Brendan McGeever
@BrendanMcGeever
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Snr Lecturer in Sociology, Birkbeck Institute for the Study of Antisemitism. Books: 'Antisemitism & the Russian Revolution' (2019) 'Britain in Fragments' (2023)
Joined November 2014
The violence in Amsterdam has been widely described as a ‘pogrom’. This is misleading and politically dangerous. It also does a disservice to Jewish history. My piece for @BylineTimes.
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Celtic manager, Ange Postecoglou, asked by a Scottish journalist why he chose to sign “four Japanese players” 👏👏👏
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The violence in Amsterdam last night has been widely described as a pogrom against Jews. This is not only misleading but politically dangerous. A thread.
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Racist graffiti in Walthamstow, London. Excellent response 👏
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Leaflet in support of striking workers handed out by the Green Brigade at Celtic Park today
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Describing the violence in Amsterdam last night as a pogrom is wrongheaded for four reasons. First, from the footage I have seen, Maccabi Tel Aviv fans were attacked not as Jews but as Israelis. The word pogrom, then, is doing the work of conflating antisemitism and anti-Zionism.
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Second, earlier in the day Maccabi Tel Aviv fans were filmed shouting “Finish the Arabs! We’re going to win!”. A Palestinian flag was set on fire. A taxi driver attacked. This context has been widely overlooked. A pogrom involves victims and perpetrators; this was not a pogrom.
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"No to war" - Moscow Metro, Krasnopresnenskaia-Barrikadnaia underpass via Anastasya Fatova
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The word 'pogrom' is not only ill-suited to the task of explaining last night, it does a disservice to Jewish history and prevents us from comprehending the multiple atrocities being carried out in the here and now.
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As a scholar of pogroms, I have been struck by the way the word 'pogrom' has been used over the last year to describe Jewish experiences in the here and now.
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The analogy of the pogrom leads us to imagine a world populated in perpetuity by beleaguered Jews and their powerful enemies. The reality today is different, as Israel’s devastating war on Gaza shows, a war described by respected scholars of the Holocaust as a genocide.
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The Russian invasion has revealed a quiet but no less extraordinary transformation in Ukrainian Jewish life (thread).
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Third, describing the violence of last night as a pogrom encourages us to ignore the vast difference between the status of Jews in Europe a century ago and their place in Israel today where they constitute the majority in a state boasting one of the world’s most formidable armies.
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Fourth, the word 'pogrom' has been shamefully put in the service of racist dog-whistling. Instead of combatting antisemitism, all this does is further entrench racism.
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The word 'pogrom' evokes histories that are etched in Jewish collective memory. Clearly, many are reaching for it as a way to make sense of recent events. But it is wrong and misleading.
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In the immediate aftermath of October 7th, there was a 900% increase in search volume for the word ‘pogrom’. In the last 24h, a 650% increase.
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The pogroms were violent acts by sections of the majority population against a racialised minority lacking in rights or state protection. The intention was to keep that minority 'in their place'.
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The word pogrom, derived from the Russian verb gromit – to plunder, destroy – passed into common usage in the English language in the early 20th century as news spread of atrocities carried out against Jews in Imperial Russia.
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In other words: pogroms occurred against Jews in regions of Europe where they were structurally discriminated against, where laws prohibiting their full participation in civic and political life, and where Jews were deemed to be carriers of alien values and ideology.
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In the Civil War of 1917-1921, more than 100,000 Jews were murdered in what was then the most ferocious wave of antisemitic violence in modern Jewish history.
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There is a wealth of scholarship on pogroms. What are the prevailing definitions? For historian Hans Rogger, pogroms occur in a context in which the mechanisms of long-term structural exploitation of a minority population begin to be relaxed or challenged.
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For David Engel, pogroms involve "collective violent applications of force by members of what perpetrators believed to be a higher-ranking ethnic or religious group against members of what they considered a lower-ranking or subaltern group”
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This shows the complete absurdity of Putin's 'denazification'. But perhaps it tells us something about history: what seems fixed today can change tomorrow. Just as Ukraine has evolved for Jews, Putin's rule in Russia will become a thing of the past. Maybe sooner than we expect.
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As the awful news in Pittsburgh unfolds, it is worth re-reading what Frantz Fanon said about antisemitism in ‘Black Skin, White Masks’. Words for our times.
