colleen wood
@colleenwood.rocks
Digital politics/culture + human rights in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. Teaching political science at a CC in Minnesota. Opinions expressed here are mine and mine alone, views do not reflect the state of Minnesota or U.S. government
Reposted by colleen wood
If you live in Minnesota you have access (no login required) to thousands of journals and ebooks, the full text of the NYT, WaPo, WSJ, Star Tribune (all the way back to the 80s), and much more. All thanks to eLibrary Minnesota. Libraries rule! 2/4 elibrarymn.org
eLibrary Minnesota
elibrarymn.org
November 25, 2025 at 2:51 PM
If you live in Minnesota you have access (no login required) to thousands of journals and ebooks, the full text of the NYT, WaPo, WSJ, Star Tribune (all the way back to the 80s), and much more. All thanks to eLibrary Minnesota. Libraries rule! 2/4 elibrarymn.org
Reposted by colleen wood
This being named a NYT Notable Book of 2025 seems to prove it's thesis
November 25, 2025 at 2:52 PM
This being named a NYT Notable Book of 2025 seems to prove it's thesis
Reposted by colleen wood
It also misses the other problem: the disintegration of truth and falsity everywhere, especially outside academia. The fact that LLMs even exist creates a “permission structure of doubt”: Even things that are real and true can be easy doubted because they “could” be fake, they “could” be A.I.
Two years ago I had lunch with the dean of a department at one of Toronto’s major universities and she told me she had instructed all her profs teaching first-year classes to do exactly this. It sounded sensible and I wonder if it’s now more widely applied
November 24, 2025 at 1:04 PM
It also misses the other problem: the disintegration of truth and falsity everywhere, especially outside academia. The fact that LLMs even exist creates a “permission structure of doubt”: Even things that are real and true can be easy doubted because they “could” be fake, they “could” be A.I.
Reposted by colleen wood
I will add the following: our students lack the research skills required to audit an LLM essay for errors. They don’t arrive on campus with these skills; we teach it to them over four long years. So throwing freshmen in the deep end and saying “swim your way to a shore of rectitude” is folly.
November 24, 2025 at 1:23 PM
I will add the following: our students lack the research skills required to audit an LLM essay for errors. They don’t arrive on campus with these skills; we teach it to them over four long years. So throwing freshmen in the deep end and saying “swim your way to a shore of rectitude” is folly.
Reposted by colleen wood
I'm so tired of people telling me to have students critique LLM outputs. I'm just going to print this on little cards and hand them out
I will add the following: our students lack the research skills required to audit an LLM essay for errors. They don’t arrive on campus with these skills; we teach it to them over four long years. So throwing freshmen in the deep end and saying “swim your way to a shore of rectitude” is folly.
November 24, 2025 at 2:36 PM
I'm so tired of people telling me to have students critique LLM outputs. I'm just going to print this on little cards and hand them out
Reposted by colleen wood
Friendly reminder that striking workers are asking you not to patronize ANY Starbucks store.
If you're traveling this week, your airport definitely has other options. Zero reason to even think about crossing a picket line!
If you're traveling this week, your airport definitely has other options. Zero reason to even think about crossing a picket line!
November 24, 2025 at 2:39 PM
Friendly reminder that striking workers are asking you not to patronize ANY Starbucks store.
If you're traveling this week, your airport definitely has other options. Zero reason to even think about crossing a picket line!
If you're traveling this week, your airport definitely has other options. Zero reason to even think about crossing a picket line!
Reposted by colleen wood
all of these are things people very much do in China, a state where the police often torture people, dissidents are disappeared, and which runs labor camps. even in authoritarian states there are different layers in who the police have impunity to brutalize and who they don't.
You DEFINITELY wouldn't be out on the street, yelling at cops, or pleading with them to be honorable, or demanding to see their ID.
You just...Would Not.
(Throwing food at a cop? Under fascism, you'd be better off just jumping into the river instead of the beating - or bullet - you'd get.)
/12
You just...Would Not.
(Throwing food at a cop? Under fascism, you'd be better off just jumping into the river instead of the beating - or bullet - you'd get.)
/12
November 16, 2025 at 5:44 PM
all of these are things people very much do in China, a state where the police often torture people, dissidents are disappeared, and which runs labor camps. even in authoritarian states there are different layers in who the police have impunity to brutalize and who they don't.
