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Dr Ian McCormick

@wokestudies.bsky.social
24K followers 18K following 3.8K posts

Quondam Prof. English Language & Literature. PhD: Monstrosity. Queer history. Gothic. 𝔄𝔯𝔠𝔥𝔞𝔦𝔠 𝔈𝔫𝔤𝔩𝔦𝔰𝔥. Editor, Shakespeare: New Voices. linktr.ee/drianmccormick

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Reposted by Dr Ian McCormick
Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 18h
Enkidu, Gilgamesh's friend. Ur, Iraq, 2027–1763 BC, Iraq Museum. #Babylonian
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 13h
Fragment of a statue of 14th-century BC ruler Akhenaten. Photo: © The Metropolitan Museum of Art/Art Resource/Scala, Firenze www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...
theguardian.com
‘Stern, sensuous, almost kissable lips’: why sculptures can have far more power when they’re broken
From a pharoah’s pouting and almost kissable lips to a Mussolini with a hole in the head, a new exhibition is exploring how some ancient fragments speak more profoundly than fully intact treasures
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 16h
A broad left coalition wins on ALL versions of a new electoral system for the UK Parliament?
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Dr. Peter Paul Rubens @peterpaulrubens.bsky.social · 17h
David with the head of Goliath, 1610, by Caravaggio. Boys messing with men's heads du jour, indeed. And today is Caravaggio's birthday.
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Professor Peter Matthews @urbaneprofessor.bsky.social · 16h
For me, we need to be shifting the balance of revenue raising from NI to Income Tax as the population ages, to make the system fairer.
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Samantha Asumadu @samanthaasumadu.substack.com · 22/09/2026
'New analysis on UK media: British media is not delivering the news to its readers. They are delivering an agenda. The seven days after Channel 4 filmed James Orr are a damning indictment of the British press. Orr is a Cambridge associate professor.' via @newscord.org
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 18h
Poem of Gilgameš. Electronic Babylonian Library. Enjoy! www.ebl.lmu.de/corpus/L/1/4...
Gilgameš so tall, perfect and terrible,
who opened passes in the mountains;
who dug wells on the hill-flanks,
and crossed the ocean, the wide sea, as far as the sunrise;
who scoured the world-regions ever searching for life,
and reached by his strength Ūta-napišti the Far-Away;
who restored the cult-centres that the Deluge destroyed,
and established the proper rites for the human race!
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Peter Smith @redpeter99.bsky.social · 23h
Trump clearly saw the Fairford story developing and decided to fabricate a story with him at the centre. That's worrying enough, but watching politicians on both sides of the Atlantic indulge his fantasy is even even worse.
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Mike Tonge @miketonge.bsky.social · 29/11/2024
What is the sound of one hand falling in the woods if nobody is there to hear it?
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The New York Review of Books @nybooks.com · 28/09/2026
“In a society that viewed the world as static and unchanging, Lamarck was the first working scientist ever to recognize from empirical evidence…that the natural world we see today reflects a long history of physical change.” —Ian Tattersall
nybooks.com
Posterity Avenged Him | Ian Tattersall
In a society still solidly creationist in outlook, Jean-Baptiste Lamarck was the first working scientist to embrace the modern idea that species or lineages of organisms can evolve over time.
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Kathryn Cramer 📚🎨 @kathryncramer.bsky.social · 29/11/2024
Oh. I have a large dead white pine that needs to be dealt with and I live in an area where there are chain saw artists. I could commission something like that.
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AW Sylwester @aw-sylwester.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
"Oxford University Press (OUP) plans to offshore its financial operations department to EXL Services, which will provide the service from the subcontinent." www.bbc.co.uk/news/article... #academia #Highered #publishing #research #India
bbc.co.uk
Oxford University Press staff strike over offshoring plans
Oxford University Press plans to relocate some of its financial operations to India.
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
"Isambard" : Library Cat, Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford University, UK. #HigherEd #research #Cats #edchat #edusky www.bbc.co.uk/news/videos/...
bbc.co.uk
Meet Oxford University's library cat!
Isambard Kitten Brunel, the adorable official library cat of Oxford University's Lady Margaret Hall.
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
James Gillray: The Plumb-pudding in danger, or, State Epicures taking un Petit Souper (1805). Caricatures of the British Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger and the newly crowned Emperor of France Napoleon. 1/2 #satire #politics #history
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
“As I have often said, England is in reality a despotism—this despotism consisting, not of an autocrat, but of an oligarchy—not of an individual, but of a few hundreds of aristocratic families.” --- G. W. M. Reynolds, The Necessity for the Ballot, Reynolds’s Newspaper, 22 June 1851.
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
READ: Class and Cloister: The St Andrews Correspondence. #novel #satire #StAndrews #students
