iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

It's an easy cop out for the entertainers, especially such as GP, to say such a thing 🤡 btw weird seeing you on bsky!

Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

Today I will be talking to my students about the destruction of pre-1848 Paris, and I took a look at Charles Marville's photos from the Bibliothèque historique de la Ville de Paris. A couple of those: 1. View of Rue de Breteuil. 2. Buttes Chaumont during its construction, 1865. 3. Avenue de l'Opéra

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

The current use of violence against the French kids is appealing. The classes have 35 pupils. In certain buildings, there are rats. During winter, they sit in their outer clothes; in summer, they faint from the heat. Instead, the state chooses preemptive violence and contempt. It's disgusting.

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

New skill (temporarily) unlocked!

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

This is a disastrous news for Edinburgh and the entire higher education system in the UK.

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Between this and @nbcnews.com's news on Pentagon considering pulling out of Europe, we are to a very happy Friday morning.

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Reposted by Olga Byrska

Christine Kooi @christinekooi.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Friends, if you've ever worked in the Dutch National Archives, consider signing this petition. Its administrators want to completely shut down its public educational programs and turn it into a repository of exclusively government records. #skystorians 🗃️

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

Last week's death of Wendell Berry, the Kentucky poet of everyday life, was likely overshadowed by Dolly Parton and Tim Curry. If you don't know him, I suggest you take some time to meditate on this poem.

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

Ned points out at one of the most important aspects of the growing influence of the far-right in Germany: in short, it is a civilisational project that aims to really change the reality, juridicially and symbolically.

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Symptomatic, because, as reported by the Observatory of Inequalities (Observatoire des inégalités) last year, the number of queer-hate violent acts is growing across the entire country, and it has tripled between 2016 and 2024: www.inegalites.fr/nombre-crime...

inegalites.fr

Le nombre de crimes et délits anti-LGBT en forte hausse

La police et la gendarmerie ont enregistré 3 000 crimes et délits homophobes et transphobes en 2024. Ce chiffre a triplé par rapport à 2016. Il faut interpréter cette hausse avec prudence, mais elle e...

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

A worrisome and symptomatic attack in Paris: last weekend, a man leaving a queer bar was attacked and beaten in Le Marais, historically a queer district (mostly catering to cis gay men). The victim is a policeman and a queer rights activist. The attacker is 20 yo. tetu.com/2026/08/31/p...

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

This year, I teach an introductory course called "Paris in literature" to a group of American students on exchange in Paris, which brings me back to my first love: literature. Today, we are going to talk about François Villon and his Testament. As of 2026, ubi sunt is very much à la mode.

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

A dla OKO.press napisałam o akademickiej apokalipsie, która dzieje się bez mała na całym świecie. // For the Polish media outlet, oko.press, I wrote an op-ed about the worldwide academic apocalypse that has been taking place for the past couple of years. oko.press/akademia-cza...

oko.press

Akademia. Czas apokalipsy

Neoliberalne z ducha nastawienie na zysk i wąsko rozumianą praktykę doprowadza właśnie do masowych cięć w naukach humanistycznych i społecznych. Kryzys krytycznego myślenia i wtórny analfabetyzm niedł...

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

Today I learnt that already as early as 1229, the Ancienne université de Paris experienced its first strike (and riots), and somehow it makes perfect sense

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

OR a neverending form to fill, only to receive no response after hours of preparing a job application. In short, the market now is hell and ridiculous, and I have never had such a difficulty in finding a remotely linked to my competencies job outside of academia. 3/3

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

and on top of that, while offering ridiculous compensation that is simply unlivable. On the other hand, applicants should not be sending their CVs to any job because *maybe* it will make it through the system. Today, the job application process is *either* a one-click application on LinkedIn 2/3

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

Yes and no, and I am speaking from the past 5 months of a rather hellish experience of searching a full-time job in Europe (still seaerching!). On the one hand, HR should be able to see the actual skills behind the application rather than searching for a 150% fit that doesn't exist 1/3

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

Last night I realised that this summer marks 15 (!) years since my first piece was published in the country-wide media outlet, Tygodnik Powszechny. It was an interview with a legendary editor and publisher, Beata Stasińska, I was not yet 20, and very thrilled to see my name in print back then!