Reposted by colleen wood
Oh so much this. It ought to be intuitively self-evident that the person who is grading your assignment already knows the answer to the question they posed or knows what an answer looks like, thus the point is learning how to achieve a result, not the result itself. We've failed to convey that.
November 16, 2025 at 5:13 PM
Oh so much this. It ought to be intuitively self-evident that the person who is grading your assignment already knows the answer to the question they posed or knows what an answer looks like, thus the point is learning how to achieve a result, not the result itself. We've failed to convey that.
Reposted by colleen wood
New feature article from TNJ (nation's best student magazine): Inside Yale’s Quiet Reckoning with AI thenewjournalatyale.com/2025/10/insi...
November 16, 2025 at 4:43 PM
New feature article from TNJ (nation's best student magazine): Inside Yale’s Quiet Reckoning with AI thenewjournalatyale.com/2025/10/insi...
Reposted by colleen wood
Minoan living room is an aspirational aesthetic
November 11, 2025 at 7:30 AM
Minoan living room is an aspirational aesthetic
"boys back in town" triggered something in me to reread this: www.vice.com/en/article/i...
i shared this essay with my aunt and now every time we go to a brewery she throws several dollars at this song to play on repeat on touchtunes
i shared this essay with my aunt and now every time we go to a brewery she throws several dollars at this song to play on repeat on touchtunes
November 11, 2025 at 3:59 AM
"boys back in town" triggered something in me to reread this: www.vice.com/en/article/i...
i shared this essay with my aunt and now every time we go to a brewery she throws several dollars at this song to play on repeat on touchtunes
i shared this essay with my aunt and now every time we go to a brewery she throws several dollars at this song to play on repeat on touchtunes
a friend from college works on AI for education at google and every time i see stuff like this, i'm so bummed, because she had such a thoughtful, passionate approach to her education and has sold out for fancy clothes to hollow out young peoples' minds
November 10, 2025 at 1:16 PM
a friend from college works on AI for education at google and every time i see stuff like this, i'm so bummed, because she had such a thoughtful, passionate approach to her education and has sold out for fancy clothes to hollow out young peoples' minds
Reposted by colleen wood
I mean, I do try my best. But I can't do it alone.
the question nobody with a soul is asking, answered by people nobody wants to hear from
November 6, 2025 at 2:21 PM
I mean, I do try my best. But I can't do it alone.
Reposted by colleen wood
There ought to be more than one American journalist whose identifiable brand is "goes hard after people in interviews."
October 27, 2025 at 10:49 PM
There ought to be more than one American journalist whose identifiable brand is "goes hard after people in interviews."
Do any social scientists who teach intro survey courses do portfolios as final projects? Would you be willing to share instructions or a rubric?
October 27, 2025 at 10:38 PM
Do any social scientists who teach intro survey courses do portfolios as final projects? Would you be willing to share instructions or a rubric?
Reposted by colleen wood
I found this a really illuminating thread on what demonstrations do and why they matter.
In social movement studies, we talk about how marches and protests expand the threshold of acceptable risk so that people take more and bigger social risks IN PUBLIC, EN MASSE. This is extremely important for the bourgeois white folks holding signs and building social rapport.
Not a shitpost: #NoKings is feel-good performative activism for comfortable mostly upper and upper middle class white folks and that’s good, actually. Millions of people in the streets protesting a fascist regime is good. It is good for the normie baseline to be massive displays of public dissent.
October 19, 2025 at 2:59 AM
I found this a really illuminating thread on what demonstrations do and why they matter.
listening to the new taylor swift album as background music: it's vaguely nice bops but every time i've dedicated mental effort to focus on the words, it's so cringey
October 6, 2025 at 9:14 PM
listening to the new taylor swift album as background music: it's vaguely nice bops but every time i've dedicated mental effort to focus on the words, it's so cringey
I want to recommend writing about Chile's constitutional referendums to a student -- both the 1988 one after Pinochet and the 2022 one. Bluesky has not historically been a great "hey does anyone have reading suggestions" platform for me, but hey does anyone have any reading suggestions? #polisky
September 30, 2025 at 12:04 AM
I want to recommend writing about Chile's constitutional referendums to a student -- both the 1988 one after Pinochet and the 2022 one. Bluesky has not historically been a great "hey does anyone have reading suggestions" platform for me, but hey does anyone have any reading suggestions? #polisky
Reposted by colleen wood
Two former video editors for independent news website Kloop have been sentenced to 5 years in prison for allegedly spreading “false information”. They were just doing there jobs, had no part in any editorial decisions, only the technical video editing. Chilling
www.reuters.com/business/med...
