Dan Hicks

@profdanhicks.bsky.social

13K followers 1.3K following 730 posts

Museum Curator and Professor of Contemporary Archaeology, Oxford University • Fellow of St Cross College, Oxford • Tutor Art/Anthropology • https://linktr.ee/danhicks

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Dan Hicks, is a British archaeologist and anthropologist. He is Professor of Contemporary Archaeology at the University of Oxford, Curator at the Pitt Rivers Museum, and a Fellow of St Cross College, Oxford. His research is focused on contemporary archaeology, material culture studies, historical archaeology, colonial history, heritage studies, and the history of art, archaeology, anthropology, and museum collections. .. more

History 33%

Environmental science 16%

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Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · Aug 15

Every Monument Will Fall: a story of remembering and forgetting — out now www.penguin.co.uk/books/452252...

Every Monument Will Fall

Tracing the origins of contemporary conflicts over art, heritage, memory, and colonialism, Every Monument Will Fall joins the dots between the building of statues, the founding of academic disciplines...

www.penguin.co.uk

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 10h

really great to meet you at last Marie — thank you so much for coming along!

Reposted by Dan Hicks

Marie Gardiner @mariegardiner.bsky.social · 11h

So great to see @profdanhicks.bsky.social at the People's Bookshop in Durham where he was chatting about his book Every Monument Will Fall. Looking forward to reading it!

Dan hicks talking to a room of people in a bookshop

Reposted by Dan Hicks

Richard Kadrey @richardkadrey.bsky.social · 14h

Good news for once
www.cnn.com/2025/11/10/p...

Supreme Court declines to revisit landmark same-sex marriage precedent | CNN Politics

The Supreme Court on Monday declined an opportunity to overturn its landmark precedent recognizing a constitutional right to same-sex marriage, tossing aside an appeal that had roiled LGBTQ advocates ...

www.cnn.com

Reposted by Henning Melber

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 16h

💥New from me in @jacobinmagazin.bsky.social
“Monuments, museums, and cultural institutions were often created in the image of “militarist realism”—presenting colonialism as eternal. Undoing this legacy is not erasing the past but combating a pernicious ideology”
jacobin.com/2025/11/brit...

One Day, Britain’s Monuments Will Fall

Monuments, museums, and cultural institutions were often created in the image of “militarist realism,” presenting colonialism and enslavement as eternal. Undoing this legacy is not erasing the past bu...

jacobin.com

Reposted by Jonathan Hopkin, Dan Hicks

George Monbiot @georgemonbiot.bsky.social · 18h

When was the last time anyone at the BBC had to resign for misrepresenting a leftwinger?

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 1d

well to be fair the article does discuss the Koh-i-Noor, which is depicted in that photo

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 1d

“France mourns its stolen crown jewels as their uncomfortable colonial past returns to view”
apnews.com/article/jewe...

France mourns its stolen crown jewels as their uncomfortable colonial past returns to view

The theft of the Louvre's crown jewels has increased calls for the museum to be more transparent about the colonial origins of the treasures it displays.

apnews.com

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 2d

What a wonderful night in Edinburgh @lighthousebks.bsky.social 💥🙏

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 3d

Edinburgh tonight ✨ lighthousebookshop.com/events/citie...

Lighthouse | Cities (re)claimed: dismantling geographies of oppression [Radical Book Fair]

lighthousebookshop.com

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 4d

💯💥✨🙏

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 4d

thank you Paul—for coming along and also for your excellent question in the Q&A 🙏❤️💥

Reposted by Scott A. Imberman, Nicole Guenther Discenza, Dan Hicks

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 4d

Trump: "What the Democrats will do is make Puerto Rico a state, make DC a state, they're gonna pack the Court. They're gonna end up with more electoral votes. They're gonna end up with 4 senators. And they're gonna do this 100%."

Reposted by Dan Hicks

Dr Paul Mullan MRIA @pauljmullan01.bsky.social · 4d

No better way to spend the afternoon as in the company of @profdanhicks.bsky.social @qubelfastofficial.bsky.social

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 4d

tune in on 20 Nov to learn about our Masters programme in Archaeology here in Oxford

School of Archaeology @unioxarchaeology.bsky.social · 6d

Want to study #archaeology at graduate level in #Oxford?

Join our tutors at 3pm Thurs 20 Nov on zoom for a cosy chat about our world-leading MSc Archaeology degree.

Meeting link: zoom.us/j/9184876042...

