Briony Neilson
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brionyneilson.bsky.social
Briony Neilson
@brionyneilson.bsky.social
Historian of 19th-century France—juvenile incarceration, prisons, settler/penal colonies (esp New Caledonia)

Book: "Dangers of Youth" www.mqup.ca/dangers-of-youth-products-9780228024330.php

Based in Sydney, Australia
Pinned
And delighted now to share this new research article by Charlotte Legg and me that explores settler colonial identities, shared affinities, racial politics and transimperial forms of whiteness in New Caledonia and Australia in the early 20th century. Open access: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
Dusky moon
January 2, 2026 at 10:30 AM
Reposted by Briony Neilson
The opening of a Gothic novel 🗃
Mystery as hundreds of Victorian shoes wash up on Ogmore beach
More than 400 leather hobnailed boots, thought to date back to the 19th Century, have been found.
www.bbc.com
December 23, 2025 at 11:42 PM
The opening of a Gothic novel 🗃
Mystery as hundreds of Victorian shoes wash up on Ogmore beach
More than 400 leather hobnailed boots, thought to date back to the 19th Century, have been found.
www.bbc.com
December 23, 2025 at 11:42 PM
Reposted by Briony Neilson
"We cannot allow our collective grief and fear to be used as a political weapon to attack the Palestine solidarity movement or any other democratic movement... The path to safety is democratic and rooted in our shared community" – Jewish Council of Australia
petitions.getup.org.au/petitions/fr...
ADD YOUR NAME ✍️ We will not be divided after Bondi
On Sunday at Bondi we witnessed the appalling consequences of hatred and how it breeds radicalisation and violence. But as the Jewish community and the whole country grieved, some politicians went on ...
petitions.getup.org.au
December 23, 2025 at 4:48 AM
A hive of activity in the central post office on the rue du Louvre as postal workers sort the mail – Paris, 1923 (Gallica, BnF) 🗃️
December 23, 2025 at 6:01 AM
"We cannot allow our collective grief and fear to be used as a political weapon to attack the Palestine solidarity movement or any other democratic movement... The path to safety is democratic and rooted in our shared community" – Jewish Council of Australia
petitions.getup.org.au/petitions/fr...
ADD YOUR NAME ✍️ We will not be divided after Bondi
On Sunday at Bondi we witnessed the appalling consequences of hatred and how it breeds radicalisation and violence. But as the Jewish community and the whole country grieved, some politicians went on ...
petitions.getup.org.au
December 23, 2025 at 4:48 AM
After the horrific attack on Jewish people at Bondi, Chris Minns has slandered those who stand for justice in Israel Palestine as responsible. He seeks to ban the words Globalise the intifada. Intifada simply means uprising. The Haiti slave revolution was intifada. So was the Warsaw ghetto uprising.
December 22, 2025 at 9:53 AM
NSW premier “Chris Minns’ protest ban has the premise that preventing the murder of Jews in Sydney means consenting to the murder of Palestinians in Gaza. It is not just authoritarian: it is breathtakingly racist and must be resisted.”
Opposing genocide and supporting justice for all is not a crime.
Minns’ protest ban: breathtakingly racist, authoritarian, and must be resisted - Michael West
Chris Minns’ protest ban is not just authoritarian: it is breathtakingly racist and must be resisted, writes Nick Riemer.
michaelwest.com.au
December 22, 2025 at 8:19 AM
And here an impressively moustachioed staff member displays a census counting machine in the French census office in Paris in 1911 (Gallica, BnF) 🗃️
December 21, 2025 at 6:05 AM
Reposted by Briony Neilson
If there only was a word for a governing system in which one set of laws applied to people of a specific race, and a completely different and much harsher set of laws applied to those of another race...

www.cbc.ca/news/world/i...
December 21, 2025 at 3:23 AM
Reposted by Briony Neilson
Further scenes at the French census office in Paris in 1911: A line of women workers process piles of census forms (Gallica, BnF) 🗃️
December 20, 2025 at 7:43 AM
Further scenes at the French census office in Paris in 1911: A line of women workers process piles of census forms (Gallica, BnF) 🗃️
December 20, 2025 at 7:43 AM
Reposted by Briony Neilson
The ambiguous intimacy of the census: women workers sort through forms in the French census office in Paris in 1911 (Gallica, BnF) 🗃️
December 19, 2025 at 12:08 AM
Reposted by Briony Neilson
Linking the march across the bridge to the massacre is disgusting and everyone doing so should be deeply ashamed of their giving tacit support for genocide

www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...
NSW to effectively ban protests for up to three months as premier links Gaza rallies to Bondi terror attack
Chris Minns says state ‘can’t risk another mass demonstration on that scale in NSW [because] the implications can be seen, in my view, on Sunday’
www.theguardian.com
December 19, 2025 at 7:14 AM
Paris is a city haunted by a ghost in chinos and fawn loafers, so says Google Maps
December 19, 2025 at 6:08 AM
Reposted by Briony Neilson
“Ahmed Al Ahmed. He saved my life & my 4yr old”
“I can only say thank you to that Muslim brother”

