Shannon Mattern
@shannonmattern.bsky.social
director of creative research @ the metro ny library council; recently resigned 😱 full professor of media studies, art history + anthropology
architecture, archives, 🎨, cities, 🐕, infrastructure, libraries, 🗺️, sound++
nyc + upstate
wordsinspace.net
architecture, archives, 🎨, cities, 🐕, infrastructure, libraries, 🗺️, sound++
nyc + upstate
wordsinspace.net
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
If you're unsure how to start a conversation with a humanities academic, ask them which intersection they are working at.
October 17, 2025 at 12:47 PM
If you're unsure how to start a conversation with a humanities academic, ask them which intersection they are working at.
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
Teaching thing I find useful: if a student stops showing up for class, make the subject line of your email "Is everything OK?" When people are overwhelmed they'll often avoid even opening bad-news emails (cf. me & my bank statements). This way, they know I'm reaching out to help, not chastise.
December 1, 2025 at 11:40 PM
Teaching thing I find useful: if a student stops showing up for class, make the subject line of your email "Is everything OK?" When people are overwhelmed they'll often avoid even opening bad-news emails (cf. me & my bank statements). This way, they know I'm reaching out to help, not chastise.
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
I'm hearing that the New School is shuttering the Graduate Program in International Affairs. I'll grumble about TNS upper management later, but DAMN. IT.
GPIA is a unique place in the staid world of professional IR training, and the most stimulating intellectual environment I've ever experienced.
GPIA is a unique place in the staid world of professional IR training, and the most stimulating intellectual environment I've ever experienced.
December 2, 2025 at 5:03 PM
I'm hearing that the New School is shuttering the Graduate Program in International Affairs. I'll grumble about TNS upper management later, but DAMN. IT.
GPIA is a unique place in the staid world of professional IR training, and the most stimulating intellectual environment I've ever experienced.
GPIA is a unique place in the staid world of professional IR training, and the most stimulating intellectual environment I've ever experienced.
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
So our campus just announced the six undergraduate programs being put on the chopping block.
One of them is Philosophy.
Philosophy.
Can we be a university without offering a Philosophy major?
One of them is Philosophy.
Philosophy.
Can we be a university without offering a Philosophy major?
December 2, 2025 at 9:54 PM
So our campus just announced the six undergraduate programs being put on the chopping block.
One of them is Philosophy.
Philosophy.
Can we be a university without offering a Philosophy major?
One of them is Philosophy.
Philosophy.
Can we be a university without offering a Philosophy major?
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
Requested a book through ILL over break. It arrived today. Libraries man.
December 2, 2025 at 10:15 PM
Requested a book through ILL over break. It arrived today. Libraries man.
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
They should invent a university that prioritizes teaching and research
December 2, 2025 at 8:15 PM
They should invent a university that prioritizes teaching and research
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
This year, universities are giving $228 million to football coaches who failed at coaching football so that they won't coach football anymore.
December 2, 2025 at 7:23 PM
This year, universities are giving $228 million to football coaches who failed at coaching football so that they won't coach football anymore.
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
"Sources in the Trump administration have previously told Zeteo that officials will at times intentionally use popular music from vocally anti-Trump performing artists, in order to trigger a negative response from a famous liberal and provide further amplification of their pervasive culture war,"
NEWS: The Trump-Vance White House is attacking Sabrina Carpenter.
In a new statement, the White House — led by Trump, a liable sexual abuser mired in scandal for ties to pedophile Jeffrey Epstein — suggests Carpenter is "stupid" and is defending pedophiles and rapists.
@swin24.bsky.social reports:
In a new statement, the White House — led by Trump, a liable sexual abuser mired in scandal for ties to pedophile Jeffrey Epstein — suggests Carpenter is "stupid" and is defending pedophiles and rapists.
@swin24.bsky.social reports:
BREAKING: Trump White House Slams Sabrina Carpenter After Using Her Song in ‘Evil’ Video
The Trump administration has apparently identified its latest enemy of the state.
zeteo.com
December 2, 2025 at 6:23 PM
"Sources in the Trump administration have previously told Zeteo that officials will at times intentionally use popular music from vocally anti-Trump performing artists, in order to trigger a negative response from a famous liberal and provide further amplification of their pervasive culture war,"
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
Family cookbooks, filled with handwritten notes, sometimes held together with rubber bands, tell the story of generations of homemakers. They are irreplaceable treasures.
🦃 Celebrate the cultural & family histories on their worn & stained pages ➡️ blog.archive.org/2024/09/30/v...
#Thanksgiving
🦃 Celebrate the cultural & family histories on their worn & stained pages ➡️ blog.archive.org/2024/09/30/v...
