Lieven Vandelanotte
@lieven.bsky.social
English lang & ling academic @UNamur & @KU Leuven. THE LANGUAGE OF MEMES out now https://www.cambridge.org/languageofmemes. He/him. https://www.unamur.be/en/profil/lvdlanot
Pinned
Call for papers: "𝐌𝐞𝐭𝐚𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐬𝐞 𝐢𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐨𝐧 𝐬𝐨𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐥 𝐦𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐚" (deadline: 31 January 2026)
Theme session as part of the @essenglish.bsky.social conference in Santiago de Compostela (31 Aug-4 Sept), co-convened with Anna Piata. Full details & submissions via metasocial.unamur.be
Theme session as part of the @essenglish.bsky.social conference in Santiago de Compostela (31 Aug-4 Sept), co-convened with Anna Piata. Full details & submissions via metasocial.unamur.be
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
A radio programme like the Shipping Forecast but it’s called Bin Day and it just reads out every single council in the country’s bin schedule
November 10, 2025 at 11:53 PM
A radio programme like the Shipping Forecast but it’s called Bin Day and it just reads out every single council in the country’s bin schedule
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
I have found this whole episode incredibly distressing and isolating, so I'm grateful to see Rory Waterman's analysis shine a light on both the poetry and the poison. Whatever your views, we need a more courteous and humane public discourse, from and for all parties. Please.
My comment, for @pnreview.bsky.social, on the Len Pennie & Sarah Doyle affair - or Canongagegate, as I like to think of it. Honourable mentions: @naush.bsky.social, @thetimes.com.
Feel free to share, to attack me with your little jelly pitchforks, or to ignore.
www.pnreview.co.uk/archive/rema...
Feel free to share, to attack me with your little jelly pitchforks, or to ignore.
www.pnreview.co.uk/archive/rema...
PN Review Print and Online Poetry Magazine - Remarkable Coincidences - Rory Waterman - PN Review 286
One of the outstanding poetry journals of our time.
www.pnreview.co.uk
November 7, 2025 at 6:28 PM
I have found this whole episode incredibly distressing and isolating, so I'm grateful to see Rory Waterman's analysis shine a light on both the poetry and the poison. Whatever your views, we need a more courteous and humane public discourse, from and for all parties. Please.
Vote with your rubbish / Bristol rules
November 10, 2025 at 7:34 PM
Vote with your rubbish / Bristol rules
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
SUPERB and angrily unvarnished response, by former BBC chairman, Lord Patten.
"I don't think that we should allow ourselves to be bullied into thinking that the BBC is only any good, if it reflects the prejudice of the last person who shouted at it." ~AA
"I don't think that we should allow ourselves to be bullied into thinking that the BBC is only any good, if it reflects the prejudice of the last person who shouted at it." ~AA
November 10, 2025 at 6:40 PM
SUPERB and angrily unvarnished response, by former BBC chairman, Lord Patten.
"I don't think that we should allow ourselves to be bullied into thinking that the BBC is only any good, if it reflects the prejudice of the last person who shouted at it." ~AA
"I don't think that we should allow ourselves to be bullied into thinking that the BBC is only any good, if it reflects the prejudice of the last person who shouted at it." ~AA
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
Look, this isn't performative reading. The guy I went to undergrad with who used to lie on a wall outside the english faculty in a velvet jacket reading poetry - that's how you do it
November 10, 2025 at 5:19 PM
Look, this isn't performative reading. The guy I went to undergrad with who used to lie on a wall outside the english faculty in a velvet jacket reading poetry - that's how you do it
Reminder :)
London now: absolutely stunning Kerry James Marshall exhibition. Do go if you can!
November 10, 2025 at 4:36 PM
Reminder :)
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
And in which jurisdiction?
One for the Reply in Arkell v. Pressdram, I think.
One for the Reply in Arkell v. Pressdram, I think.
November 10, 2025 at 3:52 PM
And in which jurisdiction?
One for the Reply in Arkell v. Pressdram, I think.
One for the Reply in Arkell v. Pressdram, I think.