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 5d

💥

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 5d

✨🙏

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 5d

earlier this year a Swedish archaeologist launched an ad hominem attack on me in the International Journal of Cultural Property

I'm grateful to the editors for inviting my right to reply—and the opportunity to correct the record

www.academia.edu/144803887/On...
or
www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

On "Distorting History" - a reply to Staffan Lundén
Earlier this year a Swedish archaeologist based at Gothenburg University’s Centre for Critical Heritage Studies published an unfounded ad hominem attack on me in the pages of the International
Journal of Cultural Property. I am grateful to the editors for this right to reply to Staffan Lundén’s wholly spurious claims, and order to correct the record. Despite its provocative, “clickbait” title, not one substantive mistake or incorrect fact was identified in Lundén’s article in my book “The Brutish Museums”. The motivation for Lundén’s serial accusations against colleagues with whose scholarship on the history of the Benin Expedition he disagrees - from curators at the British Museum to members of the Royal Court of Benin - is discussed. In conclusion,
the allegation that my book The Brutish Museums is “part of a trend away from pro-British perspectives” is contextualised and refuted. On the contrary, this reply argues, openness and transparency about the colonial past and present is a key element of the reclamation and
reimagining of Britishness that is unfolding in the 2020s – this unfinished period that the book calls “the decade of returns”.

Reposted by Shadreck Chirikure, Dan Hicks

School of Archaeology @unioxarchaeology.bsky.social · 6d

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 8d

🙏🙏🙏✨thanks so much

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 8d

*redaction 🙃🙏

Reposted by Ann Bartow, Dan Hicks

Citizen.Coping @propcazhpm.bsky.social · 8d

Dan Hicks, author of The Brutish Museums (2020) and

Every Monument Will Fall (2025),
"which holds monuments to colonialists, enslavers, etc. up against the writing of Sylvia Wynter, Stuart Hall & Ursula Le Guin, drawing together open secrets about dehumanisation and tredaction of public memory."

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 8d

💥Come and hear me talk this week
Cork Mon 3rd
Dublin Tues 4th
Belfast Thurs 6th
Edinburgh Fri 7th
www.danhicks.uk/talks

Upcoming Talks - Dan Hicks — D A N | H I C K S

News of upcoming talks and lectures by Professor Dan Hicks of Oxford University - Professor of Contemporary Archaeology, Curator at the Pitt Rivers Museum and Fellow of St Cross College Oxford

www.danhicks.uk

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 17d

Expert evaluators needed for Horizon Europe >> rea.ec.europa.eu/working-rea/...

Work as an expert

Opportunities for independent experts in the evaluation of project proposals

rea.ec.europa.eu

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 19d

remarkable transformative anti-racist works in a co-curated Mellon-funded show engaging with ideas of monuments and statues of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, at The Brick and at Geffen Contemporary @moca-la.bsky.social in LA
>> www.moca.org/exhibition/m...

MONUMENTS

Established in 1979, we are the only artist-founded museum in Los Angeles. We are dedicated to collecting and exhibiting contemporary art.

www.moca.org

Reposted by Jennifer Pett‐Ridge, Patrick Dunleavy, Iain Davidson , and 20 more Jennifer Pett‐Ridge, Patrick Dunleavy, Iain Davidson, Rosemary A. Joyce, Christoph Bertram, Philip Nel, Dawn J. Wright, Joni Lovenduski, Alan Richardson, David R. Miller, W. Andy Knight, Gerald Friedman, Alison Johnson, Stacy D. VanDeveer, Michael D. McDonald, Shannon W. Anderson, David Koepsell, Samuel Gerald Collins, Dan Hicks, Constance Bantman, Jesse D. Berman, David Darmofal, Deborah M. Kolb

Angry @angrystaffer.bsky.social · 20d

The White House is asking people not to share pictures of the East Wing because it’s even worse today.

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 21d

#Diwali

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · 21d

Listening to the fireworks going off across Birmingham tonight and proud of this city’s diversity despite recent right-wing attacks

Reposted by Dan Hicks

Marie VC, PhD @marievc.bsky.social · 22d

The Louvre jewellery story raises the question of why a society chooses to keep them, what this represents, and what could be different. Who is not there. Who extracted the stones. Who paid for the stones.

Reposted by Dan Hicks

Marie VC, PhD @marievc.bsky.social · 22d

And the second thing is @profdanhicks.bsky.social's choice to write the book in the second person ('you'), to shift the focus away from himself ('I') and avoid the 'we' that dilutes the process (who is 'we'? museums, universities, the voices we hear, from which parts of the world?).

Photo from the table of contents of Dan Hicks' book 'Every Monument Will Fall. A Story of Remembering and Forgetting' (2025).

Contents

VI 'Choc en Retour'

fall, noun. vi) (military) the surrender of an army or capture of a fortress. see also (military) to 'fall in': to form and move in a line

26. GRAND TOUR
27. SOME GREAT WAR
28. AUTOMATIC ACTION
29. THE ARROW AND THE BOOMERANG
30. WHEN THE WORLD SCREAMED

Reposted by Dan Hicks

Marie VC, PhD @marievc.bsky.social · 22d

The Louvre jewellery story reminds me that I haven't had time to write down here what I took away from meeting @profdanhicks.bsky.social and the wonderful students from @sandeepbak.bsky.social last week.

Photo of a hand holding Dan Hicks' book 'Every Monument Will Fall', published in 2025, the day I was able to collect it from my local bookshop.

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