Alex Luke
@alexluke.bsky.social
Workplace linguistic ethnographer | Socialist & unionist - current USyd NTEU branch committee member | EAP teacher. "Capire. Per meglio colpire" - Tronti. They/he
Pinned
Alex Luke
@alexluke.bsky.social
· Mar 24
I am, after years of attempts, finally getting near the end of this and, with a few small caveats, it's been great
Gonna pin this and list all the things I read in 2025. Since I'm starting at the end of March I've probably missed a few but here goes
I loathe the discourse of 'psychosocial risks/hazards', and while I can see how it might be beneficial in some lines of work I believe that overall it will only do harm to the labour movement
November 4, 2025 at 10:52 PM
I loathe the discourse of 'psychosocial risks/hazards', and while I can see how it might be beneficial in some lines of work I believe that overall it will only do harm to the labour movement
In amongst all the terrible news in this world, here is a singular, shining piece of good fortune for you: I have made the ultimate disco playlist open.spotify.com/playlist/2qO...
Disco
open.spotify.com
November 4, 2025 at 11:45 AM
In amongst all the terrible news in this world, here is a singular, shining piece of good fortune for you: I have made the ultimate disco playlist open.spotify.com/playlist/2qO...
Reposted by Alex Luke
just ScienceDirect promoting uncorrected ai-generated phrenology-sounding slop (that UGs would likely not notice is phrenology-sounding slop).
irisvanrooijcogsci.com/2025/08/12/a...
irisvanrooijcogsci.com/2025/08/12/a...
AI slop and the destruction of knowledge
Cite as: van Rooij, I. (2025) AI slop and the destruction of knowledge. This week I was looking for info on what cognitive scientists mean when they speak of ‘domain-general’ cognition. I was curio…
irisvanrooijcogsci.com
November 2, 2025 at 7:52 PM
just ScienceDirect promoting uncorrected ai-generated phrenology-sounding slop (that UGs would likely not notice is phrenology-sounding slop).
irisvanrooijcogsci.com/2025/08/12/a...
irisvanrooijcogsci.com/2025/08/12/a...
Reposted by Alex Luke
Great line: a single-use plastic of the mind
“And for what? A cankerous glut of racist memes and cardboard essays. Not only is the ratio of AI’s resource rapacity to its productive utility indefensibly and irremediably skewed, AI-made material is itself a waste product: flimsy, shoddy, disposable, a single-use plastic of the mind.”
Large Language Muddle | The Editors
The AI upheaval is unique in its ability to metabolize any number of dread-inducing transformations. The university is becoming more corporate, more politically oppressive, and all but hostile to the ...
www.nplusonemag.com
November 2, 2025 at 5:28 AM
Great line: a single-use plastic of the mind
Reposted by Alex Luke
Vance says it is "totally reasonable and acceptable" for people to not want to live next door to people who speak a different language than they do
October 29, 2025 at 2:55 PM
Vance says it is "totally reasonable and acceptable" for people to not want to live next door to people who speak a different language than they do
Reposted by Alex Luke
Via Status:
October 23, 2025 at 4:51 PM
Via Status:
The problem with the bourgeois reification into academic 'disciplines' is that the solutions proposed are in answer to the narrowly defined issues mediated through that discipline
October 21, 2025 at 9:51 AM
The problem with the bourgeois reification into academic 'disciplines' is that the solutions proposed are in answer to the narrowly defined issues mediated through that discipline
Reposted by Alex Luke
New piece on Social Europe, on the impact of the digital revolution on work and why platformisation ultimately matters more than automation #EconSky #sociology @lauranurski.bsky.social @sergiotorrejon.com
The Real Digital Revolution At Work: Why Platformisation Matters More Than Robots
The digital transformation of work isn't destroying jobs through automation—it's fundamentally reshaping how work is organised, managed and controlled.
www.socialeurope.eu
October 21, 2025 at 9:04 AM
New piece on Social Europe, on the impact of the digital revolution on work and why platformisation ultimately matters more than automation #EconSky #sociology @lauranurski.bsky.social @sergiotorrejon.com
AI boosters keep saying, in the face of what is clearly a bubble, that perhaps it will be like the dot com bubble, and that longer term the technology will prove itself, much like profit-making from the internet. But why assume that AI is following a similar track to internet platforms?
