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johnmkuhn.bsky.social
English prof. 17th century stuff. Prairie son. Working on a cultural and material history of the birchbark canoe in the early modern Americas.
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My mighty rose “Darlow’s Enigma”: the size of a house and completely indestructible

submitted 3 hours ago • 0 comments

The red ones are Roman, the green ones are Greek.

submitted 7 hours ago • 0 comments

Students are sniffing glue. Some professors try to stop this. Others allow and even encourage it, believing that sniffing glue is here to stay and that it can be a powerful learning tool if used right.

submitted 77 days ago • 6 comments

ugh, I miss being a slutty chaotic trainwreck of a humanities phd student. my social media handle this June would have been David Souter Memorial Circuit Party.

submitted 7 hours ago • 1 comment

if you have a five-dollar bill in your pocket between June and August, you are legally required to use it to purchase an ice cream

submitted 7 hours ago • 1 comment

question for humanities academics (would appreciate retweets). Has anyone made a large index of humanities talk series that are on Zoom or have Zoom components? It seems like something that might be useful.....

submitted 11 hours ago • 1 comment

in a really interesting talk right now by Danny Noorlander (Oneonta) about Jacob Steendam, Dutch poet and minister who was producing Dutch language poetry in the mid-17th c Gold Coast

submitted 13 hours ago • 0 comments

Vichy Times. Note that there’s zero context about like, how it might be bad and unusual that a rich person has this much influence in national politics? Nope, it’s just breathless gossip about a personal relationship

submitted 15 hours ago • 0 comments

Hi, I'm the one responsible for coding Bluesky's Discover tab, I was under a lotta pressure and at the same time I was under contract to prototype a dating app for the terminally humourless, some wires got crossed and I might've accidentally delivered the wrong code to the wrong client.

submitted 20 hours ago • 47 comments

These are so good. Weirdly I have my own list in my phone, from when I was going through 17th c court stuff in Maryland/Virginia. My favorites are Naughtie, Dragletail, Squirrel, and the slightly surreal Jugg (a container for milk!)

submitted 1 day ago • 1 comment

can you imagine being the aid who wrote this very neat little talking point, deftly and diplomatically invoking a relevant historical parallel / past moment of alliance....and then trump either is not listening or doesn't know what D Day is lol

submitted 1 day ago • 1 comment

a friend of mine shared this ai-generated "emotion wheel" and unfortunately i have been laughing my ass off at it for like 15 minutes now. today i am feeling Fnliinneon

submitted 1 day ago • 250 comments

Andrew Cuomo told me Etna didn't erupt, you're just not used to how Italians express themselves.

submitted 1 day ago • 1 comment

me in 2019: join hands with me, my pupils, for we have shed the master/slave dialectic at the core of traditional teaching methods and now are co-learners in the glorious garden of knowledge! me in 2026: you know who had some good ideas? whoever invented the medieval Chinese civil service exam

submitted 1 day ago • 0 comments

social isolation caused by screens should be called phoneliness

submitted 1 day ago • 0 comments

the difference between public reactions to the first travel ban (protests at airports, full court press by opposition political figures) and this one (basically nothing) is extremely telling about the public and elected Dems’ shifts on immigration since 2016

submitted 1 day ago • 1 comment

been thinking a lot about public humanities stuff recently, and dreaming up programming. My hot take: humanities academics overestimate the public's interest in their niche research, and underestimate the public's interest in well-taught iconic undergraduate survey-course type material

submitted 2 days ago • 2 comments

reading the grim news that Clark U in Worcester is laying off 30% of its faculty, & reorganizing those left into 3 units: "The School of Climate, Environment and Society; The Center for Media Arts, Computing and Design; and in health and human behavior." Are English professors Media Arts...or fired?

submitted 2 days ago • 1 comment

my lodgers (long story) left $150 worth of completely unopened hookah tobacco in my house. What am I supposed to do with it?? Turns out you can't sell tobacco on FB Marketplace or Craigslist, I feel bad throwing it out, I don't know anyone who smokes hookah. Maybe I'll compost it?!

submitted 2 days ago • 0 comments

another shot of these crazy peonies I have that start pink and eventually bleach white--these blooms are all on the same plant. Variety Coral Sunset

submitted 2 days ago • 0 comments

Death spiral. AI-edited 'nonprofessional' opinion content will erode what's left of your credibility as an actual news journal *and* still fail to outcompete with the frothing ragebait and unhinged conspiracy theory people can get from a million other places. I give this paper three years.

submitted 2 days ago • 1 comment

Being married to a high school teacher, I am continuously updating my knowledge of contemporary euphemisms for not doing very well at school. Today I was told that my dishwasher stacking skills are “emerging.”

submitted 2 days ago • 2 comments

Great Leap Forward vibes

submitted 2 days ago • 0 comments

Re-reading Book 21 of the Iliad for something, when the river god, angry the channel has been choked with bodies, comes roaring out. It’s just so incredible. Does anyone know of any other river-full-of-bodies touchstones in ancient lit?

submitted 2 days ago • 0 comments

(At the narrative museum) Stories. Trifles for children, right? (Crowd laughs) But what if I told you that history itself was a story? (Laughter stops) That your own identity is a story? (Crowd gasps) That stories can control...time itself! (Laser light show begins)

submitted 4 days ago • 0 comments

90% of my radicalization against the Vichy Times (NYT) was having to read similar comments about sugar/meat in the comments of the recipe section

submitted 2 days ago • 1 comment

remembering when Neko Case said her song "Last Lion of Albion" is about how she hopes that the ghosts of extinct Earth animals are on Mars waiting to devour Elon Musk when he arrives

submitted 3 days ago • 0 comments

Edna SV Millay poem that's always on my desk looking at me while I write

submitted 3 days ago • 0 comments

At long last, “A24’s Academic Style; or, Coming of Age in an Era of Student Debt” is now out with @jcmsjournal.bsky.social quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/i...

submitted 3 days ago • 1 comment