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
"The novel’s defining event is a gruesome mob attack on eight queer men who have clandestinely come together to work on bringing John Herbert’s 1967 gay prison play, Fortune and Men’s Eyes, to the stage." #novel #queer #reading #books #Booker #Jamaica www.theguardian.com/books/2026/a...
theguardian.com
The Disappearers by Marlon James review – a scorching exposé of homophobia in Jamaica
This Booker-listed epic set in Aids-era Kingston is a triumph – bitter, bawdy and ravishingly queer
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Mark Chadbourn @chadbourn.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Trump banned Politico from the White House because it ran “negative” stories from a leaker. And that leaker was JD Vance.
status.news
The Source Behind The Ban
The anonymous source behind one of the stories the White House cited to justify banning POLITICO was none other than Vice President JD Vance, Status has learned.
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
"Newcastle University is facing a backlash from conservationists over the appointment of the heir to an Indian oil and gas fortune who runs a controversial mega-zoo as a professor of sustainability." #HigherEd www.theguardian.com/education/20...
theguardian.com
Backlash as Indian oil heir made professor of sustainability by Newcastle University
Role for Anant Ambani, son of India’s richest person, who also runs a controversial mega-zoo, met with incredulity
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Undiscovered Scotland @undisscot.bsky.social · 07/02/2026
St Andrews Castle in St Andrews, Fife, which stands on a site fortified since the 1100s. From around 1200 it was the main residence of the bishops and archbishops of St Andrews and it witnessed many grim events over the centuries. More pics and info: www.undiscoveredscot... #Scotland #StAndrews
St Andrews Castle. The image shows the castle standing above a sandy beach in evening sunlight coming from the left. The keep is on the left and the rest of the castle to its right. Another beach can be seen beyond a broad bay in the background. There is straw coloured grass in the foreground.
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Class and Cloister: The St Andrews Correspondence. www.amazon.co.uk/Class-Cloist... #novel #satire #StAndrews #students #epistolary #fiction #HigherED
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Jonathan Calder @lordbonkers.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Liberal England: A podcast on Christopher Hill's The World Turned Upside Down liberalengland.blogspot.com/2026/09/a-po...
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Edward Cowling @edcowling.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Another taste of honey: Shelagh Delaney’s long-lost play about a teenage truant is a little gem www.theguardian.com/stage/2026/s...
theguardian.com
Another taste of honey: Shelagh Delaney’s long-lost play about a teenage truant is a little gem
The playwright’s daughter found Catch Me Who Can after her mother’s death. Now it has become a compelling audio drama with Toby Jones and Rita Tushingham
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
"Historical and archaeological approaches allow the spread of rabbits to be traced as more and more English locales hosted those warrens, the physical remains of which are still numerous across the country."
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Anna Kornbluh @annakornbluh.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
two years gone, forever here
Fredric Jameson cairn
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini punches a young fascist who tried to confront him outside the premiere for his film, Mamma Roma. (22 September 1962) Also my mum's birthday. We like Pasolini.
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Matthew @calmeilles.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Punching fascists will never go out of fashion.
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Paul Bernal @paulbernal.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
No, arresting ‘Danny Tommo’ won’t make him a martyr. *Not* arresting him will fuel his agenda.
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darren32359.bsky.social @darren32359.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
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Hawkeye8 @hawkeye8.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
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Mic Wright @brokenbottleboy.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
The idea of being ‘proud’ of being English is barking to me. It’s the very definition of an accident of birth. I had no choice or role in it. I’m proud of things I’ve actually achieved.
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
"Yet the species was not initially wild but was instead reared within manmade warrens for its meat and fur in a form of animal husbandry that was surprisingly widespread and long-lived."
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
Let's make this book a bestseller: Rabbit Farming in the Middle Ages and Beyond: A Landscape History. David Gould. www.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/book/10....
Since their introduction to the British Isles after the Norman Conquest, rabbits have successfully colonised the English landscape. Yet the species was not initially wild but was instead reared within manmade warrens for its meat and fur in a form of animal husbandry that was surprisingly widespread and long-lived.

