ming Ho @myetcetera.bsky.social · 06/07/2026
My translation of Xiao Hai's poem "Made in China" appears in an extended profile / interview with him in @observeruk.bsky.social! Read the interview here: observer.co.uk/culture/inte...
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 30/06/2026
Underappreciated difficulty of parenting: are you freaking out about the venal (go to your room), the existential (let's have a hug), or -- here's the tough one -- the horror of existence as it is manifested in the meaningless humiliations of daily life? Because I got nothing for that last one.
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Brendan O’Kane @bokane.org · 30/06/2026
Victor had a ton of material on Dungan 東干 (and probably a lot of other things!) in his home that he had planned to do something with someday. Not sure who will/can take it, but when his basement flooded 10+ years ago he saved that before he saved his childhood photos.
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Canaan Morse 莫楷 @canaanmorse.bsky.social · 30/06/2026
What?! No.
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Matt Bell @mdbell79.bsky.social · 25/06/2026
"The shortest essay I ever wrote, maybe the shortest essay anyone has ever written, was 'Little Essay on Form.' It went like this: 'We build the corral as we reinvent the horse.'” —Stephen Dunn
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 22/06/2026
Woo hoo! The new Wang Jiaxin retrospective making some waves!
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Senator Paula Simons 🇨🇦 @senatorpaulasimons.bsky.social · 09/06/2026
A thread. The other day, I happened to clock the little AI-written bio attached to my name. It announced, quite confidently, that I was married, not to my husband, but to his brother. Particularly amusing, since my BIL is a proud member of the LGBQT community. I love him, but I am NOT his type. 🧵
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 09/06/2026
Updates from my continued experiments with Google AI Mode: "You are completely right, and I apologize. I hallucinated a connection, glued two entirely different people together based on a shared name, and built a false narrative around it." 1/2
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Okka (Khairani Barokka; she/her/dia) @mailbykite.bsky.social · 19/05/2026
The US version of beloved VIOLENT PHENOMENA antho of essays on translation is out today! With a foreword from Bruna Dantas Lobato. Congrats @jeremytiang.bsky.social Kavita Bhanot, and all fellow contributors. www.harpercollins.com/products/vio...
harpercollins.com
Violent Phenomena
“These essays, deftly blending the political and the personal, offer fresh, galvanizing, and passionate perspectives on literary translation.”—Jhumpa Lahiri...
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 26/05/2026
Heard Google turned up the AI this morning, decided to take it for a test spin. 1) I am not married to that person, 2) but that person is a real colleague who now has a pretty solid emotional distress libel case against Google, 3) that's not her picture, 4) the 'evidence' links are fake.
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 20/05/2026
Translation people have to listen to this. Feeling even more committed to the niches, the small spaces, the little presses where this kind of blossom first grows.
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 20/05/2026
We got an "update" to our PeopleSoft grading software and now it predictively suggests, in non-alphabetical and shifting order, your most common grades according to how often you have given them so far in the class. Exiting the age of common sense, entering the age of average sense.
A list of grades titled "Most Relevant" that reads A, B+, A+, A-, B-, B. And then a list beneath it titled "Others" with the rest of the letter grades.
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Tony Hao @tonyhao.bsky.social · 07/05/2026
My translation of ADRIFT IN THE SOUTH, the debut memoir of Chinese worker-poet Xiao Hai 小海, out with Granta Magazine Editions today. A landmark work of the migrant worker literature movement, it showcases one of China’s liveliest emerging voices. #XiaoHai #chineseliterature #translatedliterature
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 14/05/2026
My colleague Allen Carlson will be teaching his gateway class "What Is China?" online starting May 1, perfect for people who want an interdisciplinary, contemporary, transnational introduction to Chinese politics and society. Course description + syllabus here: classes.cornell.edu/browse/roste...
classes.cornell.edu
Summer 2026 - China & Asia Pacific Studies
Browse China & Asia Pacific Studies on the Summer 2026 Class Roster.
