Catherine Baker
richmondbridge.bsky.social
Catherine Baker
@richmondbridge.bsky.social

Edited The Routledge Companion to Popular Music and Politics of the Balkans (2025) and co-edited Off White: Central/Eastern Europe and the Global History of Race (2024). Eurovision research since longer than I can remember. She/her. .. more

Political science 30%
Sociology 24%

Reposted by Catherine Baker

‘Whatever some clown you sympathise with seems to say it is’, apparently…

A couple of years ago I started 🇺🇦 Duolingo to reinforce the classes I was doing.

It *loves* postmodernism and art talk, compared to other languages. Or so did the human curators when it used to have them.

That little glimpse of cultural sovereignty which has now gone who knows where.
In other news I am currently reading this which is proving most stimulating.

Still worth questioning what made *this* last incident the decisive one bsky.app/profile/adam...
He’s said he’s staying in post for now and will be discussing a transition with the board so I assume he’ll still be around for any votes in December www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/...
BBC Director-General Tim Davie to step down
www.bbc.co.uk

Reposted by Catherine Baker

He’s said he’s staying in post for now and will be discussing a transition with the board so I assume he’ll still be around for any votes in December www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/...
BBC Director-General Tim Davie to step down
www.bbc.co.uk

So now yet a different director-general will be giving the BBC its steer in the vote about Israeli TV’s participation in the next Eurovision that may or may not be happening.
Political Editor New Statesman “SCOOP: Tim Davie is about to announce his resignation as Director General of the BBC, according to a person familiar with the matter.”

Reposted by Catherine Baker

In other news I am currently reading this which is proving most stimulating.

Reposted by Catherine Baker

Political Editor New Statesman “SCOOP: Tim Davie is about to announce his resignation as Director General of the BBC, according to a person familiar with the matter.”
“What was once a reliable, repeatable pillar of her life was ripped away from her, first because she felt like an outlier among her peers, and then..the powers that be took away her right to be on the team.” The government has “targeted the fundamental social pillars upholding trans lives”. so cruel
For @teenvogue.com I wrote about the death of trans athlete Lia Smith and how trans youth kind themselves with central pillars of their lives being constantly ripped away from them because of politics. www.teenvogue.com/story/politi...
Politicizing Transgender Athletes Is Dangerous. Lia Smith Deserved Better.
"Let her passing be an inflection point for how you think about trans rights and trans people more generally."
www.teenvogue.com

Reposted by Catherine Baker

PLEASE DO NOT ASK STAFF WHERE DRACULA’S GRAVE IS THERE ISN’T ONE.

Iconic sign from St Mary’s Church next to Whitby Abbey. I love that people think Bram Stoker’s Dracula was a real person/vampire who lived and died in Whitby.

I have often been surprised how well a critical understanding of the social life of Yugoslav self-management bureaucracy equipped me for navigating HE…

I had Croatia in a model UN the actual UN had put on in London in April 2000 to celebrate the Millennium Development Goals.

Keynotes were an Irish peacekeeper, Zlata Filipović and Geri Halliwell. And I want to say Kofi Annan but would have to dig out souvenir programme to be sure.

We found out John Smith had died in 1994 when I was in the computer room making campaign materials for the Labour team in the middle of our one.
Did you take part in a mock election at your UK school or college between 1983 and 2001?

Share your memories for a research project on young people and democracy in modern Britain!

Write to us about your experiences here: forms.office.com/e/FNAwjfFR7f

Reposted by Catherine Baker

Restricting women’s procreative and bodily sovereignty and overall access to abortion will sure have those effects. As @marta-zboralska.bsky.social writes in a comment on the plummeting birth and population rates in Poland👇 indeed, how many women have emigrated…

www.theguardian.com/world/2025/o...

It can’t feel exactly the same as 1970s-80s because society has already now had the experience of such blatant racism being less permissible - so along w/the racism itself comes the knowledge that people are actively fighting back against that sense of progress many people found pride & safety in…

Reposted by Catherine Baker

Who could have predicted that mainstream media and politicians mainstreaming far-right talking points and symbols would embolden fascists (except all the research available on the matter)?

www.theguardian.com/news/2025/no...
Flags and Christian nationalist slogans feature in soaring attacks on UK mosques
Between July and October, 25 buildings were targeted in 27 attacks, according to British Muslim Trust
www.theguardian.com

Reposted by Catherine Baker

Many thanks to autocorrect, which has decreed that the heir to the French throne was not in fact handed over 'aux hommes' – i.e. to the care & education of men rather than women – in 1787

No, he was handed over to 'his homies'

If you find this wild misprint in my book, please blame Microsoft Word

My very first talk about the project that became Race and the Yugoslav Region was an invite from Nottingham’s Serbian/Croatian team.

Already one of the very few places in the UK where you could study post-Yugoslav languages a decade ago.
Well this is awful news: tinyurl.com/yr65mjkx
'All modern language and music courses are being suspended for new students at the University of Nottingham.'

