No description without analysis

Okay wait this brings up a point Dr. Richard D Wolff (americas leading Marxist economist) brought up in a lecture a while ago; economics needs an ethics review board.

Every other major discipline has an ethics review board. If you're a doctor and prescribe a patient a lethal dose of the wrong medicine, you get disciplined. If you're a biologist and commit animal cruelty, you get disciplined. If you're a psychologist and conduct an unethical study, you get disciplined. If you're an engineer and neglect safety standards when building a bridge, you get disciplined.

But if you're an economist and your policies actively harm people in a demonstrable way, nothing happens. It's all just a 'matter of opinion'

American and other western economists advised the Russian government on how to run the country following the end of the ussr and its estimated that the economic policies they recommended directly lead to the deaths of millions of people. And not a single economist so much as even lost their job.

Economics degrees also need courses on ethics and the real human impact of economic policies so that economists can learn how to avoid harm in the first place.

Recently, one of the most famous US economists posted a tweet sternly chiding the “hysteria” people were fostering in falsely claiming that inflation was bad in the United States. He included a graph that showed that in fact, prices for most things was down! Except for groceries and utilities. The things that people actually need for even basic survival. He did not seem to even understand that there could be any dissonance in his statement. At best, economists get so caught up in numbers that they lose sight of the human costs of everything involved. At worst, and indeed frequently, they actively contribute to making things worse for the people already at the biggest disadvantages.

Heyo it’s back to school time and here’s a research tip from your friendly neighborhood academic librarian.When searching for any topic on the internet just type in the word ‘libguide’ after your topic and tada like magic there will be several  beautifully curated lists of books, journals, articles, or other resources dealing with your subject. Librarians create these guides to help with folks’ informational needs, so please go find one and make a librarian happy today!!

this is the BEST advice, and there are so many options, both if you’re doing academic research, or just curious and looking for information!

It’s so interesting what you can find!

Dime novels, mystery & detective fiction, adulting (not academic, but still), D&D guide, citation libguides, comics, graphic novels, and manga, German language & literature, differentiating fake news, firefighting, body autonomy for kids and young adults, interfaith women advocates for social justice, cooking (nonacademic)/food culture and cuisine/food & cooking.

Thank you for excellent additions and very much agre ewith you that cooking libguides are the best!! Have you seen all the ones from the Culinary Institute of America??

Oh! Building on your notes I figured I should mention to everyone that most academic institutions with a library are going to have a page with the research guides the librarians have made for their patrons. This will include basic topic guides on things like how to use the library or how to create citations. There will also be subject guides for areas of study like philosophy or biology. As well as specific course guides to assist classes that are being taught like FM 114: Introduction to the Fashion Industry or BME6938: Nanoparticle Nanomedicines.

If any of y’all have started university totally check out the ones your librarians have put up! There’s a ton up to help you along your research journey. And if you aren’t at university check them out too!! Some of the resources won’t be accessible but there’s loads of information you’ll still be able to use and get to.

Hello, fellow academic librarian specializing in instruction! Many libraries also include guides orientations on how to properly utilize non-subject specific databases. Watch those before diving into your first research project so you understand the tools and features available to you to make your life easier. Many universities subscribe to ProQuest or EBSCO and there are MANY tutorials that will teach you how to use them in less than 5 mins.

Believe me, you will save yourself A LOT of headache with both LibGuides and orientations. Good luck and happy hunting!

The Sphex Wasp Citation

aka always dig into your sources, there might be some interesting drama 🔍👀

Oh boy, oh boy, I wish I had an avenue for sharing this with my undergraduates. This is some GOOD information literacy shit.

[image description: satellite  images of the 9 planets of the solar system, starting from Mercury and ending with Neptune. Each planet is labelled with Cree syllabics and the Cree planet name. end image description.]

happy international mother language day to those who speak dialects, minority and indigenous languages, discriminated and endangered languages, “economically unprofitable”, “useless”, “unprestigious” languages and everyone who defends languages from colonialism and chauvinism

2day my linguistics professor asked people to name some ships bc she was talking about morphology & how ship names were an example of blending and the room of 100+ people was completely silent bc who wants to expose themselves?? until this one person was like “umm johnlock” and i heard someone behind me go “oh my god……. i hate this”

every time i see someone say that we should erase all other languages and make english the 'universal language' I'm reminded how ignorant and culturally insensitive some people are. to not be aware of the historical and cultural significance of a language in most cultures is bizarre. in erasing a language you would thus be erasing years of important history of a culture. i hope these people educate themselves before speaking on something they know nothing about simply because it would 'make their lives easier'. not to mention its so tone-deaf to the people who are fighting for language revitalization due to the historical language suppression of their ancestors.

Pacific Rim is great because of the absolutely fanfiction level of its plot points. Want to pilot the giant robot? You’re going to need to share your most painful memories. Who will you share them with? YOUR CRUSH

#theres only one robot

Old English is a language option on ao3 now????

