Christopher Smith
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christophersmith.bsky.social
Christopher Smith
@christophersmith.bsky.social
3.9K followers 1.4K following 980 posts

University of St Andrews; Executive Chair, Arts & Humanities Research Council; International Champion and Creative Industries Sector Champion UK Research and Innovation

All views my own, but none of the poetry.

Videos

Christopher John Smith, FRSE, FSA, FRHistS, is a British academic and classicist specialising in early Ancient Rome.

Source: Wikipedia
History 56%
Art 25%
Posts Replies Media Videos

christophersmith.bsky.social
Christopher Smith @christophersmith.bsky.social · 8d
Super to see a Lynette Roberts poem; huge thanks to @carcanet.bsky.social for championing this revival of her remarkable work

www.theguardian.com/books/2025/d...
Poem of the week: Winter Walk by Lynette Roberts
A journey through a visionary landscape, exceptionally bright in icy weather, conjures a surreal semi-mythical world
www.theguardian.com

christophersmith.bsky.social
Christopher Smith @christophersmith.bsky.social · 10d
Happy birthday Jane Austen from AHRC @ukri.org

www.ukri.org/who-we-are/h...
Jane Austen at 250
Research projects use film, exhibitions and digitised manuscripts to inspire students and connect new audiences with Austen’s enduring legacy.
www.ukri.org

Reposted by Christopher Smith

centreplacewriting.bsky.social
Centre for Place Writing @centreplacewriting.bsky.social · 18d
Applications are invited for three fully-funded Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Doctoral Landscape Awards (DLA). Deadline is 9th February 2026.
Proposed projects must be arts & humanities-led
#PhD @findaphd.bsky.social @dcahf-met.bsky.social
More details:
#PhD www.mmu.ac.uk/study/postgr...
Doctoral Landscape Awards
Applications are invited for three fully-funded Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Doctoral Landscape Awards (DLA).
www.mmu.ac.uk

Reposted by Christopher Smith

theclassicslibrary.bsky.social
The Classics Library @theclassicslibrary.bsky.social · 23d
Monumental Roman basin hidden for 2,000 years unearthed near Rome | ScienceDaily
Monumental Roman basin hidden for 2,000 years unearthed near Rome
Archaeologists excavating the ancient Roman city of Gabii have uncovered a massive stone-lined basin that may represent one of Rome’s earliest monumental civic structures. Its central placement hints…
www.sciencedaily.com

Reposted by Christopher Smith, Charles West, Lesley A. Hall , and 6 more

adamchapman.bsky.social
Adam Chapman @adamchapman.bsky.social · 24d
A blast from my past - the Medieval Soldier database takes nearly 300,000 military service records from 1369-1453 and makes them available as a searchable database.

An invaluable resource for understanding medieval warfare, society and the English medieval state. Learn more in the link. 🗃️
We built a database of 290,000 English medieval soldiers – here’s what it reveals
We created the database in order to challenge assumptions about the lack of professionalism of everyday soldiers.
theconversation.com

christophersmith.bsky.social
Christopher Smith @christophersmith.bsky.social · 25d
Is that ladle, perhaps, a runcible spoon?? 🤔

Reposted by Christopher Smith

abrackenbury.bsky.social
Alison Brackenbury @abrackenbury.bsky.social · 26d
'December, 1854. A hard winter in Lincolnshire. The lane-side trees, at the village edge, are caves of white above the dark figure, bundled in shawls. She has seen many things in her calls at cottages. But never before a woman on fire...'
Alison Brackenbury, 'Village'
What next? LINK IN COMMENTS!

Reposted by Christopher Smith, Margot C. Finn

susanklaiber.bsky.social
Susan Klaiber @susanklaiber.bsky.social · 26d
The Turin Humanities Programme again offers two-year #postdocs, this time with a #CFA on the topic "After the Enlightenment: Histories, Debates, and Reinterpretations”.

Sponsored by the fabulous Fondazione 1563, deadline 16 February. #skystorians

www.fondazione1563.it/progetti/en-...
EN THP 2025 - Fondazione 1563
Turin Humanities Programme call for application 2025 "After the Enlightenment: Histories, Debates, and Reinterpretations"
www.fondazione1563.it

christophersmith.bsky.social
Christopher Smith @christophersmith.bsky.social · 27d
We shed as we pick up, like travellers who must carry everything in their arms and what we let fall will be picked up by those behind. The procession is very long and life is very short. We die on the march. But there is nothing outside the march so nothing can be lost to it. 
Tom Stoppard 1937-2025

christophersmith.bsky.social
Christopher Smith @christophersmith.bsky.social · 28d
"words are brought together that have long been split apart, just as long-lost cousins at a family wedding might be surprised to see their own faces reflected everywhere they looked."
@dharmabam.bsky.social on Heaney