This is what the media should show. Messages of unity & hope from survivors. Despite that it’s not the answer this Sky News journo was seeking. #auspol #Bondi
December 19, 2025 at 12:51 AM
Following the horrific antisemitic attack at Bondi supporters of peace & rights for all in Israel Palestine are being slurred as supporters of terrorist atrocity. In a democracy peaceful protest is essential but NSW Premier Minns wants more powers to ban it. Write urgently to MPs using this template
Letter to NSW MPs: Protect democracy - don't ban protests
In an attempt to exploit the horrific trauma produced by the recent mass shooting that devastated the Jewish community in Bondi, the state NSW premier, Chris Minns, announced that Labor would move to ...
palestinejusticemovement.good.do
December 19, 2025 at 1:03 AM
The ambiguous intimacy of the census: women workers sort through forms in the French census office in Paris in 1911 (Gallica, BnF) 🗃️
December 19, 2025 at 12:08 AM
Women workers pore over pages and pages of people's responses in the French census office in Paris in 1911 (Gallica, BnF) 🗃️
December 18, 2025 at 5:41 AM
Reposted by Briony Neilson
The History department at the University of Toronto is searching in the field of Ukrainian history.
networks.h-net.org/group/discus...
University of Toronto - Associate Professor/Professor - John Yaremko Chair in Ukrainian History | H-Net
The Department of History in the Faculty of Arts and Science at the University of Toronto invites applications for a full-time tenure stream position in Ukrainian History. The appointment will be at t...
networks.h-net.org
December 18, 2025 at 2:08 AM
"[T]he horror of the Bondi killings [is] facilitat[ing] a renewed ideological campaign against Gaza solidarity by those who always hated the anti-genocide movement." – Jeff Sparrow
“If we’re to emerge from this awful spiral,” writes @jeffsparrow1.bsky.social, “we’ll only do so on the basis of a very different politics: one that takes for granted the ability of ordinary people — of any race, gender or creed — to unite against racism and violence.”
On the need for a renewed democratic universalism - Overland literary journal
If we’re to emerge from this awful spiral, in which one form of identitarian chauvinism spurs the next, we’ll only do so on the basis of a very different politics: one that takes for granted the abili...
overland.org.au
December 18, 2025 at 3:30 AM
It's never not a good time to gaze at a Caspar David Friedrich

Caspar David Friedrich, 'Giant Mountains (Riesengebirge) / Before sunrise in the mountains,' c.1830 (oil on canvas, Alte Nationalgalerie)
December 17, 2025 at 10:51 PM
'"What Ahmed did is a source of pride for us, for Arabs, for Islam, and for Muslims, given that he performed a heroic act that saved a number of lives regardless of knowing if they were Christians or Muslims or otherwise," Ahmed Al Ahmed's uncle Mohammad Al Ahmed said.'
Bondi hero a 'source of pride' for small town in Syria
The village of Al Nayrab, in north-west Syria, is the hometown of Bondi hero Ahmed Al Ahmed — and its residents are filled with pride.
www.abc.net.au
December 17, 2025 at 6:41 AM
Reposted by Briony Neilson
Neither MUP nor the Melbourne University council even tried to save Meanjin. In fact they chose *not* to pursue offers to help save it.
They also actively ignored the advice of the independent review they commissioned into Meanjin's sustainability. They just shut it.
FOI documents reveal that Melbourne University Publishing’s council didn’t even debate trying to save Meanjin, treating its closure as a fait accompli.
FOI docs reveal Meanjin axing never debated by Melbourne Uni. And why were all bids to save it rejected?
www.crikey.com.au
December 17, 2025 at 3:11 AM
"After the Bondi massacre, we don’t have the luxury to grieve silently" www.972mag.com/bondi-massac...
December 16, 2025 at 10:11 AM