@professorsparklepants Oh my goodness! I checked the category, and it has 16 stories - 15 of which probably just assumed it was another spelling of 'english'. But one absolute MADMAN took it on and wrote possibly the only fanfic in Old English - because they could! And I for one, salute them <3

indigostohelit

"AO3 has had an Old English language category for a minute, but none of the fic in it is in Old English, which I think is a crying shame. I'm not sure if anyone has posted fic in Old English before in, uh, all of human history, so I figured how better to inaugurate fic in the (arguable) origin of the English language than with the (arguable) origin of modern fanfiction?

This is the most unbelievably niche thing I have done in my entire life, and the category is competitive. Chapter 1 is the fic; Chapter 2 is a translation and translator's commentary, meant for an audience of non-Old English speakers. I love this language and its wildly homoerotic and emo poetry very deeply—if your primary reaction to a fanfiction in Old English is "why the sweet hell would you do this" a) you are right but b) I do want you to have a good time wondering with me how Captain Kirk would describe advanced computational technology in a language designed mainly for medieval men who are horse girls.

I'm hugely indebted to Bosworth-Toller's Anglo-Saxon Dictionary Online, and use their formatting for long vowels and palatalized C and G. The last time I was actively studying this language was 2017, and my grammar is certainly atrocious—corrections very welcome."

KING SHIT

OH MY GOD

PLEASE READ THIS @bannanachan​

…Wow, 

This is amazing.

@whitmerule

For any of you who are writing ‘across the pond’-here is a little guide I put together of some common differences between British and American English!

Oh thank god for this

Some of these on the American side, both terms are used. Some buildings have a ground floor ad then a first floor above it. These are usually older buildings. Sometimes we will use the term “flat” to describe a smaller style of apartment (I think that one’s regional).

A wardrobe and a closet describe two different things. A closet is built into the wall and has a door. A wardrobe is a standalone piece of furniture. To further confuse things, if it’s entirely drawers instead of having a set of doors to open it’s usually called a dresser.

While most of the time we will refer to the actual device as a cell phone or smartphone (or, usually anymore, just “phone”), when asking for a number, particularly official forms will ask for your “mobile number”.

While the actual stuff that comes via the post office is called mail, it’s still post office and postal worker (mail carrier is also sometimes used, again that might be regional).

I’m not sure why “write to me” and “write me” are split here. We use both.

We do also use “bill” for certain things, “check” in the context of “slip of paper that tells you the money owed” is mostly only used in restaurants. Otherwise you are sent a bill, or an invoice. Outside of the restaurant context a check is something you write out in order to pay someone using your bank account.

We use trousers in the US but mostly for like, nicer pants like business khakis or whatever. Tights and pantyhose are NOT the same thing - tights are the opaque kind that don’t rip easily, pantyhose are those sheer things you wear with business skirts and whatnot that rip if you look at them wrong.

Handbag is still used by some people but at least where I live it’s mostly older folks who use that term.

We still use the phrase “wash your hands”. The only context in which I have ever heard “wash up” is when someone tells their child to “wash up before dinner”.

Faucet and tap are both used in the US but frequently when we say “tap” (outside of the context of saying “tap water”) we may also mean like, the handle you use to turn the water on.

We definitely use the term makeup in the US. “Cosmetics” is more formal and I rarely hear it in a casual context. Again this may be regional. Remember the US is freaking huge and has a lot of different dialects floating around.

We DO have the term coriander but it only refers to the seed in US English. We used spring onion, green onion, and scallion interchangeably. “Green onion” is usually how they are labeled at the store where I live.

We do have a use for the term pavement here but we could be talking about anything that’s paved in either concrete or ashpalt, so it’s a broad term.

Freeway is also sometimes called a highway, depending.

Almost nobody in the US is familiar with streetcars anymore so if you’re writing something modern, keep in mind that thanks to the car lobby almost all the street cars in the country are gone.

I don’t know anybody who uses knapsack outside of Appalachia who isn’t an old-timer. It’s called a backpack or a bookbag, depending, but to my knowledge the former is more common.

So just an extra caveat that if you’re setting something in a particular location you may want to try and touch base with someone actually from there (or at least look at their writings).

God I’m so dumb I glanced at it and read it like THIS

and had a solid 3 seconds of being like “British people call an eggplant a pavement?” before realizing

I kinda like skimming milk as slang for going to the movies tho

An excellent contribution here in the tags

Research advice that tells you not to use Wikipedia is setting you up for failure.

What you should not do is *cite* Wikipedia or treat it as in any way definitive.

Just to add: Wikipedia is a great way to find sources! Look through the footnotes, sign up for an Internet Archive account (it's free!) to access some of those library books and articles online.

Have a read and decide for yourself. Use Wikipedia less like a one-stop shop and more as a reference guide.