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
Hunting for bias will ultimately be hunting the snark. We are all biased in some way or another. The news team need to insist on detail and rigour, not matching one empty but biased commentator with another equally empty and biased commentator from the other side.
November 10, 2025 at 10:21 AM
Hunting for bias will ultimately be hunting the snark. We are all biased in some way or another. The news team need to insist on detail and rigour, not matching one empty but biased commentator with another equally empty and biased commentator from the other side.
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
Robbie Gibb once suggested that reporters should reflect if they were getting more retweets from one side than the other - a braindead analysis that ignores that fair and impartial reporting of education might get more Tory retweets than say, criminal justice.
Stephen really does have the best take on this. It’s not clear that the BBC Board or indeed the rest of the News team really understood the message of the previous reviews, which were about getting detail right. Instead they wanted to know what was ‘biased’ or not like they were blotting out stains.
The impossible dream some people on the British right are chasing is that you can have a BBC News operation that retreats from detail and expertise, that takes dictation from the government, but this will only create incompetence and failure when it suits you:
November 10, 2025 at 10:39 AM
Robbie Gibb once suggested that reporters should reflect if they were getting more retweets from one side than the other - a braindead analysis that ignores that fair and impartial reporting of education might get more Tory retweets than say, criminal justice.
Concepts of a plan
Wait, they voted to end the shutdown because of the *promise* of a *vote*? How fucking stupid do you have to be?!
November 10, 2025 at 10:21 AM
Concepts of a plan
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
"The problem isn’t that we have a deliberately biased BBC, it’s that we have a BBC that has been consciously reduced in its scope and bullied into dumbing down and retreating." @stephenkb.bsky.social's newsletter today
November 10, 2025 at 9:40 AM
"The problem isn’t that we have a deliberately biased BBC, it’s that we have a BBC that has been consciously reduced in its scope and bullied into dumbing down and retreating." @stephenkb.bsky.social's newsletter today
I realize this is niche
November 10, 2025 at 8:12 AM
I realize this is niche
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
'If both sides are criticising me, I must be doing something right,' I warble, as I run babytalk opinion on the BBC News website.
November 9, 2025 at 11:39 PM
'If both sides are criticising me, I must be doing something right,' I warble, as I run babytalk opinion on the BBC News website.
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
agreeing to make a terrible deal while your main opponent is quite literally being boo'd on live tv by an entire stadium of people is the kind of political instinct you'd normally only find in a 3 week old dead goldfish
November 10, 2025 at 12:36 AM
agreeing to make a terrible deal while your main opponent is quite literally being boo'd on live tv by an entire stadium of people is the kind of political instinct you'd normally only find in a 3 week old dead goldfish
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
We are so far through the looking glass that the man who tried to overthrow an election becomes president, the people who attacked the Capitol are turned into martyrs, & it's the BBC that gets punished - cheered on by the worst news outlets in the UK & the two most dishonest politicians of our age.
It’s not at all clear to me how the BBC can do any kind of serious journalism if its top two bosses can be forced to quit over such an obviously confected scandal. There is no substantive error here. How can the BBC report on Trump, or Farage, or anyone else, in these circumstances?
November 9, 2025 at 9:08 PM
We are so far through the looking glass that the man who tried to overthrow an election becomes president, the people who attacked the Capitol are turned into martyrs, & it's the BBC that gets punished - cheered on by the worst news outlets in the UK & the two most dishonest politicians of our age.
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
Hello my genderfluid monarch
www.royal.uk/crown-depend...
www.royal.uk/crown-depend...
November 9, 2025 at 11:16 AM
Hello my genderfluid monarch
www.royal.uk/crown-depend...
www.royal.uk/crown-depend...
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
The BBC should serve as an example to all that there is nothing you can give the far rabid right that will satisfy it.
It has simpered, pandered, soft-balled and fluff-jobbed, both-sidesed and debased itself into being a platform for liars to look down the camera and lie on, & it still gets fucked.
It has simpered, pandered, soft-balled and fluff-jobbed, both-sidesed and debased itself into being a platform for liars to look down the camera and lie on, & it still gets fucked.
November 9, 2025 at 7:12 PM
The BBC should serve as an example to all that there is nothing you can give the far rabid right that will satisfy it.
