Matthew Kelly

@matthewjkelly.bsky.social

3K followers 840 following 240 posts

Historian of Britain & Ireland at Northumbria University. Beginning new work on the history of ornithology in twentieth-century Britain.

Videos

Political science 33%

Sociology 31%

Posts Replies Media Videos

Pinned

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · Dec 23

We can all identify with this harassed fella. ‘The Minor Official’ from George Birmingham’s ‘Irishmen All’ (1913). Illustration by Jack B. Yeats.

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 14m

Funder loves Orwell’s work. And working on the life of his ‘invisible’ wife & Orwell’s treatment women, inc. his appalling sexual behaviour, doesn’t change this. Rather than exceptionalising Orwell, tho he is undoubtedly odd, he is treated as shaped by the patriarchal mores of his time.

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 21m

Thought Anna Funder’s Wifedom brilliant. Perhaps the most effective dissection of patriarchy I’ve read. Here’s some reasons why I liked it as a historian.

Anna Funder’s book Wifedom. Mrs Orwell’s Invisible Life (2023).

Reposted by Jonathan Portes, Tim Bale, Miri Rubin , and 1 more Jonathan Portes, Tim Bale, Miri Rubin, Matthew Kelly

Colm Murphy @colmpm.bsky.social · 1d

Breaking the tax pledge is the right call...and politically sulphurous. Reeves must argue, far more forcefully, that taxes are *the* essential downpayment we all pay for a fairer society.

Patrick Diamond and I wrote for @renewaljournal.bsky.social. Key points in 🧵 👇

renewal.org.uk/blog/if-labo...

If Labour want a fairer society, they must argue for it

Labour must make the political argument: taxes are the critical downpayment we all pay to live in a fairer society. It now seems all but certain that direct taxes will rise in the forthcoming Budget...

renewal.org.uk

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 3d

so funny I spat out my coffee / cornflakes as I went to get popcorn

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 3d

This👆

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 3d

I remember feeling touched by this act of solidarity. Just a few short steps from being the Mamdani of Exeter. If only I‘d realised.

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 3d

A supporter nicked a Labour banner from a front garden near the school. They thought nothing of it, I found it a bit unnerving. Moment when the sensitivities of the lower middle-class boy & the boy from the estate met in a political alliance but with unresolved questions of tactics & strategy.

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 3d

Just something historians of Ireland very sensitised to, though saying UK a Good Thing given signals Britain doesn’t technically include Ireland even under the Union, though British as a descriptor- the British Government - a can of worms that most ‘British’ historians don’t worry about enough!

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 3d

Sorry to pedantic, but as you’ll know, Ireland isn’t outside the UK in 1909.

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 3d

Lost as Labour candidate in 92 to mate pretending to be a Liberal Democrat who promised to ban IT coursework.

No amount of pontificating about the degradations of Thatcherism was going to beat that.

Helen Sunderland @helenlsunderland.bsky.social · 17d

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

Research Volunteers Needed for a project on the history of young people and democracy in modern Britain. We would like to hear from people who took part in a mock election at their UK school between 1983 and 2001. Write to us about your experiences here: https://forms.office.com/e/FNAwjfFR7f

Reposted by Matthew Kelly, Steven Fielding

Robert Shrimsley @robertshrimsley.bsky.social · 4d

Labour needs to stop fooling itself and lean in to the political logic of its choices. It is a high taxing, high spending government. www.ft.com/content/00a5...

Reposted by Matthew Kelly

Frank Cogliano @frankcogliano.bsky.social · 5d

What's the German word for the joy one feels when a friend publishes a book?

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 5d

Take all these points, but seems quite specific to BP. Her adherence to her brief is impressively self-controlled & articulate but refusal to be drawn on anything is a serious weakness if her ambitions go beyond a mid-rank ministerial career. She’s going to need to loosen up!

Reposted by Matthew Kelly

Jonathan Hopkin @jonathanhopkin.bsky.social · 7d

I'm sure if any serious attempt was made to do this there would be heads on spikes. It's quite hard to transition to a higher tax and lower consumption economic model, but the current one is clearly creating lots of problems we're no longer able to grow our way out of

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 7d

Do you know that for a fact? Road shd have been reclassified by the CC but would that have overridden the HS2 schedules once in law? Nice earner for the contractors; perhaps not so surprising BCC made as awkward as possible.

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 7d

Agree. I’m sure the redesignation just never happened, nobody got around to it, & then it was overtaken by the HS2 legislation, which wasn‘t based on an on-site visit but ‘authoritative’ maps. Possible the local planning process saw talk of a wildlife corridor…

wasn.mt

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 7d

Mad but fascinating.