Historical and archaeological approaches allow the spread of rabbits to be traced as more and more English locales hosted those warrens, the physical remains of which are still numerous across the country. This book provides a history and a comprehensive investigation of the types of structures associated with rabbit farming and details how warrens were managed, both on a day-to-day basis and in terms of how they were placed within the landscape.

In contrast to their eventual fate as food for the poor, rabbits were initially bred for the wealthy few and it follows that rabbits would have been viewed differently by past societies. Adopting a multi-disciplinary approach, this volume explores the species’ historic status and discusses associations with conspicuous displays of wealth, Christian symbolism, and female sexuality. It also investigates the extent to which rabbits were simply viewed as destructive pests or as providing opportunities for poaching.
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Nearly 4m records of enslaved people in 20 former British colonies now searchable online “the most systematic set of archival documents we have on enslavement in the British Caribbean and British colonial world” www.theguardian.com/news/2026/se... #research #history #slavery #higherEd #edchat
theguardian.com
Nearly 4m records of enslaved people in 20 former British colonies now searchable online
Exclusive: Collection’s 300,000 pages record lives of enslaved people in countries including the Bahamas, Barbados, Jamaica, Mauritius, South Africa and Trinidad
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Time travel!
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Management: abduction! #HigherEd #satire
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
"Administrative cowardice. Rampant cheating. The soaking and scamming of undergrads and grad students. Performative wokeism. Intensifying competition for international tuition dollars from an expansive China." #HigherEd #academia #edchat #academicSky #PhdChat www.wsj.com/arts-culture...
wsj.com
Academia Is in Trouble and This English Professor Understands Why
Combining wicked satire with genuine hope, Randy Boyagoda’s latest novel takes on the financial, moral and cultural crises plaguing modern academia.
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
“We do have in our mating market an oversupply of educated women and an undersupply of formally educated men – I’m talking academically, not necessarily in their skill set, emotional or social intelligence,” said Dr Wendy Walsh, a clinical psychologist.
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
Criminal thugs running British far right.
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Dr Ian McCormick @wokestudies.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Ben Jennings on Andy Burnham’s meeting with Donald Trump – cartoon www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
theguardian.com
Ben Jennings on Andy Burnham’s meeting with Donald Trump – cartoon
At the UN general assembly the British prime minister promised to crack down on misinformation ahead of his meeting with the US president
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The Daily Britain @thedailybritain.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Farage says Burnham’s National Centre for Information Defence will “clamp down on free speech”. The government says it will target hostile foreign information attacks. Farage’s Brexit Party voted against stronger action on Russian propaganda in 2019.
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LordSteveyPofStoke @lordsteveyp.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

OSWALD MOSELY  NIGEL FARAGE
THE SAME STORY, SEPARATED BY 80 YEARS... WEALTHY FAMILY, PUBLIC SCHOOL
EX-TORY, PART OF THE ESTABLISHMENT
POPS UP DURING A RECESSION CAUSED BY BANKERS 
FORMS NATIONALIST AUTHORITARIAN POLITICAL PARTY 
CLAIMS TO SPEAK FOR THE MAN IN THE STREET
BLAMES MINORITIES AT THE BOTTOM FOR THE PROBLEMS CAUSED BY PEOPLE AT THE TOP
Anti-
REFORM
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Miaganga @miaganga.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Teach the Facts.
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Mrs. G @janbellina.bsky.social · 27/07/2025
I used to operate one of those! 😁 It didn't seem strange at all that the senders message was printed out and physically carried to them in the internal mail system instead of being delivered to a screen on their desk. Only the telex operator had a screen, and that was a huge advance.
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Luke Ontario @coolhand.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Oh my God, I agree with WSJ opinion Oh my God, shoot me in the face
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
OPINION COMMENTARY (U.S.)
The Hidden Agenda Behind the Al Panic
A mathematical model doesn't rebel.
Anthropomorphizing it helps obscure human errors and accountability.
By Gabriele Mazzini
September 21, 2026, 5:43 pm EDT
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Robert Reich @rbreich.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Please remember this when Trump or anyone else from his regime talks about "waste, fraud, and abuse."
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Robert Reich @rbreich.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Microsoft has laid off over 5,000 workers since July. Its CEO made $96.5M in 2025, a 22% increase from the previous year. Microsoft made $101B in net income last year — and raked in up to $12.5B in tax breaks from Trump's Big Ugly Bill. This is what a rigged system looks like.
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Barry Howard 🔶h @barryhow2c.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Why would any party leader be against tackling Russian Disinformation⁉️ Unless it suits their political agenda or because Reform have form receiving payment for spouting Russian Propaganda⁉️https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/nigel-farage-russia-misinformation-unit_uk_6ab3e906e4b043d6b56a6107
huffingtonpost.co.uk
Nigel Farage Has Attacked The Government's Plans For A New Russia Misinformation Unit
The Reform UK leader claimed it is “targeted directly” at his party.
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Laura Webster @lauraewebster.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
One anonymous PHD scholarship student said: "There have been many times where I've been ignored or made fun of in class because of my accent being 'too strong' or because the American and international students 'cant understand what I'm saying'. The tutor just laughs..."
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