Dan Hicks
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profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks
@profdanhicks.bsky.social
13K followers 1.4K following 780 posts

Museum Curator and Professor of Contemporary Archaeology, Oxford University • Fellow of St Cross College, Oxford • Tutor Art/Anthropology • https://linktr.ee/danhicks

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Dan Hicks, is a British archaeologist and anthropologist. He is Professor of Contemporary Archaeology at the University of Oxford, Curator at the Pitt Rivers Museum, and a Fellow of St Cross College, Oxford. His research is focused on contemporary archaeology, material culture studies, historical archaeology, colonial history, heritage studies, and the history of art, archaeology, anthropology, and museum collections. .. more

History 33%
Environmental science 16%
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profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 23d
honoured to see #everymonumentwillfall named as an @artforum.com book of 2025 www.artforum.com/lists/best-o...
Books
Fourteen writers, artists, and scholars choose the year’s outstanding titles.
www.artforum.com

Reposted by Richard S.J. Tol, Jonathan M. Gilligan, Efrén O. Pérez , and 2 more

reuters.com
Reuters @reuters.com · 1d
Kennedy Center Christmas Eve jazz concert canceled after Trump's name added reut.rs/3NfgBky
Kennedy Center Christmas Eve jazz concert canceled after Trump's name added
A planned Christmas Eve jazz concert at the Kennedy Center was canceled, with the host of the longtime annual performance attributing the decision to the addition of Republican U.S. President Donald Trump's name to the institution in Washington.
reut.rs

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 2d
🙏🙏

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 2d
on a hopeful note, 2026 will I believe see a new public dialogue about the scandal of unregulated human remains in UK institutions, from museums to universities — that open secret that so urgently needs addressing

Reposted by Dan Hicks

hookland.bsky.social
hookland.bsky.social @hookland.bsky.social · 2d
It is a profound horror. A day will come when the word elite is no longer a forcefield against consequences.

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 2d
Sadly that’s exactly right, David 💯🙏✨

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 2d
yet another desperate story about elite universities and their treatment of the dead — this time from Harvard
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/17/u...
Ex-Harvard Medical Morgue Manager Who Sold Body Parts Gets 8-Year Sentence
www.nytimes.com

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 4d
an interesting and compelling appropriation and reimagining of the symbol of the so-called “Famine Queen”

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 4d
Sheffield's 1904 Queen Victoria statue in Endcliffe Park was dowsed in red paint, and the words FREE THE HUNGER STRIKERS written on the pedestal, overnight — in solidarity with and to raise awareness of the six people who remain on hunger strike in British prisons today

Reposted by Margot C. Finn

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 4d
An important summary of where we are now on the charities act and restitution here in the UK

bateswells.co.uk/updates/unus...
Unusual use of powers: DCMS purports to change effect of Act of Parliament by commencement SI | Bates Wells
On 14 November, Civil Society minister Stephanie Peacock signed a statutory instrument, to bring into force the beleaguered provisions on “ex gratia” moral payments in the Charities Act 2022 with effe...
bateswells.co.uk

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 6d
🙏🙏🙏

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 6d
✨❄️🙏

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 6d
more on Empire Lines and the amazing Jelena Sofronijevic here >> jelsofron.com/empire-lines/
EMPIRE LINES - JELENA SOFRONIJEVIC
EMPIRE LINES uncovers the unexpected, often two-way, flows of empires through art. Interdisciplinary thinkers use individual artworks as artefacts of imperial exchange, revealing the how and why of th...
jelsofron.com

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 6d
Just published - a new #EveryMonumentWillFall podcast

Empire Lines X Dan Hicks, recorded with a live audience at Oxford's Common Ground in October

find it here on Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts >> open.spotify.com/episode/3Yv1...
Every Monument Will Fall, Dan Hicks (2025) (EMPIRE LINES Live at Common Ground, Oxford)
open.spotify.com

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 6d
Happy Holidays everyone ❄️

and a very special Winterval to the self-styled anti-woke, “diversity is weakness” brigade ✨

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 6d
✨✨happy holidays to all — and a reminder that there’s still time to get down to your favourite independent bookseller and gift someone a copy of #EveryMonumentWillFall, or give it to yourself — or even listen to me reading it all out wherever you get your audiobooks www.danhicks.uk/every-monume...

Reposted by Dan Hicks

barackobama.bsky.social
Barack Obama @barackobama.bsky.social · 7d
While in Chicago, I took a tour around the Obama Presidential Center. I can’t wait for you all to visit in June 2026. Here’s a sneak peek:

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 8d
(4/4) Never mind cultural usury — it’s time to return stolen art and culture and build new equitable relationships from our museums. That, however, would require political leadership and understanding from the Culture Secretary which isn’t currently there. www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/abd2d00...
British Museum sends artefacts abroad to help countries ‘decolonise’
Museum director hopes the loan project will be a ‘new model’ for seeking redress for colonialism
www.telegraph.co.uk

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 8d
(3/4) It becomes patriarchal interference, the exercise of soft power based on the antidemocratic circumvention of elected governments demanding returns to broker deals with independent museums, from Ghana to India.