Nottingham friends: please be assured that we will join you in protesting against this decision in the strongest possible terms. Solidarity.
Music and modern languages courses suspended at University of Nottingham
In a statement the institution also says it is
www.bbc.co.uk

Reposted by Catherine Baker

“If Fulham was where I learned what Englishness meant, Horley showed me what it had become.”

@tamhussein.bsky.social writes about his experiences reporting on migrants, refugees and asylum hotels — and what they reveal about a country wrestling with itself.
Reckoning With Belonging in Britain
Journeys to England’s asylum hotels prompt reflections on what it means when the country you call home may no longer want you
newlinesmag.com

Reposted by Catherine Baker

"Several winners of Cycling UK’s 100 Women in Cycling prize have declined their nominations following the charity’s decision to exclude trans women and non-binary people from the award."

www.bikeradar.com/news/cycling...
Cycling UK’s exclusion of trans women from award prompts winners to withdraw in protest | BikeRadar
The cycling charity’s 100 Women in Cycling prize doesn’t include trans women, following legal advice, which has led to a backlash from the winners
www.bikeradar.com
Well this is awful news: tinyurl.com/yr65mjkx
'All modern language and music courses are being suspended for new students at the University of Nottingham.'

Nottingham friends: please be assured that we will join you in protesting against this decision in the strongest possible terms. Solidarity.
Music and modern languages courses suspended at University of Nottingham
In a statement the institution also says it is
www.bbc.co.uk

Oh well. There we are. Probably not a bad time to have optimistic news stories about new and returning broadcasters floating around. eurotrippodcast.com/2025/11/05/e...

Someone’s probably measuring up the dancing maple leaf outfits for the hello-here-we-are special guest interval act as we speak 🍁
Eurovision organisers discussing Canadian participation
Canadian national broadcaster CBC is in discussions with Eurovision organisers to participate in the competition, The Euro Trip can confirm.
eurotrippodcast.com
In 2020, a young socialist organizer & AIAC contributor sat down with us, sharing his vision for a world that empowers working people over the rich and powerful.

Today, that vision has carried him to City Hall.

Congrats, Mayor @zohrankmamdani.bsky.social! 🌹 africasacountry.com/2020/01/roti...
Roti and roses
Will Shoki sits down with Ugandan-born rapper and housing advocate Zohran Mamdani about his bid to represent Queens in the New York State Assembly.
africasacountry.com

Reposted by Catherine Baker

He did a whole two minute ad highlighting the life of Sylvia Rivera! That was backed by a banger of a track from Sophie, noting the murder of Martha P Johnson. Never mind not running away he embraced NYC trans folks. AND WON! youtu.be/bEvVSpN0BXg?...

This *doesn’t* necessarily mean the song contest - could mean the EBU’s wider Eurovision Network of programming and live link-ups.

Still interesting in a media space where policy debates have usually just been about protecting the future of ‘Canadian content’ when US media are so popular.
🇨🇦 The Canadian government, in its 2025 budget released today, has stated it is “working with CBC/Radio Canada to explore participation in #Eurovision.”

CBC/Radio Canada is an associate EBU member and would need an invitation from the EBU to participate.

Reposted by Catherine Baker

🇨🇦 The Canadian government, in its 2025 budget released today, has stated it is “working with CBC/Radio Canada to explore participation in #Eurovision.”

CBC/Radio Canada is an associate EBU member and would need an invitation from the EBU to participate.
What happens when nationalist history meets the horrors of empire? For @jacobinmag.bsky.social, I reviewed a new exhibition on British counterinsurgency at the Imperial War Museum jacobin.com/2025/11/brit...
Reckoning With Empire at Britain’s Imperial War Museum
An exhibition at London’s Imperial War Museum offers a welcome corrective to the nostalgia for empire common among Britain’s elites.
jacobin.com

‘The proportion is even higher for trans people between the ages of 18 and 24 – who have grown up watching their rights challenged and their safety eroded – with 38% saying they were either very or fairly likely to leave the UK’

Reposted by Catherine Baker

✈️ NEW ✈️

A large proportion of UK trans people are looking to emigrate within the next 10 years, with almost 40% of younger people considering a move abroad, according to a new YouGov poll:
https://goodlaw.social/t2h8
Over a quarter of trans people likely to leave the UK
YouGov poll reveals a large proportion of UK trans people are looking to emigrate within the next 10 years, with almost 40% of younger people considering a move abroad.
goodlaw.social

Reposted by Catherine Baker

Why did the British army have an artist with them in Northern Ireland? Art created by Ken Howard during the Troubles shows the power of images to control the conflict narrative and conceal the reality of war, writes Clare Carolin @kingscollegelondon.bsky.social www.rte.ie/brainstorm/2...
Why did British army employ an artist in Northern Ireland?
Art created by Ken Howard during the Troubles shows the power of images to control the conflict narrative and conceal the reality of war
www.rte.ie