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20 years ago I walked into a 2nd year undergraduate Sociology lecture at Glasgow University. It was a class on ‘Racism and Modernity’. The lecturer taught us about the relationship between capitalism and racism. It completely changed the way that I saw the world 1/
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Extraordinary! Archivists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst Library have fully digitised and made available nearly 100,000 items in the W.E.B. Du Bois archives. Link to the full collection:
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James Connolly's 1902 Yiddish election leaflet addressed to Jewish workers in Dublin: "Do not vote for the candidate of the bourgeoisie. which provokes hatred of the Jew. Vote for the socialist James Connolly!". Connolly was born 150 years ago today.
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As a new academic year begins, there surely isn't a single classroom (virtual or otherwise) that will not benefit from reading Stuart Hall.
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A century ago, Ukraine was the epicentre of antisemitism. This was the age of the pogrom, the most violent chapter in pre-Holocaust modern Jewish history. Over 100,000 Jews were murdered, many by Ukrainian nationalists. It was the Red Army that brought the violence to a halt.
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Yet today, as Russia invades, that association no longer holds. The Ukrainian state is headed by Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who is Jewish. In the passing of time, something significant has taken place. Has the past simply faded from view?.
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And yet, Ukrainian Jewry cleaves to the nation and more or less does so successfully. Powerful statements against Putin's war from mainstream Jewish organisations in Ukraine last week underlined that attachment.
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Jacques Derrida lecturing in Soviet Moscow in 1990 under the banner "The doctrine of Marx is omnipotent because it is true".
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First Soviet editions of Peter Benchley's 'Jaws', published in the late 1980s/early 1990s.
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All the place names you are hearing in the news right now – Kyiv, Cherkasy, Chernihiv, Zhytomyr, Odesa, Uman – were sites of major acts of anti-Jewish violence. Gomel, where today’s ‘talks’ will take place, can be added to that list: a devastating pogrom occurred there in 1903.
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Remember this?.“What we are concerned about is an uptake in antisemitism…there are reports of 48 bomb threats against Jewish centers, there are people committing antisemitic acts or threatening to…”.TRUMP (interrupts) “sit down. very insulting question”.
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“White supremacy relies on the maintenance of anti-black racism and antisemitism, hence there will never be a time when these two struggles will not be connected”. Rest in power, bell hooks
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100 years ago today nearly 2,000 delegates travelled to Baku for the 'First Congress of the Peoples of the East' – a week-long gathering of revolutionary anti-colonialism. On arrival they were greeted by the 'Eastern Orchestra'. Here they are playing the 'Internationale'. 1/4
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Walthamstow tonight: “Say it loud say it clear refugees are welcome here”
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RIP Billy McNeill, the first British footballer to lift the European Cup. Here he is, taking those historic steps on 25 May 1967.
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This antisemitism was carried into the middle of the twentieth century, through the violence of Bandera, the OUN and collaboration in the occupied territories. For many in the Jewish diaspora, Ukraine was simply synonymous with antisemitism.
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Not really. Streets are named after Petliura, there's a monument to him in Vinnytsia; Khmelnytsky adorns the 5 hryvnia banknote; there's a Bandera Blvd in Kyiv; the history of the OUN is often occluded in official Ukrainian nationalism. The far-right retains a presence in Ukraine.
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Nudist beach by the Kremlin. Soviet Moscow, 1920s.
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The proportion of British Jews self-identifying as Zionist fell from 72% to 63% in 2022. Among Jews in their twenties, the number falls to 57%. Findings from new report by @jprinstitute. Full report here:
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Interested in the Russian Revolution? Back in 2017 we ran a series of public lectures called 'Social Histories of the Russian Revolution' to mark the centenary. All 15 of these lectures are now online. Enjoy!
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Incredible image from the encampment at the University of Toronto. Paul Klee's Angelus Novus painting accompanied by a passage from Aimé Césaire's 'Notebook of a Return to the Native Land'. 📷 via @thaqafatalhind
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Been waiting a few days in case an email arrived saying this was all a big mistake. 'Antisemitism and the Russian Revolution' is Co-Winner of the @aseeestudies 2020 Reginald Zelnik Book Prize and is Honourable Mention for the W. Bruce Lincoln Prize😱😱😱😱
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Published today! Thank you to friends and loved ones who helped me over the finish line. The book explores how the left confronted antisemitism within its own movement during the Russian Revolution. For anyone interested, you can read bits of it here:
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How do we make sense of the slaughter in Gaza and the simultaneous reality of antisemitism? A piece be me and David Feldman 🧵
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🤯😮My book has been awarded the British Association for Jewish Studies Book Prize. Deep gratitude to the panel for this recognition. When I wrote the book I so hoped it would reach the field of Jewish Studies. Never for a moment thought this would happen! Thank you BAJS.
