Michael Munnik
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michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Michael Munnik
@michaelmunnik.bsky.social
1.4K followers 1.7K following 3.5K posts
Canadian pilgrim in Wales. Sociologist of media and religion, senior lecturer at Cardiff University, Centre for the Study of Islam in the UK. Musical side-hustle at https://michaelmunnik.ca/
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michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Last one: Lady Grey.
I've seen this one in shops for a while, never really understood it. Seems to be additional citrus (lemon and orange) which makes the whole thing "bright and zesty".
I would say: it's fine. Not one I'd reach for but not one I'd say no to if offered.
#FiveDaysEarlGreysFiveWays
A sachet for Twinings Lady Grey tea propped against a grey mug with tea visible over the mouth. Both are positioned on a grey textured chair. The tea sachet is black and grey with accents of orange and yellow, and rather than a top hat, the ridiculous icon is a parasol.
November 28, 2025 at 11:25 AM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Today: Strong EG
This is much better than yesterday. Unclear what makes it "strong" - box says slightly more bergamot flavouring plus some peel. I wondered if the tea itself would be stronger.
Anyway, it seems just a fuller version of Good Ol Earl Grey. Would drink again.
#FiveDaysEarlGreysFiveWays
A sachet for Twinings Strong Earl Grey tea torn at the top and propped against a grey mug with tea visible over the rim. Both are positioned on a textured grey chair. The sachet continues the Twinings Earl Grey motif of black and shades of grey with a purple flare, but other accents here are shades of pink, including bars at the side and the ridiculous top hat. Nice that pink can be strong.
November 27, 2025 at 11:43 AM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Today: Lavender EG.
Oh dear. Actually an abomination. I worried when I saw this tag on the box, and the drink confirms them.
I know aroma is a chief yea/nay factor for Earl Grey anyway, but lavender makes this smell like laundry. Can't say "taste like" - I don't eat soap.
#FiveDaysEarlGreysFiveWays
November 26, 2025 at 11:42 AM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Today: Vanilla EG.
When you start w a sweet perfume quality, adding more sweet perfume seems unnecessary. (Many feel the bergamot in Earl Grey is already so.)
But vanilla is a comforting one that plays well with others. Big teaching day for me, so the warm hug is welcome.
#FiveDaysEarlGreysFiveWays
A Twinings Vanilla Earl Grey tea bag sachet, torn open at top, propped against a grey mug with a tea bag floating at the top just visible over the lip. Both rest on a textured grey chair. The sachet is black and shades of grey with a dash of unifying purple (for the theme of the company's Earl Grey series) but has predominant creamy off-white accents, as well as the ridiculous cliched top hat.
November 25, 2025 at 11:15 AM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
First up: the classic. This was my mom's tea, the only tea we had in the house (Dad was a coffee drinker). She liked it "clear" & so that's me, too.
Colleagues despise the idea of Earl Grey: "it's been doused with perfume."
Well, I like it. But I miss the yellow sachet.
#FiveDaysEarlGreysFiveWays
The sachet for Twinings Earl Grey (purple shares on a grey and black background, with a ridiculous top hat icon), propped against a grey mug with tea and a floating bag just visible at the top, on a textured grey chair.
November 24, 2025 at 11:30 AM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Getting some teas for the rest of the family and came across this monstrosity of 21st Century consumerism.

On the one hand, what the hell, Twinings?

On the other hand, I'm all in for it.

#FiveDaysEarlGreysFiveWays
A box of Twinings teabags dubbed the Earl Grey Discovery Collection sits on a grey textured chair with no arms. The box advertises 4x five different versions of Early Grey tea, each with a different coloured tab and a cutesy faux Britannia icon: Earl Grey, Vanilla Earl Grey, Lavender Earl Grey, Strong Earl Grey, and Lady Grey.
November 24, 2025 at 9:51 AM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
A movie that takes place where you're from (double bill)
Movie poster for Cool Runnings. Four men in colourful t-shirts and shorts mak funny gestures while half-in a bobsled painted black, yellow and green for the Jamaican team. Movie poster for film Eddie the Eagle. A slightly squat man in blue lycra and a numbered bib and a blue crash helmet stands on the roof of a red van with the tips of his skis poking over the windscreen. Driving the van is a cool dude in sunglasses and a black shirt, his left hanging out the window as he drives.
November 23, 2025 at 9:49 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Lovely to have Mark Drakeford, former First Minister for Wales, at the celebration and anticipation of our community garden at Canton Uniting Church. A good use of his time, and speaking of green space as a need in these densely populated urban neighbourhoods.
An older man with grey hair and glasses in a grey jumper speaks at a wooden podium in a wood-floored Church sanctuary. Against the white wall are carved.wooden chairs amd a table, and a blue and white banner hangs at the top right.
November 21, 2025 at 6:47 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
This week: two goose eggs and minimal words down on "productive" days, but there was good reading and note taking. #AcWriMo
Screenshot of table from Microsoft Word. Left column is dates, next is word count tallies for the day, notable for two zeros. Next is an accumulative total that finishes at 8,449, and then at right some notes on what was accomplished.
November 21, 2025 at 5:43 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Not sure why I'm punishing myself publicly, at this point.