www.reuters.com/business/med...
www.reuters.com
September 17, 2025 at 4:46 PM
Two former video editors for independent news website Kloop have been sentenced to 5 years in prison for allegedly spreading “false information”. They were just doing there jobs, had no part in any editorial decisions, only the technical video editing. Chilling
www.reuters.com/business/med...
www.reuters.com/business/med...
Reposted by colleen wood
Whenever I see data like this from Inside Higher ed survey, I want to go back and ask the students these questions: 1. What kind of brainstorming? Did you ask for an idea for your research paper? For a list of points you could cover in your paper? For ideas about how to research your topic? /1
September 12, 2025 at 2:48 PM
Whenever I see data like this from Inside Higher ed survey, I want to go back and ask the students these questions: 1. What kind of brainstorming? Did you ask for an idea for your research paper? For a list of points you could cover in your paper? For ideas about how to research your topic? /1
Reposted by colleen wood
thank god we’re all against political
violence
violence
Politico - President Trump tells reporters "we just have to beat the hell" out of "radical left lunatics," following the killing of conservative commentator Charlie Kirk.
Trump says ‘we have to beat the hell’ out of ‘radical left lunatics’ after Kirk killing
The conservative activist's killer remains at large and authorities have not said what the motive was behind his shooting.
www.politico.com
September 12, 2025 at 1:13 AM
thank god we’re all against political
violence
violence
a student wearing a trump 2028 livestrong bracelet kept referring to james madison as she/her while discussing federalist 51. me: "i'm saying madison because it's his last name" student: "yeah that makes sense. anyway she sounds really smart." gender, a construct, etc etc
September 12, 2025 at 1:22 AM
a student wearing a trump 2028 livestrong bracelet kept referring to james madison as she/her while discussing federalist 51. me: "i'm saying madison because it's his last name" student: "yeah that makes sense. anyway she sounds really smart." gender, a construct, etc etc
Reposted by colleen wood
Try to praise the mutilated world.
Remember June’s long days,
and wild strawberries, drops of wine, the dew.
-Adam Zagajewski
Resharing a favorite.
[trans. Clare Cavanagh, published in TheNewYorker’s Sept 2001 special issue]
#everynightapoem
Remember June’s long days,
and wild strawberries, drops of wine, the dew.
-Adam Zagajewski
Resharing a favorite.
[trans. Clare Cavanagh, published in TheNewYorker’s Sept 2001 special issue]
#everynightapoem
September 11, 2025 at 12:44 PM
Try to praise the mutilated world.
Remember June’s long days,
and wild strawberries, drops of wine, the dew.
-Adam Zagajewski
Resharing a favorite.
[trans. Clare Cavanagh, published in TheNewYorker’s Sept 2001 special issue]
#everynightapoem
Remember June’s long days,
and wild strawberries, drops of wine, the dew.
-Adam Zagajewski
Resharing a favorite.
[trans. Clare Cavanagh, published in TheNewYorker’s Sept 2001 special issue]
#everynightapoem
Reposted by colleen wood
This is what we are talking about when we say Erdogan is blocking the roads so people can’t go to oppo party HQ. This is one of the major arteries in central Istanbul, a city of 18 million.
September 7, 2025 at 9:41 PM
This is what we are talking about when we say Erdogan is blocking the roads so people can’t go to oppo party HQ. This is one of the major arteries in central Istanbul, a city of 18 million.
Reposted by colleen wood
Fermented horse milk is *the* staple drink of rural Central Asia and the amount of female labor that goes into make sure it is (relatively) safe to drink on the daily is *wild*
I lived for several years in rural cattle country in Central Africa, where milk was a major part of the diet. All the milk was either boiled or fermented to make it safe. Always. No one ever drank raw milk.
September 3, 2025 at 7:26 PM
Fermented horse milk is *the* staple drink of rural Central Asia and the amount of female labor that goes into make sure it is (relatively) safe to drink on the daily is *wild*