Dr Joanne Norcup

My most recent open access paper with David Lambert (University of Warwick) in @areajournal.bsky.social #CaribbeanHistoricalGeographiesandBritishGeography doi.org/10.1111/area...

'Now entering its 21st week and with no end in sight, the current strike involving University and College Union (UCU) staff is the longest in living memory in British higher education, originating from a staff marking boycott in April over proposed job cuts.'

1/2 An object lesson in the difference between acknowledgement of an enslaving past and reparative justice: South African wineries pay tribute to past generations of captives while evicting their uncompensated descendants: www.theguardian.com/world/2026/o...

Molly Guptill Manning, A Librarian's War: The Man Who Fought World War II with Books and Brought the Joy of Reading to Millions - @academic.oup.com, January 2027 global.oup.com/academic/pro...

Academics, students, anyone. Let authors know that you enjoyed reading their work. It matters.

These superb essays indicate where the heritage sector stands - as a battleground in a right wing culture war backlash against Black lives mattering - but also document how it carries on truth-telling nonetheless. Writing the foreword was cathartic. www.routledge.com/Britains-Con...

Don't forget to sign up for "The many faces of Sans Souci: Black watchmakers in the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Caribbean" if you're keen to join the friendly & welcoming London Group of Historical Geographers in person or online for this Tuesday's Institute of Historical Research seminar.

I just want to name that people overcame this. Even against a stacked deck, the good fight is worth it. Win or lose, it's worth it. And sometimes the good guys win.

NEW: Trump is a Russian asset. And the UK government is finally waking from its decade-long slumber Read this. And order a wind-up radio. broligarchy.substack.com/p/the-dark-t...

In action today at Slindon Church, West Sussex, where the “founding father of English racism” Edward Long is commemorated. My keynote linking Long, the enslaved Roque Ferdinand and the current backlash against the Church of England’s Project Spire available here: alanlester.co.uk/blog/edward-...

I could spend the rest of my life analysing this feedback sign in the local Home Bargains. Did 'not happy' break from overuse? Was it taped over to ensure 100% positive feedback? Is the green 'b' in 'feedback' some kind of subliminal nudge? Is the duck tape indent because people still keep pressing?

Lula: "We had to overcome foreign interference through digital platforms, which we will have to regulate. A crime in the digital world must be treated the same as a crime in the real world. We cannot have monstrous companies earning millions... not paying taxes... wanting to steer elections."

Greed

Lula Goes HARD

'Replacing written coursework with live verbal performance, without fundamentally reforming how oral tasks are designed and marked, risks systematically penalising students who stammer, as well as neurodivergent learners and those with other speech disfluencies.'

The reason the BL has empty desks is that the cyberattack has reduced people’s access abilities and pushed researchers away from the institution. (Not helped by their mad ebook-only policies around new book acquisitions, etc). If only the UK had a culture secretary.

If you want a palate cleanse from the worst of the world, strongly recommend going to see #GhostsThePossessionOfButtonHouse. The joy of the TV series with added 80s Spielberg adventure film vibes. Sold out at my screening. Intergenerational audience members from 8 to 80s. Instant family classic. ♥️

'There has been a tendency across the East of England for the arts and humanities to be the first to bear the brunt of cuts. This tendency not only has negative economic effects on the creative and cultural industries, but also erodes...underlying skills...developed by these course profiles.'

Then maybe don’t send him to bloody boarding school… #Cruelty

A history lesson for a culture war.

Museum of Looted Antiquities logs loot in large database: mola.omeka.net

The outpouring of love for the Ghosts film over the last day has been overwhelming. 2k reviews posted on Letterboxd in the first 12 hours and I’ve read most of them!

Protect this Young WOMAN at all Cost!!

Remastered from the archives (Feb 2021)

Everton, Liverpool, 1973, photo by Mike Abrahams.

We reward the wrong people. www.mirror.co.uk/news/politic...

Very much enjoying this by @lukekennard.bsky.social

Anyone going on BBC this month should order one of these beforehand and let them sweat www.poppyshop.org.uk/products/pri...

Stuart Hall Digital: Mediations of the Stuart Hall Archive A huge amount of material from the Stuart Hall archives has been digitised. stuarthalldigital.bham.ac.uk/archival_mat...

Mélanie Lamotte, By Flesh and Toil: How Sex, Race and Labor Shaped the Early French Empire - @harvardpress.bsky.social, January 2026 www.hup.harvard.edu/books/978067... New Books discussion with Edward Blum newbooksnetwork.com/by-flesh-and...

Nicholas Mulder, "Total Historian" - on Marc Bloch www.theideasletter.org/essay/total-...

Kent Anti-Racism network organised a counter-protest today to register local disapproval of a smaller v ugly Herne Bay march by the maximally racist "Kent Nationalist Movement" who shouted "England for the White Man" and "Remigration Save Our Nation" into a loudhailer www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

I do think “there are masked men marching through high streets screaming about repatriation and white supremacy” is something the government needs a much stronger public voice against — it might be (?) that Prevent is all over it but there should still be a loud and consistent official attack line.

Apropos of current university redundancies and current interest in preserving freedom of speech at universities, it's worth asking whether staff at any English universities who are being made "voluntarily" redundant are also being required to sign non-disclosure agreements.

'The History Boys is to return to the West End for the first time in two decades, with a warning from its director of an “almost terminal decline” in humanities teaching in state schools.' If you like your satire with lashings of irony, think about the gender statistics at the same time.

Kudos to UCU for securing a Westminster Hall debate on Higher Education funding, led by Sheffield Central MP Abtisam Mohamed, on the morning of the budget announcement. It's 28 October 9:30-11:00am.

I needed to know what day the semester ends at my own university; it only took me a web search and 8 separate clicks to find

Every gal you know has been a Sharon at some point. And the fact someone as generous and good natured as Sheen can slip into it shows just how easy and insidious it is. #CelebrityTraitors

It will be a shock to noone that the campaigns against Professor Jason Arday - that continue even after they hounded him to death - are financed by far right-inclined millionaires who also finance far right think tanks, media, academic racists and Neo Nazis. bylinetimes.com/2026/10/21/j...

Market day in a Lancashire town, painting by Salford-born Edith Le Breton (1912-92).

Do yourselves an autumnal favour - go to your nearest public library or download Libby app and e-book borrow all the @janicehallett.bsky.social books perfect time of year for a (re) read

👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏 #nailedit

The 'academic management roles' are chair of the Faculty of Divinity's exam board and convenor of the MPhil in philosophy of religion. He continues to lecture undergraduates in ethics. With a sharing link for 3 non-subscribers.

Sharon getting banished due to toxic masculinity is the absolute worst. And James B and Michael will come out untouched #CelebrityTraitors