But anyway, I scraped 367 words on Friday and didn't even have capacity to post an update and week-ending screenshot because that's how the day went.

And my #AcWriMo is most definitely #AcWriMonToFri, so nothing added at the weekend.
A table with four columns. Left is days of the week, from 10 Nov to 14 Nov. Next column is a daily word count (noting two zeros on 10 and 13 Nov), followed by a cumulative count that finishes at 7,563. Right column is minor notes on what was happening in the writing each day.
November 17, 2025 at 12:26 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Ffantasteg to hear @juderogers.bsky.social reading to kick off the launch for Folding Rock vol. 3 - a literary mag fron Wales whose theme this issue is, appropriately, music. And we're at The Canopi, my neighbourhood hang for an excellent open mic. foldingrock.com
www.thecanopi.org
A woman in glasses and a red dress stands before microphone reading from a journal in her hands. She's offset to the right, and her shadow, with green and red aura fringes, displays on a bare white screen behind her.
November 13, 2025 at 8:52 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
But for Michael Prescott to portray concern from Jewish org's over BBC coverage of the conflict and ignore concerns from the Muslim org the Centre for Media Monitoring shows the selectivity that characterises his criticisms more broadly. (Report here, for the curious: cfmm.org.uk/cfmm-report-...)
Cover of a report called Media Bias: Gaza 2023-24 by the Centre for Media Monitoring. Two megaphones on a red and white cover, one with an Israeli flag and a smaller one with a Palestinian flag. It's placed on a pale table, and the hexagonal pattern of an ottoman is visible at the top left.
November 10, 2025 at 1:55 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Other things on my shelf were already down and about my desk as I work on this #AcWriMo book text (haha to today's productivity...) Just thinking about the enterprise of journalism more broadly, and apologies for the heavy US tilt of these thinking-through texts. What *is* journalism for in 2025?
Three books on a pale table, with a hexagonal-patterned ottoman in top left. To left, Why Journalism Still Matters by Michael Schudson; centre, What Journalism Could Be by Barbie Zelizer; to right, Beyond Journalism by Mark Deuze and Tamara Witschge.
November 10, 2025 at 1:31 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
A glimpse of a few texts from my shelf. I know scholarly critiques of media are not accessible to or interesting for everyone, but they give context: Schlesinger from 1978/87; Born more recently; Mills from a very critical angle that still repudiates the "liberal metropolitan elite" bias argument.
Three books on a pale table, with a hexagonal patterned ottoman in the top left behind. To left, Putting Reality Together by Philip Schlesinger; centre, Uncertain Vision by Georgina Born; to right, The BBC: Myth of a Public Service by Tom Mills.
November 10, 2025 at 1:22 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
If you see this, post an album cover with a motor vehicle on it.

(Even a gratuitous one.)
Album cover for Michael Munnik Driving Through America at Night. A black cover with a white diagonal silhouette line of a city skyline, mountains, prairies with a barn, the great lakes, and another city. Runs from bottom left to top right, where a simple purple car drives steadily forward. In the top left half, scratchy hand drawn stars. At the bottom, artist name and album title in purple and white.
November 8, 2025 at 9:57 AM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Well, things-to-do be damned, I still got my best day of the week in. The writing was less restrained, also less informed by scholarship. Also likely would need to be clawed back in final deliverable manuscript, so let's not big it up too much. #AcWriMo

Here's the chart for the week.
Table from Microsoft Word. Above, it reads "Target: 25-30,000 words". The left column shows dates from 3-7 Nov; the middle ones a daily word count followed by a cumulative one; and the right brief notes about what writing was done and, sometimes, what interposed.
November 7, 2025 at 4:54 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Just a bunch of very disappointed dogs.
A lovely puppy - tan coloured but with dark brown slightly pointed snout and floppy ears - lying on the grass and gnawing on a red hard-rubber toy called a Kong while looking directly at the camera.
October 20, 2025 at 8:29 AM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Oh, mate.

