Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
@caitcoker.bsky.social
Curator, fangirl, utter nerd. Assoc. Prof/Curator of Rare Books and Manuscripts at U of Illinois Urbana Champaign. Co-Editor Women in Book History Bibliography at womensbookhistory.org. Fan Studies, Tolkien Studies, SFF Studies. I just really love books ok
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
Happy to report that the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign academic senate overwhelmingly passed a resolution against the federal “compact” all of us in higher ed have been offered, encouraging our administrators to keep opposing it. #MADC www.senate.illinois.edu/2025-2026/20...
www.senate.illinois.edu
November 11, 2025 at 2:15 AM
Happy to report that the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign academic senate overwhelmingly passed a resolution against the federal “compact” all of us in higher ed have been offered, encouraging our administrators to keep opposing it. #MADC www.senate.illinois.edu/2025-2026/20...
Kassiani (Byzantine poetess) in progress…
November 9, 2025 at 9:13 PM
Kassiani (Byzantine poetess) in progress…
Charmed by 24/7 cake machine on a lonely chill road.
24/7 cake vending machine in the middle of nowhere. Maximum Poland.
November 9, 2025 at 8:23 PM
Charmed by 24/7 cake machine on a lonely chill road.
Female-Orgasm Industrial Complex is my new band name FYI.
It's mostly covers of Josie & the Pussycats and Marvin Gaye but set to nu metal. Our one-off album will be called The Tyrannt.
It's mostly covers of Josie & the Pussycats and Marvin Gaye but set to nu metal. Our one-off album will be called The Tyrannt.
The Tyranny of the Female-Orgasm Industrial Complex
What one woman’s quest for sexual satisfaction reveals about desire, hysteria, feminism, and capitalism
theatln.tc
November 9, 2025 at 3:26 AM
Female-Orgasm Industrial Complex is my new band name FYI.
It's mostly covers of Josie & the Pussycats and Marvin Gaye but set to nu metal. Our one-off album will be called The Tyrannt.
It's mostly covers of Josie & the Pussycats and Marvin Gaye but set to nu metal. Our one-off album will be called The Tyrannt.
Honestly just gonna pretend this image is of Percy Shelley and it's unclear if the handwriting is Mary's, Claire's, or Byron's.
Happy GdT Frankenstein on Netflix day everyone #filmsky 📽️
November 8, 2025 at 2:31 AM
Honestly just gonna pretend this image is of Percy Shelley and it's unclear if the handwriting is Mary's, Claire's, or Byron's.
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
#InterviewWithTheVampire
#TheVampireLestat #iwtv
Birthday Boy Lestat appears in a new teaser shared by @annerice.amc.com!
#TheVampireLestat #iwtv
Birthday Boy Lestat appears in a new teaser shared by @annerice.amc.com!
November 7, 2025 at 5:36 PM
#InterviewWithTheVampire
#TheVampireLestat #iwtv
Birthday Boy Lestat appears in a new teaser shared by @annerice.amc.com!
#TheVampireLestat #iwtv
Birthday Boy Lestat appears in a new teaser shared by @annerice.amc.com!
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
The Heritage Foundation has given the Emily Dickinson Museum (@emilydickinson.bsky.social) a C in its new guide to historic sites nationwide because events at the museum reportedly "celebrate abortion, homosexuality, and a whole host of progressive causes," so anyway, sounds cool, I'll be visiting
November 6, 2025 at 2:02 PM
The Heritage Foundation has given the Emily Dickinson Museum (@emilydickinson.bsky.social) a C in its new guide to historic sites nationwide because events at the museum reportedly "celebrate abortion, homosexuality, and a whole host of progressive causes," so anyway, sounds cool, I'll be visiting
New acquisition: a manuscript copy of a printed biography of a transwoman. France, 1859. (And after this, showing off cool items to Economics faculty…)
November 7, 2025 at 4:19 PM
New acquisition: a manuscript copy of a printed biography of a transwoman. France, 1859. (And after this, showing off cool items to Economics faculty…)
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
Same—ask your library to buy what you want! (Plus if the authors/books you want are BIPoC, queer, and/or by other folks libraries/publishers under-resource, you're helping good librarians argue against bigots by proving local demand, & putting that book on the shelf for others to discover)
can confirm that the only time I've been rejected by the UVA Library or JMRL is when they can't find the title to buy or already own the book, and I've requested a LOT of books
HOT LIBRARY INTEL: you can ask your library to purchase specific titles for their collection, usually right through the library's website.
