Farah Bakaari
@bakaari.bsky.social
keeping east coast hours in pacific standard time
Pinned
Farah Bakaari
@bakaari.bsky.social
· Nov 18
yes, i’m a class A curmudgeon, but a basic tenant of my professional life is to act as though the pie is always larger than we are told it is. i’m always happy to choose fellowship over ambition. i’ve no anxiety about influence. may this always be the case.
genuine question: what were airports like before cellphones?!
December 30, 2025 at 4:14 AM
genuine question: what were airports like before cellphones?!
Reposted by Farah Bakaari
MTC New Year's Letter from our editor-in-chief plus our editors' picks of 2025. Thank you everyone for helping us have a great year! See you next year and happy holidays ✨
tinyurl.com/bddh3y4r
tinyurl.com/bddh3y4r
December 30, 2025 at 12:24 AM
MTC New Year's Letter from our editor-in-chief plus our editors' picks of 2025. Thank you everyone for helping us have a great year! See you next year and happy holidays ✨
tinyurl.com/bddh3y4r
tinyurl.com/bddh3y4r
i finally watched the finale of the beast in me and wow, aggie is not a good writer.
December 29, 2025 at 3:05 PM
i finally watched the finale of the beast in me and wow, aggie is not a good writer.
Reposted by Farah Bakaari
Additionally, let’s not add -ness and -y to make nouns and adjectives. Let’s do the hard and beautiful work of description.
can we stop inventing new words for describing regular old things?!
December 28, 2025 at 9:43 PM
Additionally, let’s not add -ness and -y to make nouns and adjectives. Let’s do the hard and beautiful work of description.
can we stop inventing new words for describing regular old things?!
December 28, 2025 at 9:28 PM
can we stop inventing new words for describing regular old things?!
it turns out i am always a really slow writer until i start writing something no one has asked for or cares about while way overdue on everything else.
December 28, 2025 at 6:12 PM
it turns out i am always a really slow writer until i start writing something no one has asked for or cares about while way overdue on everything else.
a little known fact about me is that most people in my life know little to nothing about where i am from which in a morning like today and yesterday feels rather surreal.
December 27, 2025 at 4:58 PM
a little known fact about me is that most people in my life know little to nothing about where i am from which in a morning like today and yesterday feels rather surreal.
in the spring, i’m teaching an undergraduate seminar on criticism that is solely organized around doris lessing’s the golden notebook and i couldn’t be more excited :/
December 26, 2025 at 6:01 PM
in the spring, i’m teaching an undergraduate seminar on criticism that is solely organized around doris lessing’s the golden notebook and i couldn’t be more excited :/
Reposted by Farah Bakaari
for my PhD exams I spent months reading 300+ books in European intellectual history, modern European history, modern Jewish history, medieval Jewish history, and critical theory. There is a huge difference between the style of reading that accommodates this, and having a computer "summarize" books.
December 22, 2025 at 8:01 PM
for my PhD exams I spent months reading 300+ books in European intellectual history, modern European history, modern Jewish history, medieval Jewish history, and critical theory. There is a huge difference between the style of reading that accommodates this, and having a computer "summarize" books.
guess how many snacks i got for my marathon grading!? a lot but probably not enough 🫠
December 22, 2025 at 8:29 PM
guess how many snacks i got for my marathon grading!? a lot but probably not enough 🫠
Reposted by Farah Bakaari
i’m currently reading a novel that’s genuinely bad for my health and general wellbeing and has intervened with my sleep and has put me in a very bad mood. and yet, i continue to neglect grading and other duties to read it. i’d like to see a machine do that
December 21, 2025 at 7:08 PM
i’m currently reading a novel that’s genuinely bad for my health and general wellbeing and has intervened with my sleep and has put me in a very bad mood. and yet, i continue to neglect grading and other duties to read it. i’d like to see a machine do that
i’m currently reading a novel that’s genuinely bad for my health and general wellbeing and has intervened with my sleep and has put me in a very bad mood. and yet, i continue to neglect grading and other duties to read it. i’d like to see a machine do that
December 21, 2025 at 7:08 PM
i’m currently reading a novel that’s genuinely bad for my health and general wellbeing and has intervened with my sleep and has put me in a very bad mood. and yet, i continue to neglect grading and other duties to read it. i’d like to see a machine do that
my mood at 9am on this sunday.
