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ZSW

@zsw.bsky.social
1.8K followers 1.4K following 1.7K posts

I teach American Studies, labor history, and abolitionist university studies. Also I post about birds. abolition.university

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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
I’m at the Military Complex I’m at the Triumphal Arch I’m at the Combination Military Complex and Triumphal Arch
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
I found a juvenile American Golden-Plover a few miles from my house this morning. They’re a scarce migrant through the Northeast ok their way from the arctic to Argentina and Uruguay, and it’s always great to see them.
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jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 20/09/2026
students said “Maybe our university should not profit from this” and then donors, faculty, and staff called them terrorists and organized to deport them
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
Worse than that, our universities (never ours) colluded to have people detained and deported for opposing this.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
A Least Sandpiper, the world’s smallest shorebird, in a small puddle yesterday morning.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
Being mad about wages and working conditions is a principled stand. (Being a cop is not.)
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levweinstein.bsky.social @levweinstein.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
This was brutally hard in a fun kinda way, picking 10 songs outta 20 rekkids to string together a narrative
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Ed Burmila @edburmila.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
The political and cultural response to 9/11 was to briefly mouth some "Islam is not to blame" platitudes and then declare total war on Muslim people and the Muslim world and we're entering the 25th year of it with no end in sight.
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ProPublica @propublica.org · 10/09/2026
NEW: Major League Baseball has long known about teams making handshake deals with Dominican players as young as 11 — and the predatory industry that has grown around this system. But it’s never publicly warned or penalized a team for making an early deal.
propublica.org
How the Dominican Baseball Factory Traps Young Players and Their Families With False Promises
Teams make handshake deals with players as young as 11 while moneylenders prey on their families. The industry is corrupt, but Major League Baseball and the players union have done little about it.
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Shaun Richman @shaunrichman.org · 10/09/2026
It's like a religion to these people: "Some set of A.I.-enabled devices and processes would surely allow a hotel maid to clean more rooms faster with less hassle and physical strain." Motorized carts and more efficient vacuum cleaners relieve physical strain, not some mystical spreadsheet.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
Fun Fact! Hudsonian Godwits are named for William Godwit, father of Mary Godwit, later Mary Shellfish, author of Franklin’s(Gull)Stein
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Mike Rosenwald @mikerosenwald.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
A self-described “anarcho-confectioner,” he led the International Patisserie Brigade, a gang of custard commandos who referred to their assaults as entartements. They deployed pies with soft crusts to ensure that their caloric projectiles would only injure pride www.nytimes.com/2026/09/07/w...
nytimes.com
Noël Godin, Prankster Who Threw Pies at the Powerful, Dies at 80 (Gift Article)
Splattering figures like Bill Gates, Jean-Luc Godard and Bernard-Henri Lévy, he perfected the art of using whipped cream as a form of protest.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Birds like this are why you spend a Sunday morning in a landfill. (Buff-Breasted Sandpiper, Clarkstown Landfill, West Nyack, NY August 30, 2026)
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Abbie Boggs @abbieboggs.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
@minorcompositions.bsky.social @elimeyerhoff.bsky.social @touchfaith.bsky.social @zsw.bsky.social
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
Another photo of the Buff-Breasted Sandpiper at the Clarkstown Landfill from yesterday. All my prior encounters with this species were either too distant for photography or prior to my owning a camera, so it was nice to get some up close shots of this bird.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
Rockland County’s first eBird record of Buff-Breasted Sandpiper, found yesterday by John Dow, continuing this morning.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
A juvenile semipalmated sandpiper early this morning
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Abbie Boggs @abbieboggs.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
Shameless self promotion, but my book on noncitizen students, the university, and immigration law comes out on Fordham in October and I'd be happy to share proofs and talk to students!
share.google
Degrees of Empire - Abigail Boggs
A sweeping history of how noncitizen students shaped U.S. universitiesFrom colonial missionary schools to the globalized university of the twentieth century, U.S. higher education has long depended on...
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
Semipalmated Plover, the roundest shorebird in the western hemisphere.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
Calidris bairdii, or, in Inupiat, “Puviaqtuuyaaq.”
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
A Baird’s sandpiper at the pier this morning!!
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
New England slaveholders in the 18th century would just name their children things like “Eliphalet” and “Jabez.”
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 09/08/2026
TFW your four year old starts drawing on your iPad and accidentally discovers Russian constructivism
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David Roberts @volts.wtf · 05/08/2026
jesusfuckingchrist
kptv.com
Oregon senators warn prediction markets allowing betting on wildfires could incentivize arson
A public report urges the CFTC to ban prediction market contracts on destructive wildfires, raising concerns over public safety and potential arson.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
I think the fact that he is describing his stool to a journalist is more striking than the fact that he is publicly admitting that he does not wipe himself, which is in turn more striking than the apparent fact that he does not wipe himself.
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Aaron Bady @zunguzungu.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
"Every Flock license plate reader camera operated by the Winona Police Department has been sawed off and stolen in what investigators believe was a coordinated theft." www.valleynewslive.com/2026/08/04/e...
valleynewslive.com
All of Winona Police Department’s Flock cameras cut down and stolen
Lost cameras valued at about $24,000