#Thanksgiving
November 26, 2025 at 6:02 PM
Family cookbooks, filled with handwritten notes, sometimes held together with rubber bands, tell the story of generations of homemakers. They are irreplaceable treasures.
🦃 Celebrate the cultural & family histories on their worn & stained pages ➡️ blog.archive.org/2024/09/30/v...
#Thanksgiving
🦃 Celebrate the cultural & family histories on their worn & stained pages ➡️ blog.archive.org/2024/09/30/v...
#Thanksgiving
"A political movement that dreams of a world that is smaller, simpler, dumber, more servile and less curious and much narrower than the one that currently exists would naturally fixate upon college campuses and the individual and collective acts of becoming that happen there..."
The Conservative Grievance Business Is Always Hiring | Defector
Given his age when he first came to the world’s attention and assuming continued good health in the intervening decade and change, Marine Todd would be in his late 30s today. That would be if he was a...
defector.com
December 2, 2025 at 4:17 PM
"A political movement that dreams of a world that is smaller, simpler, dumber, more servile and less curious and much narrower than the one that currently exists would naturally fixate upon college campuses and the individual and collective acts of becoming that happen there..."
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
I asked the machine if you had joy 💀
December 2, 2025 at 3:53 PM
I asked the machine if you had joy 💀
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
Judging from the quotes in here, university admins are some of the least “ai literate” people in existence. No wonder they think students need to be taught how to use it.
After mass AI college-cheating freakout, many admissions offices are using it to screen student applications | Fortune
It wasn't long ago they began banning student use of it for homework or test-taking. Admissions offices are different, though.
fortune.com
December 2, 2025 at 3:51 PM
Judging from the quotes in here, university admins are some of the least “ai literate” people in existence. No wonder they think students need to be taught how to use it.
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
Breaking: Second wave of strikes at British Library announced
Union says lack of stable leadership after chief executive’s departure has “undoubtedly undermined staff confidence”
www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-c...
Union says lack of stable leadership after chief executive’s departure has “undoubtedly undermined staff confidence”
www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-c...
Second wave of strikes at British Library announced - Research Professional News
Union says lack of stable leadership after chief executive’s departure has “undoubtedly undermined staff confidence”
www.researchprofessionalnews.com
December 2, 2025 at 2:04 PM
Breaking: Second wave of strikes at British Library announced
Union says lack of stable leadership after chief executive’s departure has “undoubtedly undermined staff confidence”
www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-c...
Union says lack of stable leadership after chief executive’s departure has “undoubtedly undermined staff confidence”
www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-c...
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
NEW TWIST: data centers in farm country may accelerate nitrate contamination from agricultural sources with big implications for public health.
Studies are needed to confirm or refute this finding. Lack of transparency, monitoring, regulations makes it tough.
www.rollingstone.com/culture/cult...
Studies are needed to confirm or refute this finding. Lack of transparency, monitoring, regulations makes it tough.
www.rollingstone.com/culture/cult...
'The Precedent Is Flint': How Oregon's Data Center Boom Is Supercharging a Water Crisis
Amazon data centers constructed in eastern Oregon's farmland have worsened a water pollution problem that’s been linked to cancer and miscarriages.
www.rollingstone.com
December 2, 2025 at 1:39 AM
NEW TWIST: data centers in farm country may accelerate nitrate contamination from agricultural sources with big implications for public health.
Studies are needed to confirm or refute this finding. Lack of transparency, monitoring, regulations makes it tough.
www.rollingstone.com/culture/cult...
Studies are needed to confirm or refute this finding. Lack of transparency, monitoring, regulations makes it tough.
www.rollingstone.com/culture/cult...
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
@patrickmccray.bsky.social's literary history of computers, "README," explains the essential role that the oldest literary technology—books—played in making computers popular and pervasive: mitpress.mit.edu/978026255348...
December 2, 2025 at 2:16 PM
@patrickmccray.bsky.social's literary history of computers, "README," explains the essential role that the oldest literary technology—books—played in making computers popular and pervasive: mitpress.mit.edu/978026255348...
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
Enormous shout-out to the Australian and Kiwi librarians standing up to Elsevier. This is killer.
Librarians versus the world
Photo of London’s National Art Library by Sebastien LE DEROUT on Unsplash Here at the Research Whisperer, we love librarians. They are smart, dedicated people who want to help you with your researc…
researchwhisperer.org
December 1, 2025 at 7:36 AM
Enormous shout-out to the Australian and Kiwi librarians standing up to Elsevier. This is killer.
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
In NC, there are often 0 appointments available at the DMV - to the point where people trade availability in the local mom’s Facebook group.
December 1, 2025 at 11:15 PM
In NC, there are often 0 appointments available at the DMV - to the point where people trade availability in the local mom’s Facebook group.
