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Dr Nicola Clark

@nikkiclark86.bsky.social
3.8K followers 1.6K following 983 posts

Writer, occasional talking head, Senior Lecturer in Medieval and Early Modern History at the University of Chichester. Autistic. Views own, etc. She/her.

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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Obsessed with chronicles. In 1563 Stowe thought it worth recording that the Mayor of London Sir Thomas Lodge was the first Mayor ever to wear a beard, 'ye whiche was thowght to mayny people very straynge'.
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Today I am pirate
Woman wearing glasses and burgundy sweatshirt with grey tabby cat sprawled on her shoulder
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
I think I'm going to start a Substack. I prefer written rambling to pictorial, I've never really been a 'proper' Instagram historian. Do I need to call it something? Any pithy names not already taken?!
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
More forbidden sweetie
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Forbidden sweetie
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Ooh. I think I've got a chapter draft.
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Lisa Rullsenberg @rullsenberg.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
"Universities are routinely expected to justify themselves through the earnings of their graduates in a way that few other public institutions are. We do not judge hospitals solely by the future tax revenues of the patients they treat..."
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
It's too humid to do laundry without a tumbledryer. It will sit and be damp forever. Suboptimal.
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Dr Surekha Davies, Historical Monster Consultant (she/her) @drsurekhadavies.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
The South Asian edition of HUMANS: A MONSTROUS HISTORY is out from @westlandbooks.bsky.social! It’s the history of the category of the human since antiquity, told through ideas about monsters and monster-making. 🧪💙📚 🗃 #ancient #medieval #earlymodern #histsci #histmed #18thCentury #politics #HAMH 🧵
A tower of copies of HUMANS, with bright red spines, and a single copy balanced on top, its mirror-foil oval mirror on the cover facing outwards.
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
Entering my Bond villain era
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HistFest @histfest.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
📣 Announcement! We’re delighted to share a brand-new podcast series that invites expert historians to challenge your perceptions of the past. CHALLENGING HISTORIES is hosted by historian and author, @amyfuller.bsky.social. Listen wherever you get your podcasts! podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/c...
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
Today I need to look at a bunch of those Big Reformation Books written by Big White Male Historians, which has made me realise that is indeed a trope. Unfortunately (?) I have met and like several of them and their work. Am I missing Big Reformation Books written by women?!
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
What noise does glass make as it breaks. A tinkle? A tinkle of broken glass? A sad tinkle? Am I insane?
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Anyone know anything about the custom of the Easter 'wythe'? From Stow: 'In the weeke before Easter, had ye great shewes made for the fetching in of a twisted tree, or With, as they termed it, out of the Woodes into the Kinges house, and the like into euery mans house of Honor or Worship'
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Did either of the Cecils leave an opinion about former administrators like Cromwell? Sudden vision of William like, 'Christ alive how did he do all of this'
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
I need a historian of parliament! When a bill was committed in Elizabeth's reign, is there any reason to read into the person leading the committee - were they someone trusted by the House, by both 'sides' if there were sides to the issue? Or could it even be influenced by the Q?
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Have discovered I can still work mostly horizontal with laptop on my lap and kitten on my chest, but this means I can't keep an eye on other kittens. *thunk* 'Meep, what are you doing?' *meep meep MEEEEEEEP* 'Yes, I hear you. If it's naughty, stop!'
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Liesbeth Corens @onslies.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
When will authorities realise you don’t mess with nuns? The dictionary needs a new word to capture the level of tenacity of a nun — there’s no rush when you’ve got centuries of tradition coursing through you. #nuntastic will do for now. Anyway: cheese 🧀 + PhD + history + nuns = 👌👌👌
Screenshot of an Instagram post about a cheese making nun: regulators questioned a cheese making nun so she went and got a microbiology PhD and defended her cheese with data
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Catherine Fletcher @catherinefletcher.info · 02/09/2026
One for all you train nerds... the gate to the Vatican train station, only opened when a train goes through which is not often.
Brick wall with large iron gate in it. A papal coat of arms is carved in stone above the gate. A few trees and blue sky in the background. Behind some green fencing railway tracks are just visible leading up to the gate.
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Admin day. I'm such a millennial I HATE calling strangers on the phone.
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Catherine Fletcher @catherinefletcher.info · 28/08/2026
Last day of the holidays, so here are a few things I have coming up once I get back to work 🧵
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
Apparently I'm getting my own personal tiltyard
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Trying to write the Elizabethan religious settlement without putting readers to sleep. Thoughts and prayers pls.
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
Hmm so this year I need to extend my first year Wars of the Roses sessions from 2 hours to 3. Bring on the sources and seminar tasks and space for off-piste debates!
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
Cuddle puddle says no work
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Pascale Aebischer (she/her) @pascaleexeter.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
Just in case you haven't signed this yet: The crisis in Exeter is not over. It's just in that dangerous phase where people forget about it unless they're affected. We're waiting to find out the results of the 'consultation'. There's still time to change course. Share and sign! c.org/VZDjrbTybJ
c.org
Sign the Petition
Stop Redundancies at the University of Exeter
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
Anyone got access to this? www.jstor.org/stable/26624...?
jstor.org
Religion and the Composition of the Commissions of the Peace, 1547–1640 | JSTOR
ALISON WALL, Religion and the Composition of the Commissions of the Peace, 1547–1640, History, Vol. 103, No. 2 (355), April 2018
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
Alec Ryrie has put Maeve to sleep
Tabby kitten lying across laptop keyboard
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David Veevers @davidveevers.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