Librarians can't know every single new title, nor can they mind-read what their patrons might want to check out. Give it a shot!
Librarians can't know every single new title, nor can they mind-read what their patrons might want to check out. Give it a shot!
November 7, 2025 at 10:46 AM
Same—ask your library to buy what you want! (Plus if the authors/books you want are BIPoC, queer, and/or by other folks libraries/publishers under-resource, you're helping good librarians argue against bigots by proving local demand, & putting that book on the shelf for others to discover)
Had a long depressing conversation about invisible/unacknowledged labor and then come see the same stuff on bsky. More things change, etc.
November 6, 2025 at 3:48 PM
Had a long depressing conversation about invisible/unacknowledged labor and then come see the same stuff on bsky. More things change, etc.
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
Vincent van Gogh made this lithography of “potato eaters” by himself and sent it to his brother Theo and some friends as a prior announcement of the painting.
1885.
Litho technique allowed artists to express their own artistic style in a mass production way without compromising the quality.
1885.
Litho technique allowed artists to express their own artistic style in a mass production way without compromising the quality.
November 6, 2025 at 12:18 PM
Vincent van Gogh made this lithography of “potato eaters” by himself and sent it to his brother Theo and some friends as a prior announcement of the painting.
1885.
Litho technique allowed artists to express their own artistic style in a mass production way without compromising the quality.
1885.
Litho technique allowed artists to express their own artistic style in a mass production way without compromising the quality.
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
New print in honor of Studs and my neighbors standing up to protect our communities. #letterpress
www.starshaped.com/8x10prints/o...
www.starshaped.com/8x10prints/o...
November 6, 2025 at 12:44 AM
New print in honor of Studs and my neighbors standing up to protect our communities. #letterpress
www.starshaped.com/8x10prints/o...
www.starshaped.com/8x10prints/o...
On booksellers redacting parts of books they otherwise couldn't sell due to censorship (esp LGBTQ+ books): “It doesn’t let people forget that there is a problem.”
In Russia, Bookstores Offer a Shrinking Refuge as Censorship Tightens
www.nytimes.com
November 5, 2025 at 6:13 PM
On booksellers redacting parts of books they otherwise couldn't sell due to censorship (esp LGBTQ+ books): “It doesn’t let people forget that there is a problem.”
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
🥳🥳🥳
Today is the LAUNCH DAY for
‼️GENDERTRASH FROM HELL ‼️
The zine that redefined transsexual culture forever
THAT'S RIGHT: GENDERTRASH IS NOW LEGALLY AVAILABLE WITHOUT AGE RESTRICTIONS
Get it from our website, or from all good bookstores. You can even ask your library to order it!
💥📕💏🫦💥
‼️GENDERTRASH FROM HELL ‼️
The zine that redefined transsexual culture forever
THAT'S RIGHT: GENDERTRASH IS NOW LEGALLY AVAILABLE WITHOUT AGE RESTRICTIONS
Get it from our website, or from all good bookstores. You can even ask your library to order it!
💥📕💏🫦💥
Gendertrash From Hell - ALL-NEW — LittlePuss Press
Long-lost and all-new zines revealing the secret history of contemporary transgender culture
www.littlepuss.net
November 4, 2025 at 5:11 PM
🥳🥳🥳
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
It's also publication day for my comrade Char Adams's new book "Black-Owned: The Revolutionary Life of the Black Bookstore." It's the first book to offer a comprehensive history of the Black bookstore. I found the book very readable and informative. www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/734577...
Black-Owned by Char Adams: 9780593474235 | PenguinRandomHouse.com: Books
**A November LibraryReads Pick** Longtime NBC News reporter Char Adams writes a deeply compelling and rigorously reported history of Black political movements told through the lens of Black-owned boo...
www.penguinrandomhouse.com
November 4, 2025 at 5:17 PM
It's also publication day for my comrade Char Adams's new book "Black-Owned: The Revolutionary Life of the Black Bookstore." It's the first book to offer a comprehensive history of the Black bookstore. I found the book very readable and informative. www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/734577...
Review of the new Blair book on vampire epidemics in the 18th c.
The Stakes of Vampire Scholarship
John Blair’s new book digs up the undead.
www.chronicle.com
November 4, 2025 at 4:23 PM
Review of the new Blair book on vampire epidemics in the 18th c.
