Find me @sam-miles.bsky.social. Reader in Medical Sociology @QMULBartsTheLon; former social scientist @LSHTM. Researching queer lives, tech, sexual health.
London, England
Joined March 2011
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I'm excited to publish entries on 'Space' and 'Nightlife' for the Encyclopaedia of Queer Studies @ElgarPublishing. In a political climate reducing trans people to legislative 'gotchas', it's even more important we support queer communities.
Volume eds. @robcover & Christy Newman
Sam Miles retweeted
The university system is collapsing, but no one seems to mind. 90 courses abolished at Edinburgh, 600 jobs at Nottingham, 200 at Sussex etc. The problem is that universities have no public constituency: the media, Labour Party, public opinion. They are friendless and fearful.
The state we are in.
timeshighereducation.com/new…
Sam Miles retweeted
The average British person is incredibly gullible, and politicians bank on this. Foreign students don’t have access to UK student loans, and in fact their fees are two to three times higher than what home students pay.
The only exception I can think of is students with indefinite leave to remain, but even that isn’t always guaranteed.
Reform UK has promised to ban “foreign students” from accessing student loans and said it will end public subsidies for “woke nonsense” degrees #highered #studentloans
timeshighereducation.com/new…
Sam Miles retweeted
Really really nervous that we appear to be tearing up all guidance on reporting around suicide. One of most dangerous tropes we can promulgate is that death will allow people to repent and see error, allowing deceased to be reframed as heroic and set family free
Fantastic article by Julia Bell on @Substack that articulates everything I've been thinking about higher education cuts, but better than I ever could. @UniofExeter & @ucu featured here could stand in for anywhere:
professorbell.substack.com/p…
'The university isn’t being re-thought by academics and theorists of education and society, or by people with a teaching background and years of practice in the classroom, lecture theatre and workshop. It’s being remodelled by call-us-by-our-initials-only consulting firms...
I’ve got a @ButternutBox fancy dog food referral code, 70% off for both you & me: butternutbox.com/Ruby248?sha…
Sam Miles retweeted
Today experienced the 24th day of year hitting 30C in London.
For perspective in whole of 1980s we had 21 days.
Sam Miles retweeted
We’re fortunate to have rainfall records from 1871 and largely continuous data at Kew, SW London.
In those 155 years we’ve never observed a rainless calendar month. Could 2026 be about to be the first?
Driest months on record (1871-2026):
0.0mm July 2026**
0.5mm August 1995
0.6mm July 2018
0.6mm March 1929
1.1mm June 1925
1.3mm April 1912
1.8mm May 2020
1.9mm October 1978
2mm May 1990
2.2mm February 1959
2.2mm March 1944
2.2mm August 1940
2.2mm April 1895
2.3mm February 1891
2.5mm July 1999
2.5mm April 1938
2.5mm April 1893
2.6mm September 1959
Sam Miles retweeted
most UK unis are almost certainly facing more hard choices of even bankruptcy/failure and the current state of discourse related to unis is nothing but how many cabinet ministers went to oxford + in what circumstances. ffs this is the scrutiny of the education secretary in the FT
Sam Miles retweeted
The collapse of the AMOC, the warm water currents system that keeps Western Europe warmer than Eastern Canada, is such an economically existential risk to this country the British state needs to have a serious grip on research about it. It’s a huge national security risk and needs to be treated as such. If this research is correct that a collapse of the system becomes locked in if emissions continue to rise throughout this century this needs to be front and centre of public awareness why Net Zero is so important to our wellbeing.
New study estimates the risk of triggering an #AMOC shutdown as >10% if the world ramps down emissions to net zero by 2060, and 80% for a high emissions path.
It’s based on one model, but is plausible based on overall knowledge on how fragile AMOC is.
e360.yale.edu/digest/amoc-co…
Sam Miles retweeted
Creative industries are one of 8 key industrial strategy areas.
Heaven forbid we have a coherent cross dept approach to an identified area of economic growth, cultural power and social cohesion 🤦🏼♀️
Performing and creative arts university courses will no longer receive funding from a government teaching grant as part of “difficult decisions” about spending priorities, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson has said. artsprofessional.co.uk/news/…
Sam Miles retweeted
We are in one of the most serious crisis of higher education in postwar Britain, largely inflicted by financialised management and Reform-politics of migration, and the Labour government turns the knife in a bit deeper.
Sam Miles retweeted
Read this about the senior management at Sheffield Uni wasting around 30 million on an IT project that only delivered for some decrepit software company that bamboozled these incompetents.
Here is one driven on by people with no technical understanding. I am not sure any of the SMT were held responsible.
ucu.group.shef.ac.uk/campaig…
Sam Miles retweeted
Don't forget the crucial info that these redundancies / gutting of the Humanities and the 8th top English department in the country (and reason Exeter achieved its Russell Group status) are NOT FOR A FINANCIAL RATIONALE.
Sam Miles retweeted
I am continually astonished at the number of academic administrators who cannot read a balance book and do not realize that cutting the subjects that cross-subsidize others can never mathematically save them money.
Terrible news from Exeter. The axe is swinging all over the UK for the humanities and social sciences. If we lose these subjects then we will sever a vital link that passes our cultural and social heritage down to the next generation. bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2d…
Sam Miles retweeted
UK universities trying to sell academic degrees while cutting its own academic workforce
Sam Miles retweeted
So true about UK unis! "Heavily metricised, buried in audit and groaning under the weight of paperwork, no one seems to have told universities that these techniques were tested and found wanting by most private sector companies in the 1980s and 1990s" 1/2 isrf.org/blog/what-does-it-f…