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Reposted by Olga Byrska

Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

Great piece, @currentaffairs.bsky.social "In a cultural landscape dominated by the attention economy and defined by precarious labor and existential dread, Fallon presents play not as an escape from work, but as an obligatory task that must be performed, a contractual obligation to a marketing team"

currentaffairs.org

The Banal Horror of Jimmy Fallon

Under the sterile blue lights of his studio, Fallon laughs endlessly at the same pseudo-jokes, rubs elbows with Trump and Sam Altman, and ushers in the death of culture.

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

currentaffairs.org

The Banal Horror of Jimmy Fallon

Under the sterile blue lights of his studio, Fallon laughs endlessly at the same pseudo-jokes, rubs elbows with Trump and Sam Altman, and ushers in the death of culture.

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

This might be, unironically, the best LinkedIn post I have ever read:

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

This semester, I teach a fun course at the Council on International Educational Exchange (CIEE) in Paris: "Paris in literature". Aaand, I almost put this into the readings folder, instead of Proust:

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

Yesterday, over 20 NATO planes were spotted in the Polish airspace, which can be treated as a sign sent to Russia not to risk any excursion into the alliance’s territory. Here’s a link to the news in Polish, as I have not seen, so far, any foreign media talking about this.

forsal.pl

Ogromny ruch samolotów wojskowych nad Polską. Sygnał dla Rosji - Forsal.pl

NATO przeprowadziło 18 sierpnia szeroko zakrojone działania lotnicze w rejonie państw bałtyckich i Polski. W pobliżu obwodu królewieckiego pojawiło się około 25 samolotów z różnych państw NATO, a częś...

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

I’d argue it’s the inability to form nuanced opinions and recognise the complexity of the world without becoming a defender of rotten hierarchies on the one hand and holding people accountable for their actions on the other.

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

One of the most impressive investigative journalism podcasts I have listened to in recent months has been @theobserveruk.bsky.social's and @tortoisemedia.bsky.social's 6-episode "We call her Emma" on Asma al-Assad. It is a deep dive into the non-obvious ways of wielding power. Listen to it!

observer.co.uk

We call her Emma | The Observer

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 08/08/2026

And of course I'd love to see the Pikachu faces of those who are closing down humanities depts all over the world to then see kids asking for us and our expertise. 3/3

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 08/08/2026

It may be just anecdotal evidence of course, but I would be very curious to hear whether it reflects the beginning of a broader change, first seen among those with the greatest capacities for mobility and predicting the future possibilities. 2/3

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 08/08/2026

Yesterday I had a tutoring session with a teenage Chinese student who pivoted towards the humanities after years of schoolwork spent pursuing a STEM degree. She also said that the majority of her peers are doing this or considering it, since with AI, they see many of their career plans unravel. 1/3

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

Happy birthday to James Baldwin, born #otd in 1924. Photo: Michael Ochs

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Reposted by Olga Byrska

Michael Lobel @mlobelart.bsky.social · 01/08/2026

Edward Hopper, Study for August in the City, 1945 whitney.org/collection/w...

Composition for a painting, with building and trees

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 29/07/2026

Yet another argument against AI-optimists, painting this technology as curing the cancer. If the Nobel Prize is not enough to avoid dismantling a team in the name of "changing the strategy", what else is left?

giftarticle.ft.com

Google DeepMind dismantles Nobel-winning AlphaFold team in strategy shift

Landmark project that solved protein folding gives way to a wider race to build AI systems for scientific discovery

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 28/07/2026

Don’t wanna talk about it more than sharing this post, just pointing out ridiculousness of it all.

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

And another bitter layer of this tragic event: the victim was Polish. It doesn't make this death any more or less important, but it does make me even sadder, as we Poles still don't enjoy even the most basic rights in our home country.

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Reposted by Olga Byrska

Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

Senior colleagues, apply for the position of a Chair in Intellectual History at my alma mater!

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 23/07/2026

I will also gladly talk to people personally touched by those changes, especially outside of Europe/UK and the US.

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

Senior colleagues, apply for the position of a Chair in Intellectual History at my alma mater!

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

I suppose we're talking about different buildings: this is the Francois Mitterand site, not the Richelieu one :)

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Olga Byrska @obyrska.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

Ah, the coolness of the National Library of France (both in the sense of its AC and excellent working conditions) @labnf.bsky.social

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