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
How a misread Arabic tale misled generations of historians about the Black Death's rapid spread
Paper: Mamluk Maqāmas on the Black Death. (2025). Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies, 25(4), 151-181. doi.org/10.5617/jais...
Paper: Mamluk Maqāmas on the Black Death. (2025). Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies, 25(4), 151-181. doi.org/10.5617/jais...
How a misread Arabic tale misled generations of historians about the Black Death's rapid spread
Myths about how the Black Death traveled quickly across Asia, ravaging Silk Route communities, date back to a single fourteenth-century source, experts have found.
phys.org
November 4, 2025 at 1:09 PM
How a misread Arabic tale misled generations of historians about the Black Death's rapid spread
Paper: Mamluk Maqāmas on the Black Death. (2025). Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies, 25(4), 151-181. doi.org/10.5617/jais...
Paper: Mamluk Maqāmas on the Black Death. (2025). Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies, 25(4), 151-181. doi.org/10.5617/jais...
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
Thursday Nov. 6 5pm EST African connections with Anglo-Saxon England? New insights from ancient DNA (Joscha Gretzinger, Emmanuel K. Akyeampong, John Hines ) sohp.fas.harvard.edu/event/africa... Initiative for the Science of the Human Past at Harvard
November 4, 2025 at 3:49 PM
Thursday Nov. 6 5pm EST African connections with Anglo-Saxon England? New insights from ancient DNA (Joscha Gretzinger, Emmanuel K. Akyeampong, John Hines ) sohp.fas.harvard.edu/event/africa... Initiative for the Science of the Human Past at Harvard
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
I had a great time speaking with Matilda Siebrecht about medieval manuscripts, European mss in North America, and of course my favorite manuscript (#Voynich)! Here's part 1 of our conversation: open.spotify.com/episode/60q1...
The Voynich Manuscript with Dr Lisa Fagin Davis (part 1) - Ep 40
open.spotify.com
November 4, 2025 at 3:52 PM
I had a great time speaking with Matilda Siebrecht about medieval manuscripts, European mss in North America, and of course my favorite manuscript (#Voynich)! Here's part 1 of our conversation: open.spotify.com/episode/60q1...
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
thank you for all the support; the statement from our union is now live here with some more reporting.
now that this is public I can confirm that the majority of today’s layoffs were women of color. there are no longer any Black women working at Teen Vogue.
now that this is public I can confirm that the majority of today’s layoffs were women of color. there are no longer any Black women working at Teen Vogue.
November 3, 2025 at 11:25 PM
thank you for all the support; the statement from our union is now live here with some more reporting.
now that this is public I can confirm that the majority of today’s layoffs were women of color. there are no longer any Black women working at Teen Vogue.
now that this is public I can confirm that the majority of today’s layoffs were women of color. there are no longer any Black women working at Teen Vogue.
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
Back in June, I gave the keynote address at the American Library Association's Carnegie Awards, and I'm very pleased that @literaryhub.bsky.social has republished the full text of my speech:
In Praise of Librarians in Dangerous Times
Librarians are on the front lines of history and current events, when news and change arrive at a furious clip that only quickens every day. And without libraries, my work would simply not exist. I…
lithub.com
November 3, 2025 at 1:24 PM
Back in June, I gave the keynote address at the American Library Association's Carnegie Awards, and I'm very pleased that @literaryhub.bsky.social has republished the full text of my speech:
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
Made a real-size cassette tape from metal type and kind of love it, like I loved that mix tape my high school bestie got from a cooler older cousin circa ‘93. Available as a small print: www.starshaped.com/small-prints...
November 3, 2025 at 3:33 PM
Made a real-size cassette tape from metal type and kind of love it, like I loved that mix tape my high school bestie got from a cooler older cousin circa ‘93. Available as a small print: www.starshaped.com/small-prints...
Reposted by Cait Coker <<digital brat with an insect mind>>
My book is now available open access on project muse, with OAPen launch coming soon. Hard copies should start going out this week (if they have not already): you can get yours for 50% off with code SAR50.
November 3, 2025 at 2:56 PM
My book is now available open access on project muse, with OAPen launch coming soon. Hard copies should start going out this week (if they have not already): you can get yours for 50% off with code SAR50.
Imma guess God.
November 2, 2025 at 3:39 PM
Imma guess God.
Annnnnnnnnd the SFFRD has officially hit 150,000 citations.
November 2, 2025 at 3:36 AM
Annnnnnnnnd the SFFRD has officially hit 150,000 citations.