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
Both of these were published in the last 14 months and are part of a larger right wing project designed to build the permission structure for Christians to embrace a selfish, cruel, and fascistic vision of Christianity by redefining one of the central teachings of the New Testament and Jesus Christ
December 2, 2025 at 5:19 AM
Both of these were published in the last 14 months and are part of a larger right wing project designed to build the permission structure for Christians to embrace a selfish, cruel, and fascistic vision of Christianity by redefining one of the central teachings of the New Testament and Jesus Christ
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
Just imagining how much better it would be if ALL news stories about vaccine-preventable illnesses were illustrated with pictures of people with the disease, not pictures of needle injections. If you must show something that people will find scary & unpleasant, make it the disease, not the cure.
I'm so tired of measles.
I'm also tired of people using needle shots on stories like this.
Show what measles looks like.
I'm also tired of people using needle shots on stories like this.
Show what measles looks like.
Gallatin Co. reports 2nd measles case, warns of exposure sites nbcmontana.com/news/local/g...
December 2, 2025 at 4:40 AM
Just imagining how much better it would be if ALL news stories about vaccine-preventable illnesses were illustrated with pictures of people with the disease, not pictures of needle injections. If you must show something that people will find scary & unpleasant, make it the disease, not the cure.
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
The U.S. Transportation Department is threatening to shut down thousands of truck driving schools, part of the Trump administration's widening crackdown on industry.
Thousands of U.S. trucking schools could lose accreditation under DOT crackdown
The U.S. Transportation Department is threatening to shut down thousands of truck driving schools, part of the Trump administration's widening crackdown on industry.
n.pr
December 1, 2025 at 11:19 PM
The U.S. Transportation Department is threatening to shut down thousands of truck driving schools, part of the Trump administration's widening crackdown on industry.
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
"What work is that detail doing?" is one of the best questions I learned to ask (thank you, Juliana Spahr!) during my MFA in poetry and it has served me well beyond belief as both an artist and political ecologist. 🌱
I wrote an essay for @bostonreview.bsky.social about what I learned about close reading when I taught at West Virginia University
www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...
www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...
The Claims of Close Reading - Boston Review
Literary studies have been starved by austerity, but their core methodology remains radical.
www.bostonreview.net
November 30, 2025 at 7:41 PM
"What work is that detail doing?" is one of the best questions I learned to ask (thank you, Juliana Spahr!) during my MFA in poetry and it has served me well beyond belief as both an artist and political ecologist. 🌱
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
Cleaning out a closet and I found all these letters that my parents saved, that I wrote home from college my freshman year. Apparently my standing joke was to make up names for them.
November 30, 2025 at 6:13 PM
Cleaning out a closet and I found all these letters that my parents saved, that I wrote home from college my freshman year. Apparently my standing joke was to make up names for them.
Tonight I somehow happened upon the Hammerstone School, a carpentry school for women + gender minorities in Ithaca — which led me to Westermorrow in Waitsfield, VT; Wild Abundance near Asheville, NC; Mill Hollow Works in West Keene, NH... Such great places!
hammerstoneschool.org
hammerstoneschool.org
Hammerstone Carpentry for Women | Learn, Build, Empower Today
Empowering women and gender minorities through carpentry courses and craft trades education. Join us in Ithaca and Trumansburg for skill-building workshops and community connection.
hammerstoneschool.org
December 2, 2025 at 4:07 AM
Tonight I somehow happened upon the Hammerstone School, a carpentry school for women + gender minorities in Ithaca — which led me to Westermorrow in Waitsfield, VT; Wild Abundance near Asheville, NC; Mill Hollow Works in West Keene, NH... Such great places!
hammerstoneschool.org
hammerstoneschool.org
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
day 1 is "penzeys revolution blend" and i cant stop laughing at "we have to GET RID of this lying, cheating, CORRUPT SCUMBAG PRESIDENT!! RESIST! REVOLT! REVOLUTION NOW!! good on roast poultry and carrots"
December 2, 2025 at 12:59 AM
day 1 is "penzeys revolution blend" and i cant stop laughing at "we have to GET RID of this lying, cheating, CORRUPT SCUMBAG PRESIDENT!! RESIST! REVOLT! REVOLUTION NOW!! good on roast poultry and carrots"
Reposted by Shannon Mattern
My wife has been HIV+ for 34 years. She’s alive today b/c work of activists who destigmatized the virus, pushed medical science to adapt & find ways to treat it, & advocated for gov health programs that helped fund her care. The current U.S. regime may want to go back in time, but we won’t let them.
December 2, 2025 at 1:27 AM
My wife has been HIV+ for 34 years. She’s alive today b/c work of activists who destigmatized the virus, pushed medical science to adapt & find ways to treat it, & advocated for gov health programs that helped fund her care. The current U.S. regime may want to go back in time, but we won’t let them.