Ambrose McMonagle (they/them) 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈
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ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
Ambrose McMonagle (they/them) 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈
@ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
210 followers 290 following 24 posts
📚 PhD Student at Glasgow University (SGSSS Funded) in Disability Studies

🗂️ Stuart Hall Foundation Fellow & member of Scottish Criminal Justice Research Centre

🗳️ Former Policy & Research Officer at ScotParl

✨Autism & Chronic Pain Club

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ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
Presented “Disability and Deinstitutionalisation: revisiting Lennox Castle” to other sociology students at Glasgow Uni, reflecting on the work I’ve carried out in this 1st year of my PhD.

Many thanks to Dr Lovelock for advice on presenting sensitive & emotional research, & driving me to fieldwork.
Ambrose stands in the bottom left corner of an image, wearing a black skirt, black boots, white shirt and black hat. They are speaking voice notes into their phone and balancing with their walking stick against overgrown grass. In front of them behind spiked fencing is the ruined entrance to Lennox Castle, affected by graffiti and fire damage. Ambrose stands with their walking stick and wearing a pinstripe grey suit trousers and waistcoat, and a bolo tie. They are presenting a slide on “models of disability” which contains an image by disabled artist Dolly Sen of a charity tin which has a label on it of “Help the normals”, and a table with key features of the medical and social models of disability. Listed under medical is: disability = impairment, biological reality, individual deficit & medical intervention, prevention and care. Listed under social is disability / impairment, social barriers, sociopolitical & environmental, and activism and disabled people’s rights. The presentation is in a small seminar room with white walls and red carpet and black chairs.
May 6, 2025 at 8:30 PM
ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
Edinburgh said No Pasarán!

(Incredible community organising by @rtie.org)

#transrights #queeracademics #lgbtq
Ambrose wears a denim blue jumpsuit with badges sewn on reading They/Them; Trans Rights are Human Rights; and Gender Bender Cisstem Offender. They are smiling behind a blue face mask. They hold a homemade protest sign which reads “I began to think of gender less as a scale and more as a landscape” (Maia Kobabe, Gender Queer). The sign is decorated with drawings of flowers. There is a large crowd of people around them, all protesting for trans rights. A progress pride flag, and a non binary flag, wave against a blue sky with scattered clouds, above the Princes Street skyline in Edinburgh
April 19, 2025 at 4:12 PM
ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
With thanks to @mcaulayjoseph.bsky.social for the reading recommendation to start my New Year with.

May 2025 be the year I finally wrangle Social Reproduction Theory.

#theory #reading #phdlife
A dark wood cafe table takes up the foreground, with a pale yellow cup filled with a latte, and a chocolate brownie on a plate beside it. Taking up the most space in this foreground is a book with a cover that colour gradients from deep pink to cool blue. The title of the book reads “Family Abolition. Capitalism and the Communizing of Care” with the author’s name M.E. O’Brien in thick white block capitals. In the background there’s another cafe table with someone working on a laptop, and a dark blue with glass panels door is caught in the uppermost left hand corner of the image.
January 4, 2025 at 1:33 PM
ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
Two months in and this is perhaps the most accurate summary of my PhD journey thus far.

#phd #phdthoughts #writing #research
A laptop sits on a table in a coffee shop, with a split screen showing reading text on the left, and notes in red text and / or highlighted yellow on the right side, a hand is typing on the keyboard. A semi finished coffee in a pink mug sits just by the crop fo the image. In the centre overlayed atop the previously described scene is a cropped Tumblr ask post where Anonymous asks: “who is the biggest hater in history?” And a user replies “Me when I’m in a mood”
December 4, 2024 at 10:59 AM
ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
🚅 London bound for the Stuart Hall Foundation Fellowship welcome event!

Excited to meet up and hear about everyone’s projects, even if I’m still working out how to pitch mine (very thankful to my friends for patiently editing over messages when I have signal)

#PhD #London #Travel
Sitting on a LNER train a leg is crossed wearing a grey and white pinstriped suit and showing off a black and white cowboy boot. Above the crossed legs are a folded out table seat with a laptop and a orange can of ginger beer.
September 5, 2024 at 12:56 PM
ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
✨Life Update: I’m starting a PhD at Glasgow Uni this October, with funding from SGSSS and a fellowship with the Stuart Hall Foundation.

Sad to leave team ScotParl this Tuesday after three years, but excited for the adventures that lie ahead.