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Chad Loder @chadloder.dev · 28/07/2026
The slur "tonks" is used by Border Patrol to describe migrants. It's derived from the sound a baton or heavy duty flashlight makes when hitting a migrant over the head.
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Marisa Kabas @marisakabas.bsky.social · 27/07/2026
Exclusive from me — Daniel Moraff, one of the political operatives behind Graham Platner's rise and fall, has been accused of sexual assault. Full story here:
thehandbasket.co
Exclusive: Political operative behind Graham Platner's rise accused of sexual assault
A spokesperson for Daniel Moraff said: “Any suggestion that he committed a criminal offence is false and without foundation."
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 28/07/2026
An incredibly tough week so far, and it is literally only Monday.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 26/07/2026
It Is Time To Liquidate The Wall Street Journal
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Matthew Hay Brown @matthewhaybrown.bsky.social · 25/07/2026
UPDATE Brazil has denied visas to the two State Department officials Trump planned to send to undermine confidence in the country’s electoral system
washingtonpost.com
Brazil denies visas to U.S. delegation aiming to impugn election system, officials say
The U.S. delegation had planned to visit the Brazilian capital and cast doubt on the integrity of the voting system before a presidential election this fall, officials said.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 25/07/2026
I am 32 pages into “Beneath The Wage,” and it is excellent.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
I watched “The Mandalorian and Grogu” yesterday, and besides the absurdity of swole Jeremy Allen White hutt pit-fighter with a heart of gold, and the underwhelming plot and pacing, my main takeaway is that Andor is a tough actor to follow.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
Going to pretend that Forster’s Terns are named after Robert Forster of the great Australian proto-Indie rock band The Go-Betweens.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
Just watched a large rat flush two semipalmated and two least sandpipers off of the rocky tip of Piermont Pier.
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Daniel Denvir @danieldenvir.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
We just completed Nusantara, @thedigradio.bsky.social's 8-part series on the history of Indonesia. The fourth largest country is barely understood in the West and yet has decisively shaped the world: from Dutch colonialism to third world revolution to US-backed mass anti-communist genocide. 1/
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Sami Schalk @drsamischalk.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
Police murdered a Black man in the street in Madison WI today. Shot point blank in the head while on the ground, tased, and surrounded by four cops. It looks like an execution. Multiple videos circulating online. Things are about to get very bad here.
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Lisa Diedrich @lisadiedrich.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
Joan Scott: "Princeton operates as a centralized, hierarchical institution (one scholar has dubbed this form of admin 'presidentialized'). There is no shared governance w/the faculty as a collective body &, as a result, the administration’s power remains unchecked." academeblog.org/2026/07/14/a...
academeblog.org
Academic Freedom and the Palestine Exception at Princeton
BY JOAN W. SCOTT Princeton University President Christopher Eisgruber has carefully curated his public reputation as a defender of free speech and academic freedom against the wanton attacks by the…
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Abbie Boggs @abbieboggs.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
Got a useful question on the thread about student visas as to whether it's contradictory, from an abolitionist perspective, to describe the university as "a sanctuary for knowledge." The answer, for me, is both yes and no. Sharing an elaboration here.🧵
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
I was today years old when I realized that Thomas More and Thomas Aquinas are different people
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
Dinesh D’Souza is a frothing racist, and 8’m not sure why anyone should assume that this 14-words ass meme and being married to D’Souza’s daughter are contradictory rather than complementary subject positions
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
Six new books I’m excited about: 1) Tejasvi Nagaraja - Troop Movements - a new labor history of the WWII era 2) Annie McLanahan - Beneath the Wage - teaching this Marxist account of gig work next week. 3) Stuart Schrader - Blue Power: Stuart’s history of the rise of the political power of police
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
I have, unfortunately, known Jamie Kirchick since college. His concern for the Democratic Party here is an act. He is a neoconservative who tries to bestow his noxious right-wing politics with fictive legitimacy by claiming to be more left wing than he has ever been.
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ZSW @zsw.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
Important analysis from Abbie on the Trump administration’s new restrictions on student visas.
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Abbie Boggs @abbieboggs.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
A university cannot be a sanctuary for knowledge while serving as an agent of the border. As long as some students can be threatened with deportation, no one's academic freedom is secure. 20/
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Abbie Boggs @abbieboggs.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
But there is far more to all of this, of course. The current policy was established in 1978, as the #s of nonwhite noncitizen students in the US grew rapidly and as the US worked to extend its global power. It enacted a broadly held understanding of the university's function for the US state. 11/
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Abbie Boggs @abbieboggs.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
Immigration law has always functioned through both spectacular acts of exclusion and through the accumulation of administrative obstacles. To state what is obvious to many: bureaucracy is a technology of power. 10/
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Abbie Boggs @abbieboggs.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
This is more than just extra paperwork. It creates new bureaucratic checkpoints to be anticipated and navigated throughout students' educational lives. Every extension. Every recertification. Every application becomes another moment where permission must be sought and secured. 9/
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Abbie Boggs @abbieboggs.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
Under Duration of Status, students could remain in the U.S. for as long as they made satisfactory progress toward their degrees. The terms of their visa were governed by educational rather than bureaucratic time. 7/
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