October 21, 2025 at 7:17 AM
AI boosters keep saying, in the face of what is clearly a bubble, that perhaps it will be like the dot com bubble, and that longer term the technology will prove itself, much like profit-making from the internet. But why assume that AI is following a similar track to internet platforms?
Reposted by Alex Luke
I expected Keir Starmer to be a bland, middle-management, platitudinous, tediously disappointing Prime Minister, which is why it’s been such a surprise to find out he’s actually a stupid, incompetent, vindictive, reactionary and outright dismaying Prime Minister.
October 17, 2025 at 8:32 AM
I expected Keir Starmer to be a bland, middle-management, platitudinous, tediously disappointing Prime Minister, which is why it’s been such a surprise to find out he’s actually a stupid, incompetent, vindictive, reactionary and outright dismaying Prime Minister.
Reposted by Alex Luke
I teach a history of antifascism course @ruhistorydept.bsky.social and figured I'd start an ongoing thread this semester to share some insights from course readings and recommend some great works on antifascism.
🧵
🧵
September 30, 2025 at 3:30 PM
I teach a history of antifascism course @ruhistorydept.bsky.social and figured I'd start an ongoing thread this semester to share some insights from course readings and recommend some great works on antifascism.
🧵
🧵
Revealed: NSW Police ‘significantly’ overstated antisemitic attacks
www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw...
www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw...
October 10, 2025 at 7:02 PM
Revealed: NSW Police ‘significantly’ overstated antisemitic attacks
www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw...
www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw...
Reposted by Alex Luke
We also show how a counter language ideology labelling those literacy practices as 'HR-language' operated as a form of discursive counter-conduct. It was an absolute pleasure writing this with Karin and learned a lot from doing so. Let me know if you can't access it and I can get you a copy.
October 8, 2025 at 8:11 AM
We also show how a counter language ideology labelling those literacy practices as 'HR-language' operated as a form of discursive counter-conduct. It was an absolute pleasure writing this with Karin and learned a lot from doing so. Let me know if you can't access it and I can get you a copy.
Reposted by Alex Luke
I'm happy to say that the article that Karin Tusting and I wrote for Text and Talk is now available. In it, we look at how a number literacy practices were deployed in a university language centre to try to shape workers into reflective practitioners. www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi...
‘SMART goals’ and ‘HR language’: technologised literacy practices and counter-conduct in the workplace
This study examines the use of literacy practices in a performance management system which aims to produce reflective practitioners, and how these practices were discursively resisted by staff. It emp...
www.degruyterbrill.com
October 8, 2025 at 8:10 AM
I'm happy to say that the article that Karin Tusting and I wrote for Text and Talk is now available. In it, we look at how a number literacy practices were deployed in a university language centre to try to shape workers into reflective practitioners. www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi...
Reposted by Alex Luke
Streets are still closed off in front of the Portland ICE facility at 8:30pm. Protesters have gathered on a side street. Dance party in progress.
October 8, 2025 at 3:31 AM
Streets are still closed off in front of the Portland ICE facility at 8:30pm. Protesters have gathered on a side street. Dance party in progress.
Reposted by Alex Luke
The Guardian has published the names of the 18,457 children killed in Gaza. www.theguardian.com/world/ng-int...
Young lives cut short on an unimaginable scale: the 18,457 children on Gaza’s list of war dead
Every name on a list compiled by health authorities in Gaza of the child victims of Israel’s offensive
www.theguardian.com
October 8, 2025 at 8:02 AM
The Guardian has published the names of the 18,457 children killed in Gaza. www.theguardian.com/world/ng-int...
I'm happy to say that the article that Karin Tusting and I wrote for Text and Talk is now available. In it, we look at how a number literacy practices were deployed in a university language centre to try to shape workers into reflective practitioners. www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi...