It has simpered, pandered, soft-balled and fluff-jobbed, both-sidesed and debased itself into being a platform for liars to look down the camera and lie on, & it still gets fucked.
It has simpered, pandered, soft-balled and fluff-jobbed, both-sidesed and debased itself into being a platform for liars to look down the camera and lie on, & it still gets fucked.
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
This is the basic problem and it does make you wonder whether anyone decent would go for either job. Ludicrous expectations, no resources, God knows what skeletons from 30 years ago that might suddenly kill you, lukewarm government backing, the money isn’t that good by industry standards...
I can't imagine a job i'd like to do less. Managing an organisation held to a ludicrous standard by roaring idiots on a daily basis, while the main mediums it uses are all in decline and it's starved of resources.
November 9, 2025 at 6:29 PM
This is the basic problem and it does make you wonder whether anyone decent would go for either job. Ludicrous expectations, no resources, God knows what skeletons from 30 years ago that might suddenly kill you, lukewarm government backing, the money isn’t that good by industry standards...
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
So let me get this straight: the BBC, which has been massively and obviously biased in favour of Tories and Reform since at least 2015, is apologising and the DG is resigning for… ‘anti Trump and anti Israel bias’??? Make it make sense
November 9, 2025 at 6:33 PM
So let me get this straight: the BBC, which has been massively and obviously biased in favour of Tories and Reform since at least 2015, is apologising and the DG is resigning for… ‘anti Trump and anti Israel bias’??? Make it make sense
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
It's so cool that when the right person lands a direct hit on ol' Elon he can't stop from lighting up and spinning his bowtie like a carnival game clown
November 9, 2025 at 5:07 PM
It's so cool that when the right person lands a direct hit on ol' Elon he can't stop from lighting up and spinning his bowtie like a carnival game clown
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
Next BBC Director-General: Odds
Tristram Hunt: Evens
Li Shulei: 10/1
The collective hosts of The Rest Is Directors-General: 33/1
Andrew Mountbatten Windsor: [BETTING SUSPENDED]
A looped episode of Sideshow Bob's Last Gleaming: 75/1
Grok-generated Victoria Derbyshire: 100/1
David Milireith: 150/1
Tristram Hunt: Evens
Li Shulei: 10/1
The collective hosts of The Rest Is Directors-General: 33/1
Andrew Mountbatten Windsor: [BETTING SUSPENDED]
A looped episode of Sideshow Bob's Last Gleaming: 75/1
Grok-generated Victoria Derbyshire: 100/1
David Milireith: 150/1
November 9, 2025 at 6:11 PM
Next BBC Director-General: Odds
Tristram Hunt: Evens
Li Shulei: 10/1
The collective hosts of The Rest Is Directors-General: 33/1
Andrew Mountbatten Windsor: [BETTING SUSPENDED]
A looped episode of Sideshow Bob's Last Gleaming: 75/1
Grok-generated Victoria Derbyshire: 100/1
David Milireith: 150/1
Tristram Hunt: Evens
Li Shulei: 10/1
The collective hosts of The Rest Is Directors-General: 33/1
Andrew Mountbatten Windsor: [BETTING SUSPENDED]
A looped episode of Sideshow Bob's Last Gleaming: 75/1
Grok-generated Victoria Derbyshire: 100/1
David Milireith: 150/1
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
Very much a ‘he’s resigned over…. THAT?’. Staggering.
November 9, 2025 at 6:12 PM
Very much a ‘he’s resigned over…. THAT?’. Staggering.
Reposted by Lieven Vandelanotte
In these dark times we must take joy wherever we find it, and I delight in every picture of how hideous Trump has made his White House look. No part of the decoration has been made to fit with any other. It’s a parody of elitism: witless, crude, clumsy, jarring, cheap, ugly, pathetic. It’s so him
November 9, 2025 at 1:31 PM
In these dark times we must take joy wherever we find it, and I delight in every picture of how hideous Trump has made his White House look. No part of the decoration has been made to fit with any other. It’s a parody of elitism: witless, crude, clumsy, jarring, cheap, ugly, pathetic. It’s so him