December 21, 2025 at 5:08 PM
my mood at 9am on this sunday.
i don’t want to be around anymore.
6) The fake citation you found co-piloting on the internet, is not (yet) in the library catalogue. However, your library page might still show you this found reference, and it pretends that this reference is published somewhere. So, halleluja, enjoy your time spent online.
December 21, 2025 at 4:54 PM
i don’t want to be around anymore.
as someone who went to not one but two small experimental art pubs parties last night and who co-founded another, i find the scene i just read pretty funny.
December 19, 2025 at 5:46 PM
as someone who went to not one but two small experimental art pubs parties last night and who co-founded another, i find the scene i just read pretty funny.
Reposted by Farah Bakaari
we just finished the last editorial meeting of the calendar year for @mid-theory.bsky.social. it’s hard to believe we’ve only been up for 14 months. personally & professionally 2025 has been quite the year for me, but MTC remains the thing i am most proud of & the one i’ve worked the hardest at! 🎉🥂
December 18, 2025 at 12:50 AM
we just finished the last editorial meeting of the calendar year for @mid-theory.bsky.social. it’s hard to believe we’ve only been up for 14 months. personally & professionally 2025 has been quite the year for me, but MTC remains the thing i am most proud of & the one i’ve worked the hardest at! 🎉🥂
Reposted by Farah Bakaari
Thank you to the brilliant editors at @mid-theory.bsky.social for the chance to write about some of my favorite subjects: transfictional character, gender performance, and Daniel Craig’s tenure as a post-9/11, “serially straight” James Bond.
The Drag of Being Bond
It is a drag, and it is drag doing the gender work expected of 007. One of popular media’s perennial questions, whether the role is currently filled or not, is “who will be the next James Bond?” It…
mid-theory.com
December 18, 2025 at 9:28 PM
Thank you to the brilliant editors at @mid-theory.bsky.social for the chance to write about some of my favorite subjects: transfictional character, gender performance, and Daniel Craig’s tenure as a post-9/11, “serially straight” James Bond.
Reposted by Farah Bakaari
"It is a drag, and it is drag doing the gender work expected of 007.
This year Amazon acquired full creative rights to the James Bond franchise. And as the quest for the next 007 drags on, Lauren Eriks Cline reflects on Daniel Craig's legacy in making palpable the character’s coerced masculinity.
This year Amazon acquired full creative rights to the James Bond franchise. And as the quest for the next 007 drags on, Lauren Eriks Cline reflects on Daniel Craig's legacy in making palpable the character’s coerced masculinity.
The Drag of Being Bond
It is a drag, and it is drag doing the gender work expected of 007. One of popular media’s perennial questions, whether the role is currently filled or not, is “who will be the next James Bond?” It…
mid-theory.com
December 18, 2025 at 8:05 PM
"It is a drag, and it is drag doing the gender work expected of 007.
This year Amazon acquired full creative rights to the James Bond franchise. And as the quest for the next 007 drags on, Lauren Eriks Cline reflects on Daniel Craig's legacy in making palpable the character’s coerced masculinity.
This year Amazon acquired full creative rights to the James Bond franchise. And as the quest for the next 007 drags on, Lauren Eriks Cline reflects on Daniel Craig's legacy in making palpable the character’s coerced masculinity.
we just finished the last editorial meeting of the calendar year for @mid-theory.bsky.social. it’s hard to believe we’ve only been up for 14 months. personally & professionally 2025 has been quite the year for me, but MTC remains the thing i am most proud of & the one i’ve worked the hardest at! 🎉🥂
December 18, 2025 at 12:50 AM
we just finished the last editorial meeting of the calendar year for @mid-theory.bsky.social. it’s hard to believe we’ve only been up for 14 months. personally & professionally 2025 has been quite the year for me, but MTC remains the thing i am most proud of & the one i’ve worked the hardest at! 🎉🥂
every day this week, while i had been cooped up inside with a deadline, it’s been 50° and sunny, but the minute i finished and could go run errands and get life done, it rains all day.