Our AGM starts with our Secretary, @DavidTollerton, announcing our book prize winners, this year focusing on the modern period. The winner is @b_mcgeever (@bbkpsychosocial/@bisa_bbk) for Antisemitism and the Russian Revolution (@CambridgeUP).
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We run a short educational course at Birkbeck called 'Facing Antisemitism: Politics, Culture, History'. It’s open to the public, individuals and organisations. Please share.
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Earlier today Trump retweeted Jayda Fransen of the far-right Britain First party. When Fransen stood for election to the UK Parliament in 2014, she received 56 of the 40,065 votes cast. Fifty Six. The President has 44 million followers.
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Openly homophobic t-shirt’s on sale at today’s Scottish Cup Final in Glasgow. Shameful. What century are we in?
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Joint statement by Muslim and Jewish community organisations in response to yesterday's 'The Muslim Problem' article in the Sun.
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Earlier today Zelensky did an interview with 4 Russian journalists. One of them is TV Dozhd' editor Tikhon Dzyadko (underneath Zelensky in the image below). Dzyadko's great-grandfather was a guy called Tsvi Fridliand. A niche THREAD for those interested in Russian history.
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Tom Nairn’s classic ‘The Break-Up of Britain’ (1977), purchased at @HousmansBooks. Page 185 is bookmarked with a boarding pass for passenger ‘Mr Tariq Ali’. The date of the flight? 14 September 2014, just 4 days before the Scottish Independence Referendum 1/3
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Socialist and Communist alternatives to the Olympic Games – THREAD
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Claude McKay in the Kremlin, speaking at the 4th Congress of the Communist International, Moscow, 1922: "We need an all-Negro organisation. otherwise the whites will want to tell us what is right for our people even against our better thinking".
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Poster for Pink Floyd's 1989 concert in Soviet Moscow.
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I left the building (the Boyd Orr for those who know) feeling totally inspired by the teacher and it was in that moment that sociology became my passion. The lecturer that day was Satnam Virdee. Today, 20 years on, our jointly written book ‘Britain in Fragments’ is published! 2/.
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Look at this support for striking workers in London today! Brilliant and beautiful, and hopefully the start of something even bigger to come #EnoughlsEnough #PayUp #ucuRISING #TeacherStrike .📷 via @eiecampaign
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May Day in Soviet Moscow, 1918. Metalworkers celebrate 100 years since the birth of Karl Marx; a globe is wrapped in the words "international socialism".
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The "Z" symbol has been brandished on a Lenin statue in the capital of Buryatia, Russia; the same Lenin who said this about Ukraine in 1919.
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Also worthy of note: around a quarter of British Jews now report as anti or non-Zionist. That’s a pretty significant minority.
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In 1959 the Soviet Union issued a Robert Burns postage stamp marking the bicentenary of his birth. The text in Russian reads: 'Robert Burns, the great national poet of Scotland'. #BurnsNight2021 #Burns
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Extraordinary online exhibition on the history of the Communist International, using photographs and documents from the former Party Archives in Moscow. Here is the 'Eastern Orchestra' playing at the First Congress of the Peoples of the East. September 1920, Baku.
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Multiculturalism, liberalism and, yep, you guessed it, “Cultural Marxism”, are all “Jewish ideologies”. They are part of a “Jewish group evolutionary strategy” to undermine “European traditions”. So says an ‘academic’ paper published in 2019.
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'Antisemitism and the Russian Revolution' - published today in paperback! 20% discount code: 'HIS3920'
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A giant banner quoting the late Mark Fisher at the @UCL_UCU picket line. Moving and inspiring. #UCUstrike
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EU nations where far right has polled 12%+ in 2017.Belgium.Bulgaria.Denmark.Estonia.Finland.France.Germany.Hungary.Netherlands.Poland.Sweden.
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Members of the Zhenotdel, the Women's Department of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks). Photographs taken on International Women's Day, March 8 1923, Soviet Russia. #IWD19 #InternationalWomensDay
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May Day, Moscow 1918. Metalworkers celebrate 100 years since the birth of Marx; a globe is wrapped in the words "international socialism".
