Spencer Strub @spencerstrub.bsky.social · 30/07/2026Thank you, Cristina! Less than a month—I can't wait! 010
Reposted by Spencer StrubRebecca Colesworthy @rcolesworthy.bsky.social · 30/07/2026“Closing the Writing Center and removing its leadership now sends a disturbing signal about how seriously Harvard actually takes [its] mission.” Closing a writing center or library or dept or program or university press—an attack on one is an attack on all. www.thecrimson.com/article/2026...thecrimson.comIn Defense of the Harvard College Writing Center | Opinion | The Harvard CrimsonAs current and former Harvard College Writing Center tutors, we write to condemn the dissolution of the Writing Center as an independent entity and the laying off of its director, Jane Rosenzweig. 316549
Reposted by Spencer StrubKarl Steel @karlsteel.bsky.social · 30/07/2026Well we still have one at the CUNY grad center (that's right! A writing center for grad students!) and it's great. Harvard should take a page from us. 1312
Reposted by Spencer StrubJosephine Riesman @josie.zone · 28/07/2026Holy shit Jane Rosenzweig was my freshman expository writing teacher back in 2004 A genius and a true defender of human ingenuity Her firing by Harvard is fucking outrageous DOWN WITH THE CHATBOTS 48020
Reposted by Spencer StrubMary Lewis @profmarylewis.bsky.social · 28/07/2026It‘s quite possible that with this move, @harvard.edu could become the only Ivy League university without a writing center. www.thecrimson.com/article/2026...thecrimson.comHarvard College Lays Off Writing Center Director, Consolidates Center | News | The Harvard CrimsonThe Harvard College Writing Center will no longer operate as a standalone unit after its director was laid off and its functions were consolidated as part of a restructuring in the Faculty of Arts and... 27380149
Spencer Strub @spencerstrub.bsky.social · 25/06/2026Some PRO archivist back in the day had an impressive sense of style. 000
Spencer Strub @spencerstrub.bsky.social · 25/06/2026I should log onto this website more often. Thank you for the shout out, @aschurchhistory.bsky.social! 121
Reposted by Spencer StrubAmerican Society of Church History @aschurchhistory.bsky.social · 09/06/2026Today's featured book: Spencer Strub, "Scorn, Shame, and the Simple Reader: Lay Piety and Literature in Late Medieval England," University of Pennsylvania Press, 2026 @pennpress.bsky.social @spencerstrub.bsky.social www.pennpress.org/978151282938... 054
Reposted by Spencer StrubDaniel Bellingradt @dbellingradt.bsky.social · 21/05/2026The Danse Macabre interpreted in 1450 as a hand-drawn polonaise... 26714
Spencer Strub @spencerstrub.bsky.social · 21/05/2026That's my contribution to social media for the year. Please buy my book, which is about how medieval people actually quite enjoyed being miserable, thank you very much. Currently 40% off!pennpress.orgScorn, Shame, and the Simple Reader – Penn PressAn investigation into how the emotional language in texts intended for solitary women became the foundation for a medieval Christian reading publicScorn, Sha... 031
Spencer Strub @spencerstrub.bsky.social · 21/05/2026...which seems like the consensus here. Surviving in a preindustrial society sucked in a lot of ways, and citing a mangled memory of Schor's thought experiment to defend Doordash (??) is grotesque. But saying that medieval life was an unremitting horror shows a profound incuriosity about the past. 120
Spencer Strub @spencerstrub.bsky.social · 21/05/2026All "peasants had it easier" discourse probably derives from the bit of Juliet Schor's Overworked American (1989) arguing that medieval English peasants worked fewer hours on net than modern Americans. A super debatable claim, omitting the huge burden of reproductive labor, but it's not risible... 132
Reposted by Spencer StrubMonica H Green @monicamedhist.bsky.social · 23/03/2026#MedievalSky I received a very important announcement today. Feminae, the bibliographical database on medieval women created and run by Margaret Schaus for the past couple of decades, is going offline as of 1 April. Download as much as you can ASAP: inpress.lib.uiowa.edu/Feminae/Adva...inpress.lib.uiowa.edu Feminae- Advanced Search 9204200
Reposted by Spencer StrubEsther Liberman Cuenca @estherlcuenca.bsky.social · 05/01/2026Really proud to be part of this special issue. 072
Reposted by Spencer Strub👻 Jack Djinn Wail 🧞 @jacktindale.bsky.social · 26/04/2025Bloody hell, Thomas Aquinas was massive. I think he's the only kaiju to have been a Doctor of the Church. 352349358
Reposted by Spencer StrubCeleste Ng @pronounced-ing.bsky.social · 14/04/2025"No government—regardless of which party is in power—should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue." 130231
Spencer Strub @spencerstrub.bsky.social · 14/04/2025When I mentioned professional farters in class last semester (as one does), a serious and earnest student looked at me quizzically and asked, "I'm sorry, did you say professional farters?" 110
Spencer Strub @spencerstrub.bsky.social · 14/04/2025"For some people can actually move their ears, either one at a time or both together... Some people produce at will without any stench such rhythmical sounds from their bottom that they appear to be making music even from that quarter... I know of a man who used to perspire at will." 010
Reposted by Spencer StrubMegan L. Cook @meganlcook.bsky.social · 13/04/2025Do you do fun DH/sciency things with late medieval books? Do you want to present at the New Chaucer Society congress in Freiburg, GR in July 2026? Then now is the time to apply to my panel (there are also many other fine opportunities)! Deadline is 27 April cdn.ymaws.com/newchaucerso... 099
Spencer Strub @spencerstrub.bsky.social · 14/04/2025I reviewed Diarmaid MacCulloch's very good, very long book about sex and Christianity, which is (among other things) a healthy reminder that "traditional values" aren't very old at all.nytimes.comBook Review: ‘Lower Than the Angels,’ by Diarmaid MacCullochIn “Lower Than the Angels,” the historian Diarmaid MacCulloch traces two millenniums of libidinal frustration. 153