We're gonna need those bicycles.
A silver bike tarp draped over bicycles in a back garden. Before it, Centre of the image, is a spider on its web. Close up of the spider on its web in front of bikes under a silvery tarp.
October 12, 2025 at 9:18 AM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Whoa-ho! It's been two years since I released my album Driving through America at Night in Cardiff. A memorable, magical gig. Here are some pics, including me singing with my eldest two kids! Thank to the band and everyone who came for a special night. michaelmunnik.bandcamp.com/album/drivin...
Four men lined up on stage at a gig. To left, a bearded bespectacled man in white t-shirt holding a red Fender Jaguar guitar. Next, visible under the guitar neck, a bearded man in flannel shirt sitting atop a cajon drum and smacking it with his left hand while shaking an egg in his right. Next, a bespectacled man in a black t-shirt playing a tobacco sunburst electric bass. At right, a bespectacled man in a dark shirt and jeans holding a tenor saxophone. A bearded bespectacled man in a green fedora playing an acoustic guitar is to the left, singing into a microphone. The remainder of the image is dark negative space, though faintly you can see the windows and a pillar of the church hall where the gig is happening. Live concert footage. A young man in glasses and a red plaid shirt over a dark t-shirt sings into a microphone, shared with a young woman in a dark shirt and green trousers, who sings while playing a ukulele. To their right, a bearded bespectacled man in brown jacket and green fedora sings into a microphone and plays an acoustic guitar. Image from behind the band at a concert. The backs of several musicians are visible, seen in highlit accents at various levels as they play their instruments. Before them, the arched columns supporting a church hall, with peaky windows to the sides and a large one at the back, central to the image. It is atmospherically lit.
October 6, 2025 at 3:56 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
When my wife and I were on a bit of holiday this summer up north Wales, we took a day trip to Liverpool and were delighted to see @hananelizabethissa.bsky.social 's poem on "home" as part of a mural series. So good to see her words travelling widely and accessible to the public!
A poster on a wall with the large question "What does home mean to you?". There is a photo of two people affectionately cuddling on a blue sofa, and there is the smaller text of a poem "Home" by Hanan Issa. Apologies not to include the poem text in the alt.
September 18, 2025 at 2:07 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Now up, a brand new poem commissioned for the 20th anniversary of @islamukcentre.bsky.social by the current National Poet of Wales Hanan Issa, "Where the two rivers meet"
A woman in dark clothing and a pale blue hijab speaks at the front of a white walled room. At left, sat before a Cardiff University banner and beside a pink stool, is a bald man in dark suit and pale woven jumper.
September 18, 2025 at 1:57 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
A wealth of scholars in British Muslim Studies - past chairs of the Muslims in Britain Research Network. Jørgen Nielsen speaks first, remembering they had maybe one meeting before the Rushdie Affair, after which "the world around us increasingly began to set the agenda." A milestone for the field.
Seven people sat around a table with a red tablecloth carrying the logo for the Centre for the Study of Islam in the UK and Cardiff University. Above and behind them, a white screen.
September 18, 2025 at 1:05 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Box office time! Yusuf Islam / Cat Stevens returns to @islamukcentre.bsky.social (sadly only virtually) twenty years after he was present for our opening.

If you want to sing out, sing out!
A bearded bespectacled man in a blue shirt is speaking on a screen, stood before a colorful piece of artwork. Caption at the bottom says "to the Cardiff University and"
September 18, 2025 at 12:55 PM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
Rare is the day they get me in a necktie these days, but today we're celebrating 20 years of @islamukcentre.bsky.social where I work, so I'm rising to the occasion. Looking forward to the day and seeing all the people gathered!
A bearded bespectacled man in a dark grey suit with a lighter grey shirt and purple paisley tie, smiling at the camera before a wall with books on shelves. He wears a red lapel pin with the logo for the Centre for the Study of Islam in the UK.
September 18, 2025 at 9:00 AM
michaelmunnik.bsky.social
I could take or leave the content of The Horse Whisperer, but Redford made Montana sing in that movie.

And Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is still one of my all-times.

RIP
Promotional image for the film The Horse Whisperer. A white man in a blue denim shirt and white cowboy hat is foreground right with his arm around a young white girl in a white shirt with hair pulled back (presumably in a ponytail). Behind them, a vast mountain plateau covered in gras stretches out with rocky mountain peaks in the background and the clouds coloured shades of pink and purple in a sunset.
September 16, 2025 at 12:38 PM