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Glimmer of hope: more than 100 municipal delegates across Russia have condemned the Russian "operation" in Ukraine. Signatories call on Russian citizens to refuse to participate in the aggression, to not approve of it, and to not be silent. via @Anika_Walke.
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Corbyn has just won a higher share of the vote in England than Blair did in 1997. Just let that sink in.
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Soviet Haggadah 1922: “This year a revolution here; next year - World Revolution!” In place of breaking matzah: the seizing of control of the means of production from the bourgeoisie; in place of the Korech/sandwich: the revolution consumes all oppressors of the working class.
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I'm excited, honoured and to be honest, in disbelief that my new book ‘Antisemitism and the Russian Revolution’ will be launched tonight at the @yivoinstitute in New York. Details here for anyone who is interested:
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The Moscow Metro through the decades, 1930s - 1970s.
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Just published: our article for the Guardian on antisemitism, co-written by me, Ben Gidley (@bengidley) and David Feldman (@PearsInstitute). We make two key points.
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Thanks to @ManchesterUP for putting it out there in the world. The book is available for £15-20 depending on where you buy it. 3/
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Really grateful to have been selected as a 2019 'New Generation Thinker' by @BBCRadio3 and @ahrcpress. Looking forward to learning from producers and my fellow researchers over the coming year. #NewGenerationThinkers
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@liamgallagher Liam my best mate in the world has cancer. His name is Pete. Here he is with you in 2009. Can you send him some love? It’s his 39th birthday tomorrow x
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We could do worse than read Stuart Hall (1987) right now: . "This looks like a moment of total crisis for the Left, when all the reference points, the predictions, have been shot to bits. The political universe, as you have come to inhabit it, collapses. .
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Some of the extraordinary things Russian people have done today to resist this war. 🧵👇.
Glimmer of hope: more than 100 municipal delegates across Russia have condemned the Russian "operation" in Ukraine. Signatories call on Russian citizens to refuse to participate in the aggression, to not approve of it, and to not be silent. via @Anika_Walke.
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Wrote something for @BBCRadio3 and it airs tonight! It's about pogroms in the past and antisemitism in the here and now.
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Big news at the Birkbeck Institute for the Study of Antisemitism, which has just received a major grant from the Open Society Foundations. This comes at a key moment in the field, where is there is significant debate about how to define, understand and combat antisemitism. 1/4.
BISA has received a major funding boost from.@OpenSociety and will forge ahead with its ambitious programme of research, policy and public engagement to promote a better understanding of #antisemitism Full story @BirkbeckUoL
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Soviet Haggadah, 1922: “This year a revolution here; next year - World Revolution!” In place of breaking matzah: the seizing of control of the means of production from the bourgeoisie; in place of the Korech/sandwich: the revolution consumes all oppressors of the working class.
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New book! Co-written with Satnam Virdee. It's about the mess we are in and what we might do about it. Out early next year with @ManchesterUP.
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This is a powerful intervention by leading scholars in the fields of antisemitism and genocide studies.
An Open Letter on the Misuse of Holocaust Memory
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In 1934 a Soviet 'Jewish state' was established 5000 miles east of Moscow in Birobidzhan. To hear more about Stalin's 'forgotten Zion' come to Birkbeck on Feb 25 as we offer a rare UK screening of the classic Soviet film 'Seekers of Happiness'. More info:
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“White supremacy relies on the maintenance of anti-black racism and antisemitism, hence there will never be a time when these two struggles will not be connected”. - bell hooks, ‘Killing Rage, Ending Racism’, 1995.
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"This establishment is a hoard of colossal wealth plundered by Britain from its colonies". Lenin, after visiting the British Museum in 1907. #Lenin150.
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Ever seen a such beautiful and revolutionary football strip? The new FC Vitebsk kit marking 130 years since the birth of El Lissitzky, in collaboration with the Belarusian-Jewish Cultural Heritage Center. Designed by «Ничего Обычного»
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Around 600,000 days have been lost in the 2018 university strike so far. That's more days lost through strike action than the entire UK workforce took in 2015 and 2016 *combined*. #USStrike #USSstrikes #NoCapitualtion.
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‘PROOF!’ Today my book goes to print. For anyone interested, here’s the opening pages. Out late-September with @cambUP_History. Don’t tell me if you spot a typo!
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“The portrayal of Scots as abolitionists and liberal champions has hidden a long history of profiting from slavery in the Caribbean”. This is a must read piece by Yvonne Singh.
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