Prob reveals legislation partly drafted based on maps rather than on-site checks, meaning Bowood ‘Lane’ effectively misclassified, creating an obligation. Can leg be amended to avoid?

Parody of a planning dispute, when local amenity society wins ‘modification’ to proposals.

Martin Robbins @mjrobbins.com · 8d

My latest: Move over bat tunnel, here’s the wild story of how HS2 were forced to build a multi-million pound bridge for a road that… doesn’t actually exist.

How HS2 built a bridge to nowhere

A state-of-the-art road bridge has been built deep in the heart of rural Buckinghamshire. Designed to carry traffic over the HS2 railway, there's just one tiny problem - there's no actual road.

martinrobbins.substack.com

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 7d

Great post! Is part of the problem that the legislation was drafted as a desk exercise, or partly, meaning Bowood ‘Lane‘ was effectively misclassified (see 1 inch OS?) creating an obligation Bucks CC ruthlessly exploited?

Reposted by Will Jennings, Jonathan Hopkin, Matthew Kelly , and 1 more Will Jennings, Jonathan Hopkin, Matthew Kelly, Jon Dean

Martin Robbins @mjrobbins.com · 8d

My latest: Move over bat tunnel, here’s the wild story of how HS2 were forced to build a multi-million pound bridge for a road that… doesn’t actually exist.

How HS2 built a bridge to nowhere

A state-of-the-art road bridge has been built deep in the heart of rural Buckinghamshire. Designed to carry traffic over the HS2 railway, there's just one tiny problem - there's no actual road.

martinrobbins.substack.com

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 8d

Also, quite far from a research library & given can now acquire old books (’printed primary sources’) easily & cheaply, they end up stacking up too, so something has to give.

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 8d

Yes, once started, surprisingly easy to let stuff go you’ve had in your eyeline for 20 years but not opened for as long. For all the fetishising of books, they become deadweight. Tend to feel differently about nicely read pb fiction tho.

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 8d

Me too. End of single occupancy offices means end of a particular model of academic life. Finding WoB v convenient & I almost believe there might be some virtue in their circular economy schtick. Maybe the monograph they’re giving me 20p for will make it to a graduate student for a couple of quid…

Reposted by Matthew Kelly

Guy Shrubsole @guyshrubsole.bsky.social · 8d

Great trespass along the River Dart today to kick off @righttoroam.bsky.social's 9 river trespasses in November - protesting the inadequacy & unworkability of the Govt's 9 river walks pledge

We trespassed in an estate owned in the Cayman Islands & later met up with kayakers from Friends of the Dart

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 10d

Failure of US party system to produce effective leaders baffles. Complex reasons, I know, explained by brilliant historians & political scientists, but here’s an articulate, young Democrat & to think of that auld dude who ran for office twice. Can’t imagine how frustrating the dysfunction must be.

Matthew Kelly @matthewjkelly.bsky.social · 10d

As a historian writing about the history of ornithology, and not a scientist, I’ve been wondering about this: Robin or robin, blackbird or Blackbird? So, this is helpful!

Reposted by Matthew Kelly, Michael H. Whitworth

Katja Bruisch @kbruisch.bsky.social · 11d

We need a critique of AI in academic publishing. Following my decision not to sign an AI addendum to my contract with Cambridge University Press, I wrote this short essay which is now out in the Dublin Review of Books.
👇
drb.ie/move-over-fo...

Move over for AI - DRB

Katja Bruisch writes: I recently completed a scholarly monograph – an environmental, economic and energy history of peat in imperial and Soviet Russia. After years of thinking and writing, I approache...

drb.ie

Reposted by Matthew Kelly

Patrick walsh @speakerconolly.bsky.social · 11d

Great to see @kbruisch.bsky.social’s superb essay on AI and Academic publishing and its extractive dimensions up on the DRB. @historytcd.bsky.social drb.ie/move-over-fo...

Move over for AI - DRB

drb.ie

Reposted by Matthew Kelly, Carmen M. Mangion

Royal Historical Society @royalhistsoc.org · 12d

Published today: 'Atlantic Isles: Travel and Identity in the British and Irish West, 1880–1940', by Gareth Roddy bit.ly/4nwj9Y2

Gareth's book is the latest title in the Society's New Historical Perspectives series @uolpress.bsky.social. Available Open Access and in paperback print #Skystorians 1/2

Book cover for "Atlantic Isles: Travel and Identity in the British and Irish West, 1880–1940", by Gareth Roddy

Light upyour news

Sign in to Lightnews

Sign up to start reading

Connect Bluesky

Connect with Bluesky

Light up
your news