I honestly would love to know what policymakers think will happen to social mobility, regional growth, employment, and educational attainment, when all these provincial universities are gone or shrink to almost non existence? Isn’t avoiding that disaster alone worth a billion quid right now??
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Glen O'Hara @gsoh31.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
Yeah well, maybe you shouldn't take an axe to its biggest university then, you stupid idiots. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
bbc.co.uk
The 'education gap' hiding in picture-perfect Cornwall and Devon
Behind the South West's postcard image, poverty and isolation are limiting opportunities for many young people.
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Tanya D. || Writer || Narrative Designer @cypheroftyr.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
Daaaamn. “AI is the asbestos we're shovelling into the walls of our technological society. Our descendants will spend generations digging it out again, and the longer the bubble goes on without popping, the longer it will take to repair the damage." www.thenerve.news/p/cory-docto...
thenerve.news
Cory Doctorow: The people who tell you ‘AI is changing everything’ are lying
It has become impossible to tell managers mesmerised by artificial intelligence that the tools are not, in fact, helpful. So employees just play along with the fiction to keep their jobs, writes our t...
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
Have any other @ihr.bsky.social seminar convenors had their schedule of sessions for next academic year from the events team yet?
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 03/08/2026
Living with Maeve is often like trying to duck someone who really really really wants to french kiss you. Sometimes literally. What it is to be loved.
My face against a green sofa, tabby kitten smooshed into meAlso my face, now with kitten paw over one eye
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
The phrase 'look at' in proposals or introductions. 'This essay will look at...' - how nice for it but you're gonna have to do more than look. Irrational rage.
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
When writing about the pre-modern City of London as an agent ('the City had outdone itself with the coronation pageants', for example) would you capitalise?
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
Green woodpecker in the graveyard!
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Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
Recruitment suspended on UG environment & sustainability, mathematics and physics. At postgraduate level, suspended courses include international corporate finance, water & environmental engineering and environmental strategy. If you think your subject is safe because not Humanities, rethink. 1/2
timeshighereducation.com
Course closures at University of Surrey raise concerns
Science and maths programmes among those suspended in recent months, with UCU claiming decisions are being made ‘in haste’
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Prof Rob Dover @robdover.bsky.social · 30/07/2026
The sec of state who has seen at least 15000 academics lose their jobs just said this. Out loud. Mercy me. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...
theguardian.com
‘It hurts to lose a job you love’: Starmer loyalist Bridget Phillipson fights on despite cabinet demotion
Exclusive: The former education secretary on her new role as Labour chair and continuing as the minister for women and equalities
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 29/07/2026
Those days where the words won't come and so you start trying things that might help: household chores, because they need doing regardless and you have to be useful/productive somehow and mundanity might free up the hippocampus; coffee, to break through the brain fog; and if all else fails,a nap.
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Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 29/07/2026
'Strip away the grandiose language and a pattern emerges – some combination of fewer, larger modules, almost always wedges of 30 credits, an all-core or heavily prescribed first year, reduced optionality in later years, curated pathways instead of individual module choice... [cont.] 1/4
wonkhe.com
Curriculum reform is a wedge issue
With curriculum reform converging on fewer, larger modules across the sector, Jim Dickinson argues that consolidation solves institutional problems while reallocating regret onto students least able t...
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 28/07/2026
Why do vets always tell you cats are drowsy after anaesthesia. Lies. He is high as a kite and completely hyperactive, and they never warn you about this.
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João Florêncio @noisybits.bsky.social · 28/07/2026
New day, new insights from what’s going on at @exeter.ac.uk. It doesn’t cease to amaze me how uni management patronises its workers while deploying the most obscene kind of “caring management” attitude by offering free mental health support to those whose lives it wants to destroy. #DefendExeterUni
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 27/07/2026
Oof I've remembered why I tend not to read others' non-fiction writing for pleasure while I'm trying to write my own. Suddenly my 'voice' feels shallow, and yet I must not accidentally morph into somebody else's either!
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 27/07/2026
Helping
Laptop on my lap, tabby kitten face with big eyes peering around the right hand side
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
When will @britishlibrary.bsky.social learn that the majority of its clientele don't want expensive fancy food for lunch on a normal work day? Exhibitions and making money yes yes but at least put a reasonably-priced sandwich option there for the rest of us library-using plebs.
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
@tracelarkhall.bsky.social it won't let me message you but I have coronation procession questions about London in 1559....
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Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
What's gender go to do with it? Within UK SHAPE disciplines, women are 51% of academic staff (39% of professors). In STEM, that's 45% of all academics (27% of professors). What are the impacts of disproportionate SHAPE redundancies on those stats? Is anyone attending to gender equality? 1/2
Cover of Tina Turner's single 'What's Love Got to do with It', featuring the artist wearing a short black dress and sitting astride what looks like a rock wrapping in a tan-coloured blanket.
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
Anyone got access to this? www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1...
tandfonline.com
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
Officially the idiot who came to the archives and forgot her laptop. Luckily I only came to take some pics and I can access my files on my phone 😂
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Dr Nicola Clark @nikkiclark86.bsky.social · 16/07/2026
The Coronation-eve procession thru London sounds awful for anyone in the queen's train. Stop start constantly. No chance of hearing the speeches at each pageant unless you're right next to the queen. What if you need a wee and oh god she's stopped AGAIN because some peasant waved at her.
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