‘SMART goals’ and ‘HR language’: technologised literacy practices and counter-conduct in the workplace
This study examines the use of literacy practices in a performance management system which aims to produce reflective practitioners, and how these practices were discursively resisted by staff. It emp...
www.degruyterbrill.com
October 8, 2025 at 8:10 AM
I'm happy to say that the article that Karin Tusting and I wrote for Text and Talk is now available. In it, we look at how a number literacy practices were deployed in a university language centre to try to shape workers into reflective practitioners. www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi...
Reposted by Alex Luke
- put down the damn AI.
October 7, 2025 at 12:26 PM
- put down the damn AI.
Reposted by Alex Luke
"hand-to-hand combat with antifa every night"
October 6, 2025 at 7:45 PM
"hand-to-hand combat with antifa every night"
Reposted by Alex Luke
The "AI" research community:
1) Claims to be building "everything machines", doesn't acknowledge that that means what they're doing is untestable (see Gebru & Torres 2024)
firstmonday.org/ojs/index.ph...
>>
1) Claims to be building "everything machines", doesn't acknowledge that that means what they're doing is untestable (see Gebru & Torres 2024)
firstmonday.org/ojs/index.ph...
>>
October 6, 2025 at 8:28 PM
The "AI" research community:
1) Claims to be building "everything machines", doesn't acknowledge that that means what they're doing is untestable (see Gebru & Torres 2024)
firstmonday.org/ojs/index.ph...
>>
1) Claims to be building "everything machines", doesn't acknowledge that that means what they're doing is untestable (see Gebru & Torres 2024)
firstmonday.org/ojs/index.ph...
>>
Reposted by Alex Luke
🚨 Update from Yasmin Acar, spokesperson for the Global Sumud Flotilla, speaking from the Alma Freedom ship:
At 150 nautical miles from Gaza, about 20 drones are hovering overhead. Multiple naval vessels have been spotted, with reports of an imminent interception by Israeli vessels.
At 150 nautical miles from Gaza, about 20 drones are hovering overhead. Multiple naval vessels have been spotted, with reports of an imminent interception by Israeli vessels.
October 1, 2025 at 2:02 AM
🚨 Update from Yasmin Acar, spokesperson for the Global Sumud Flotilla, speaking from the Alma Freedom ship:
At 150 nautical miles from Gaza, about 20 drones are hovering overhead. Multiple naval vessels have been spotted, with reports of an imminent interception by Israeli vessels.
At 150 nautical miles from Gaza, about 20 drones are hovering overhead. Multiple naval vessels have been spotted, with reports of an imminent interception by Israeli vessels.
If this isn't capitalism, why do I and almost everyone I know have to engage in wage labour and purchase commodities to socially reproduce ourselves and the people we love?
September 30, 2025 at 8:18 PM
If this isn't capitalism, why do I and almost everyone I know have to engage in wage labour and purchase commodities to socially reproduce ourselves and the people we love?
Reposted by Alex Luke
I'm starting to think we need to bring back a constructive form of shame, which @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social makes a great case for in this excellent piece:
www.bostonreview.net/articles/how...
www.bostonreview.net/articles/how...
September 30, 2025 at 5:12 PM
I'm starting to think we need to bring back a constructive form of shame, which @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social makes a great case for in this excellent piece:
www.bostonreview.net/articles/how...
www.bostonreview.net/articles/how...
Remember that smug meme, "If you ever wondered what you would have done while the Nazis took power, you're doing it now"? It would seem now that most people never thought about that at all
September 28, 2025 at 5:39 AM
Remember that smug meme, "If you ever wondered what you would have done while the Nazis took power, you're doing it now"? It would seem now that most people never thought about that at all
Reposted by Alex Luke
Well said by Karl Jacoby, this has been much on my mind, need to think about the absurd meeting of generals in this light
Only an administration intent on committing war crimes in the present and future would stoop to calling Wounded Knee a "battle" rather than what it truly was: a massacre of over 250 Lakotas, mainly women, children, and the elderly. 1/
September 27, 2025 at 4:51 PM
Well said by Karl Jacoby, this has been much on my mind, need to think about the absurd meeting of generals in this light