Julia Laite

@julialaite

Teller of small stories. Professor of history at Birkbeck. Rider of bikes, grower of vegetables, Brook custodian & friend to five ducks. Townie Cantabrigian. Eternally homesick Newfoundlander; researching the island's history & the legacies of empire.

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Julia Laite@julialaite· 1d

Sunset in the coastal forest.

Fir trees, white and black. Green moss. Yellow sun.

Julia Laite@julialaite· 3d

Sculpins is people, too.

Julia Laite@julialaite· 4d

"In the middle of the week In the middle of the day In the middle of the summer In the middle of the bay..."

Julia Laite@julialaite· 4d

A grey falling house on a grey foggy day.

A house falls down in a meadow, distant hills in background.

Julia Laite@julialaite· 9d

Where there's hardly any difference between sea and sky; and when the gannets dive they cut through the water with the sound of a sharp stone.

Slate grey water world. In the distance, a headland. In the sky, a gannet.

Julia Laite@julialaite· 9d

Not a bad spot to spend the night.

Two tents overlook the ocean and a headland

Julia Laite@julialaite· 9d

Find someone who looks at you the way I look at this porcini.

A white woman with curly hair in a yellow jumper and jeans looks at a freshly picked mushroom like it is a sexy mushroom.

Julia Laite@julialaite· 12d

My hometown looking it's best on this grey foggy day.

Green hills rise from the sea, beyond that, a city through the trees

Julia Laite@julialaite· 16d

I'm home in time for the lupins this year and they are glorious.

Purpke and magenta lupins stretch down towards the sea. In the distance a hill rises across the water.

Julia Laite@julialaite· 20d

Appropriate reading for my journey home, and highly recommend!

A book on an airplane tray, Terra Nova: Food, water and work in an early Atlantic World by Jack Bouchard

Julia Laite@julialaite· 28d

Kid the Younger, watching Chris Packham hold a strange breathing land-fish on Evolution: I want a pet. I want that.

An eel like fish with strange legs on a TV screen.

Julia Laite@julialaite· Jul 5

A colourful day at the allotment, with wild plums, white currants, beetroot, broccoli and pointed cabbage in my end-of-work bouquet.

A cornucopia of fruit and veg in and outside a basket

Julia Laite@julialaite· Jul 4

Sunset over the chimney pots

salmon-orange clouds with deep purple ones at the heart are in the background; english suburban roofs in the foreground. Above it all, powder blue sky and whispy pink clouds

Julia Laite@julialaite· Jul 1

...'defective teeth' whose mum got £18 allowance after he died. How might we might tell these stories differently today? How do we respect the world views of these men & their mothers, who died for the empire; while rejecting wholly the avarice, militarism & exploitation that saw them slaughtered?

A letter from 1920 from Ellen Bewhey that reads: 'Although his loss to me was indeed a very heavy blow, yet I feel that my loss was his Country's gain, and this assurance helps to lessen our sorrow'

Julia Laite@julialaite· Jul 1

Today (or at least this morning, before it turns to Canada Day) is Memorial Day in Newfoundland, marking the anniversary of Beaumont Hamel, the 1916 battle that saw the Newfoundland Regiment get virtually wiped out by enemy fire as they crossed no-man's-land... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memoria...

Julia Laite@julialaite· Jun 21

A blessed solstice to all, from a place where this day has been marked by humans for tens of thousands of years.

An orange streaky sunset across a grassland. A couple sits in the foreground.

Julia Laite@julialaite· Jun 15

For a historian of attempts to 'ban' things, this poll is nonsensical. If you do not think banning something will work, then *you do not in fact support banning something*. Maybe one day I'll see an end to morally-symbolic & deeply ineffective/harmful legislation, but that day is not today.

"YouGov has released polling showing that three quarters of parents support a social media ban for under-16s. But more than half of parents do not think a ban will be effective, the same polling says."

Julia Laite@julialaite· Jun 10

I watched a beautiful Lancaster sunset yesterday evening, on a hillside entirely populated by me and a bunch of teenagers. Well played, teenagers of Lancaster, on your hang out spot. Well played.

A grassy path descends into a tree filled valley and beyond that distant hills rise. A sunset paints the sky orange and the clouds purple.

Julia Laite@julialaite· May 30

A powerful message spotted in Amsterdam. Rest in power, Anne and Hind. Maybe one day the world will keep its promise.

A cloth hand painted sign with an image of Anne Frank and Hind Rajab. It reads: never again means never again for anyone.

Julia Laite@julialaite· May 26

Yes.

Two white skinned feet in a shallow clear brook. Pebbles of flint in yellow green and grey

Julia Laite@julialaite· May 26

I see that the UK, like Australia, is comparing a social media ban for under-16s to a tobacco ban. While I recognize the harms that social media does to some teens, this analogy is ridiculous. A lot of teens--especially queer and disabled teens--depend on social media for essential peer support.

'Like tobacco', reads the headline: 'Wes Streeting calls for partial social media ban for under 16s'

Julia Laite@julialaite· May 25

Siblings can be so different from one another.

Julia Laite@julialaite· May 25

I wish you all a shady path and a cool chalk stream.

Dappled sunlight falls on a path still red from last years' leaves. Bright spring green leaves make a tunnel

A marsh marigold and irises frame a clear steam with a brown silty steam bed.

Julia Laite@julialaite· May 23

Well I'm not sure what everyone else is doing this beautiful bank holiday Saturday but I just watched a kingfisher take a bath in my little stretch of brook.

A brook flows past some yellow flag iris and trees. Not pictured, the kingfisher

Julia Laite@julialaite· May 22

A ruling or law that protects some women but actively harms and excludes other women? For this historian of sexual labour, it's deja vu.

Although the focus of interest is what the code says about single-sex provision, it includes a range of new protections for people across the country, including for women whose menopause has a significant impact on their everyday life, updates to reflect the legalisation of same-sex marriage, and clarification that women who breastfeed are protected from harassment.

Julia Laite@julialaite· May 19

Staying in a lovely Oxford College accommodation reminds me of a friend who used to say 'my college single-glazed windows are only good for keeping out the pigeons'. One day, he rang me. I could hear him laughing & an enormous commotion. 'Julia!', he cried. 'THEY DON'T EVEN KEEP OUT THE PIGEONS'

Enormous, beautiful arched windows in a very old college room. A very old college tower is visible outside. Currently, the scene is pigeon-free.

Julia Laite@julialaite· May 19

Them, Mommmmmm, we want a pet! Mom: Fine you can get a fish. Them:

A detail from a painting, a copy of 'Allegory of a River', in my Oxford college accommodation. Two naked toddlers pet a giant fish.

Julia Laite@julialaite· May 13

Having just yesterday witnessed three teenage girls almost get hit by a car that decided a crossing overcrowded with children was a good place to speed through a red, I think the answer to this question is people behind wheels often turn into garbage people. www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...

Julia Laite@julialaite· May 10

The sheer joy of looking at this patch of deep mauve alliums that someone has cultivated in the allotment. It's like a fantastical drawing of a fairy land and yet it's real. Also, my allotment friend's fox hole is getting fancier and fancier, and he's been watching three kits play!

Big perfect round balls of bright purple allium. A shed.

A fox hole, framed in logs, that looks like a cross between a wwi dug out and a hobbit hole.

Julia Laite@julialaite· May 10

Because they drank it all and their wives haven't gone to the shop for more.