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 14/05/2026
Found myself making the argument that a student using AI inpainting (i.e. starting a paragraph with her idea, finishing it with the AI's) was not improving her writing, but submitting to the ideology of the AI, which is related to the average ideology of the data-set. Two neat recent sources:
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Coraline Jortay 喬海霖 @qiaoj.bsky.social · 12/05/2026
Original essay here for anyone interested! www.chinesepen.org/blog/archive...
chinesepen.org
黄子平:七十年代日常语言学
一、起床啦!起床起床!    那些年每日里天蒙蒙亮,听到的第一声吆喝就是这“起床起床”。其实并没有所谓“床”,苗村黎寨,男女各占一个大谷仓,一溜稻草铺地的大统铺,阔气点的最多垫块塑料布隔隔湿气。兵团建制,明明是个种橡胶的农场生产队,偏要叫做某师某团某连。连长姓康,脸上有疤,因此显得有点凶狠,却是个耿直寡言的四川汉子。众人平日尊称连长,意见大发时,当面或背后就直接唤他“康疤”,他也不恼。那些年...
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 12/05/2026
It's here! _Orphans of the Times_, translations from the pathbreaking Bei Dao and Li Tuo-edited book 《七十年代》. Fiction writers (Han Shaogong! Ah Cheng), poets (Zhai Yongming!), and artists (Xu Bing!) reflecting on their lives in memoirs of the PRC's turbulent 1970s. cup.cuhk.edu.hk/CUHKP/Orphan...
The cover of the book _Orphans of the Times_, blue on top and with a woodcut of a figure opening its own face with its hands on the bottom.
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 11/05/2026
Highly recommend this episode of the Sinica podcast with @kaiserkuo.bsky.social and translator Eleanor Goodman, about the brilliant poetry of Zheng Xiaoqiong, the Chinese labor poetry movement generally, and the joys and challenges of poetry translation: www.sinicapodcast.com/p/the-poetry...
sinicapodcast.com
The Poetry of Zheng Xiaoqiong: A Conversation with Translator Eleanor Goodman
A live event co-hosted by NYRB Poets and Equator Magazine, recorded May 4, 2026.
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 05/05/2026
The bear in the middle's celebrating five years of the Hong Kong National Security Law. The family at the bottom's caption: "National Security -- Family Security" Top right: "Only with national security is there development." Question: are Hong Kongers bears in this, and non-HKers...human?
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Giorgio Strafella @gstrafella.bsky.social · 01/05/2026
Post your warning sign
Sticker on a beijing number plate that reads, sorry, novice driver, with the portrait of sailor moon making a cute face
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Nick Admussen @nadmussen.bsky.social · 01/05/2026
Post your warning sign
An industrial machine with the (probably fake, photoshopped) warning sign "It is possible to survive this but not unaltered"
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Poetry Foundation @poetry.foundation · 23/04/2026
He lies if they ask him how he does it. To leap on top or to the side. To dodge the ceaseless lottery. —Luis Muñoz, translated by Idra Novey and Garth Greenwell. Read the full poem: bit.ly/4vcQ3Ck
Blue book cover featuring a white pegasus silhouette at the bottom. The text on the cover reads: "in the back patio of his mind, a plant opens, a succulent of accomplishment." Below, it says "Luis Muñoz translated by Idra Novey and Garth Greenwell, 'I."
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Chris Song @chrissonghk.bsky.social · 26/04/2026
After two years of sustained effort, I am delighted to share that the first #Cantonese language course is now being offered across the University of Toronto's tri-campus system. My sincere thanks to all who have supported this initiative along the way!
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emily fraser 🌿🐌✨ @emilyesfraser.bsky.social · 19/04/2026
Louise Glück
Telemachus' Detachment

When I was a child looking
at my parents' lives, you know
what I thought? I thought
heartbreaking. Now I think
heartbreaking, but also
insane. Also
very funny.
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Mikki Brock @mikkibrock.bsky.social · 01/04/2026
I don't see this said enough: the widespread use of generative AI is not only making our jobs as educators harder logistically, but also emotionally. It is genuinely sad to be suspicious of students when you have spent so much time building a pedagogy based on trust and not being a cop. It sucks.
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Rebecca Colesworthy @rcolesworthy.bsky.social · 14/04/2026
Replace every how-to-publish panel with one on the material realities of publishing. This is where I’m at.
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