December 17, 2025 at 8:36 PM
every day this week, while i had been cooped up inside with a deadline, it’s been 50° and sunny, but the minute i finished and could go run errands and get life done, it rains all day.
i’m late to the party but only because i was late with an essay for @johannawinant.bsky.social this is stunning and true 🤩
“When offered a poem, and time, and attention, and good faith, my students offered their own arguments back as if they had been waiting their whole lives for the chance…”
“When offered a poem, and time, and attention, and good faith, my students offered their own arguments back as if they had been waiting their whole lives for the chance…”
The Claims of Close Reading - Boston Review
Literary studies have been starved by austerity, but their core methodology remains radical.
www.bostonreview.net
December 17, 2025 at 6:20 PM
i’m late to the party but only because i was late with an essay for @johannawinant.bsky.social this is stunning and true 🤩
“When offered a poem, and time, and attention, and good faith, my students offered their own arguments back as if they had been waiting their whole lives for the chance…”
“When offered a poem, and time, and attention, and good faith, my students offered their own arguments back as if they had been waiting their whole lives for the chance…”
Reposted by Farah Bakaari
Stephanie Insley Hershinow surveys recent Austen-related works on Jane Austen's 250th birthday: "Austen offers endless opportunity for examination and reexamination; still, it might be fair to ask what more one can say about our dear Jane." https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/happy-birthday-jane/
December 16, 2025 at 4:21 PM
Stephanie Insley Hershinow surveys recent Austen-related works on Jane Austen's 250th birthday: "Austen offers endless opportunity for examination and reexamination; still, it might be fair to ask what more one can say about our dear Jane." https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/happy-birthday-jane/
i managed to meet my modest goal of finishing a shamefully overdue essay i have been dragging on all semester before the dept. holiday party this evening. only catch the essay is now twice as long as the word limit. but i think that’s tomorrow’s problem. for now i’ve earned myself a manhattan.
December 13, 2025 at 2:25 AM
i managed to meet my modest goal of finishing a shamefully overdue essay i have been dragging on all semester before the dept. holiday party this evening. only catch the essay is now twice as long as the word limit. but i think that’s tomorrow’s problem. for now i’ve earned myself a manhattan.
Reposted by Farah Bakaari
"With no closure in sight, readers join Alex in his pursuit of the unspeakable, hovering in an endless silence thick as blue smoke." Read Korey Williams revisiting of Richard Bruce Nugent's “Smoke, Lilies and Jade" for MTC celebration of Harlem Renaissance Centennial
mid-theory.com/2025/12/11/h...
mid-theory.com/2025/12/11/h...
Hold Up: Grief’s Uneasy Pleasures in Richard Bruce Nugent’s ‘Smoke, Lilies and Jade’
In honor of Harlem Renaissance Centennial, poet and scholar Korey Williams revisits Richard Bruce Nugent’s blazing queer short story ‘Smoke, Lilies and Jade.’ Williams reflects on…
mid-theory.com
December 12, 2025 at 4:12 PM
"With no closure in sight, readers join Alex in his pursuit of the unspeakable, hovering in an endless silence thick as blue smoke." Read Korey Williams revisiting of Richard Bruce Nugent's “Smoke, Lilies and Jade" for MTC celebration of Harlem Renaissance Centennial
mid-theory.com/2025/12/11/h...
mid-theory.com/2025/12/11/h...
Reposted by Farah Bakaari
In honor of Harlem Renaissance Centennial, Korey Williams revisits Richard Bruce Nugent’s blazing queer short story ‘Smoke, Lilies and Jade.’ Williams reflects on the story’s treatise on love and beauty, its abiding legacy, and its singular lesson for today’s living. #HarlemRenaissance100
Hold Up: Grief’s Uneasy Pleasures in Richard Bruce Nugent’s ‘Smoke, Lilies and Jade’
In honor of Harlem Renaissance Centennial, poet and scholar Korey Williams revisits Richard Bruce Nugent’s blazing queer short story ‘Smoke, Lilies and Jade.’ Williams reflects on…
mid-theory.com
December 11, 2025 at 6:04 PM
In honor of Harlem Renaissance Centennial, Korey Williams revisits Richard Bruce Nugent’s blazing queer short story ‘Smoke, Lilies and Jade.’ Williams reflects on the story’s treatise on love and beauty, its abiding legacy, and its singular lesson for today’s living. #HarlemRenaissance100