📷 Audrey Ho
A short young white person with a flop of ginger hair wearing thick glasses frames in their mid 20s sits on the floor of a museum hallway, cowboy boots peaking out of a pinstriped trouser and waistcoat suit, with a white shirt with large collar and rolled up sleeves. Their arms are propped up on their knees with their face smiling and propped up by their hands under their chin as they look straight at camera. The museum floor is pale wood, with busts on plinths in a white material behind them, and white ceiling rafters visible above.
August 29, 2024 at 11:34 AM
ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
Matching @docphoenix.bsky.social book with my coffee

A political nerd since I was 11 watching the LD/Tory coalition form whilst down with flu, who now works in policy and research at ScotParl I’m likely a bit biased…but, whether you’re a politics hater, stan, both or neither: it’s a must read!
A bright pink book cover detailed with icons from political conspiracies such as Q, Trump supporter iconography, and movements such as the EU flag, Extinction Rebellion…and most importantly a Liz Truss lettuce. Beside it is a pink coffee mug holding a latte. The book title reads I Heart Politics: How People Power Took Over The World, the author: Phoenix Andrews.
April 15, 2024 at 9:10 AM
ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
Any recommendations for the poetry corner of my desk at work?

Always looking for more queer/trans/BIPOC art and words!

These beautiful ones have been repurposed from the Programme for I, Joan.

#poetry #poetrycorner #lgbtq #collage #trans
Three poems are layered in a collage on a pin board, Death Before Detransition by Jennifer Espinoza; Burdened by my own Contribution by Tanaka Fuego, and Soft Rocks by Elijah J Harris. There’s also an image of astronauts with rainbow shading and a speech bubble stating “I use they/them pronouns”.
January 10, 2024 at 9:22 AM
ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
Due to Unhelpful Brain I haven’t been able to enjoy a book in months. So, my Christmas Eve Treat is trying out reading, at my own pace, a book I’ve had in my sights for a while!

Thank you @lighthousebks.bsky.social for providing respite from Loud Christmas!

#reading #neurodiversity #books
The book Empire of Normality, subheading Neurodiversity and Capitalism, by Robert Chapman sits atop a pair of old washed out denim jeans. The cover is white with a shape of a face in side profile, instead of facial features the profile is instead filled with a vintage wallpaper of hummingbirds.
December 24, 2023 at 5:51 PM
ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
Bastard pain flare ups mean it’s a bed = desk day.

My own disability and health are both things that have come crashing down this year, but in my research for PhD funding I’ve discovered work that has let me learn to try and be kinder to myself, even if just a lil bit.

#phdfunding #disability
Three books sit layered facing the viewer. On the right is Crip Theory by Robert McRuer with an abstract oil cover, in the centre is Tonguebreaker by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha with a drawing of a BIPOC person raising their fist, wearing a vest saying “no more spoons” and tulips growing where their head should be, and on the left is a black and white cover with an illustration of women looking through or out a window titled On Being Ill. The three books are spread atop an grey apple laptop and everything is on top of a white and green monstera plant themed bed spread.
November 24, 2023 at 9:09 PM
ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
Today we mark #transdayofremembrance

It's been a year since I spoke at TDOR for the first time, and its been a fucking hard year.

My heart goes out to each and everyone of my trans and nonbinary siblings.

Pt1/?
A non-binary person (Amy) in a brown trench-coat with dyed pink hair stands behind a microphone. To their left is a home made trans flag held up by multiple other members of the LGBTQ community due to its sheer size. There are candles and a group of folks listening in front. This picture was taken at Bristo square at Edinburgh University last year as part of their trans day of remembrance speech
November 20, 2023 at 8:54 PM
ambrose-mcm.bsky.social
After a parliamentary term taken up with being very unwell, I’ve treated myself to my first Pokémon game to explore over Recess!

Any tips from those who aren’t complete newbies like myself?

#Pokémon #Nintendo
In the foreground sits a yellow Nintendo switch lite, with a screenshot from Pokémon Scarlet of a young trainer with red hair, a white hat, a white shirt, red stripe shorts, a black bag pack, white knee length socks with red bands and trainers looks on at the sunny fields full of Pokémon. In the background lies two slices of thick buttered white toast on a white plate with a blue rim, atop a yellow and white chevron print blanket.
October 7, 2023 at 11:53 AM