Reposted by Christopher Smith

dharmabam.bsky.social
Don Paterson @dharmabam.bsky.social · 28d
essay on Heaney over at the northseapoets substack … open.substack.com/pub/northsea...
Heaney on the Underground
Don Paterson on Seamus Heaney's choice of words
open.substack.com

Reposted by Christopher Smith, Jacob T. Levy, Michael H. Whitworth , and 2 more

johannawinant.bsky.social
Johanna Winant @johannawinant.bsky.social · Nov 26
I wrote an essay for @bostonreview.bsky.social about what I learned about close reading when I taught at West Virginia University

www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...
The Claims of Close Reading - Boston Review
Literary studies have been starved by austerity, but their core methodology remains radical.
www.bostonreview.net

christophersmith.bsky.social
Christopher Smith @christophersmith.bsky.social · Nov 23
"In London #November isn't a month, it's a state of mind."
Antal Szerb, Journey by Moonlight
Monet Houses of Parliament at sunset

Reposted by Anna O. Law, Rebecca Solnit, Rosemary A. Joyce , and 13 more

rbtownsend.bsky.social
Rob Townsend @rbtownsend.bsky.social · Nov 23
"While other universities report that the humanities are shrinking, at Berkeley, the opposite is true. The music major is the fastest-growing major on campus. We are finding bigger classrooms because film is exploding. English is back to the numbers we saw 15 years ago. We are hiring" bit.ly/4ohKuOe
"The humanities really are a resource — a confidence for living in our times.” Dean Sara Guyer on the modern utility of humanities degrees
This interview originally appeared on the Division of Arts
bit.ly

christophersmith.bsky.social
Christopher Smith @christophersmith.bsky.social · Nov 23
One of the great satisfactions of #reading is "an ability to join together isolated fragments of knowledge into a meaningful whole"
Robert Douglas-Fairhurst @thetimes.com
#libraries

www.thetimes.com/culture/book...
How to get more out of reading — tips from an Oxford don
In Look Closer, the academic Robert Douglas-Fairhurst rattles through literature from Charles Dickens to Sally Rooney
www.thetimes.com

Reposted by Margot C. Finn

christophersmith.bsky.social
Christopher Smith @christophersmith.bsky.social · Nov 23
Here's an excellent piece by Sverker Sörlin on his notion of integrative #humanities..

To solve some of the issues for #science raised in recent posts by @ersatzben.com @richardaljones.bsky.social @profserious.bsky.social we will need more of this thinking

www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10....
University of Chicago Press Journals: Cookie absent
www.journals.uchicago.edu

christophersmith.bsky.social
Christopher Smith @christophersmith.bsky.social · Nov 23
Profoundly beautiful account of the history of snow studies, the fragility of snow and the impact of the anthropocene by Sverker Sörlin.

Also an appeal for a different way of doing #science
Book cover, Sverker Sörlin, Snö, a detail of snow covering trees and landscape from a painting by Gustav Fjaestad

Reposted by Diane Coyle, Christopher Smith, Margot C. Finn

profserious.bsky.social
profserious @profserious.bsky.social · Nov 23
'What We Need To Do Now' ... an agenda for universities in the new post-16 system ... set out by @profserious.bsky.social profserious.substack.com/p/what-we-ne...
What We Need To Do Now
an agenda for universities in the new post-16 system
profserious.substack.com

Reposted by Christopher Smith

carcanet.bsky.social
Carcanet Press @carcanet.bsky.social · Nov 22
⭐Discount Spotlight: Citizen Poet by Eavan Boland, edited by Jody Allen Randolph📘

Carcanet's monthly discount has launched! This month, enjoy 20% off a selection of books from our Lives and Letters collection by using the code LETTERS20 at our website checkout:⬇️
www.carcanet.co.uk/978180017170...

Reposted by Christopher Smith

longbarrowpress.bsky.social
Longbarrow Press @longbarrowpress.bsky.social · Nov 22
Update: we have sold a total of twelve books this month. "The end of the work is the possibility of connection, that the book, if it has been made well, might become 'a site of exchange', that it might have use and value to others, whether the others are many or few."
longbarrowpress.bsky.social Longbarrow Press @longbarrowpress.bsky.social · Nov 18
It may well be the case that small, independent presses are the lifeblood of literature, and a vital feature of our cultural landscape, providing an essential service in a complex ecosystem, like wrasses or shrimps. What is undeniably the case is that we have sold a total of five books this month.