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 8d
(2/4) That methodology and model is the defunct V&A Circulation Department that loaned objects to regional UK locations from 1909 until former director Sir Roy Strong shut it down in 1977.

When now applied to formerly colonised nations as “cultural diplomacy” what does this circulationism become?

Reposted by Sarah Smith

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 8d
What is this “new model”, for museum loans that we increasingly read about in the press releases of UK national museums? Loans have always taken place from these museums of course. Ramping them up to distract from restitution demands borrows a methodology from the old Edwardian V&A model (1/4)

Reposted by Dolly Jørgensen, Andrew Thacker, Dan Hicks

britishacademy.bsky.social
The British Academy @britishacademy.bsky.social · 9d
Very welcome news today that the UK will join the Erasmus+ programme in 2027. This will enable greater opportunities for study abroad and contributions in UK universities, and is something we called for in our most recent Manifesto.

Reposted by Henning Melber, Hansjörg Dilger, Dan Hicks

decolonizeberlin.bsky.social
Decolonize Berlin @decolonizeberlin.bsky.social · 10d
Gemeinsame Pressemitteilung: Offener Brief – Der Bund hat die Pflicht zur Kolonialismus Aufarbeitung und Erinnerung

Hier geht es zum Offenen Brief: decolonize-berlin.de/de/pressemit...

Mitzeichnung über den Link weiterhin möglich!

Reposted by Catherine J. Frieman, Dan Hicks

ghoulpus.bsky.social
A.L. Goldfuss @ghoulpus.bsky.social · 13d
YOUTUBE: you like history
ME: I do!
YOUTUBE: and you're white
ME: well, I mean
YOUTUBE: here are some white people who also like histor--
ME: no no no No NO NO NO

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 13d
there’s a few of these #everymonumentwillfall postcards at Bookmarks Socialist Bookshop in London — go and pick one up if you’re near Bloomsbury/Tottenham Court Road #StayWithTheFragments

Reposted by Dan Hicks

rebeccasolnit.bsky.social
Rebecca Solnit @rebeccasolnit.bsky.social · 13d
It was @dahlialithwick.bsky.social who described these executive orders as "letters to Santa," I believe.
reptedlieu.bsky.social Rep. Ted Lieu @reptedlieu.bsky.social · 13d
Statement on Trump’s Executive Order Restricting State Regulation of AI
Statement on Trump’s Executive Order Restricting State Regulation of AI

Reposted by David Stott

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 14d
Before anyone asks where I was on 25 September I have a rock solid alibi, I was at work in a museum of stolen objects oh no wait
profdanhicks.bsky.social Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 14d
Sorry to read about these thefts from the colonial collections of Bristol Museum, wishing for a speedy recovery

And some still claim objects are safer in the warehouses of European museums rather than with the communities from whom they were originally stolen 🙃

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Hundreds of items stolen in 'high-value' Bristol Museum raid
More than 600 artefacts from the museum's British Empire and Commonwealth collection were taken.
www.bbc.co.uk

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 14d
Sorry to read about these thefts from the colonial collections of Bristol Museum, wishing for a speedy recovery

And some still claim objects are safer in the warehouses of European museums rather than with the communities from whom they were originally stolen 🙃

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Hundreds of items stolen in 'high-value' Bristol Museum raid
More than 600 artefacts from the museum's British Empire and Commonwealth collection were taken.
www.bbc.co.uk

Reposted by Andreas Mehler

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 17d
Tomorrow in London —all welcome!

www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/laying-anc...
Laying Ancestors to Rest - The Follow-up Parliamentary Briefing
APPG on Afrikan Reparations parliamentary briefing reconsidering the politics of retention and reimagining repatriation
www.eventbrite.co.uk

profdanhicks.bsky.social
Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 17d
looking forward to participating in the online book launch this Thursday for this important new edited volume
danielpalacios.bsky.social Daniel Palacios González @danielpalacios.bsky.social · 18d
I am thrilled to announce the digital launch of our new book, Redefining Monuments! 📘 🎉 The @memstudiesassoc.bsky.social will host the event online on 11 December. José and I will be in conversation with Britt Baillie, @profdanhicks.bsky.social and Gal Kirn to discuss how we can redefine monuments!

Reposted by Dan Hicks

danielpalacios.bsky.social
Daniel Palacios González @danielpalacios.bsky.social · 18d
For more information, please visit the MSA website! You can register here:
events.teams.microsoft.com/event/72abb8...