Reposted by Diane Coyle, Dave O’Brien, Christopher Smith , and 1 more

andywestwood.bsky.social
Andy Westwood @andywestwood.bsky.social · Nov 22
Here is @richardaljones.bsky.social basically telling us how it is. I’ve been thinking about this since listening to him say this stuff out loud at the @royalsociety.org
on Thursday.
softmachines.org?p=3192
UK Science in a post-liberal world – Soft Machines, by Richard Jones
softmachines.org

Reposted by Christopher Smith

evanpjones.bsky.social
Evan Jones (Ευριπίδες Ιωάννου) @evanpjones.bsky.social · Nov 21
In which a New Zealander writes about a fire likely still burning. From Collected Poems of Bill Manhire, Carcanet Press, 2001. @carcanet.bsky.social @pacificraft.bsky.social

Reposted by Dave O’Brien, Christopher Smith

funding.ukri.org
UKRI Funding Opportunities @funding.ukri.org · Nov 20
ICYMI: Early career research fellowships scheme coordination and cohort support (invite only) #ahrc #academicsky
Early career research fellowships scheme coordination and cohort support (invite only)
Apply for funding through an invitation only funding opportunity to lead cohort coordination and development for AHRC’s early career fellowships in cultural and heritage institutions. You must be based at UK Independent Research Organisation (IRO) eligible for AHRC funding.
www.ukri.org

Reposted by Diane Coyle, Christopher Smith

mctd.bsky.social
Minderoo Centre for Technology & Democracy @mctd.bsky.social · Nov 20
NEW REPORT – The Impact of Generative AI and the Novel 📚

Today we've published new research by @clemicollett.bsky.social examining how industry practitioners, from novelists to publishers, are experiencing AI’s significant impacts.

Read now: www.mctd.ac.uk/impact-of-ge...
The impact of generative Ai on the Novel, Dr Clementine Collett. The logos of BRAID, MCTD, the Institute for the Future of Work, the Uni of Cambridge, and UKRI all feature. The image is a curved wall bookcase filled with books.

christophersmith.bsky.social
Christopher Smith @christophersmith.bsky.social · Nov 19
And a very good book it is too! @margaretheffernan.bsky.social

Reposted by Christopher Smith

andrewkelly.bsky.social
Andrew Kelly @andrewkelly.bsky.social · Nov 19
Margaret Heffernan is hosting our Festival of Economics event today on artists and AI. Here’s my recent interview with her on her new book on artists and how they can help us navigate uncertainty. Follow @margaretheffernan.bsky.social for more.
Festival of Ideas 1: Margaret Heffernan on Artists and Navigating Uncertainty
An interview with Andrew Kelly
festivalofideas.substack.com

Reposted by Christopher Smith, Margot C. Finn

ersatzben.com
Ben Johnson @ersatzben.com · Nov 18
The government has talked about organising R&D into three 'buckets' - discovery research, research aligned to government priorities, and business support. This is a good idea that could fail in the implementation. Here are my 10 tests for success:
www.ersatzben.com/p/the-three-...
The three-bucket problem
Ten tests for the UK’s new R&D funding framework
www.ersatzben.com

Reposted by Christopher Smith

asls.org.uk
Association for Scottish Literature @asls.org.uk · Nov 18
The St  Andrews Chronicles, one of the most important manuscript histories of Scotland, is going on public display for the first time in its 500-year history. The book will be on display at @uniofstandrews.bsky.social from 21 November to 7 December
#BookHistory
news.st-andrews.ac.uk/archive/500-...
A sixteenth-century handwritten book, lying open on a dark grey-blue cushion. Cloth-covered weighted cords hold the book open to display the text, including a section underlined in red and a paragraph starting with a large, red capital M.

christophersmith.bsky.social
Christopher Smith @christophersmith.bsky.social · Nov 18
Completely agree with @richove.bsky.social @hetanshah.bsky.social; we have woefully underinvested in the #digital #research infrastructure for Arts Humanities & Social Sciences.

AHRC continues to work with #libraries & #archives but the funding model has to give greater weight to Digital Humanities

Reposted by Christopher Smith, Peter Gatrell, Adrian Vickers , and 3 more

richove.bsky.social
Richard Ovenden @richove.bsky.social · Nov 18
Good to see the problems facing our colleagues @britishlibrary.bsky.social being raised here by @hetanshah.bsky.social (of @britishacademy.bsky.social). If this had happened in France it would be considered a national problem to be urgently addressed! www.cityam.com/the-british-...
The British library is in crisis: why does nobody care?
The widespread indifference to the British Library's crippling cyberattack demonstrates a perilous failure to value the knowledge infrastructure vital for national prosperity
www.cityam.com